If there is something to learn about service its good to focus on one of the oldest industries in the world: Retail. Retail is simple, you purchase goods, display them in the best possible way and sell the goods at prices customers want to pay, at the end of the day you count your money take off your costs and whats left is your profit. Now I know its not that simple but many retailers lost this simple principle.
Every christmass time my father sells christmass trees for the local music association http://www.mvengelhard.nl/. Here I experienced the simple retail principle most purely. And although my father is 79 years now he is showing me something very essential in retail sales and service: a huge engagement in the job, enjoy it and give a lot of personal attention and service to the customer. It all is very well apreciated in the local community and every year they sell more trees. All the profit goes straight into new instruments and equipment.
In my village there is a franchise outlet of Hollands largest Supermarket Chain, Albert Heijn http://www.ah.nl/. In the past years they have been awarded 3 times as best Albert Heijn franchiser in Holland. I started to observe and talk occasionally with the manager and this learned me a great deal. Their succes is about simple things that gives the shopper a quality feeling. Its not about technology, its not about products they sell, its about service, personal attention and attention to details. When the customer asks where to find something the shop staff will walk te customer where he or she can find this. When a product is out of stock it will be replenished (actually it will be filled up way before out of stock). When something is dirty its cleaned, when there are long lines check-outs are opened up, etc. So here too the engagement, personal attention and good service make the difference.
Although the basic principle is so simple there are more examples of bad service then there are good examples. I guess there are plenty you can think of? The absolute winner in bad customer service to me was years ago when I visited East Germany and got shouted at when a restaurant employee felt stress when we western schoolboys wanted to eat all at the same time :-) Now the work moral in East Germany was low and there was no alternative restaurant but closer to home restaurant experiences aren't that good as well, especially if you go out with kids and have to wait for ages........
Crucial to all offline service experiences is good contact with the customer, good management of the staff, clear procedures and employees have pleasure and engagement in the job. At my local Albert Heijn you see the manager refill out of stock, clean floors and interact with customers.
I clearly state offline service. Offline service is the work of people and when done well an absolute treat. Online service is perceived as very good but there is no personal contact involved. That is interesting because it goes straight into all rules of good (offline) service. Online technology is evolved the past 8 years and enabling a very good customer experience that exeeds most of the offline experiences. When a customer enters the Albert Heijn the best customer gets the same treatment as the worst customer, really. Ponder at that for a moment because it is o so true. It started with cookies and now we leave our profile everywhere and is our clicking and buying behaviour registered. This sounds scary but is happening: right here, right now. The same rule applies on the internet too, if your customer is not treated well he or she will never return. Worse, online the competition is just "one click away" and is shopping so transparent that service is making the difference. Also when your profile or clicking behaviour is misused or you receive SPAM mail you will never return.
I had the opportunity to talk with a leading dutch marketing platform and learn they combine all the data with normal human business logic and engage the online customer over and over again for leading dutch firms. 400 million personalised mails in 2007 engage brand and customer online. For instance you buy a camera online, get a survey in a week after the delivery about- the product and the service and in two weeks time get offers for accesoires. Are you offended? No you are happy that exactly at the right moment you get the right offers and periodically get personalised offers that really are about the products you like. And yes you buy. Statistics still show growth of online sales and still we go out to get the poor service offline.
In 2000 all offline retailers, bricks in those days, where predicted to be on a dead end street. Its 2008 now and bricks and clicks live togheter. Now the theme is how to follow the customer from online to offline and vice versa. With the virtues of online marketing there is only one problem, what happens to the customer we engage with when he turns out the computer. Right, he or she is as anonymous as everybody.
