Making businesses design ready

This article is the basis of two features published in the Business Pink supplement of the Harrogate Advertiser last Friday:

Making businesses design ready

Brian Minards is a Harrogate based, independent consultant operating in the area of business integration, new product development, corporate and brand strategy, creative direction, and design management. He is a past Vice President of the Chartered Society of Designers, an academic, and a past director of WPP, a World leader in marketing communications.

Three years ahead of the economic downturn, The Cox Review of Creativity in Business expressed the importance of creativity, design and innovation to business performance and the UK economy. Sustained success in business, regardless of sector, Cox said, increasingly depends on the ability to innovate: to exploit new ideas and new opportunities ahead of the competition.

The Design Council maintains that to survive in challenging economic conditions and stay ahead of overseas competition, UK businesses must add value – designing innovative products and services instead of cutting prices. Design is a significant source of competitive advantage. Companies that invest in their design capability and develop a reputation for innovation can avoid competing on price alone. In the UK, 45% of firms that do not use design compete mainly on price; only 21% of firms where design is significant do so.

The Design Council’s research finds that for every £100 a design-alert business spends on design, turnover increases by £225. There are many instances where this success can be measured and evaluated, making design a tangible asset to any company.

Embedding design at the heart of a business’s strategy is crucial, but where do businesses look for advice and support in this minefield? Clearly, directly approaching design suppliers without a wider knowledge of the ways in which they may integrate with your business is ill advised. A current support scheme for businesses is Designing Demand, a programme managed nationally by the Design Council and delivered by the RDAs and their delivery partners. Designing Demand has recently gone live across Yorkshire.

Design is no longer a cosmetic, superficial bolt-on used to make products and services prettier for market, it’s firmly embedded in the operation of those UK companies that are growing.

The integration of design at all levels – from corporate strategy, through products and services, to internal and external communication – is important to the wider success of a business.

Making businesses design ready involves the strategic management of design at board level, linking design and business to deliver service or product development across R&D, brand strategy and realisation, the marketing mix, environment (interior and exterior), engineering, and the manufacturing process.

The quest is to source a strategic design consultancy that understands this and will work with your business from the outset to identify direction and routes to market.

It is both possible and necessary to design our way out of the recession, ready and healthy to come out fighting at the other end.

© Brian Minards 30 June 2009