Creative Role: The Frameworker

When thoughts and ideas fly, a framework may help to orchestrate them—to view them from different angles. This difference can make all the difference. A framework gives structure to thoughts and ideas. Its dictionary definition extends to “scaffolds.” If thoughts and ideas can be described as a building, then the framework is the scaffolding that supports them into a meaningful arrangement.

While completing a graduate program at the Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology, frameworks were like a dialect. Every class project involved making a framework to help guide thinking. Some frameworks were coined as acronyms like AEIOU (Activities, Environments, Interactions, Objects, Users), which is popular for arranging ethnographic findings. Others include POSTA (Person, Objects, Situations, Time, Activity) plus LATCH (Location, Alphabetical, Time, Category, Hierarchy) by information architect Richard Saul Wurman. Then there was the batch of frameworks used for projects dealing with planning.

Another example is from the frameworks-filled book “Unstuck” by Keith Yamashita, founder of “change and innovation firm” Stone Yamashita Partners, and Sandra Spataro, assistant professor at the Yale School of Management. There is a brief chapter called “Learn to fix the system, not just the symptom.” In it is advice “To succeed as a leader (or, for that matter, as an individual)” whose goal is to unify:

• Your purpose
• Your strategy
• Your people and the way they interact
• Your structure and process
• Your metrics and rewards
• Your culture

This framework was specifically made to help structure thoughts and ideas about success in leadership. Here’s the framework as a visual model:



There are probably as many frameworks as there are approaches to leadership. What framework works best to tackle a topic, such as leadership, depends on the quality of its usage. The framework quality can up (or not) the quality of the thinking about a problem or issue. Where one framework fails in application, the same framework can be changed and tried. Mostly, I’ve seen one framework used at a time. I suspect that more than one can be applied simultaneously, like a framework-mash-up.

Frameworks are made to help arrange thoughts and ideas in a conducive way; conducive to accomplish meaning. A structure—like a building or a car—is as stable as its frame. A frame can work thinking for the better.

Tap into your inner frameworker.

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This is the sixth piece of a series focused on the lively cast of characters whose roles make the play of Creativity. In case you missed the previous Creative Role, meet the Modeler.

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Typographic illustration, tailormade for this series, was done by Shawn Hazen. Read his Designer’s Quest(ionnaire).

Making Rare Book Feast #1: Herbert Bayer’s Book of Maps

From my rare design book collection, designer Herbert Bayer’s “World Geo-Graphic Atlas” keeps my attention. I wrote about it. This time I wanted to make a video of it.

I pitched the idea to my collaborator, Joe Giovenco, since I know nothing about working with audio and video. We’ve done some audio reviews of creative business books. He was game. As this was an on-the-side project, we worked over a few weekends, and Joe spent a few nights assembling, editing and refining the footage.



Camera and Microphone
The primary draw for this project was digital documentation. Joe did some research and determined that a Canon EOS Rebel T2i Digital SLR camera would have the best price point vs. performance—we split the cost and acquired one. But the thrill was short-lived: Joe noticed a rogue red pixel in the test photos. It was mailed (twice) for repairs. Afterwards, the camera cooperated. An Azden mic was used for the narration which was done at a separate time.



Software
Another draw for this project was Joe’s experience with Ableton Live and Adobe After Effects. The learning curve was minimal, but handling digital material with moving images and sound sucked up a lot of computing power, which became evident on Joe’s pre-unibody MacBook Pro. Much time was spent waiting for effects to render themselves. For drafting the script and storyboards, I relied on Microsoft Office, while the stills were handled in Adobe Photoshop.



To organize our files and share them, from iterative storyboards and scripts to soundtrack samples and to-dos, we used 37signals’ Backpack. I’ve been using this webapp for a lot of projects and it proved useful again for this collaboration.

What’s next?
The next rare design book project is TBD. In the meantime, enjoy our first installment of Rare Book Feast:



Big thanks to Joe for the video and audio engineering plus photography—most of all, a fun collaboration.

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The reception to the first installment of Rare Book Feast has been tremendous. This would not have been possible without Tina Roth Eisenberg of swissmiss, Maria Popova of Brain Pickings and The Atlantic, Jim Coudal of Coudal Partners, Daniel Benning of ONEEIGHTNINE, and Dan Wagstaff of The Casual Optimist. Big thanks to each of these awesome Gestalt-Ingenieurs and to viewers like you!

Biggest Highlight of Keynote Presentation at Apple’s WWDC 2011: People

Plenty of highlights emerged from Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference 2011 keynote presentation. As Philip Schiller, who is in charge of worldwide product marketing, said: “A lot has changed during the last ten years.” He was referring to the debut of Mac OS X in 1999. An entire serial show could be based solely on the Mac OS X Lion’s features. The same can be said of iOS 5.

But the highlight, to me, was revealed by the camera, as it panned across the audience—each intermittent shot serving up a smidgen of human diversity. Many were there because of their jobs. Even so, it looked and sounded like all were there to feel good.



One of my favorite quotes is from urbanist Jane Jacobs who proclaimed, “Design is people.” This is a pattern of Apple’s keynote presentations throughout the years (and proven to be a kind of art therapy for me)—a cinematic showing of audience anticipation and reception to technology designed for them—people’s work, entertainment and ultimately their art.

Image-snips of Apple Special Event, June 6, 2011.

Interface Details: Noah Scalin, Rita Rita, The Economist and more

The layout of black rectangles found on artist Noah Scalin’s website is reminiscent of paintings by Sol Lewitt, particularly his Wall Drawing 792. Mousing over each shape reveals underlying information. While initially arresting, it also invites curiosity—which is the underlying intent.



Discovered via Audree Lapierre: Two sides—one part Studio, one part Boutique—form the creative business Rita Rita. They are shown in an intuitive way, similar to two overlapping sheets of paper.



Discovered via Swissmiss: Photographer Russ Morris’ “Forever” take on the footer aims for longevity, enough said.



As a companion to its “Most commented” list, The Economist magazine visualized commented topics as interactive mind maps. The size of each key word correlates to popularity. It’s a variation of a tag cloud. Mouse over any key word to display the published comments for that selected topic. It steers attention to articles through reader feedback, siphoned through a bubble diagram.



Though the boundaries are unknown, dragging (the motion, not the emotion, though it could feel like both) your way through the limited-edition bags of Otaat does take work. Answering the question “What do these bags look like?” drives users to go along with the “click and drag” as opposed to the mainstream point-and-click convention. Such gall, especially applied to eCommerce, is appreciated.