Design Thinking for Global Innovation

Design Thinking for Global Innovation

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Welcome to our Wai Involve podcast. Today we are honored to have with us a prolific designer, global entrepreneur, and visionary leader. Dhruva Paknikar The founder and CEO of Dominix Global Design, the world's best young design company specializing in industrial communication, strategy, digital as well as space design.

Dhruva's incredible journey spans prestigious institutions like MIT and Strate École de Design collaborations with icons like Karim Rashid and impactful work with global brands like Ikea and Pepsi. Having designed over 500 brands and products, many of which are award winning, his influence has left an indelible mark on international markets. He's not just a designer but a mentor, guiding over 100 startups, speaking at global forums, as well as empowering innovations through initiatives like Abled Labs, the world's first specially abled centric NGO. Welcome, Dhruva Welcome to our Wai involve podcast We have called you for your expertise on, your design thinking, your expertise in business, as well as different use cases that you can, put some insights. I just wanted to ask you about you have worked with multiple different industries, and over a period of, at least more than a decade, I assume, along with your education in design as well.

And now your, moving towards a business, role. So how do you actually envision multiple design or design disciplines, which can be eventually, either merged together or do you see them actually being as standalone design disciplines themselves? So, from where I see it, let me give you a context of my education. So I am a graduate of product design, and I did, product design from MIT Institute of Design And then I moved to France, at a Institute called Strate École de Design where I major into brand and business design. So at that time, UX, UI, those courses were not available as that, field was not into, good form and shape. Right. So, at that time I did, some brand, business design, major there.

I took some other courses as well in human computer interaction, then all the things. So, then I learned that the base of design, any design discipline for that matter, is design thinking. Right. So the thought process that goes behind anything, in design world is the same is the core.

So that's where I realized that the core is very important to understand and, to apply and to practice as a main thing. Right. Technologies will change.

Disciplines will change. Disciplines will merge, in the coming future. Here in India, when we were, we were talking about design. Design is usually talked in disciplinary format. So correct.

Product design is different. Automobile design is different. Maybe, brand and business design is different. UI UX is different. So that is how, design. And of course they have to do it because it's an education.

This thing, it's, it's backed by education formats. And if they start teaching everything, it won't be, it won't be completed in the designated years. That is there. So, it's an obvious, choice to disintegrate all these things and then, you know, disciplines it? And try to teach the focus discipline, which is there, of course there.

when you are, looking for a job or something like that, the focus thing works because, when you are, working in a big corporate, they have they already have a set of people, heading those disciplines. And then, it seeps down but in the coming future with the with the disruption of AI, with the disruption of the skillset based training that we get, the disciplines have learning, like, so, let me give you a very recent example, of any automobile company which is there right now. So if you see automobile companies back in maybe 1950s or maybe 2000s, were very focused on the engines and, the delivery and mechanisms of the engines since 2000-2005 the technology aspect started to slightly come in the power steering, the power windows, the power mirrors, all these things. And so it became a electromechanical kind of a thing. So it was it was hard core automobile engineering, kind of thing. And then styling was obviously another aspect.

But it, it started to develop into an electromechanical thing. So electronics started to play a very important role. As, as you went from like 2005 to 2015, from 2010 -15 onwards, electronics started to play a major role in automobile If you see, these days, every automobile company is transforming itself into a e electric, kind of a thing, or maybe hydrogen cells. But the base now is the electronics part of it. The mechanical base is is now not that strong as it was in 2005 or maybe 1950s. So from the industrial Revolution to the technical revolution through the technical revolution, now it is a car essentially is a product. Right

It is not an automobile it is a product. It is something, to do with the human. Every aspect of the car is now centered to the human.

So the recent example of Jaguar, many people hated the transformation are hating the transformation that they have done, I personally, I do hate the transformation because I'm a hardcore automobile guy. I'm, I, you know, engine guy. But if you if you really look into that, the, the aspect of the thought process essentially every automobile company is now a lifestyle company Yeah. Right.