Where the online world meet the offline world is very interesting. Selfservice is the magic word and online technology meets the physical world. But just putting a machine on a place where you used to be helped by people is not working by itself. I have observed for instance the interaction between traveler check-in desk personel on an Airport. After standing in a waiting line the desk clerck takes over the ticket and pasport and enters the data, asks about where to sit, puts the label on the suitcase and tells people where to board and at what time. No engagement, no service just exchanging the essential information. With cash terminals being the first selfservice process in the 80-s the aviation industry started with selfservice in the late 90's. The current selfservice kiosks on airports still are the translation of the check in desk process into a user machine process and giove a very poor customer experience. The result is that floor walkers who actually should give positive service take over the process and check you in, selfservice? No just a different kind of check in desk. In the evolution of self service there still is a long way to go. The development of good selfservice needs a complete different approach and the evolution is jsut started. In the meantime we will see more and more sub-optimal sollutions being rolled out beacuse the business case is as solid as a rock. Most selfservice kiosks are cost effective between 12 to 18 months but give 24 hours 7 days a week maximum capacity and changes the role of the desk clerck into a service host ............... as long as the host does her job well and go back to the basic rules of offline service: a huge engagement in the job, enjoy it and give a lot of personal attention and service to the customer.
Friday, 30 November 2007
Monday, 12 November 2007
Viva la difference
Funky stats telling us the world is changing and there are a lot of cultural and demographic differences. Highlighting Asia.
Sunday, 11 November 2007
User Centric Innovation Methodology (UCIM)
Blog 3) The Methodology for Design Innovation.
In 1993 I was looking for an internship as Industrial Design student and talked with several companies. At one, a Dutch High Tech start-up, I had a meeting with an ex Fokker Fine Mechanical Engineer, he said to me "I want you, you are a designer that speaks my language". High tech chose me and I fell in love with high tech. Along the way I met the real geeks and it became different then talking with the Fine Mechanical Engineer and I had to learn about their speciality in order to build the bridge between technology and people. With technology changing fast paced I learned to understand the big lines but intuitively found out I'd better let the geeks understand me. An image tells more then a thousand words so started making conceptual designs: sketches, illustrations, models, scenarios, etc. just as a means of communication. What happened was even more interesting these studies where understood by everybody and stretched the mindset so well that developers, marketing & sales, customers, users, etc. started to contribute to the concepts in a very early stage.
As blogged before to me the Schiphol Project opened my eyes for the opportunities for Design Innovation but the story of the Methodology start years in advance. When confronted with the technological approach from IBM in this project I was reading "The Art of Innovation" http://theartofinnovation.com/ written by Tom Kelley about the Leading American Design Firm IDEO. Reading this was like coming home, here the #1 in the world was doing the same thing as the loner I always chose to be and the book helped me a great deal in structuring my methodology. I created the User Centric Innovation Methodology (UCIM) and applied it successfully in the Schiphol project. When faced with the challenges of the technological driven Schiphol Project I blend my and IDEO's Methodology together into UCIM and started to practice it.
In UCIM I have defined 5 phases:
1) Understand
2) Observe
3) Visualise
4) Evaluate & Refine
5) Implement
Let me explain this Methodology following the Schiphol Project. For the project Schiphol looked for a team experienced in designing user friendly products and approached design agency MMID www.mmid.nl who realised that this project was more then a typical physical design project, in this project the physical world met the virtual world. At this stage I was talking with MMID and they wanted me to be the project leader because of the conceptual character and high level of IT involvement. Our role was to do a feasibility study and answer the question if dropping of luggage in a self service process was feasible within acceptable process time in a user friendly way, second task was to stop the technology push of Schiphols suppliers. A challenging task, managing and participating in a creation process and keep conflicting individual- and corporate political interests out of the project.
In phase 1 you do your homework regarding: user, market, business rules & objectives, technology & innovation, specifications, etc. For Schiphol this meant to dig through specifications, IATA rules, KLM policies for customer care, visit a comparable Lufthansa solution, talk with suppliers, etc.
In phase 2 you observe real people in real life situations. Always the best thing to do is go out there and observe, experience it yourself and talk with the people involved. For the Schiphol project we observed for days the Self-Service Check in Area, interviewed people, etc. and saw great things happening because the current Check-in kiosks are far from perfect.
In phase 3 you come up with ideas: conceptual design, storyboards, scripts, video, etc. Based on what we observed we decided to design the Self-service Drop Off Service (SSDOP) as part of the Airport Experience. We used 8 characters that tested the system, not average users but critical people: the control freak, older people who cannot read well, inpatient business travellers, etc. We gave these a name and face and with them we simulated the process building the SSDOP in carton board playing the process of the characters. This role playing was such an eye opener for everybody and we experienced a group process of creative contribution. Based on this we designed the business rules for the process, the user interface, the SSDOP desk itself and an innovative label concept.
