Today, I heard a story. A group of church elders commissioned an artist to paint pictures of a dying church. I suppose they wanted to move their congregation members by showing what they don’t ever want to be. However, when the artist produced a set of paintings, they were shocked to see a nice cathedral with towering steeples, expensive chandeliers in the auditorium, an extravagant “fellowship hall,” recreation room, and everything fanciful. The paintings even had groups of people all dressed up nicely coming in and out of the building.
When asked why he didn’t have an image of a run-down building with weeds and broken windows, the image they had had in mind, he responded that the type of death for a church is not such a deterioration, but a spiritual decaying. A church may have it’s people, activities, and nice facilities, but if the spirit is lost, all is lost.
I think about how this relates to the enterprise of design and what some in the design world call “4th order” design, that is, the design of organizations and ideas/thoughts. George Nelson, the renown designer, believed that organizations were the greatest design products of the 20th century. As much as designers create “posters” (graphic design) and “toasters” (industrial design), these products are made possible by organizations and corporations. Can we drive around our Toyota Camrys without the colossal organization (whatever organization means) that “builds” it?
Like the image of a dying church, have many organizations have already lost their soul, their essence? Is there a need for change, and can designers play a role in such change?
Thoughts to consider:
- Managing Design : companies have been doing this for quite some time, managing the various creative departments of their organization.
- Designing Management : Oooo. Sounds so much more interesting, doesn’t it? I’ll post more on this later …