Unless until it's a for racing and, for all these things. But it has that lifestyle aspect of it. People are now not looking to just move from here to there. They are now looking to enjoy the ride.

They are now looking to experience the rides. So that experiential context is a huge context. And that is one of the reasons Jaguar, has moved towards an experiential kind of a, a kind of design than just, having, Fasttrack. Right.

Of course it it has its pros and cons and all these things, but essentially every, every single vertical that, that is there, every single, paradigm that is, that is going to shift in, in terms of the learning of the discipline and that's what I, saw when I was working with Karim Rashid, the New York. So he essentially was a product designer and he used to design a lot of graphics. We did a lot of campaigns for Pepsi. I was a part of the team that designed the temptation, resorted Cancun.

So every product was designed by us. The the whole space was designed by us the experience of the people were designed by us. Right. And that's where I realized that the the disciplines, doesn't are not that important as the whole process or the whole aspect is? But speaking of these design disciplines, like they have been evolving over multiple decades, let's say if you speak about, as you said, automobile started off way before, but 1950s, let's say it picked up.

And now we have, in every five years, we have certain different, new innovations that are coming in. And eventually it seeps into the consumer aspect of it, but because of the time that, people are putting into it, it actually leads to the users also adopting it and getting comfortable with it. Right. But now if we are going to be, let's say if we are seeing that certain design disciplines are getting merged together, and of course, because of the advent of AI, that this space is actually going to be very fast now. So from a user's perspective, do you think that maybe us designers, we are trying to head towards more of disruption rather than also losing the focus on maybe we should also think about the sustainability part of it.

Right. Okay. So sustainability is different criteria altogether. What I believe is everything should be sustainable.

So, building that was built 100 years old and there is still functioning in all, parts of the world are sustainable is what I believe. Yeah. Right. It is not just about using the sustainable materials. It's not just about using the sustainable things. It is about the long lastingness of the things as well. The shelf life of the things.

Yeah. So, because of the economy and because of the, capitalism, aspect of it, we are in a world where, fast, growing goods, they FMCG, fast moving items are, preferred then, long lasting things. Right. So that is one of the reasons. So for example, smartwatch versus mechanical watch goes for thousands of years maybe perpetual Yeah.

If kept well, whereas a smartwatch, the life is now a year or so. That's it. So, those shifts are also, affecting the sustainability part of it. Yeah.

So to answer your sustainability question, that is always, that should be always in the core. From a design thinking perspective, design thinking doesn't deal with any, any vertical for that matter. It is essentially with the human, right. So, what I believe is design thinking is or maybe designing anything should have three main aspects.

One is the the function of the form of it and the empathy. And so, the empathy part, really, really deals with the human that we are designing it for Yeah. And the more and the more people we are designing it for, the more combinations. And, the permutations happen and, of course, the function and the forms that are developed upon the set of the users Yeah. So anything that you develop to solve a problem or essentially develop, with these three pillars as, as course, will result into a great design.

So having these thought processes in mind, if you design anything, sustainability will take care of itself, right? Yeah. And of course, there are materials, more, more things which are nature friendly and which will give you a lot of, lot of positive, things for the environment, of course there are but the, the core value of sustainability will always lie in the lasting of the So, like sustainability. Of course.

I was also talking about the material aspect of it, but I'm also trying to, get to the point because I would genuinely love to understand your insights on it, that right now you spoke about function, form and empathy. So, of course, because of the industrial revolution, we're taking care of the function part of it, right? We have everything set. We have all of the particular industry belts and everything. We have everything there. Empathy.

Also debatable. But let's not go there. But, the form aspect of it, of course, there are multiple, views in the design world right now. Is that earlier, let's say a few centuries back or a few decades back, at least every thing that we tried to design, we tried to put a little bit of a human touch into it.

Now, what is happening is that because it's industrial Because it has to be in a certain structure, there is no, human touch to it, and everything looks the same. Everything feels the same. And, that sort of leads to a certain era or a certain reality which we are living in right now, where all of the buildings look the same. All of the let's say if you're walking on a road, you actually see the pillars on the road, even those are the same.