In phase 4 you simulate and/or build mock-up’s, prototypes, evaluate, etc. The SSDOP projects go/no go decision was related to the manned Drop Off Desk. We had to design a low burden solution for 90% of all air travellers that cost 10% extra time related to the Manned Drop Off Desk. To measure this we build a prototype simulating the average process, we invited 30 test persons, set up a observation lab with camera's and gave them 2 suitcases and an e-ticket saying they where flying to Paris. Without instruction every test person checked-in 2 suitcases and after an interview they checked in again. It was another interesting phase to see the concept being used by all the characters we selected in phase 3. The result convinced Schiphol to continue and plan a pilot on Schiphol Airport.
In phase 5 you materialize concept into commercial products. In this stage I am not involved anymore, but this is the typical Design Agency design & engineering work. Design Agency MMID continued the project after a long period of internal procedures within the Schiphol organisation and redesigned the Concept into a SSDOP prototype that currently is being tested on Schiphol Airport, Hal 3. The implementation of the SSDOP is planned in 2009 on a larger and commercial level on Schiphol and possibly also other Airports.
From: ron66, 6 months ago
15 years of experience in the design and innovation world resulted in a method to build bridges between people, innovation and strategy.
www.eye-ddi.com
SlideShare Link
Next blog I will highlight some projects I have worked on, pitched on a few but was confronted that not everybody realises the importance of my work.
In 1993 I was looking for an internship as Industrial Design student and talked with several companies. At one, a Dutch High Tech start-up, I had a meeting with an ex Fokker Fine Mechanical Engineer, he said to me "I want you, you are a designer that speaks my language". High tech chose me and I fell in love with high tech. Along the way I met the real geeks and it became different then talking with the Fine Mechanical Engineer and I had to learn about their speciality in order to build the bridge between technology and people. With technology changing fast paced I learned to understand the big lines but intuitively found out I'd better let the geeks understand me. An image tells more then a thousand words so started making conceptual designs: sketches, illustrations, models, scenarios, etc. just as a means of communication. What happened was even more interesting these studies where understood by everybody and stretched the mindset so well that developers, marketing & sales, customers, users, etc. started to contribute to the concepts in a very early stage.
As blogged before to me the Schiphol Project opened my eyes for the opportunities for Design Innovation but the story of the Methodology start years in advance. When confronted with the technological approach from IBM in this project I was reading "The Art of Innovation" http://theartofinnovation.com/ written by Tom Kelley about the Leading American Design Firm IDEO. Reading this was like coming home, here the #1 in the world was doing the same thing as the loner I always chose to be and the book helped me a great deal in structuring my methodology. I created the User Centric Innovation Methodology (UCIM) and applied it successfully in the Schiphol project. When faced with the challenges of the technological driven Schiphol Project I blend my and IDEO's Methodology together into UCIM and started to practice it.
In UCIM I have defined 5 phases:
1) Understand
2) Observe
3) Visualise
4) Evaluate & Refine
5) Implement
Let me explain this Methodology following the Schiphol Project. For the project Schiphol looked for a team experienced in designing user friendly products and approached design agency MMID www.mmid.nl who realised that this project was more then a typical physical design project, in this project the physical world met the virtual world. At this stage I was talking with MMID and they wanted me to be the project leader because of the conceptual character and high level of IT involvement. Our role was to do a feasibility study and answer the question if dropping of luggage in a self service process was feasible within acceptable process time in a user friendly way, second task was to stop the technology push of Schiphols suppliers. A challenging task, managing and participating in a creation process and keep conflicting individual- and corporate political interests out of the project.
In phase 1 you do your homework regarding: user, market, business rules & objectives, technology & innovation, specifications, etc. For Schiphol this meant to dig through specifications, IATA rules, KLM policies for customer care, visit a comparable Lufthansa solution, talk with suppliers, etc.
In phase 2 you observe real people in real life situations. Always the best thing to do is go out there and observe, experience it yourself and talk with the people involved. For the Schiphol project we observed for days the Self-Service Check in Area, interviewed people, etc. and saw great things happening because the current Check-in kiosks are far from perfect.
