Designing in a complex world

A trip to the local pub never fails to provided a full and lively array of discussion topics that would never normally be debated outside of its four walls and this occasion was no different. Only last week I discussed the last taboo in swearing with a few members of the Wayshowing Group at our monthly meet-up, how we came onto this topic I can't tell you. (I'd like to point out it was not because of alcohol, its just I cannot remember the sequence that brought us to that point!)

Anyway, I've digressed from the image above. At face value to many the image could have been drawn by a small child however, it was actually constructed by two fully grown men both design professionals. The 'diagram' is trying to convey the USA and its cultural areas, at first we thought this would be a relatively simple task each of us had our own clear understanding. We didn't agree!

It wasn't the amount of areas of even the description, it was how we physically defined them on the paper. My argument was that it wasn't as straight forward as clearly dividing up the landscape like a political map, as with many things cultures merge, integrate and overlap. My approach was to define the areas in a more loose approach, I was quickly knocked back as being indecisive and identified as a typical 'Design Strategist'.

However it made me think, the graphic designer just wanted to make a decision, define the boundaries and get on with making a beautiful info graphic but, whats the point!? What would have been produced would of undoubtedly been beautiful but not very useful, I think it goes to prove that 'Design Strategists' as a important part of the design process and time should be taken to research, understand, analyse, rethink and question what we are doing. Too many times stuff is just produced and sent out into the world without thought and this can be linked back to a previous post of mine 'Information Design in a complex world'.