Adam Zeiner

"Design" means one thing to a graphic designer, another thing to an engineer, and something else to a business consultant. Even within the design discipline, a Silicon Valley manager and a Danish joiner are unlikely to be imagining the same thing as they both talk about design.

I like the concepts “strategy” and “tactics” to capture what these two sides of design are about. As far as I can tell this appears to be the choice of words that professional designers and design leaders use.

For those that aren’t familiar, a boundary object is an artefact (thing, concept, discourse, process, etc.) that can hold a diversity of incomplete perspectives and enable communication and collaboration amongst those stakeholders despite that incompleteness.

This matters because services designed and optimised for the current system can have the effect of further entrenching it — by introducing additional forces and interests to ‘keep things the way that they are’. This isn’t to dismiss their value — systems change is slow and uncertain, and in the meantime it’s essential we deliver the most effective... See more

‘Systems’ and ‘systemic’ have always been tricky words, as they mean different things to different people. Some people immediately think of technical systems (like airport control), some social systems (like a family unit), some natural systems (like a forest), and some dynamic systems (like a multiple cause diagram for obesity). In my last job,... See more