The Importance of a Connection

Back in Experience Design 101, my class was taught a quote:

“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.”
– Benjamin Franklin**

**You may have heard an almost identical quote from Confucius that substitutes learn for understand.

“Tell me and I will forget. Show me and I may remember. Involve me and I will understand.”
– Confucius

Immediately after, we were taken outside and told to form a circle. Once in place, we preceded to throw a ball around only after saying one of our classmates’ names. Now normally, I am terrible at remembering names, though I will remember faces until the end of time. However, since I was actively involved in the process, the names actually stuck with me, as did the quote.

From that point onward, we were constantly reminded to design experiences to activate as many senses as possible. After some time, it was plain to see that it worked. I could recall facts from projects I worked on in Experience Design classes easier than I could after any lecture.

Since the majority of the Experience Design events were designed around an educational purpose, it was easy to apply a hands-on learning approach. However, many things, such as my graphic design work, existed primarily in a no-touch zone. How was it possible to get the same results in these cases?

It took me some time, but I realized that it wasn’t the tactile aspect that I should be focusing on, but rather the effect of these types of experiences. People walked away from an event with a connection.

Connections are all about feeling like you can relate to someone and vice versa. For graphic designers, this means you have to know your audience from not only on a demographic standpoint, but also from a psychographic one. You have to truly dig into the heart of what your audience. You have to know about their goals and aspirations. You need to know what drives them and what they care about. Also, you should know what type of design gets their attention.

After you feel like you have a clearer understanding, I would recommend you make a creative/design brief. Basically, these allow you to spell out any pertinent information that you can use as reference throughout the course of your project.

While there are many different types of briefs that ask a wide range of questions, I prefer a brief that I discovered during my class, Art in Print Communication. Not only does it focus on your audience, but it also takes little time to complete. I have included it below and hope it will help with an creative endeavors you may embark upon.

1. Why are we advertising?
2. Whom are we targeting?
3. What do they currently think?
4. What would we like them to think?
5. What is the single most persuasive idea we can convey?
6. Why should they believe it?
7. Are there any creative guidelines?

 

Whiskey Barrel Furniture

I was browsing through a consignment shop the other day and found an interesting chair made out of whiskey barrels. I had never seen anything like it, so I was extremely excited to uncover this gem. Apparently, this type of furniture was very popular back in the seventies.

Why?

Last Monday, at work, my boss showed this TED talk from Simon Sinek.

This has changed the way I will communicate, and I hope it makes you think about your why.

To learn more about, check out his website.

12 Profound Truths

One of my favorite classes in college, was not a design class at all, but rather my Organizational Behavior class.

As part of the class, the professor had a list that she shared with each class every semester called the Twelve Profound Truths. Some of these statements are simply observations of life, while others give advice for how to navigate it. Regardless, I thought these were good to share. Enjoy!

Twelve Profound Truths

1. Sometimes things are simple but not easy.
2. Perspective changes everything.
3. Insecure people behave badly.
4. Don’t sell you credibility cheap, because it’s incredibly expensive to buy back.
5. Never stay in the room with an elephant.
6. Surprised people behave badly.
7. Always go with the highest, best use.
8. Lead strong.
9. Handle your “stink” pile first.
10. The size of the problem is directly proportionate to its ability to produce growth.
11. Reality is your friend.
12. All you ever have to do is the next right thing.

Hopefully, at least one of these truths inspired you.

Personally, I like the last one the best — all you ever have to do is the next right thing. When you think of life as just a series of “the next right thing” it makes it sound much easier.

An Introduction to Employee Engagement and Organizational Behavior

The concept of employee engagement is something I’ve been thinking about recently. From a business standpoint, engagement is the extent in which employees are committed and satisfied with the organization in which they work.

Lipic’s Engagement helps other businesses achieve this, and also happens to be where I work. However, Lipic’s wasn’t always an engagement company. In fact, when I started, a mere five months ago, Lipic’s Engagement was Lipic’s Recognition, focusing on service awards, recognition programs, and promotional products. We still offer these services, but we have expanded our reach into all areas of engagement. We have included measurement and evaluative techniques, additional communication methods, and consulting services into our mix to help target the areas of engagement we haven’t ventured into before. All of these additions are aimed at improving communication between employees and management and creating custom programs that meet the needs of the employees. Doesn’t sound too difficult, right?

Wrong. The majority of companies struggle with employee engagement. Since I started considering this, I have been baffled by this fact. How is it that after all these years business haven’t found the magic recipe to keep employees satisfied?

For obvious reasons, I have decided to start digging into that very question. My digging has started with the notes I saved from my Organizational Behavior class in college. For those who may not be familiar with the term, organizational behavior is the study of an company’s culture, focusing on how individuals and groups impact organizations. While I was in the class, I thought of it as the “psychology of business.”

