ISSUE 015

SOMETHING LOVELY
​that I saw

This movement diagram captures 'The Lay, The Meal, The Trace' - a really dynamic and evocative expression of an everyday activity. These kinds of sketches or diagrams are an interesting thing to include in a portfolio or presentation to share your thinking and analysis of how people use and function in a space.

SOMETHING USEFUL
​for this week

Ask a designer how they feel about being persuasive when it comes to talking about their designs, and chances are you'll get a nod and acceptance that's part of what we do. But if you were to use the word 'persuade' in the same sentence as 'sales', you'll more likely get a bit of a scrunched up face and a blergh noise.

In the context of winning work, persuasion sounds like pressure, like talking someone into something they didn't actually want. But the actual definition is more nuanced (and nicer!) than that: guiding people to change their thoughts, feelings or actions through communication, using reasons, facts and emotional connection rather than force or tricks.

Guiding and connection are the important words. A guide's job isn't to trick someone into a decision. It's to challenge how they're thinking and offer up ideas they hadn't considered yet. Done well, that naturally steers a potential client towards wanting to work with you. But the role of guide (and persuader) itself is built to help first.

There's a book called 'Influence is Your Superpower' by Zoe Chance, and she makes the point that people who are genuinely good at persuasion ask more than they tell. They spend more energy figuring out what someone actually wants, instead of building a case for what they think they should want.

That makes the whole concept a bit more palatable, right?? You're not convincing someone to choose you - you're helping them work out what they need - and only then showing them you're the person who can help them with that.

SOMETHING INTERESTING
​that I'd like to share

Between 1908 and 1940, Sears sold houses through their mail-order catalogue. You picked a floor plan, sent a cheque, and a few weeks later around 30,000 pieces of a house arrived at your local train station. The timber was pre-cut, every piece was numbered, and whole thing came with a 75-page instruction manual (Ikea, eat your heart out!).

Over 70,000 of these kit homes went up across the US, and a lot are still standing. Some owners only discover the history of their home by accident, finding stamped numbers on beams during a renovation.

I wonder whether this was one of the first full examples of a 'design and build' model. Concept, plan, materials and construction, all compressed into a single mail order transaction. Let's just hope it went together more than an allen key!

If my CDS content or newsletter has taught you something you didn't know before - coffee's always appreciated.

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