So even if I move from one city to the other, even the differentiation between cities and isn't it right? But because you lived in France, you've studied in France. And I'm assuming you've also traveled around in Europe. If you can just talk about how different cities in Europe, they do feel different because the building structures are different, even if the function of the building still the same because the form is different.

You understand Okay, maybe now I'm in Paris, I'm over there, or I'm in Madrid, or I'm in Amsterdam or something, or even in India. If you consider Rajasthan looks different, Tamil Nadu looks different, Maharashtra looks different. So do you think now over a period of time, are we losing out on all of these intricacies and is it leading to us human beings also ending up being very minimal? And for the lack of a better word, emotionless? Okay. So, to address your first part of the question, yeah, I've been to a lot of cities. So I love going to cities and exploring them, in Europe, a lot of cities I've seen are, maybe 600 to 700 years old.

To a minimum. Yeah And the the esthetic part of it. So, what I believe is, maximalism is the was the esthetic part back then, one reason why maybe, those parts were taken care of was the, the the time to build that building. So if you go to Rome, you once you enter Rome, you will understand that this is not this is really not based on any. Yeah it is.

It took centuries to form what it is right now. Right. So every detail is carved out. Every corner is, an art piece. Okay.

So if you look, from, from an art perspective, you will find art in every corner of Europe. Yeah, right. Similarly, in Rajasthan, you will find that similarly in, in, all, everywhere. Few years back, few 100 years back, that was the aspect because the people knew that this building I'm creating, this building, this will last for 100 years. Yeah, 200-300 years, maybe more than it the time to that it took for the construction of those things also was, very huge compared to what it is right now. Maybe because of population, maybe because of the capitalism that that happened.

Consumption was fast. And that's why economy also grow So what I believe now is that the thing that we are creating right now, they lack a certain, esthetic, sense from that perspective. But if you see, minimalism came in after Industrial revolution, because of industrial revolution, mass production was possible. Yeah.

Before then, mass production was not there. So everything was carved out in a different way. Every piece of even furniture was a one, one of a kind of.

Okay. Yeah. So that changed due to the mass production cycles. And in those mass production cycles, companies like Ikea became big because they could, really produce something, for very, minimal cost. And cost was one of the biggest, biggest barriers. It is still there and it's always going to be there. So if you say in that perspectives, if you see London, central London, the tons or maybe the Queen and all these people could afford really good housing, could afford really artistic things, and that's where we see right now.

But if you see the the outskirts of London back then, it was, it was a garbage. Right. Because the people lived now even the common man has a kind of aesthetic chair or aesthetic table in the house because of the mass manufacturing and because the prices are less so if you change the perspective a little bit. Now, everyone, it is art is. It can be now, it's a commodity kind of. Yeah.

Of course the detailing and all these things are, lost. But now it is spread more than it was before. That's a really positive way of looking at it, actually.

Of course. But now, if you really want to go ahead from this, we have a huge, huge opportunity. in the digital space Right. there is metaverse there is any, any digital interface and all these things where we have no, no bounds Right. And we can see

visually anything what we want. So if you see the new interfaces, those are very engaging. I'm, I'm not a big fan of the flat UI and flat surfaces. I have a more dynamic.

I need depth in it. Because essentially, if you are creating something which can have depth and not have, depth in it. Yeah.

So so Google, you know, came up with the material design kind of a thing that they really actually have had lights and everything, put on their UIs And then they actually created those kind of. Yeah, UI, interfaces, in there, whole suite. So, there is a lot of opportunity now to really go into art, to really, create a world where, there is no bound So it is commoditized as well as it is. It can be it can be mass produced as it, it can be integrated.