Below I have compiled some interesting tidbits that relate to employee engagement. As with other articles, italicized sentences are my comments.

McGregor’s Theory X and Y
Basically, Douglas McGregor created two schools of thought for management. Theory X states that most people are lazy and want to avoid any responsibility. Therefore, management needs to closely supervise and direct employees. Theory Y states the exact opposite. Work is a natural activity and employees will flourish if given space to manage themselves.

I think is pretty obvious which management style employees would like better. If you need a hint, here is an article that takes McGregor’s theory an extra step further.

Pygmalion and Golem Effect
People will either live up to your high expectations (Pygmalion) or live down to your low expectations (Golem).

Total Quality Management
An organizational culture dedicated to training, continuous improvement, and customer/employee satisfaction, fostering mutual respect and trust.

AKA – The ideal organizational culture.

Herzberg’s Hygiene/Motivator Theory
Has to do with employee satisfaction and dissatisfaction.

Hygiene factors relate to job context. If these are perceived as poor will cause employee dissatisfaction and demotivation. If perceived as great, employee will be not dissatisfied, but won’t be motivated either.

Motivational factors relate to job content. If these are not in place, will not be dissatisfied but won’t be motivated either. If motivational factors are in place then will increase satisfaction and motivation.

For more in-depth information on this theory, visit this page.

Job Design
Huge factor on employee engagement and satisfaction. To decrease repetition and boredom:

Job Enlargement — adds tasks to scope of job description
Job Rotation — cross training
Job Enrichment — training or incentive

A Study of Intelligence: Dolphin Style

At my internship at the St. Louis Science Center, my primary duty was to develop and redesign the Human Adventure gallery. Over the course of my internship, I decided to focus this gallery around what makes humans unique in the context of the animal kingdom.

By far the most cited things that makes humans unique are our intelligence, creativity, language, and spirituality. These successes are mainly attributed to how our brains are wired with the ability to think using the so called “higher functions.” Humans are especially adept at thinking symbolically, which accounts for our problem solving and ability to communicate ideas with the potential for new realities.

For the most part, animals would display some elements of  intelligence, creativity, or language, but would fall short of what humans are capable. Animals can use simple tools, like an otter using a rock to break open an oyster, but have not mastered the complex systems humans have developed. Some birds decorate their nests, but this ritual does not seem to have any other purpose than to attract a mate, whereas humans create and appreciate solely for the sake of art. Nearly all animals make some noise, but as of yet, humans can’t decipher if there is a deeper meaning.

This seems to apply to most examples, but dolphins made me reconsider. Below, I’ve included a video that talks about their intelligence and ability to create. I’ll let you decide if humans are really that unique after all.

Where I’ve Been and What I’ve Learned

Where I’ve Been

As you can tell by my blog archive, I haven’t been writing for quite a few months now. Let me fill you in.

Over the summer, I had an internship at The St. Louis Science Center as an Exhibition Design Intern. This was on-top of my newly-started, full-time job at Lipic’s Engagement (formerly Lipic’s Recognition), and saying I was extremely busy would be an understatement. For obvious reasons, I decided to put my blogging on hold until my life slowed back to a normal pace once again.

While it took some time, I have finally returned to a point of equilibrium and am now ready to make up for my months-long absence.Therefore and without further ado, I officially dub November 10th through November 16th as, “Meredith’s Extreme Blogging Extravaganza,” where I will write everyday for the entirety of this week.

To start off this monumental occasion, I’ll talk about something that veers aways from my traditional ramblings about art and design.

Where’s the Inspiration?

Back in May, I was given a stack of articles to read to familiarize myself with exhibit design concepts and ideas. Among them, was a article from the American Alliance of Museums from 2012, entitled Telling Tales: A Conversation with Andy Goodman. By the title alone, I could tell where this article was headed; it was going to talk about storytelling.

From my experience design classes, I knew a strong narrative was vital to any experience. Stories help lead participants along and tie all the elements together. It helps to create an emotional connection, which in turn leads to action. Nine times out of ten, people want you to do something with an story or information they present, so a good story and a good connection is extremely important.

With such a high value placed on stories, it struck me as odd that, in all my classes, I had never been giving tips on how to write a good story. Of course, I taken writing classes to teach me the proper grammer and punctuation. But a well-placed comma will not inspire anyone. I knew nothing about moving someone to action. 

Luckily for me, Andy Goodman was ready to help. Goodman is a former screenwriter for movies and television, who created a consulting firm to help non-profits focus their message. Over the years, he came up with ten laws of storytelling, which are presented below. Keep in mind, the article I pulled these laws from were aimed at non-profits. There will be references to this, but the principles stay the same for whatever story you want to tell.

