Design: The new business mantra

It is not uncommon for many companies to be totally at their wit’s end if their new businesses are not paying or their diversification strategies are not working. These are companies who are seeking for answers in their marketing, technical and financial strategies and are not able to pinpoint as to where they went wrong. Very often, the answer lies in the ‘design’ that they used and if they used it effectively and adequately.

Since time immemorial, design has been the key element in making a difference and adding value. This is going to continue. Today’s business needs design more than ever before and the sooner the visionaries realise this, the better. Technology and finance play a role, but only to an extent. Design creates the impact and the competitive advantage that any business needs. Design would drive strategy and would have a direct impact on the bottom line. Some of the global corporations have realised this and already set up inhouse design heads with large teams looking into every single opportunity to use design for their brand advantage. This has paid them manifold results in the short term and will continue to do so in the long term.

A company’s business growth strategy rides on two key vehicles — expansion and diversification. Expansion in the current markets with current products is definitely not an easy task, given the fact that technology is easily available and perhaps at much lower costs than a decade ago. Here, design drives the differentiation and supports the marketing endeavour in making your products and brands more and more meaningful to the consumer. Diversification strategy needs to be totally based on design, right from designing the gameplan to designing the product and the related strategies. Any mistake at this stage could not only be expensive but also put you back by several years.

Designing your products is increasingly becoming important, as that drives the research & development strategy for your company. The big question is: what should be the inputs for designing your products and where should it all begin? The data from the consumers is the first point to begin with, but this needs to be analysed and understood in detail before using it for forming business strategies. Designing the entire communication plan for the consumer becomes critical in a large and diversified economy like ours. Here the question is, would the same communication design work for all the markets, would we need a different approach in rural versus urban areas, and so on and so forth. Designing your packaging becomes the next most important step, as one has to reach the products to consumers in a form that is consumable and reusable.

It is, thus, not a surprise that a lot of business consultants are actually design specialists and using a lot of design principles and techniques to input into their business strategies. The challenge, however, is of a different nature and perhaps needs to be overcome before design can become an effective tool in a business enterprise. Very often, design is judged on subjective evaluation and thus, it is not necessary the best idea will go forward. Very often, the organisational culture does not allow the opportunities for creative explorations and the output is judged best if it is in line with ‘our way’ of working.