Good afternoon, Arlene. Thank you for joining us. Hello. It's great to have you again. You're the strategic director of Ontario's Design Industry Advisory Committee. You're also the course director for design placement in the Bachelor of Design program at York University. Wow. And you're the academic coordinator for the Design Management Certificate program at Ryerson University. Quite an accomplished set of roles and responsibilities. Thank you for coming. I wanted to start by asking you, JP, there's a lot of talk about innovation today, but you don't often see design connected to innovation. Why is that, and what can we do to change it? It really is a reflection of how innovation is created in the marketplace. And it's really a siloed structure. So when you look at new products that are launched- Okay ... or if you look at innovation in the automotive industry or in the manufacturing industry, it really starts with
engineers, and looking at capabilities and opportunities. In some cases it starts with marketing based on customer needs states, but very often it's a result of some kind of capability that's discovered, and then the need to find a market for those capabilities. And so often, design's not considered or even thought of, because it's all about how do you capitalize on that technology. And so it's a mindset that has been around for a long time. Very few companies have the Apple passion for design, where design is at the core of the innovation idea. I'm sure that when they're coming out with a new remote control or a new
element in the car, a new feature in the car, that the manufacturing of those features, and the cost benefit of those features, are what takes precedent, and design is somewhere down the line when they've kind of validated that it's a viable proposition. When had design been there at the beginning, they may have discovered how that feature could even be better. So can we have successful innovation without design? Yes. We can have very successful innovation with design. Design is all about fundamentally creating desire. Mm-hmm. I was just reading automotive magazines over the weekend, looking at these different cars and yes, they talk about the features, the warning lights and the elements on the dashboard, how functionally beneficial they are to the driver. But at the end of the day, it's about the aesthetics of the experience. We buy based on our emotions. I think 80% of all buying decisions are emotionally driven.
Cars, for example. Those big-ticket items are very much driven by desire. And so I think there's this conflict happening in innovation. We've got this left brain thinking about features and benefits and manufacturing costs and ability of getting it to the market quickly. And then you've got the right brain that says it's really about the experience. It's about the emotional needs of the customer, or the gaps that are in the marketplace. And I think those two elements really conflict each other because they really start from very different places. You have said that the new power of innovation is design collaboration. Yes. So what do you mean exactly by that? To truly be innovative and to truly stand out, you need to look at all the different facets of an idea. And you can't do that when you're working in silos. You can't do that when a solution is derived in engineering or in manufacturing, and then once it's kind of refined, sent to
design to kind of decorate it. That ideas need to be generated from a variety of different perspectives. Not all from the same camp, not all from the same silo. And so collaboration's about this ability of starting a project with different perspectives, looking at that problem from different angles. Angles that maybe you wouldn't have considered in your silo, in your department, in that group of individuals. And by having collaboration, not just with designers, but collaboration with the customers, which is a huge trend now. If you look at P&G and Unilever, they've created these networks where they're going out to the marketplace and asking anybody for an idea. They're open to receive ideas from anybody, from anywhere. And that opens up true innovation. It allows ideas, that you may have never considered from your perspective, to be created and to truly answer those needs in the customer.
So how do you collaborate with your clients? We're fortunate that our clients see the value of design. Obviously they spend a lot of money in development of design concepts and design execution. And we're seeing a shift, where we're now involved... Take a look at PepsiCo and the launch of the emojis, which has now been a global success story. That project started by the client going to all of the creative disciplines, from advertising, public relation, experiential, us, graphic design, and asking us all to come to the table with ideas that will solve a key challenge for them. And then through that process of how various ideas were presented, narrowed down, and selected, and how we then collaborated across these different communication disciplines to execute, deliver that concept. And it was a huge success. That demonstrated the power of collaboration. That demonstrated that ideas should come
not from silos or from dedicated channels of ideas. They should come from a variety of stakeholders. Over the past few decades, you've built SLD from a graphic design studio to a business that really crosses many boundaries. Different design disciplines, different business sectors. So what drove that change? It's our clients. It's identifying a need that was missing in the marketplace. When you look at a solution, it's never just one thing. If you look at a retail experience, it's as much about the retail environment as it is about the digital signage inside the store, the packaging, the sales choreography, the training for the staffs, and then the online e-commerce experience. If you look at M&M Meats, the success that they've had through their brand transformation that we helped lead, it's all about all those moments of truth that the customer comes into contact with. We saw a gap. The handing off
from one discipline to the other, the ideas got diluted. The vision got watered down, or it got redirected. And what started as a brilliant idea, a brilliant value proposition, by the time it got executed across all these different disciplines, got watered down, got fragmented, lost its focus. Mm. And so we saw a huge need in the marketplace to provide that holistic, coherent approach to delivering innovation. JP, you're trained as a graphic designer, but you called graphic design a legacy business. So what do you mean by that? Well, unfortunately, terms define us, and they also limit us. Clients, the industry, pigeonhole industries. They pigeonhole architects, engineers, and us designers. And when you say graphic design, it really narrows and undermines what we truly deliver. We deliver breakthrough ideas that can be translated in a virtual world and in the physical world. And so the word graphic is a legacy of the past when
the primary form of communication was print. And if you look today at print, look at magazines and newspapers and the media and how we consume communication, what we realize is that print, graphic, is such a small percentage of how we absorb information. And so to me, we're actually limiting what we truly do as a profession by calling ourselves graphic designers. We're designers. At Four Shake Hotel, we're designers of immersive experiences because we've realized that the power is creating these emotional connections between a client's brand and the consumer. And what we, as designers, are very well qualified to do is to understand those dynamics, understand what are going to be the triggers, from a sensory and visual elements that are going to create that connection. And that bodes well for the industry. But obviously, graphic design reminds me of typesetters when I first got into the business.
