Stephen Hay

I Don't Care What Airbnb is Doing

(and Neither Should You)

"Hey, have you seen that thing that Airbnb did? Let's do something like that."

When thinking about how to solve our design problems, we often look to what others are doing. And when we don't, our stakeholders do. We call this "inspiration". But at the heart of it is a focus on solutions rather than problems. We fall in love with a solution to someone else's problem and try to make it fit our own. We contribute to design sameness, and confuse it with reasoned convention. In making things easier for ourselves, we might miss opportunities to really make a difference.

Stephen will explore the why and how of deeply understanding design problems. We'll look at why it's important to think outside of the box, when it's appropriate to look at the work of others, and what to do with it when we do.