In phase 3 you come up with ideas: conceptual design, storyboards, scripts, video, etc. Based on what we observed we decided to design the Self-service Drop Off Service (SSDOP) as part of the Airport Experience. We used 8 characters that tested the system, not average users but critical people: the control freak, older people who cannot read well, inpatient business travellers, etc. We gave these a name and face and with them we simulated the process building the SSDOP in carton board playing the process of the characters. This role playing was such an eye opener for everybody and we experienced a group process of creative contribution. Based on this we designed the business rules for the process, the user interface, the SSDOP desk itself and an innovative label concept.
In phase 4 you simulate and/or build mock-up’s, prototypes, evaluate, etc. The SSDOP projects go/no go decision was related to the manned Drop Off Desk. We had to design a low burden solution for 90% of all air travellers that cost 10% extra time related to the Manned Drop Off Desk. To measure this we build a prototype simulating the average process, we invited 30 test persons, set up a observation lab with camera's and gave them 2 suitcases and an e-ticket saying they where flying to Paris. Without instruction every test person checked-in 2 suitcases and after an interview they checked in again. It was another interesting phase to see the concept being used by all the characters we selected in phase 3. The result convinced Schiphol to continue and plan a pilot on Schiphol Airport.
In phase 5 you materialize concept into commercial products. In this stage I am not involved anymore, but this is the typical Design Agency design & engineering work. Design Agency MMID continued the project after a long period of internal procedures within the Schiphol organisation and redesigned the Concept into a SSDOP prototype that currently is being tested on Schiphol Airport, Hal 3. The implementation of the SSDOP is planned in 2009 on a larger and commercial level on Schiphol and possibly also other Airports.
EYE-D Designed Innovation, User Centric Innovation Method
From: ron66, 6 months ago
15 years of experience in the design and innovation world resulted in a method to build bridges between people, innovation and strategy.
www.eye-ddi.com
SlideShare Link
Next blog I will highlight some projects I have worked on, pitched on a few but was confronted that not everybody realises the importance of my work.
Thursday, 8 November 2007
Design Innovation
Blog 2) today I will start with a definition of my playing field: Design Innovation.
According to literature Design Innovation is about the combination of creativity and technological know how. Following my intuition and curiousity I added two main components to this, user behaviour and strategy. User behaviour because I think in a time when technology can realise nearly anything and has become a commodity, applying technology to people is the main focus. With my background in design I have a lot of experience in design for human behaviour and ergonomics. I added strategy because I experienced that great ideas do not sell themselves, that new products- or services have to fit in the strategy of how a company want to serve its customers. To me strategy is the business compass in which direction I can come up with creative ideas. For me Design Innovation is about people, technology and strategy all coming togheter in an orchanic process creating new conceptual designs, a process illustrated above.
So what are conceptual designs? To me conceptual design is about making new unexpected connections. According to theory conceptual thinking is problem solving or thinking based on the cognitive process of conceptualisation, putting aside of commonly accepted beliefs or constraints or better said “thinking out of the box”.
Being curious, following my heart intuitively and being a critical observer I explore lots of issues ranging from: social change to the latest gadget, from politics to sports, from architecture to the newest innovation and mostly wondering why people do the things they do the way they do and adapt to a continuously changing world. All these factors sometimes just out off the bleu connect and form new patterns, create new thoughts, ideas, products and services.
Next blog I will introduce the reader into the Methodology I intuitively developed in the past 15 years and that all fell in place while I managed the Schiphol Project being confronted with a technology driven project group but needed focus on the customer experience instead of flow diagrams.
According to literature Design Innovation is about the combination of creativity and technological know how. Following my intuition and curiousity I added two main components to this, user behaviour and strategy. User behaviour because I think in a time when technology can realise nearly anything and has become a commodity, applying technology to people is the main focus. With my background in design I have a lot of experience in design for human behaviour and ergonomics. I added strategy because I experienced that great ideas do not sell themselves, that new products- or services have to fit in the strategy of how a company want to serve its customers. To me strategy is the business compass in which direction I can come up with creative ideas. For me Design Innovation is about people, technology and strategy all coming togheter in an orchanic process creating new conceptual designs, a process illustrated above.