Andy Goodman’s Immutable Laws of Storytelling

1. Stories are always about people. Even if your organization (a) is devoted to saving flora and/or fauna, (b) toils in the dense thicket of policy change or (c) helps other organizations work more effectively, humans are still driving the action.
2. The people in your story have to want something. A story doesn’t truly begin until the audience knows precisely what the protagonist’s goal is and has a reason to care whether or not it is attained. So within the first paragraph or two, make sure it’s clear. 
3. Stories need to be fixed in time and space. If you help your audience get their bearings quickly, they will stop wondering the where and when or your story and more readily follow you into the deeper meaning within.
4. Let your characters speak for themselves. When characters speak to each other in the story, it lends immediacy and urgency to the piece. Audience members will feel as if they are the proverbial fly on the wall within the scene, hearing in real time what each person has to say. Direct quotes also let characters speak in their idiosyncratic voices, lending authenticity to the dialogue.
5. Audiences bore easily. Human being are hard-wired to love stories, but in this, the Age of Too Much Information, people don’t have time to wait for your story to get interesting. Within the first paragraph or two, you have to make them wonder, “What happens next?”
6. Stories speak the audience’s language. According to national literacy studies, the average American reads at a sixth grade level.
7. Stories stir up emotions. Even when you have mountains of hard evidence on your side, you have to make your audience feel something before they even glance at your numbers. Stories break though the white noise of information that inundates us every day and to deliver the message this is worth your attention.
8. Stories don’t tell; they show. Intellectually, your audience will understand a sentence such as, “When the nurse visited the family at home, she was met with hostility and guardedness.” But if you had written this instead, “When they all sat down for the first time in the living room, the family members wouldn’t look here in the eye,” your audience would have seen as picture, felt the hositily and become more involved in the story.
9. Stories have at least one “moment of truth.” At their essence, the best stories show us something about how we should treat ourselves, how we should treat other people, or how we should treat the world around us. We have always looked to stories to be containers of truth, and your audience will instinctively look within your story for this kind of insight.
10. Stories have clear meaning. When the final line is spoken, your audience should know exactly why they took this journey with you. In the end, this may be the most important rule of all. If your audience cannot answer the question, “What was that story all about?” it won’t matter how diligently you followed rules one through nine.

To learn more about Andy Goodman or his storytelling, check out The Goodman Center.

Even if you are not a writer, I hope you found some nugget of information that you can apply to your life. After all, your life is the most important story of all.

Perception is Everything

Proof that perception is everything:

For more information check out this website.

Forced Perspective Photographs

I have always loved optical illusions. There is something about messing with perspective that truly fascinates me. Below I include some of my favorites of forced perspective from various sources (see below for full list).

I can’t seem to find the original source, but here is where I found it first.

Orignal Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/flibble/4991178634/

Original Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeppeolsen/4802301439/. When I was looking through the various articles (see below), I found quite a few examples from salt flats.

Original Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/26405687@N08/3648818846/, The setting sun also is also quite common to use for forced perspective.

Again, I can’t find original, but I discovered it  through the YouTube video linked below.

This photograph, along with its sister photograph, shows up a lot on various articles. Once again, the linked YouTube video was where I found it originally.

This video gave me the idea for this blog:

Additionally images discovered through the following articles:

http://www.instantshift.com/2011/11/03/99-excellent-examples-of-forced-perspective-photography/?t=1320424564

http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/force-perspective-photos/

http://prafulla.net/graphics/photography/assorted-optical-illusion-forced-perspective-photography/

Does Originality Truly Exist?

“Nothing is completely original. All creative work builds on what came before. Every new idea is just a remix or a mashup of one or two previous ideas.”

– Austin Kleon, author of Steal Like An Artist, from his TedTalk in 2012

When I first ran across this concept while reading Steal Like An Artist, I wanted to argue against it. How is it possible that nothing is original? Does this mean that I can’t come up with anything new? Well, yes and no.

After some thought, I had to concede that nothing is original. There will always be someone out there who will see a direct correlation between two artists’ works. Additionally, people are influenced at least subconsciously by what they see on a daily basis. As a result, it is nearly impossible not to be compared to someone.

If you are depressed by this statement, you shouldn’t be. How many creative-types hear that they need to come up with something new on a regular basis? The reason you can’t come up with something completely original is because it does not exist. The pressure is off. Now you can concentrate as on being as original as possible and not completely original.

And as an added bonus, you already have the framework for being “original.” Your personal style, spin, or take on a specific topic will not be the same as someone else, at least not 100 percent. Nobody has the exact experiences or influences that you do. People will judge the “originality” of an idea by what ideas are used and how they are remixed. You have complete control over that.

If this still doesn’t convince you, watch the video below.