Michele Azzopardi
In this interview, Design Droplets New York correspondent and contributor Anna Lorenzetto spoke with the Director of Design Victoria, Michele Azzopardi.
Design Victoria is a Victorian State Government initiative that aims to increase the competitive skills of Victorian designers in local and export markets and develop the innovation and excellence capabilities of small to medium enterprises (SMEs). Design Victoria also have a fantastic website that is full of informative articles for both designers and businesses.
Follow Design Victoria on Twitter.
Highlights
- The term design is used in a variety of contexts. It is quite commonly used in reference to an aesthetic value, which doesn’t necessarily reflect the value and power that good design can have. While aesthetics are important, they are only a sum of the parts when it comes to design.
- Skills shortages pose a potential barrier to the increased dissemination of design use – the design industry may be significantly hindered if consultancies cannot meet demand for their services and if businesses cannot recruit designers to fill in-house positions.
- There is a strong correlation between a company’s ability to launch new products, services or processes and the importance it places on design.
1. Michele, welcome to Design Droplets and thank you for speaking with us today. You are the Director of Design Victoria; for those who are unfamiliar with Design Victoria, could you give an overview of the organisation and what you and your team are responsible for.
Design Victoria is a State Government initiative that aims to increase the competitive skills of Victorian designers in local and export markets and develop the innovation and excellence capabilities of small to medium enterprises (SMEs).
The Case for Export - This publication was recently launched to inspire and assist Victorian designers to export their products and services with confidence
Through a range of informative and practical programs Design Victoria is helping design professionals and SMEs achieve commercial success.
Design Victoria’s Business Ready program delivers seminars and workshops that empower Victorian designers, design consultancies and in-house design teams with skills and knowledge to grow their business and better engage with industry. The events target various design disciplines including urban and landscape, industrial, multi-media, graphic, architecture, interior design, fashion and textile and design management and are tailored to address knowledge and skill gaps identified in the industry.
Through the Design Ready program, Design Victoria demonstrates to Victorian businesses how to use design to create innovative and profitable products and services to improve their competitiveness. This occurs through workshops, seminars and the Business Immersions program, which provides funding support for eligible businesses to receive hands-on design expertise to solve a business challenge and improve performance.
In the Design Knowledge program we conduct research and develop and distribute information that provides a better understanding of the cultural, social, environmental and economic impact of design, and practical, design-related resources for businesses and designers. This program is steadily developing a world-class body of localised knowledge on design, including how it is successfully being used by private and public enterprises.
Design Victoria is currently in our third year of delivery and to ensure we achieve the highest standard of outcomes in the delivery of our programs we partner with professional associations, leading business experts, industry peak bodies, tertiary education institutions and government.
2. Design is difficult to define; it’s an ambiguous term – a noun and a verb, it’s the doing, the result and the practise and it is now used to describe a multiplicity of ‘stuff’ from tampons to organisational planning. Is design a bastardised version of its former self and has it simply become a marketing ploy? What do you think people think of when they hear the word ‘design’? How does Design Victoria define design and which design disciplines does Design Victoria focus on?
Melbourne First Aid - This brand and identity was developed through Design Victoria's Business Immersions program, where a small business is partnered with a designer to produce a solution to a business problem through design. In this case, graphic design agency, Studio Round, developed a new brand and identity to assist Melbourne First Aid in export markets
The term design is used in a variety of contexts. It is quite commonly used in reference to an aesthetic value, which doesn’t necessarily reflect the value and power that good design can have. While aesthetics are important, they are only a sum of the parts when it comes to design.
Design is a capability that transforms products or services to improve their function, efficiency and style. We work across a broad range of design disciplines (as identified above) in identified knowledge and skills gaps areas, including intellectual property, sustainability, business development and export, to equip them with the ability to grow their business and better engage with industry. Further to that, Design Victoria focuses on increasing the proportion of design-using businesses in the Victorian government’s priority industry and research sectors which includes biotechnology, information and communications technology, advanced manufacturing technologies, energy and environmental technologies and retail.
