Spent a piece of this morning reading and thinking about this article by the NY Times. Another fabulous Apple vs. “insert here”…. in this case Apple design vs. Google’s perceived design process. The differences between design by collaboration vs. the concept of being an Autuer – a design decision & taste maker.
I like both concepts and feel they both have relevance inside a company. The “Autuer” concept comes off a bit dictatorial in the beginning, but as you read on you realize that as a decision maker, your job is to foster good design through others, not dictate. And I think that’s a concept I’m a bit more comfortable with. It’s also runs opposite of the current crowd-sourcing concept that is so prevalent in the internet. That collaboration matters, but that decisions are singular. Also took time to read Douglas Bowmans resignation from Google some years back – the part that resonated was the lack of a “designer” in a leadership role.
Two very good reads to frame my thoughts as I finish one job and mentally begin to prepare for a larger design role at a smaller, fast growing company.