So maybe this is an opportunity for us. So I guess this needs now the upper graph of this side I think probably like a perspective change can help us. Definitely. Speaking of let's say material UI or a component aspect of it, at wai technologies, we have, raaghu, which, we have the Figma design kit, where we have certain components which are also backed by, react based coding. And what we are planning to do is sort of speed up the process of actually bringing UI screens to life.

Of course, now that we are speaking about, making sure that we have a positive or optimistic perspective to all of this, is there any way that, you think maybe we can, merge certain things, such as Of course, we have the design systems, be it Google, be it Apple, be it raaghu. We have all of these, these are only in the digital space. So now that you are talking about merging design disciplines, and I know that, you work, let's say, in commercials, you work for architecture there are multiple different design disciplines that you work for.

So, is there any way of having a design system for different disciplines where eventually there comes a point where we as designers will be merging certain things, and we can play our small part in actually helping these design disciplines together? This is a good question. This is a good insight on having systems there. So it is, it is very decentralized right now.

So all the systems, are not compatible with each other. So the compatibility really needs to, take care. Maybe Android has done a wonderful job in the compatibility basis. So every interface android has touched they have really But then they, they lack the sophistication of an IOS Yeah.

So that is a very good challenge which is there in the front of the designers, which are now evolving. So essentially I believe that everyone is it a designer any coder, any anyone, who, you know, who wants to create something, who wants to solve a problem, is a designer. So we are creators.

At the end of the day, the human race is the creator. And, the knowledge that that, everyone should get, should be in, should be aligned with the the thought process that you shared right now. And that is the real challenge in, in front of the world right now. So,

here in India, most of the people lack in that knowledge. And that is the only, that is the only thing. So, how to look at a thing, how to look at art, how to how to watch a movie. Yeah.

Those things need to be really taught. in the education is what I, we need to change on these things and, you know, make people more creative, more inclined towards, really changing things. We need to teach people how to do such things or how to question these things, at the end of it. So if you are interested enough, you will probably change.

Right? So that is the that is the key thing that we need to address. While putting in this perspective that you want that is that is a key. Definitely. So speaking of, you know, you speak a lot about the Indian market or Indian society and stuff.

So do you see, or I would just like, want to know just understand your perspective. I don't really have a question, over here, I just want to understand your perspective of how the Indian market has evolved over time. And where do you see it going? So, if you see the global economies, at a very large glance. So maybe 200, 300, 500 years. First there was the, the Greek economy, which flourished and then, you know, dissipated.

But there's always a sign that there's always a curve where the economy starts to flourish and reaches its peak, and then it's, slowly fades out at a certain point and certain level. Then there are the Romans, Egyptians, all these. Yeah. Egyptians. Before maybe, then there was the, the British government, which which was there the British emperors. Then there is US, breaks the economy now, there is maybe BRICS, where the economy is this maybe, China, India, these economies are now in a on that, up going curve Yeah. So from an

economic perspective, Indian economy is booming. And, we are targeting the 10 trillion economy, in the coming future. So things will be changing rapidly.

Things will be, people will be addressing things rapidly If you see the past generation, they were, trained at something. They did that thing, for a long time for maybe for 40 or 50 years. They did the same thing, upgraded themselves. Now we have to reinvent ourselves maybe five, six, seven times in our in a through out the year maybe more. Right. The next generations they maybe need to reinvent themselves every year or maybe. Yeah.

If not, if not a month. But yes. So that kind of, growth rate, Indian economy has and because of that, in the Indian economy, all these, things will also, flourish. People will reinvent, people will, see those perspectives, and, and we will be, in a, you know, in a place where, all the things will, start making sense.

But at the same time, if we don't as I said earlier, if you don't educate people, in the course of things, what really is art? What really is science? What really is design? what really is human centric approach? Then it will be much more worse then, what what it will be it. So, having said that, the from economic perspective is booming. From our understanding, from a technology perspective, we are booming.

We are the world's best technology users is what I believe, because of the youth, which is there adaptability is fast. The people are really getting hands on experiences in all the things. So at, at a later stage, experience is something that will will counter most, definitely the the other status quo barriers will be we will be losing.

