The Power of

Why?Bill DeRoucheyAug/Sep 2012 @billder

Note:

This is a combination of three talks I gave in a three week span in Aug/Sep 2012:- UX Week (San Francisco) - UX Australia (Brisbane)- RMIT (Melbourne)Naturally, this talk evolved in between each run. This version combines all three.

The live presentation uses a lot of animations to augment the story. Since animations don’t translate to PDF, this version attempts to recreate the essence of the live version with static screens.

Boxes like this include things I said, but didn’t appear in the live versions. Consider them as speaker notes or talking points.

I’d love to keep expanding on this, so please send any feedback to billder@gmail.com. Thanks!

whToday we’re going to talk about that deep probing question, Why?, and how it relates to our careers as designers.

We are all quite

Lucky.First, let’s take a step back to acknowledge that all of us in this room are incredibly lucky to have the career that we do. The world of design and user experience is an incredible profession to be a part of.

Our job is to talk to people.

flickr : kunchia

It’s our job to talk to people, to understand what they do and how they live. We get to go out, meet strangers, and simply learn from about subjects that we often don’t know much about.

And ask them questions.

flickr : kunchia

We even get to go outdoors sometimes. Propose ideas to people. Ask them questions. Get their feedback. Invite people to partake of the design process, even if it’s just fifteen minutes at a time.

And then make things for them.

Studio Neat : Cosmonaut

And then we get to go back to the office and make things for them. Hopefully help out their lives somehow. Ease some burden or just make something better.

But we have a

Problem.But we’re faced with massive undercurrent of the relentless pace of technology. Keeping up with everything keeps getting harder and harder.

How can we plan our

Careers ?We can’t.

The result is that it makes it really difficult to plan out our careers. Looking ahead to plot a career may even be an antiquated notion. Mine has definitely been one step at a time. But there’s something to be said for having some sort of direction as we go ahead in life.

2012198719771967

Let’s look at this from the long view. We’re here in 2012. Suppose you’re 25, 35, 45 years old. Maybe even a bit more.

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And based on good medicine and exercise (right?), we’re all going to be at least 90 years old. Congratulations! Your career will span these years if you’re 25, 35 or 45. Notice how quickly 2047 comes along.

webtouch

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Let’s look at the rapid tech evolution. The web has only been around for this long. Widespread use of touch, even less time. The iPhone only came out five years ago. Five. Years. Ago.

the webwebtouch

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?flexible displays?

dynamic surfaces?

neural implants?

So what technologies do we have to adapt our design skills to next? How can we continually drive toward something while we’re continually learning about the mediums we have to design with and for?

Luckily, there is one

Constant.Fortunately, beside all this technology churn, there is one skill that we can work on throughout our careers. At least one constant that will serve us well at any age, and in any situation.

Simply asking

Why ?The ability to simply ask Why? To ask a probing, yet reasonable and calm, Why? In any situation.

Why does that happen ?Suppose you’re analyzing the action and feedback of a product and it does something unexpected. Why did that happen? What drove that design decision?

Why is that the plan ?Suppose you’re in a business that has a deadline to ship on a certain date, despite pressure that it’s a bad date. Why is that the plan? What’s driving that business decision?

Why is that the way ?Suppose you’re in a business that has a certain method for doing things, and it no longer works. Why is this the way we do things? Why did it make sense then, but not now?

Why did you do that ?Suppose you’re out in the field observing someone during some primary research. They hold a thing, or do things in an interesting order, or make an unexpected choice. Why did you do that? Tell me more about how you made that choice, or were you even aware of it?

Why do you believe that ?Suppose somebody uses an interesting word that reveals how they think about something. That’s an interesting phrase. Does that mean you think this? Why do you believe that?

WhoWhat How/MuchWhen Where

Why

These are the questions that set us apart. These are the words that help us uncover the truth, that help us understand the world around us. And I think it’s these concepts that separate us from the other creatures on the planet. “I think.”

Who

Being Human

What How/MuchWhen Where =

Why

What How Why

Let’s look at this another way. A common framework for looking at projects is What, How, Why.

What you are working on.How you are working on it.Why you are working on it.

In theory, the Why is the core and changes the least often. How you achieve that vision may change a bit more. And What the work entails will change the most rapidly.

What How Why

Scott Sinek calls this the Golden Circle. He says that people who focus on Why something should happen tend to have the best success in getting things done, because they have the vision and can communicate it.

It is our job to create a

Conversation.So let’s dig more into what it is to ask the question Why?

It’s our job as UX people to have conversations with people. They may be research participants, co-workers, or other partners. But as we need to learn from others and craft solutions, part of that is simply have a productive conversation with somebody.

We often have to ask hard

Questions.But in our quest to learn about how things can be better, different, or improved, we often have to ask people questions they don’t normally hear. We often have to ask them questions about Why they do/think/believe various things. We have to probe.

Why? digs under the

Surface.These aren’t your everyday questions. These are questions that dig below the surface of everyday activity. These are questions that dig into the layers under behavior and sometimes into the subconscious.

And this can be

Tricky.And these are delicate conversations. These are questions that require people to step outside themselves to assess what they are doing or thinking. And sometimes with a stranger filming them and somebody else taking notes. No pressure at all!

People can get

Weird.Not everybody is up for being placed in this tricky situation. They may put up their barriers and get weird somehow. Defensive. Unsure. Flippant. In short, they don’t respond to you in an open manner because they feel threatened in some way.

UneasyFlusteredDefensive

TerritorialUncomfortable

UnsureFlippantAgitatedConfused Distracted

Problems arise when

Who = WhyAnd this is because some people tie what they believe in with who they are, their identity. When you question what they do or how they think, you are questioning them as a person. No wonder some people get defensive. It’s because they believe you’re attacking them. And of course, you’re not.