You couldn't do a project without going to a typesetter. You were at their mercy, the schedule, your galley, your proofs within their schedule. And within just a mere two or three years, they disappeared because they didn't remain relevant. And that's the danger we, as graphic designers, have is by holding onto the legacy of graphics, we're limiting what we truly can deliver in the marketplace. So in your view, is print dead or on life support? They said that about LPs, vinyl records, right? Look at the resurgence of vinyl records. They become collector items. They become special. Print will never go away. That tactile feeling, the smell of paper, a glossy color, how it feels on your hands, the ability of being able to read it and flip it and toss it, rip it, all of those tactile things will never go away. However, the influence print will have on how we absorb information is going to diminish.
It's going to have a place that's going to be very relevant for a certain need, but it will be relegated to a support role versus a primary role. You've spoken about the relationship between big data and design. Now that business has embraced big data, what challenges and opportunities do you see ahead for designers in working with these kinds of businesses? I'm working on a book called "Desire by Design," and I've opened the first paragraph of my book by saying that it is very foolhardy To rely on data, to make decisions based on the fact that people are irrational, consumers are irrational. And a great point is Trump's election. I actually called, that he would win, not because I am a fervent supporter of his beliefs, but because he stood for change, and Hillary stood for the same. And the American population wanted change, and they were willing to accept change from whoever was able to deliver that change.
And obviously, Trump was that sole voice that talked about transformation and change. But the data was all wrong. The pollsters, all of these extremely intelligent people with vast amount of resources and money got it wrong because they relied on data. And data will never be able to predict the desires and wants of an irrational consumer. And that is the danger that people like Tesco in the UK went through when they focused a lot of their decisions and direction for their offerings based on big data, only to find out that Lidl came into the marketplace, and the consumer really wanted to feel empowered to be smart about saving money. And Tesco lost. Lost the battle, lost the shares, significant market share to a new entry retailer who really met the deep emotional desires of the British population. And so will big data and the other conversation is artificial intelligence. Will they really be a precursor, predictor to
success? I don't think so. I think things like neuro research that we're heavily involved in, are better predicators of how people feel. And how people feel is really a clear indication of what they're gonna do. If we can tap into those understandings of how people feel, we'll be in a better position to predict what they're going to do. Is there more that designers can do to make big data usable, really relevant to clients, to the business sector, humanize big data? Well, they can start by spending more money in design and, versus spending it in big data. That would actually help a lot, and spend,
how design impacts business. So spending more in the manufacturing of great products that incorporate great design. But designers can help big data by helping management visualize what big data means. There's such a wealth of information. There's actually an overload of information. We have too much data. And with the internet of things coming on the rise and being a big factor, we're gonna have so much data that we won't know what to do with it. And so the role of the designer will shift, especially if we move away from being called graphic designers. If the role of designers will shift in helping companies visualize big data, creating dashboards and visual tools that bring meaning to all this complexity of information. I think that that's where designers will play an important role. Look 10 years ago and today, infographics are everywhere, right? That's how we consume today information.
We look for infographics on a summary of all the key metrics, all that big data summarized with some key visuals and some key numbers that bring meaning to all that, to those mathematical algorithms. So I think big data and design have a place together. And that place is about visualization. And the other thing that I think is really important, you talk about innovation. I go back and look at... I'm a techie, I'm a Star Wars fan. I look at Star Trek, and I look at the transcoder, and look at the way they communicate. Creating that visual created a hunger for a solution that today gets solved with earpieces that connect to your smartphone or an Apple Watch that connects to your iPhone. It seeded that vision, seeded ideas that resulted in innovation in the marketplace. And designers, we have an incredible role of being able to create visuals of what the future could be, right? And I truly believe that when people can
visualize what the future looks like, we're that much closer of creating that a reality. And I view the challenge with innovation is I don't think enough time is spent on what is the visual of what that looks like? What impact does that have in a person's life? What does that life look like with this new innovation? And what does that innovation look like from a design standpoint, aesthetic, texture, feelings, even smell? Design plays such an important role because design's about visuals, primarily visuals. And visuals are a doorway to your heart. And I come back to say that people buy products they desire. They're willing to forgive a lot of things if that product talks to their emotional needs. And design is such a powerful tool because it allows you a doorway from that physical world, product world, into the customer's heart. So what advice would you have for designers launching their career today? What will be their biggest challenges and
their biggest opportunities? When I graduated design in 1978, I was the only student that got a job that year. Design had what was called the design dark period. Design really wasn't seen as something of great value. And students today are fortunate. They're fortunate because design thinking is at the forefront of most organizations. I look at some of the largest manufacturers and brands around the world. They're all building extensive internal design departments. You have chief design officers at equal importance as CMOs and CFOs, and they're at the table making and contributing to the success of the organization. So design today is very topical. So they're fortunate they're entering a marketplace where the value of design has been well documented, well understood. So they don't have to talk about the category to convince. They need to come to the marketplace, however, with an understanding of the business of design.
