And here are some more quotes from d-studio student blogs…
Emma:
I was so glad that Elsie and I were first. We love talking and we work together like we are one person so the presentation aspect of the assignment was probably the easiest for us. It was awesome that we finished on time as well. We were very proud. The questions and queries for us were interesting, some of the things we should of thought more about became relevant and I really felt it helped us think about the future and where we should go from here. I’m even that more prepared for Assignment 5….
Another notion I took away from Wednesday is the reality of the confounds that we put on ourselves for the assignment. I mentioned in class how years of business school has conditioned us to be smart but safe in whatever we choose to do. This ultimately affected our decisions within the assignment. Elsie’s and my approach was to change small factors with a big overall impact. Was it safe? Yes but when doing something new it always feels better to stick with what you know.
Daniel:
It was flattering to hear how well the visuals for our presentation went over with the guest panel. And they were designers!
While they may have looked “stupid” it really took a lot of time to narrow down what the key ideas were, and how to visually represent those without any excess noise. I Sharpie’d through many sheets of paper before I was able to come up with sketches that clearly represented the main point we were trying to get across.
The process also helped inform the content of the presentation. As I began sketching we only had discussed a rough outline for our presentation. Given that guideline I was able to experiment with many different ways to communicate our ideas, each opening up new avenues for exploration. Each different visual representation also had a slightly different verbal representation, so it was really a matter of selecting the combination that would be most effective especially given the tight time constraints.
In the end I think it was right to cut out all of the unnecessary details out of our initial presentation in order to make it more understandable for everyone. Given that everyone had a strong handle on our proposal right away, we had lots of time to discuss the finer details during the discussion session which followed.
To use Don’s analogy, we tried to throw one ping pong ball at a time.
Selena:
Yesterday in d-studio, we got to present our projects in front of a panel of experts. While this caused a minor bit of panic, as the three minute presentations were subjected to a fifteen minute critique, it actually turned out to be an excellent opportunity to learn how we can sharpen our ideas and tell our stories better.
I wanted to share my fav lil’ tidbits from the discussion that happened during the critique:
1) Keep it Simple/Stupid
This is an age old saying that people love to throw around, but oh my it is so true. So many projects falter when they have too many concepts in either the content or the delivery. Daniel and Nestor did an incredible job at this in their presentation.
2) “Design studio is about simplifying the complex”
This is something that I sometimes forget during the d-studio process. The projects are going to be complicated, they are going to have a lot of facets and information, but the real skill as a design thinker is to reshape the content so it becomes usable, understandable and digestible for the audience.
3) Ping Pong Balls
As our one of our very clever panelists noted, if you throw 10 ping pong balls at someone, how many will they catch? Maybe 2. Well if you throw 2 ping pong balls at someone, how many will they catch? 2. So pair it down to 2 great concepts and share those in a way that your audience will catch.
4) Use an Analogy
This same lesson came from the panelist who shared the ping pong story (practice what you preach I tell ya!). Sometimes concepts are hard to contextualize, so create an analogy that will allow your concept to be easily understood. This will not only make the audience understand your pitch better – but easily remember it!
Another week of d-studio is over, and wow, I have to say I am learning so much! I am so super excited about the next project, where we will actually be able to dig really deep and come up with some solutions that will be potentially implemented by companies. Such a unique opportunity in the Bcom program!
Aren’t we fortunate to have such thoughtful and fun students?