Who ≠ WhySo we need to break the bond between Who and Why. How?

Compassion and Curiosity

With compassion and curiosity. These will help you to reach people so that you can learn what you need to learn.

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First, Compassion.

What better living embodiment of compassion then the Dalai Lama? A man who simply travels the world trying to get people to be nicer to themselves so they can be nicer to others.

It is not just about

Empathy.Many people say that designers need empathy, and I agree. But is it enough? Can we be truly feel what another person is feeling? If I’m interviewing a surgeon, a social worker or a mom, I can intellectually identify with their feelings, but never at a real gut level.

Empathy first requires

Compassion.So we need to push ourselves a little harder. We need to reach out to the participant, the co-worker, the partner to really want to help them. Compassion is the alleviation of someone else’s suffering. Which not coincidentally, sounds a little bit like design itself.

Compassion If you approach others with the thought of compassion, that will automatically reduce fear and allow an openness with other people.”

“

Reducing someone’s fear can open them up.

Curiosity

flickr : kristaphoto

The other thing that designers need to reach people with is Curiosity. We’ve all been around two- and three-year olds and witnessed their insatiable need to know Why the world works the way it does.

Why is the sky blue? Why do we need money? Why does Darth Vader always wear a helmet?

It is the eternal

Unfolding.Asking Why? helps us to continually understand the world around us, to unfold the hidden aspects of our world. Since it’s impossible to know everything, it’s 100% possible to keep learning.

It is the essence of

Why?And curiosity is of course the essence of Why? It’s that desire to learn about something you don’t know, to expand your knowledge about something.

And it requires

Tenacity.And curiosity for designers requires the tenacity of a three-year old. The neverending drive to want to learn more about the subject at hand.

You will fly to another planet, parachute into the thin atmosphere, and drop yourself by a sky crane just to go look at rocks.

Curiosity

What better role model for curiosity than Curiosity?

THIS IS DESIGN

On one side, compassion for the people that we need to have hard conversations with. On the other, tenacious curiosity to understand and build. Those are both necessary components for designing.

YOU

Compassion Curiosity

I want to see you right in the middle, employing both compassion and curiosity.

Genuine Interest

YOU

Now if you slightly twist these words, you get Genuine Interest. And that’s what you need to really reach people. Simply display genuine interest in what they have to say, because people can sense fake interest.

the Worlda Person an OrgWhy?

Ok, let’s say you’ve spent some time practicing how to ask Why? with compassion and curiosity... now what?

You can now look at three different levels you can focus your Why skills on: individuals, organizations, and the world.

a PersonWhy?

Let’s start with people. Most of this talk has already been discussing one-on-one conversations, so I won’t belabor this point too much.

PEOPLEflickr : halfchinese

But simply having and displaying genuine interest in what somebody has to say is the best way to reach somebody, the best way to have a conversation that probes into what they do and think. People will tell you their life story if they think you want to hear it.

an OrganizationWhy?

Now let’s step it up a level and talk about groups of people, and that usually means....

BUSINESS!

When your design problem becomes the business itself.

Why? exposes the

Ruts & Habits.Too often, businesses fall into habits into the way they do things. They drop into ruts they can’t escape. Why? can expose the assumptions behind them, can shine light on decisions that made sense months or years ago, but maybe not now.

You have the skills to probe into business decisions to understand why things happen.

It reveals absurdity of

BECAUSEI SAID SO. Asking Why? often times will also bubble

up to somebody simply saying “because I said so” without any backup of reasoning or logical thought. Gut is one thing, but if you can’t articulate anything beyond “because”, then you have a problem. A good designer can probe here to surface that.

And then at some point...

Why ? Why!And then at some point in your career, the skills you’ve developed in having conversations with people leads you to developing skills in articulating ideas.

You learned to

Distill.Because you’ve learned how to distill many different data points or discussions into a single concept, framework or model.

You learned to

Communicate.You’ve learned to develop ways to communicate what you’ve distilled, whether it be prototypes, words, diagrams or images.

You are asked to

Explain.And your co-workers and colleagues recognize this and look to you as the one who can explain things.

Your job then becomes to

Evangelize.You become the champion of ideas because you’ve learned to talk to people, pose questions, distill your findings, and communicate them.

You have the tools to say

This is WHY!You’ve built up a skill set that can say Why something should happen because you can back it up with observations, thought, and rationale.

This is driving the trend of

UX Product.And this is what I believe is behind the trend of UX people becoming product managers. Because they’ve developed the skills to understand people and create ideas appropriate to them. They’ve learned how to be advocates for people, not just business plans.

Then you get the itch to

Go Bigger.And then at some point in your career, you may get that burn to try out your skills on even bigger problems.

in the WorldWhy?

And that means looking at the big world around you.

INSTITUTIONS!

And that means the big institutions of our lives.

FoodEnergy

BankingEducationInsurance

Transportation

WaterScienceSocial CareHealth CareGovernmentEnvironment

The really big things that we’ve built up that all have massive problems that need fixing. Massive. Problems.

These are the BIGGEST design

Problems.The great thing is, we can apply our design thinking to these problems. They’re just bigger, harder, more intransigent, and ultimately, more worthwhile in the long run to tackle.

Use your ability to ask Why to

Go Fix Them.Because in the end, somebody has to break through this mess we’ve created for ourselves. Why shouldn’t it be the designers of the world who conceive of new ways to live and work and be human? Isn’t that what we do?

Live to be at least 90 years old.Practice asking Why?Really connect with people.With Compassion. With Curiosity.Question everything, small and big. And then go redesign it all. In summary...

What’s stopping you?

Thank you.

Bill DeRoucheyAug/Sep 2012 @billder