So what are conceptual designs? To me conceptual design is about making new unexpected connections. According to theory conceptual thinking is problem solving or thinking based on the cognitive process of conceptualisation, putting aside of commonly accepted beliefs or constraints or better said “thinking out of the box”.
Being curious, following my heart intuitively and being a critical observer I explore lots of issues ranging from: social change to the latest gadget, from politics to sports, from architecture to the newest innovation and mostly wondering why people do the things they do the way they do and adapt to a continuously changing world. All these factors sometimes just out off the bleu connect and form new patterns, create new thoughts, ideas, products and services.
Next blog I will introduce the reader into the Methodology I intuitively developed in the past 15 years and that all fell in place while I managed the Schiphol Project being confronted with a technology driven project group but needed focus on the customer experience instead of flow diagrams.
Wednesday, 7 November 2007
College drop outs, think without bounderies
Just a very inspiring video on YouTube reminded me on something I've noticed before in working with- and observing self made entrepeneurs or very young entrepeneurs.
In a business world dominated by universtity graduates that rule huge companies the real inspiring people go on roads others never go, make combinations that nobody would make and thus create conceptual new and very succesfull products, services and businesses. These people are self made men and women that face a lot of criticism and obstacles but are determined to succeed.
The Internet in its pioniering days was dominated by colledge drop outs and very young kids that worked without bounderies and changed the world and still do.
The story of Steve Jobs is very inspiring, the setting is very suprising. A college drop out is doing a graduation speech for College Graduates at Stanfort University.
In a business world dominated by universtity graduates that rule huge companies the real inspiring people go on roads others never go, make combinations that nobody would make and thus create conceptual new and very succesfull products, services and businesses. These people are self made men and women that face a lot of criticism and obstacles but are determined to succeed.
The Internet in its pioniering days was dominated by colledge drop outs and very young kids that worked without bounderies and changed the world and still do.
The story of Steve Jobs is very inspiring, the setting is very suprising. A college drop out is doing a graduation speech for College Graduates at Stanfort University.
Friday, 2 November 2007
Introducing Myself
In the coming weeks I will blog about EYE-D Designed Innovation's activities, about Design, about Innovation, about past- present and future projects and about myself.
Blog 1) Today I will start with introducing myself: How does a dreamer end up being a design innovator?
I grew up in a nice village in the centre of Holland. My parent had their own removal company and as the youngest of four kids I really had a wonderful youth. With my older brothers being active in motorcycles I wrenched on my first bike engine at the age of 9. Growing up in an entrepreneurial family meant I had to help out often and enjoyed it. Creatively I was formed on the preliminary school of education reformer Kees Boeke (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kees_Boeke) Here I learned to be creative, express myself and played on the huge compound in Bilthoven. (Un) fortunately it never was discovered I was a visual dyslectic and so continued on high school in a technical direction (LTS), working with my hands as fine mechanical tool maker. For a while I loved working with my hands until I did a summer job as a fine mechanical tool maker and got bored in 2 days. I decided to crawl up the ladder using my brains (MTS and HTS) in mechanical- and fine mechanical directions. In the meantime I volunteered as youth worker organising camps for kids and really turned into a dead-end street with my technical studies. At the age of 21 I took a sabbatical from studies and went to Israel to volunteer in a hospital working with terminal patients, playing volleyball, travel in the region and enjoy normal life in a special country. When I returned to Holland I took up my studies and decided technology was not my goal but using technology to design useful things for people was and I started to study Industrial Design. Early 1995 I graduated on my own product idea and already was working as freelance designer for various companies. During the last years of my study I discovered being a visual dyslectic and learned it is of great help in my work being able to visualise complex or visionary things into simple designs or graphics that is easy to understand.
As designer with technical background and practical experience in machining and tool making I started in designing mass manufactured plastic -products and -housings for electronics as freelancer. My real career started as employee in a design agency specialising in designing bicycles ( http://www.vanderveerdesigners.nl/ )
later I followed my real passion to work on innovative electronic products and not only design good looking boxes but also work with developers of technology to set new standards in innovation, functionality and design. I also continued my passion to come up with new ideas, mostly ignited by peoples behaviour or by the (Internet) technology revolution in the late 90-s. After 3 years as entrepreneur working as industrial designer I was asked to become Innovation Manager for an unique Dutch Technology Company http://www.scantech-id.com/ (one of my clients). Scantech ID was a worldwide operating company in retail technology with various specialists in different fields working in R&D.
