Design and transformation are intimately related. By definition, change is intrinsic to the discipline: designers project how things can be in the future. A significant part of my PhD work is related to how transformation is propelled by design and how designers can get better at it.
2023 has been the year of the design thinking hecatomb. Big design agencies and consultancies laid off many of their workers and had to reflect on their own roles. Many quietly changed their descriptions to focus on transformation, digital, communications, marketing… what happened to the good old days of design-powered businesses? As with so many other bubbles, people finally started realising design thinking was too good to be true. In the beginning, I, too, was fascinated by the promises of design thinking. However, I quickly understood there was not that much thinking going on and definitely not that much doing. Again, my disbelief in the world-solving tools of design thinking motivated my PhD adventure.
Does design have anything to offer these days?
Transformation, as seen from design, is addressed from collaborative and iterative work, paying attention to the socio-material infrastructures: how people act, the tools they use, and the social structures underneath those behaviours. It’s situated and messy, and it requires getting our hands dirty. It’s doing, and it’s thinking; it’s acting, and it’s reflecting.
Designers can play a relevant role in helping people in organisations envision what the future could look like. Far from working from behind a screen, the best way to do it is to get out of the desk and work collectively with the communities.
This article proposes three ways of looking at transformation through the lens of design: strategic design, transformation design, and service design.
Strategic design
Strategic design uses design capabilities, tools, and artefacts to influence strategic decisions and promote systemic change. It is focused on evolving organisations, particularly by transforming existing value propositions and considering the organisational hidden socio-political structures. It can confer organisations the ability to evolve and survive while influencing their external environment.
Renowned author Dan Hill dedicated a book in 20121 to introduce key strategic design concepts, particularly dark matter as a critical aspect of design work: the hidden socio-political aspects often disregarded. Dan Hill sees design interventions as trojan horses with the potential to create change in urban environments if we work with the dark matter.
Another important reference is the Strategic Design book,2 which lays down a set of strategic design methods and tools.
While tools and methods are essential, strategic design must become more situated to achieve effective transformation. I propose the concept of infrastructuring to bring the strategic design practice closer to collective doing, reconciling strategic thinking with localised practices. I wrote an article on Marzia Aricò’s Design Mavericks about this, you can read it here. I also advanced an interpretation of dark matter as ‘invisible forces’ here.
Strategic design is situated work that changes how things are perceived and done. Ultimately, it challenges the idea of value and how it is created within organisations and communities.
Transformation design
Transformation design was proposed as a concept in a paper published in 2006 by the British Design Council.3
Transformation design questions the traditional understanding of who is designing, and conceptualises an emergent practice in society, both in public and private settings, namely in the United Kingdom. The traditional design field was very sceptical of this new understanding of design, as it was of design thinking. This new understanding challenges the concept of the designer-creator and evolves the very definition of the discipline. I made a previous reflection about this, which can be read here.
Transformation design is focused on long-term, collaborative capability building within communities and organisations to generate autonomy and empowerment for sustained transformation. By genuinely including communities in the design process, transformation design develops new capabilities for them to better understand and use design. This is the basis for a new, humbler conception of the role of the professional designer. There are no definitive answers yet—will there ever be?—for what that role is.
Service design
Service design focuses on bringing people together to develop new services. There are several ways of understanding and practising service design, the most common and popular being the closest to interaction design, sharing many methods and tools with what is commonly called ‘digital product design’.
An essential book to get started with service design is Lara Penin’s Designing the Invisible.4 Service design tends to be solution-focused; its object is interaction between people. To make these interactions happen, it’s inevitable to impact the existing social structures of organisations and communities. Change is both a necessity—people need to act differently before providing or benefiting from a new service—and a consequence—the collaborative nature of service design develops empathy and new ways of relating to others within service systems, organisations and communities.
Some accounts of service design go even further and assert that service design is no more than creating the social conditions for a service to take place, determining that social structures (rules, norms, beliefs) are the material service designers work with.5
While service design is definitely focused on interaction, social structures are only part of the picture. Materiality is critical to drive meaning and is a key aspect of design work.
So what?
This post proposes three ways of understanding transformation from a design perspective. To get started with transformation, first and foremost, it’s crucial to devise the direction of the transformation we’re striving for. It is also important to understand the organisation's current infrastructure to start introducing new practices and tools.
Depending on the context and the needs of the community we work with, we may rely more on strategic or transformation design principles. It may be the case when we are working on a service design project, and unintended consequences unfold, which we may need to face. Whichever the case, understanding our role and how to navigate socio-political situations is a decisive skill for designers in contemporary organisations.
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Hill, D. (2012). Dark Matter and Trojan Horses. A Strategic Design Vocabulary. Strelka Press. Get the book here.
Calabretta, G., Gemser, G., & Karpen, I. (2016). Strategic design. Eight essential practices every strategic designer must master. BIS Publishers. Get the book here.
Burns, C., Cottam, H., Vanstone, C., & Winhall, J. (2006). RED Paper 02: Transformation design. Design Council. Read the full paper here.
Vink, J., & Koskela-Huotari, K. (2021). Social Structures as Service Design Materials. International Journal of Design, 15(3), 29–43.
Thanks for this, Lourenço. I transitioned to design about two years ago, starting in product (UX), and now, I've gotten closer to services. Having worked with communities, implementing projects throughout my career, I initially thought this wasn't that "useful" in this sector, only to find out that's exactly what hands-on design is about: bringing transformation to communities in contexts, as you explain. Life is funny. :)