3. Why has the Victorian State Government decided to focus on design; why at this point in time and what are the hoped for outcomes of this effort?
Although the Victorian Government has long recognised the importance of design (identifying it as one of state’s strategic capabilities in its 2002 Innovation Statement “Victorians. Bright Ideas. Brilliant Future.”) the inception of Design Victoria was inspired by two reports published in 2003 which highlighted the number of people employed directly and indirectly in design in the State [of Victoria], and the vital flow-on effect of design and its ability to inspire and transform other industry sectors.
Through the Design Victoria Strategy, the Victorian Government is encouraging the design-led growth of Victorian industry through a comprehensive strategy backed by a $15 million investment over four years. Design Victoria aims to drive design excellence, create a more globally competitive design sector and encourage the design-led growth of Victorian industries, enriching the economy and the Victorian community.
In 2008 we launched the research report “Five Years On. Victoria’s Design Sector 2003-2008” which examined the characteristics and capabilities of the design sector, how small to medium enterprises use and value design, and the impact of design on Victoria’s economy to enable industry and the design sector to benchmark and improve performance. It found Victoria’s design sector to be highly competitive, contributing $7 billion annually to our economy and accounting for over $300 million in design-related exports. Importantly, it found that there is potential for significant growth.
4. Why is design important?
Design fosters a culture of innovation and creativity not only in business through the development, presentation and branding of products processes or services but it also touches and enhances our lives through enriching cultural and social experiences, uniquely shaping Victoria’s future as an enjoyable, creative, vibrant and sustainable place to live, work, play and visit.
5. Who should drive the use of design, the consumer or commerce?
Both. Business inevitably designs products and services in response to consumer needs and wants. However, design by its very nature fosters new innovations and can create consumer needs.
6. In the United States, where the ‘industrial designer’ was created, there is a 90 year history of designers working with and for commerce to further sales; design is seen (in the US) as an embedded cost of getting a product to market and design as a function is woven into the strategic planning of businesses and retailers. A great case in point is mainstream retailer Target which has dedicated in-house design teams working across many diverse product categories, but which also makes use of outside industrial design consultants. How does a country like Australia, where this is not the case, make up for ‘lost ground’? How do you enculturate a mainstream commercial sector into embedding design as an ‘on-road-cost’ and not an ‘optional extra’?
It’s certainly something that will take some time – to change the mindset so that design is considered integral to business, as important to the bottom line as R&D or marketing.
Oscar Furniture - This chair design was also developed through the Business Immersions program. Oscar Furniture, a manufacturer in the lift-assist chair market, was partnered with industrial designer agency, Ideation. Having previously developed a medical procedure chair prototype for the healthcare industry, Oscar recognised they required assistance with the functionality and marketability of the design.
Although the number of Victorian SMEs using and benefiting from design is positive, there are opportunities for a greater use of design. Our research identified several barriers to businesses using design – many don’t understand the value a trained designer can add to their business while other non-design users cite a lack of perceived need. The ‘pay back’ from using design is also not apparent to many businesses. If it were perceived that good design would save time and increase profits in the long run it would seem likely that they would find the time and resources to engage design consultancies.
Design Victoria is demonstrating to businesses the value of design and the ways it can be used to achieve higher business gains through market share, profitability and improved competitiveness. Our Design Ready seminars and workshops aim to impart this knowledge and equip businesses with the necessary skills to embed design into their business.
Oscar Furniture
We are also building a world-class body of localised knowledge on design. This wealth of information showing the benefits of design to business can be found on our website – there are some really good case studies there that document the experiences and outcomes of businesses working with designers to solve business problems.
