Harold G. Nelson

Foundations and Fundamentals of Design Competence
Genesis is ongoing. As human beings, we continuously create things that help form the basis of the world as we know it. When we create these new things: tools, organizations, processes, symbols, and systems--we engage in design. To come up with an idea, and to give form, structure and function to that idea, is at the core of design as a human activity. This book is about that activity.

The world is changing rapidly, sometimes with intent, but too often by accident. Despite the best attempts of science and technology to bring predictability and control to worldly affairs, the world has proven to be unpredictable. The laws of nature may be fixed, but the complex interactions of everyday events, whether provoked by accident, or fate, result in unpredictable outcomes. The one thing that makes this state of affairs tolerable is the inchoate knowledge that change--desired change--can be wrought by human intention. Human intention, made visible and concrete through the instrumentality of design, enables us to create conditions, or artifacts, that facilitate the unfolding of human potential through designed evolution; in contrast to an evolution based on chance and necessity--a highly unpredictable process.

In our struggle to understand an ever more complex reality, we believe the current traditions of inquiry and action do not give us the support we need--as leaders and designers--to meet the emergent challenges that now confront us.

In our attempts to design the world to be what we would like it to be, we find that the traditions at hand cannot fully support that task. Science, art, spirituality, economics, and technology are all important traditions of inquiry. However, these disciplines do not embody the unique specifics of the design tradition, with its corresponding philosophy and praxis. Each of the prevailing traditions has developed a depth of knowledge and insight that is impressive, but it is often focused on a narrow aspect of our human experience; one that is necessary, but not solely sufficient in the management of human affairs.

Design is such a natural human ability; almost everyone is designing most of the time, whether they are conscious of it, or not. Framing our understanding in this way, we will use the concept of design to define, and promote, a new philosophical tradition; a new culture of inquiry and action. That tradition is identified here as: The Design Way--the first tradition. This designerly approach applies to an infinite variety of design domains; including those fields that are traditionally thought of when we consider design: architectural or interior design; industrial design, engineering design, graphic design, urban design, information systems design, software design, fashion design and other forms of physical design. But, our definition also allows us to encompass other design areas: organizational design, social systems design, educational systems design, work place design, and healthcare design. Such a design approach can even be applied to significant social institutions such as the design of democratic constitutions (Sunstein, 2001).

We believe the culture of inquiry and action that infuses design thinking is an essential part of the palette of human traditions. We are not the only ones who think so. Other scholars (Cross, 2001) have investigated the concept of a design tradition. Yet, design has remained surprisingly invisible and unrecognized. This book is an attempt to change this by recognizing design as its own tradition and formulating its fundamental core of ideas. The Design Way does not present a ready-made recipe on how to engage in design. This is not a book about design praxis, which deserves several books of its own. It is not something exclusive to professional designers. It is a way to approach reality that intentionally embraces its vast richness and complexity.

What is presented in this book is a composition of what we believe a broad and deep understanding of design, and designing, as a tradition of inquiry and action, should include. This composition is, in itself, a design. It is our understanding of design, as its own tradition and not merely a variant of science, or art, or technology, or spirituality. It is an effort to build a deeper understanding of design, based on ideas we believe are the necessary ingredients for the release of design’s full potential and promise for generative human agency.

The Design Way is an introduction to many ideas that deserve a book of their own. However, we feel that it is important to present them here as a whole, as part of our composition. We are not proposing a particular theory, or a set of theorems, or axioms. Instead, we have chosen to use foundations, fundamentals and metaphysics as the unifying elements of the book. The foundations are equivalent to the first principles, or causes, of other traditions such as science. The fundamentals are identified as those core concepts of the design approach that can be learned and improved on through practice. The metaphysical issues arise as a consequence of the interaction of the foundations and fundamentals of the design tradition, with one another and with the larger domains of human existence.

Our ultimate goal is to encourage a culture of design; an environment that provides the space and freedom necessary to foster a process that is both powerful and vulnerable at the same time.

In making a case for a design culture, this structure of foundations, fundamentals, and metaphysics best reflects the level of our intention. Over the years, we have found that there are emergent patterns informing the composition of our ideas as a whole. We find that it is possible to make a composition from this tripartite relationship; one that reflects in different ways, what we see as the core of a design approach--a design way.