Just before I joined Scantech ID I launched one of my conceptual ideas “the corner shop experience” late 1999 an idea that really changed my direction from product oriented designer to conceptual designer and innovator. From that point on I focused on the context of the product in relation with user behaviour. I also entered the virtual world of mobile-, internet- and services. Ok, in the end there was a product that needed nice looks but then it was designed out of a conceptual approach.
I launched “The Cornershop Experience” by writing scenarios of how innovative technology -pattern recognition software for camera devices that scanned barcodes- could be used in all sorts of e-commerce, m-commerce and multi-channel services. This all was built on the ease of use of a barcode scanner for consumers as user interface, connecting barcodes to mobile content or connecting the vistrual world to a location. With this I initiated the foundation of 3 technology- and mobile service companies. First Scantech ID and Gavitec from Germany started working together on the Lava project that later resulted in the Lavasphere technology of Gavitec http://www.mobiledigit.de/prod_lavasphere.html . When this technology was nearing a launch on the Nokia 3650 I realised as important as the technology was the real killer would be a mobile service and co-initiated OP3 http://www.op3.com/. Where both Gavitec and OP3 where (too?) early they are still an important learning experience that eventually resulted in being co-founder and shareholder of Mbarc http://www.mbarc.nl/. With Mbarc I do not design products, I do not design and innovate new conceptual services, now I design a company, a market, a strategy, a unique marketing campaign with simple graphics, the products and work with partners on realising innovative services. Mbarc is from idea to company, an exiting episode. What was initiated as a concept in 1999 is now one of the emerging markets that survived the Internet shakedown called: “Physical World Connections” http://theponderingprimate.blogspot.com/ User friendly technology and services that convert interaction on the web to a location and vice versa using a mobile phone as carrier.
Just after quitting as Innovation Manager for Scantech and before starting with Mbarc I worked on a huge project that opened my eyes for the opportunities in Design Innovation. As conceptual designer, project leader and innovation manager I managed the development of the new Self-service Concept on Schiphol Airport. A project involving KLM Airlines, Schiphol Airport, IBM, Vanderlande Industries, design bureau MMID and other companies. The task was simple, design a user friendly Self-service Drop off (SSDOP) Machine for checking in travellers and dropping off luggage. The project started with a technological mindset and I had to rethink the methododology to design an Airport Self-service Experience leading to a simple, problem free and fast check-in process including luggage labelling.
The lessons learned in this project, the experiences from 15 years innovating myself from designer into design innovator working on complex concepts involving people, strategy, innovation, creativity and every day life has resulted into the start of EYE-D Designed Innovation. At this moment I work as Consultant on projects in Design Innovation and work as New Business Developer for Mbarc.
Innovation starts with an EYE is the payoff from my activities, critical observation and always being curious “why people do things the way they do it” is the core of my work and the EYE is my most important tool to do it.
Pew that’s a long introduction. In the coming weeks I will blog about EYE-D Designed Innovation's activities, about Design, about Innovation, about past- present and about future projects.
Blog 1) Today I will start with introducing myself: How does a dreamer end up being a design innovator?
I grew up in a nice village in the centre of Holland. My parent had their own removal company and as the youngest of four kids I really had a wonderful youth. With my older brothers being active in motorcycles I wrenched on my first bike engine at the age of 9. Growing up in an entrepreneurial family meant I had to help out often and enjoyed it. Creatively I was formed on the preliminary school of education reformer Kees Boeke (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kees_Boeke) Here I learned to be creative, express myself and played on the huge compound in Bilthoven. (Un) fortunately it never was discovered I was a visual dyslectic and so continued on high school in a technical direction (LTS), working with my hands as fine mechanical tool maker. For a while I loved working with my hands until I did a summer job as a fine mechanical tool maker and got bored in 2 days. I decided to crawl up the ladder using my brains (MTS and HTS) in mechanical- and fine mechanical directions. In the meantime I volunteered as youth worker organising camps for kids and really turned into a dead-end street with my technical studies. At the age of 21 I took a sabbatical from studies and went to Israel to volunteer in a hospital working with terminal patients, playing volleyball, travel in the region and enjoy normal life in a special country. When I returned to Holland I took up my studies and decided technology was not my goal but using technology to design useful things for people was and I started to study Industrial Design. Early 1995 I graduated on my own product idea and already was working as freelance designer for various companies. During the last years of my study I discovered being a visual dyslectic and learned it is of great help in my work being able to visualise complex or visionary things into simple designs or graphics that is easy to understand.