7. Design Victoria’s report, “Five years on, Victoria’s Design Sector, 2003-2008”, refers to the Design Innovation Ladder (developed in Denmark), a tool that is used to demonstrate a company’s level of design activity. The report highlighted that only 4% of businesses in Victoria are positioned in the top level of this ladder, signifying that those businesses use design to drive innovation and that 72% of businesses are positioned in the bottom tier, where design has little or no presence in the business overall. Can you give us a profile of what a business in the top level looks like? What are your hopes for the other 72%; what reduction is Design Victoria aiming for?
Victorian businesses are embracing design at a similar rate to countries of comparable populations, such as Ireland and Denmark (an early design leader). In 2004, 36% of all business in Denmark made some use of design; in 2008, 37% of all businesses in Victoria (totalling 69,000 organisations) benefit from using design services. While Victoria compares well internationally, there are opportunities for still more effective use of design and greater business value for those organisations currently on the lower rungs of the ladder.
SMEs with profit growth of 90% or more over the past three years, were more likely to use design than other businesses, and much more likely to be on the higher rungs (3 and 4 ) of the ladder. Common to those businesses positioned on the top rung of the Design Innovation Ladder is the valuing of design as a strategic, core business activity – a large proportion credit the introduction of new products and services and increased sales volume to the use of design.
Through the Design Ready and Business Ready programs, Design Victoria is working to develop the design innovation and excellence capabilities of SMEs positioned on these lower rungs, creating innovative Victorian industries where design underpins competitiveness and export performance, to progress them up the Design Innovation Ladder.
8. The report also states that, “…a new generation of industrial designers are [sic] required to exploit emerging opportunities in the environmental and energy sectors”. Can you explain what this means and what the future implications will be for established designers, young graduates and the role of design education?
Skills shortages pose a potential barrier to the increased dissemination of design use – the design industry may be significantly hindered if consultancies cannot meet demand for their services and if businesses cannot recruit designers to fill in-house positions. The research looked at the extent to which recruitment of suitable personnel was a problem in design consultancies and businesses with in-house designers. Concerns are around those staff available, lacking the right skills and not enough graduates in relevant disciplines. The situation was amplified among industrial design consultancies with 59% indicating it is a problem.
Skill shortages in design need to be addressed, particularly within the industrial design sector. This is essential to underpin and ensure the success of new growth industries, including environmental and waste management and alternative energy products and services.
9. There is a clear correlation between the demand for a company’s goods and services and its use of design. Can you give us an explanation of the relationship between profit and the use of design?
What is Eco-design? is an online eco-design resource for industrial, graphic, fashion and textile designers
There is a strong correlation between a company’s ability to launch new products, services or processes and the importance it places on design. Analysis by the UK Design Council found that a portfolio of design-led companies outperformed the stock market average by 200% over a 10 year period.
Businesses that embrace design are better prepared to open up new local and export markets, attract investors, meet the changing demands of markets, improve sustainability practices and business processes to become more competitive. They profit by using design to build brand and identity, reduce production costs, increase price premiums and to create innovative and profitable products and services.
Obviously there is a more complex relationship between innovation, design and business success than simply the greater the influence of design within an enterprise, the greater the success it will have. However, our research contributes to the growing body of international research that clearly demonstrates that users of design are more likely to show a growth in profits, and to show a higher rate of growth of profits than non-users.
10.Michelle, thank you, but before we wrap –up, some really important questions for you. You travel a lot, list for us some hits and memories:
(a) What and where was your most memorable meal?
An Indian Banquet at Raffles Hotel in Singapore where the flavours and fragrances were so exact, delicious and memorable.(b) What place superseded your expectations once you got there?
Most recently the Mediterranean island of Pantelleria.(c) What is the best airport to be stuck in and why?
I don’t believe any!(d) If you were despatching your nemesis where would you send them?
Somewhere where I wouldn’t have cause to happen upon he or she…
Michele Azzopardi, thank you for your time today and all the best from Design Droplets.
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Anna is AMAZING!!
Loved this article…