Spirited Thought

Talk to any software development shop and you will hear the terms “iterative development.” While there are many formal methods supporting iterative development processes, the commonality and rough translation is that software is prototyped, reviewed, revised, developed, reviewed, and revised and so on until declared “ready.”

Reading Norman’s Emotional Design reminded me of his earlier work proposing the value in iterative design. Most technology is built by technologists, hence the over-abundance of technological widgets and considerable lack of remarkable technology. Often, iterative development has nothing to do with iterative design. Iterative design should begin before iterative development. It can then overlap as the iterative development realizes the evolving design points. Finally, as the application nears completion, iterative design continues to influence resulting in both a technological and design winning outcome. There is no shortage of excuses for why most products never benefit from such design/development intertwining.

If you want a successful product, test and revise. If you want a great product, one that can change the world, let it be driven by someone with a clear vision. The latter presents more financial risk, but is the only path to greatness.

Donald Norman, Emotional Design, page 98

Iterative design is “design by committee” and while apt to please more people, often produces less than dazzling results. Norman suggests that visceral (universally appealing, pre-wired/pre-programmed) and reflective (more sophisticated, fashion and cultural trend sensitive) design is best lead by an individual with a clear vision. By logical conclusion, greatness is not derived through behavioral design. Assuming that the product delivers behaviorally (i.e. performs its intended function), game changing experiences employ design appealing to both the visceral and reflective sides of the end-user’s psyche.

I started reading Donald Norman’s Emotional Design today. I have not read anything from him since college, so I thought this 2004 publication might give me a good refresher.

Norman is well known from his book, The Design of Everyday Things. I remember being intrigued by his thoughts on why we love or hate the objects in our lives. But, as Norman points out in his forward, if you made him your only master you had “functional but ugly” objects. The good news is that most people do not seem to adopt the mindset of a single individual, but instead remix the work of many others with personal experiences to construct a set of truths all their own.

More good news is that Norman has gone ahead and integrated a critical component of how people understand the world – emotion. As a side note, this reminds me about a different book I keep seeing at the local Barnes and Noble, Beyond Reason: Using emotions as you negotiate. People have an emotional filter, but often fail to acknowledge its presence – rationalizing facts hopefully justifying feelings. It will be interesting to see if Norman’s recent work offers me more than the obvious.

Remarkable is my new favorite word, inspired by a new book I picked up, The Big Moo. I never read The Purple Cow, but I have to believe it has to do with being remarkable. A purple cow does not seem to cut it anymore, and so, we have the big moo.

The cover captured my attention, “Stop Trying to Be Perfect and Start Being Remarkable.” It has 33 authors some of which I have read before and others which were foreign. The idea that I would get to read remarkable stories from 33 thinkers, sold it. Opening the book on a cross-country flight reconfirmed it. All the profits go to three charities, the Acumen Fund, Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International and Room to Read. Another thing that got me was that readers are invited to copy the pages of the book, similar to open source, helping build a community about being more than good enough.

I never thought of myself as striving for perfection. To be honest, I was never shooting for remarkable either – seems too easy. Godin points out, if you do something that makes someone remark then by definition it is remarkable – see? Too simple. On the other hand I feel the sentiment loud and clear and The Big Moo reminds me to stoke the flame and not mind standing up and out.

This past Friday I received an email from a publisher about updating my contact information so I can receive a royalty check. Mind you, I have lived at three different addresses since the beginning of pulling the book together – New York City, Westford, MA and now Norwalk, CT. One of the frustrating aspects of traditional press is that the distance between idea to book is often twelve months or more.

As a co-editor on Peer to Peer Computing: The Evolution of a Disruptive Technology this annoyance is evident – probably only exacerbated more by the fact that editors see to every step, solicitation of chapters thru pre-press review. The goal of the book was to pull from both academia and IT practitioners to explore the impact of the P2P shift on a variety of domains. Traditional publishing is on a delayed release so some of the content is bound to feel dated. On the other hand, it is newer than whatever came out before it.

Frustration aside, I am looking forward to cashing the check!