As designer with technical background and practical experience in machining and tool making I started in designing mass manufactured plastic -products and -housings for electronics as freelancer. My real career started as employee in a design agency specialising in designing bicycles ( http://www.vanderveerdesigners.nl/ )
later I followed my real passion to work on innovative electronic products and not only design good looking boxes but also work with developers of technology to set new standards in innovation, functionality and design. I also continued my passion to come up with new ideas, mostly ignited by peoples behaviour or by the (Internet) technology revolution in the late 90-s. After 3 years as entrepreneur working as industrial designer I was asked to become Innovation Manager for an unique Dutch Technology Company http://www.scantech-id.com/ (one of my clients). Scantech ID was a worldwide operating company in retail technology with various specialists in different fields working in R&D.Just before I joined Scantech ID I launched one of my conceptual ideas “the corner shop experience” late 1999 an idea that really changed my direction from product oriented designer to conceptual designer and innovator. From that point on I focused on the context of the product in relation with user behaviour. I also entered the virtual world of mobile-, internet- and services. Ok, in the end there was a product that needed nice looks but then it was designed out of a conceptual approach.
I launched “The Cornershop Experience” by writing scenarios of how innovative technology -pattern recognition software for camera devices that scanned barcodes- could be used in all sorts of e-commerce, m-commerce and multi-channel services. This all was built on the ease of use of a barcode scanner for consumers as user interface, connecting barcodes to mobile content or connecting the vistrual world to a location. With this I initiated the foundation of 3 technology- and mobile service companies. First Scantech ID and Gavitec from Germany started working together on the Lava project that later resulted in the Lavasphere technology of Gavitec http://www.mobiledigit.de/prod_lavasphere.html . When this technology was nearing a launch on the Nokia 3650 I realised as important as the technology was the real killer would be a mobile service and co-initiated OP3 http://www.op3.com/. Where both Gavitec and OP3 where (too?) early they are still an important learning experience that eventually resulted in being co-founder and shareholder of Mbarc http://www.mbarc.nl/. With Mbarc I do not design products, I do not design and innovate new conceptual services, now I design a company, a market, a strategy, a unique marketing campaign with simple graphics, the products and work with partners on realising innovative services. Mbarc is from idea to company, an exiting episode. What was initiated as a concept in 1999 is now one of the emerging markets that survived the Internet shakedown called: “Physical World Connections” http://theponderingprimate.blogspot.com/ User friendly technology and services that convert interaction on the web to a location and vice versa using a mobile phone as carrier.
Just after quitting as Innovation Manager for Scantech and before starting with Mbarc I worked on a huge project that opened my eyes for the opportunities in Design Innovation. As conceptual designer, project leader and innovation manager I managed the development of the new Self-service Concept on Schiphol Airport. A project involving KLM Airlines, Schiphol Airport, IBM, Vanderlande Industries, design bureau MMID and other companies. The task was simple, design a user friendly Self-service Drop off (SSDOP) Machine for checking in travellers and dropping off luggage. The project started with a technological mindset and I had to rethink the methododology to design an Airport Self-service Experience leading to a simple, problem free and fast check-in process including luggage labelling.The lessons learned in this project, the experiences from 15 years innovating myself from designer into design innovator working on complex concepts involving people, strategy, innovation, creativity and every day life has resulted into the start of EYE-D Designed Innovation. At this moment I work as Consultant on projects in Design Innovation and work as New Business Developer for Mbarc.
Innovation starts with an EYE is the payoff from my activities, critical observation and always being curious “why people do things the way they do it” is the core of my work and the EYE is my most important tool to do it.
Pew that’s a long introduction. In the coming weeks I will blog about EYE-D Designed Innovation's activities, about Design, about Innovation, about past- present and about future projects.
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