So, experience and experience design will be the most essential aspect of all these things. So, speaking of the young generation or the young Indians, do you have any message to any aspiring designers or anybody who actually wants to even, understand even a little bit of design? So first, first, I like to tell everyone that, please understand that everyone is a designer at a certain stage, the way you solve a problem, if you have emapthy in it, you will do a better job. In any case, in any scenario, maybe at home. So, always I always tell that if, you're arguing with someone. Right.

There is a problem. So even solving that problem, if you have empathy towards that person, the result of the solving of that problem is way, way, way better than from not having the empathy right? That's really weird actually that is design essentially. Yeah. That is design that there is a there is a problem statement. There is empathy. There is there is form and space of course And and then you solve that problem.

So essentially everyone is a designer But people who want to pursue their careers as designers as maybe UI designers, or product designers, they need to understand that, skillset can be taught, but thought process should be learned. So the thought process is something that they need to concentrate upon. They need to ask questions. A lot of questions, they need to be very intrusive. They need to be very, and so, so, so designers are usually adamant on their things because they create something and it's like a baby.

That's should not be the case And that's what, that's what I learned at Karim Rashids' So I was very possessive about the, the thing that I made and, he said the first thing that you need to understand is, you know, once you have created it, you have to go ten steps back, criticize it And that's where you realize that there is a possibility of that design circle happening again. So that is something that I will obviously tell the, next gen designers. World is changing super fast. We will get a lot to learn from even the young people. I usually do get a good get to learn a lot from, my colleagues, my interns.

Yeah, and all these people. And it's it's, it's been a crazy thing. I just want you to talk about the impact of design and how from the start of your journey, how it started off and now even the quantity which is increasing, really the responsibility is increasing.

So, so, from my career perspective, of course, I started small, just a couple of people, you know, coming together, colleagues coming together to create something which, set of users can use. So in the first, couple of years of my career, we, we didn't get a chance to create something which is for a larger audience, we got niche projects, of course, because of the limitations of our network, limitations of our, skill sets. Maybe, but we did, I believe that we did a good job, in gathering those, sets of people, as we grew as a company, as we grew over the verticals, as we grew the disciplines which are there, now we are creating things which millions of people will come and experience. Yeah.

So, so, for example, we, we got a chance to design the, the kinetic lunar, which is there, which is which Now lakhs of people are buying. Right. And, for that, the, the target audience was the rural India, which is a huge chunk of India. And that chunk of India understanding that chunk of India, what they actually do, we we interviewed more than 5000 6000 people, going from town to town, talking with them, seeing what the problem is.

So there are very simple problems that in a small village in India, there are no mechanics. Right. Even the, the, the puncture, if there is a puncture, which usually is on Indian roads, those punctures, resolving those punctures, the skillsets of those people where of bicycles and bikes. Right.

So essentially we, we had the tires in such a way which had tubes which had a kind of a different frame which could look like a cycle. Right. So these insights, were very important to actually create, the vehicle, to address that market. And as we are growing, we are creating things which, so we are creating spaces where, maybe 20,000, 30,000 people will come daily. We are creating something in, Bangalore where, a footfall of around 50-60,000 people daily.

So, addressing those huge chunks, has taught us a lot, in terms of understanding the customer at a mass scale, on the contrary, we have already, devised three, curated, created, a set of principles of psychology, which help us to address those masses. So mass psychology, industrial psychology, something is, very close to design. And we use that we leverage that to actually solve these kind of problems. So, now, if you say going towards maybe a bigger impact, global impact, kind of a kind of a design team, we are learning more and more about humans and the world is changing so fast that that those learnings that we had in the past one year is, is now changing into something. Right So that is the beauty of this business is what I believe, that is the beauty of actually designers thinking and doing something. That is that is the that is the crux of, the, the story that that I have been trying I'm looking forward to, it, exploring more geographies, exploring more, more continents, if I may So that's what I'm held at.

