For example, Steve Jobs was a classic “right-brained thinker,” and under his leadership, Apple was renowned for its innovation. His successor, Tim Cook, was a supply chain management expert and a “left-brained thinker.” However, Jobs left behind Jonathan Ive, a “right-brained thinker” who served as the company’s Chief Product Designer. This combination enabled Apple to maintain its prosperity for another decade. Unfortunately, Ive left Apple, which was a significant loss for the company’s product innovation capabilities.
Despite the importance of “right-brained thinkers” in innovation, why do so few designers in most companies make it to the top? There are reasons for this. Pure art and business profitability are often at odds. Most designers also lack knowledge of business logic and rules. They especially lack the “user-centered” business management methods commonly used in “right-brained organizations.”
However, in reality, both design and business practice are “user-centered.” Therefore, they are inherently one. Many of the “challenges” encountered in work are actually solvable. The key is whether we have mastered some new processes and methods.
Today, we know that product design does not only mean visual or functional design. In the past decade, companies have increasingly focused on business model design, user experience design, and behavioral design, which are all critical components of product design. On the contrary, pure visual design will largely be replaced by AI in the future.
Therefore, mastering these new design methods is becoming an important and urgent task for designers. This has become a clear industry trend. Here we particularly recommend that designers attend training courses for certificates such as UCBA Business Model Architect, UCUXD User Experience Designer, and UCBD Behavioral Designer.
In fact, when designers truly master these new methods, they can not only improve their professional design capabilities, but more importantly, they also open up promotion channels within their company. Innovative organizations need “right-brained thinkers,” and “right-brained thinkers” need to understand business and products. When you have both, you become a candidate for CEO.
However, to truly master these new design contents, you need at least five to ten years of experience. The world is developing rapidly, and AI technology may develop faster than we expect. In other words, if we do not want to be replaced by AI, we need to improve ourselves as soon as possible. AI is both a challenge and an opportunity. Taking immediate action can open up a new blueprint for us…