An Introduction to the Context, Theory, and Practice of Human Centered Design

1. HUMAN
CENTERED
DESIGN
CONTEXT, THEORY, & PRACTICE
@joelfariss

2. DEFINITION
OF DESIGN
Intentional decision making.

3. CONTEXT

4. EXPONENTIAL
CHANGE
But change in what?

5. TECHNOLOGY
What futurist Ray Kurzweil calls human
history’s Law of Accelerating Returns. More
advanced societies have the ability to progress
at a faster rate than less advanced societies—
because they’re more advanced.

6. WHAT DOES
TECHNOLOGICAL
CHANGE DO?

9. CHANGES
HUMAN LIFE

13. Complexity
Gap

14. COMPLEXITY
“The chasm that now exists between new people
and old institutions is destroying economic value
and inhibiting the emergence of new models
[economic, social, business] that meet the needs
of this new society.” - Shoshana Zuboff

15. WHAT IS
THE KEY?

16. HUMAN
BEHAVIOUR
The logic of consumers is what drives the
underlying notions of value in our society.

17. THEORY

18. “I find out what the world needs, then
I proceed to invent it.”
– Thomas Edison

19. HUMAN
CENTERED
DESIGN
Both an epistemology and a methodology.

20. KNOWING
“...what the world (humans) needs.”
(the epistemology)

21. “We tend to think knowledge is information, facts,
bits of data, ‘content,’ true statements–true
statements justified by other true statements...
We conclude that gaining knowledge is collecting
information.”

22. “It has a lot of appeal, because it is quantifiable,
measurable, assessable, and commodifiable. It
offers power and control. But the knowledge-as-in-
formation vision is actually defective and damag-
ing. It distorts reality and humanness. It gets in
the way of good knowing.”

23. “We distinguish
knowledge from belief,
facts from values,
reason from faith,
application from theory,
thought from emotion,
mind from body,
objective from subjective,
science from art.”

24. “Epistemological dualism cuts us as knowers
down into disconnected compartments unable to
work together–information here, body there,
emotions in a third place. It depersonalizes us at
the moment of one of our greatest opportunities
for personhood–coming to know. It dispels any
sense of adventure.” - Esther Meek

25. HUMAN
CENTERED
DESIGN

26. From belief to knowledge.
From values to facts.
From faith to reason.
From theory to application.
From emotion to thought.
From body to mind.
From subjective to objective.
From art to science.

27. Complexity
Gap

28. DOING
“...proceed to invent it.”
(the methodology)

29. FIXED MINDSET
VS. GROWTH
MINDSET

30. An Adobe Systems poll of five thousand people on
three continents reports that 80 percent of
people see unlocking creative potential as a key
to economic growth. Yet only 25 percent of these
individuals feel that they’re living up to their
creative potential in their own lives and careers.

31. Fixed mindset:
We believe that being creative is a fixed trait, like
being born with brown eyes.

32. Growth mindset:
We believe that a person’s true potential is
unknown and creativity can be learned.

33. YOU HAVE
PERMISSION
TO FAIL.

34. Research has shown that creative people do more
experiments. Their ultimate “strokes of genius”
don’t come about because they succeed more
often than other people–they just do more, period.

35. “Real measure of success is the number of
experiments that can be crowded into 24 hours.”
- Thomas Edison

36. FIND INSIGHT
& INSPIRATION

37. Think like a traveller.

38. Engage relaxed attention.

39. Empathize.

40. Get out of the office.

41. Ask “why?”

42. DO
SOMETHING

43. Have a bias towards action.

44. PRACTICE

45. EMPATHIZE

46. EMPATHIZE DEFINE

47. EMPATHIZE DEFINE IDEATE

48. EMPATHIZE DEFINE IDEATE PROTOTYPE

49. EMPATHIZE DEFINE IDEATE PROTOTYPE TEST

51. HUMAN
CENTERED
DESIGN
CONTEXT, THEORY, & PRACTICE
@joelfariss