They need to come to the marketplace understanding how design plays an important role at building and growing businesses. And that's all about the foresight, the insights, the strategy, design strategy, design thinking. Because the reality is the execution is becoming commoditized. When we started, we were magicians. Clients didn't understand the design process. It was magic for them that we could create things. But today with technology, clients clearly understand the power of design, but they also understand the design process. And things like production and design adaptation are becoming commoditized. And so designers need to move up to be further up the strategy part of the decision-making process, where obviously innovation plays an important role. And they need to be there by having skills and talent around strategy and innovation and foresight, consumer understanding, and behavior.
These are all things that today's designers need to have if they're going to succeed in the marketplace. What is the benefit of designers collaborating across the design disciplines? Hmm. Are there real benefits to government, to the business sector? Our industry, from interior designers, architects, engineers, product development designers, graphic designers, we have grown up in a culture of collaboration. It's part of our DNA. We collaborate. We have to. We have to collaborate with photographers, illustrators, writers, videographers, in order to bring our ideas to life. And so by that nature, we're collaborators. But what we can do is where design thinking has been a nucleus for change in business, where organizations like P&G have embraced design thinking as part of their go-to-market strategy. I think we need to evolve that. We need to look at what is next, and next is really design
collaboration. And design collaboration is about this coherent, integrated approach to problem-solving. It's about not only collaboration within our disciplines, it's collaboration within the client's disciplines. The big issue with most organizations today is they're built around silos, and these silos are efficient, but they really cause barriers for new ideas that come to market. They create resistance to change and to transformation. And what we can do as designers is empower these organizations through design collaboration of learning how to work across the different silos within a company, but also align the resources around very focused, successful goals, and that's what we can do. And I think that's the future role of design is to move from design thinker to design collaborators, and imbue that unique capability that's part of our DNA within the business community. The Canadian government is developing a new innovation strategy.
I wonder how you think we should be connecting design to that strategy. It's unfortunate when you look at that strategy from the government. You would be hard-pressed to find the word design. Because it's simply put, the government's interested in creating jobs. That is one of the metrics that they use to evaluate their performance, or we use to evaluate their performance. It's been Trump's platform in the US, create jobs, let's make America great again. It's every politician's dream to create jobs. It's the one metric that is actionable, clearly identifiable. I always say what gets measured gets done, and what gets rewarded, being reelected, gets repeated. And so the issue is innovation's all about creating jobs. It's about driving our manufacturing capabilities in Canada, which has been dwindling over the years. And design is not seen as a job creator. And yet Can we bring manufacturing back to Canada without
creating unique and compelling products, unique brands- Absolutely ... for those products? The reality is that if you want a product to succeed in Canada, you really need to ensure it's well-designed and meets the needs of customers. And if you look at other countries, we do a lot of work in China, we have an office in Shanghai, they have a huge commitment to design, a huge appetite for great design. And they're willing to take that great design from anywhere, from their own country, from outside their country, from Canada, because they understand the power of design. They understand that a well-designed hybrid vehicle is going to sell globally, that it's going to appeal to the needs of their own population and the needs of the population abroad. And we need a government that understands that to truly innovate and to grow manufacturing in this country, they need a bigger commitment to design.
They need to understand that design is not an add-on, a nice to have. It is actually the fundamental core of innovation. It's at the center of innovation, innovation success. It is not at the fringe. I think if we can communicate that to our business sectors, we will have a winning streak. The other thing I think we need to understand is that we're a country in the shadow of a large other country, the US, and a lot of our manufacturing is an outsourced manufacturing from the US. If you think of our automotive industry, we have some of the best plants, the most efficient car makers in Canada, but we're making American cars. And still designing them in America. I am hoping that more innovation is manufactured in this country and is supported by the Canadian government. And those new startup companies and these innovation solutions will only succeed if they drive desire with their customers. And we can't drive desire
with our customers if we don't have great design. Thank you very much, Arlene. That was fun talking. Thank you, JP. Yeah. Okay. My pleasure.
