Gurus Day – How it went

It’s taken me a while to get round to writing up this post – ‘Guru’s day’ was a week ago today. I’ll start by talking about what I had on my desk and how it was laid out. Basically I had two boards, one which described a bit about the massive problem of food waste in our society and another which had some examples of critical and persuasive design (design which tries to influence or change people’s behaviours). I also had an A4 board which had my 50 word project summary (which i changed slightly between the last post and the day itself) and another 50 words on what I would like to talk about.

*Click the pictures to see them full size.

The layout of my 1/3rd of a desk for Gurus Day

The ‘Gurus’ were Richard Banks, Tim Regan, Paul Greenhalgh and Martin Bontoft. Banks is the head interaction designer for Microsoft research; Regan is also a researcher at Microsoft with a PhD in computer science (he claims he’s not  a designer but he’s been working with them for most of his career and he definitely thinks like one); Greenhalgh is the director of design for Team Consulting (a medical industrial design company) and Bontoft is head of design research at Team who focuses on ergonomics and user centred research. So we had a good mix of highly experienced professionals.

The day itself ran quite smoothly and was a good experience for all of us. From 10am until about 3.30pm we all manned our desks as the gurus made their way around talking to each student about their project so far; areas they found interesting or insightful and where they thought the project could go next. As there are about 60 students over the two courses, I only managed to speak to Richard banks. We talked for about 15 minutes – he was really helpful and gave some good insights into my project. The main insight that i’ve taken away from the conversation is what role other people’s perceptions of your ‘eco-friendliness’ plays. For example: driving a Prius may not actually be all that environmentally  friendly (after all the parts being transported around the world several times) but it certainly makes a statement i.e. ‘I care about the environment’. Is this important to people? He also gave me some pointers on where to go next, such as going to environmental and freegan (people who live off of food disgarded by others) groups to talk to people – one anecdote from someone could spark a specific idea or direction for my project. Whilst the gurus were making their way round I also spoke to some of the masters students (studying design ethnography or service design) who were also really helpful and gave me some good areas to look into.

At half 3 we then had a 1 1/2 hour question and answer session with the gurus and Graham (our tutor) which I thought was probably the most interesting part. Although it wasn’t specific to each project it was good to hear the opinions and thoughts of people who have been in the design industry for over 20 years.

Gurus Day

Gurus Day is an event that is run each year by the joint 4th year of the Product Design and Digital Interaction Design courses in the university. It’s a chance for us (the students) to get advice and insights from some leading figures in design industry. The format is this: each student is allocated a space in which they present their research and work so far and where they think the project is heading and the industry experts walk around and chat with the students giving advice on areas to look into and what the next steps might be. Its a really good opportunity to gain feedback from people who have a wealth of experience in design practice.

As the ‘gurus’ or experts walk around they are each given a ‘menu’ that lists all the students and gives them a brief (50 word) summary of their projects so far, so if they feel they have particular expertise in an area that a student is looking into then they can go directly to them for a chat.

Each student gets 1/3rd of a desk to present their work in whatever format they think is appropriate (physical objects, pictures, videos, presentation boards etc.) – we have been advised not to make the boards too text-heavy as the gurus only have a short time with each student.

So far I’ve come up with my 50 word summary: My project will focus on the issue of food waste in the home. I want to create a product, with a critical design tone, that will increase people’s awareness of the problem and encourage them to be more conscious of how much food they throw away.

I’m going to try and get advice on what the next steps might be and what research techniques would be most appropriate.