So do you would you like to actually elaborate a bit on how different is let's say, user interface design, user experience design and product design? Yeah. So, as I told earlier, that design thinking thought process is is core and is same everywhere. the outcomes of these three things that that I'm, that you mentioned, are completely different so user experience design deals as it suggests it deals with the user experience. So again user is the is the centre part of it.

So how a person will navigate something, how a person will look at something, how a person will. So from a very, very basic perspective, if you, just go on to Apple website and check, there is call to action on everything, which is there it gives a clear sense of buying that's how they increase their sales So user experience directly directly results in increase of sales. Right. So from that perspective, if you see the user experience is a very complex, addressing user experiences is a very complex system where you actually study the users, know their preferences, know their, trends, and know their languages, build an architecture, around that. Into an interface. Yeah. Right.

So that is where the user interface starts coming. And of course, you say it's overlapping set and it, it's not two different things. Completely, but user interface deals more with the user's, sensory aspect and the, offerings of the, of the, interface, which is there. So, people think about UI, UX as just app design or website design, but interfaces are everywhere. So even if you even if you, go to a park, there is an interface. Of course, if you add a digital, it will transform it digitally.

It becomes a digital interface. But interface is something which is there around us. Even the shirt is an interface. Anything that you see is an interface, everything which you see I which I see is an interface, that's how I get the knowledge of, the world. Right? So essentially, designing an interface, takes a lot of sensorial aspects, and the senses are, looked in, not just the thought processes, not just the, habits.

And all this things the sensory, sensorial aspect of it is very important while creating the UI or the user interface, part of it, as I mentioned the, the digital, transformation is, is, heavy these days. And it gives us a different dimension altogether to interact with the world. So, there are huge screens in, in instead of, instead of walls. Now, which can give you a, different dimension. And so we are we are creating a restaurant where every, every, every surface is a screen and, you are dining in that restaurant.

So if you, if you have some Arabic food, you will be sitting in a in, some desert in, in the Middle East. If you are having some seafood you will be sitting in Japan and something like that and that experience that the temperature experience, the all the senses, will be, will be there. So these kind of experiences are the user interface part of things.

And actually navigating through these things is the experience part of it, where a product is the product or, if I may say, physical product deals more with the ergonomics part of it when it comes to the user deals with the form and the, what we call in the CMF, the material finished part of it, which is the half, agenda. And the other is the manufacturing of it. How to create that stuff? What will be the processes of manufacturing? What will the cost, which is implemented in that, how to create the, manufacturing process part of it. And now these things are also merging. So every other product is now having a interface. Soon enough, the chairs also will have an interface, some or the other.

So this even the thing that we pull and push, that is an interface essentially that was physical kind of an interface. Now it, it could be digital in the, in upcoming future. So, so these things are completely different. So you need to understand, what what thought processes go in that and how these things will be merging together to essentially to create experiences for the person.

And that's where that's where the world is headed and that's where the design community is headed That's where we are headed. So would you consider it to be UX, UI or UI? UX? Technically, UX will be the first, the lower hanging fruit, right. Which needs to be addressed. While creating something Right. Then the interface will come in, but it will start parallelly because the research process is, can can start parallely. So, maybe UI UX is something that, is, it's easier to say.

Yeah, that's why it is termed like that. But, the first, low hanging fruit might be the UX. Okay. So. Dhruva, would you like to say anything to our audience who is watching? Yes. So, as I said earlier, I'll frame it again. Everyone is creative.

Everyone has the knack of solving a problem. Everyone does solve a problem every day. So essentially everyone is a designer. And if you look at the world in a different perspective, if you try to understand different perspectives, if you try to empathize with different people, with sets of people, the masses of people, your world will be much, much, much more bigger. And, you will be a better person and you will be a better designer.

Well, thanks a lot. I would definitely love to chat more, but probably we're out of time. But thank you so much It was really great meeting you Stay tuned for more podcast from Wai Involve and follow us on the Wai Involve Network. Thank you.

2025-01-25 09:18

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