Design and Research Methods

I am thinking about design today.

As I move forward with developing the methods section for my master’s thesis, I am going to have to spend a good amount of time considering design.  What are the best questions to ask, to explore my topic?   What are the best ways to ask those questions?  Who should ask the questions?

Talking about design is a conversation at the forefront industry.  I would argue that this conversation was started by Steve Jobs who labored over design elements like the best “color gray” to use.

Laboring over study designs for research is less glamorous (for now anyway).  But design works, and this topic is popping up in unexpected areas.  For instance, I just read “A Whole New Mind: Why Right-brainers willRule the Future.”  In this book author Daniel Pink explains that the most marketable skill sets in the future are the ones that incorporate elements of design and cultural sensitivity into products.  I also just found an article by Rebekah Chang is an intern for Kiva’s Strategic Initiatives which highlights some comments on design by Tim Brown the CEO for IDEO:  “…things that work well are usually developed with a lot of thought to the “how” factor and with a deep understanding of the communities being served.”