FBTB22: Anna Kirah – F*ck design thinking

Anna Kirah was headhunted as the first-ever anthropologist to join Microsoft back in 1999, at that time a company with over 70,000 employees. She took the role of Chief Design Anthropologist for Windows, MSN, Windows Live, mobile services, embedded software solutions, and digital media.

This talk is a series of reflections from a design anthropological perspective about the future of design and UX. Anna’s job has been to unveil truths for organisations: making the known unknown and making the unknown known. The answer to what transforms organisations lies in the premise that no one discipline is best and that no one discipline alone will solve the challenges we are facing.

[Abysshe]

What is Anna trying to say? We design for defined and measurable goals. These goals are defined within capitalism (in the case of work within any corporation). Any outcome will be in the service of capitalism and profit, not human happiness. Diversity, accessability, inclusivity and so on are only goals if these goals themselves support the higher goal of profits. The problem lies not with individual designers, nor methodology, but within the system itself. Design thinking involves the people affected by whatever youre designing, and "transdisciplinary thinking" is just a rebranding of the same, with the false assumption that designers can force corporations to think less about profit.