Apple Inc. - Sir Jonathan Ive
Richard Trajcevski
z3377927
http://www.webni.cz/wp-content/uploads/ive.jpg
Apple, and its designers’
way of creating and thinking not only develops and produces technological
devices, but the process they have taken and continue to take pushes the
boundaries of innovation, really thinking about the way their users will feel-
making their lives better.
From the beginning, Steve
Jobs built products that the thought “the rest of us” would want to
use. Jobs urged “us” to “think different”, and in the process he fundamentally
changed the way we thought about technology.
Jonathan Ive, Jobs’ “spiritual
partner at Apple” also plays a tremendous role in the ‘theme’ and ‘legacy’ that
Apple, Inc. lives by. We're keenly aware that when we develop and make
something and bring it to market that it really does speak to a set of values…
We're very genuinely designing the best products that we can for
people." (Richmond, S, 2012. Jonathan Ive interview: Apple's
design genius is British to the core. The Telegraph, 23 May).
Concept
The creative process begins
with the conceptualisation of an idea or thought. A concept is generally
developed in order to combat a problem, or to satisfy wants and/or needs.
Concepts are formed using research, knowledge, ideas, and influences. Jonathan
Ive’s concepts for his products for Apple, Inc. are based on creating products
to “make life better” for users.
Jonathan Ive is very much
so influenced by German consumer goods
manufacturer Braun, more specifically, Dieter Rams from the 1950s and 1960s.
The success of Apple’s products can be quite strongly attributed to their
incredibly iconic designs. Apple products have amazing design, but
Apple lead designer Jonathan Ive freely admits that he draws heavy inspiration
from his idol Dieter Rams.
Ive talks
about Rams designing “surfaces that were without apology, bold, pure,
perfectly-proportioned, coherent and effortless,” he could equally be
talking about the iPod. “No part appeared to be either hidden or
celebrated, just perfectly considered and completely appropriate in the
hierarchy of the product’s details and features. At a glance, you knew exactly
what it was and exactly how to use it.”
Ive goes
on to say that “what Dieter Rams and his team at Braun did was to
produce hundreds of wonderfully conceived and designed objects: products that
were beautifully made in high volumes and that were broadly accessible”.
Little wonder, then, that the calculator on the iPhone and iPod Touch is so
clearly inspired by Rams’ version for Braun.
Jonathan
Ive is heavily influenced by Dieter Rams, and the way in which he designs, which
is unashamedly obvious in the work Ive has produced for Apple, Inc. Simplicity
seems to be the most predominant theme throughout Ive’s designs, also in Rams’
designs. Ive’s concepts are generally developed and based around principles. As
in all his designs, he follows his ‘Principles of Innovation.’
http://peopleint.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/jonathan-ive-apple.jpg
Schema
Jonathan Ive stood and
continues to stand by many principles and influences he has when designing
products for Apple, Inc. He is a strong believer in having a thirst for
knowledge and understanding – gaining insights and learning’s that will aid in
the solving of a specific problem or to facilitate a new innovation.
Jonathan Ive on Apple's Design Philosophy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOnCRWUsSGA
Keep the focus – Ive limits the number of
projects he works on, so that he can focus his attention on a few projects, revisiting
them, refining designs, iterating concepts in order to exceed expectations and
achieve the highest level of creativity and innovation. In doing so, Ive is
able to solve the most sophisticated problems, focussing on each and every
component, even the smallest, to ensure that the holistic product experience is
nothing but perfection.
Obsess about the details - Ive could be defined by his devotion to detail. As he
acknowledges, “…that fanatical attention to detail and coming across a
problem and being determined to solve it is critically important – that defines
your minute by minute, day by day experience.” [ii] His obsession and
unwillingness to compromise sometimes takes him months, but in the end produces
the most fundamental product.
Look to be wrong – Ive is interested in being wrong. He believes
that his “interest in being wrong” leads to the discovery of something new. The
failures that arise, he sees as mere learning's that come about throughout the
design process. By doing so it enables the exploration and trial of new
ideas without worrying about failing. It’s combining curiousness and optimism –
together leading to invention.
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Iterate and reduce – Ease and simplicity are the
two defining qualities Apple believes in when it comes to use. “Our goal is simple objects, objects that you can’t imagine any
other way. Simplicity is not the absence of clutter. Get it right, and you
become closer and more focused on the object.”[ii] Ive believes that simplicity is the intense focus on
usability and application for the target market. He is also a firm believer
that functionality is as, if not more important than form. The way Ive achieves
this is though iteration – reducing a design element or
problem down to its simplest and essential form.
“We wanted to get rid of
anything other that what was absolutely essential, but you don’t see that
effort. We kept going back to the beginning again and again. Do we need that
part? Can we get it to perform the function of four other parts?” – Jonathan Ive.
Be better, not different – The general consensus is that
being different creates a certain competitive advantage- but sometimes this
isn’t enough. Ive believes that Apple’s philosophy is about being better is
about the user seeing, feeling and believing that the product is in fact
better. “…Most of our competitors are
interested in doing something different, or want to appear new – I think those
are completely wrong goals. A product has to genuinely better. This requires
real discipline, and that’s what drives us – a sincere, genuine appetite to do
something that is better.” Every aspect must satisfy the consumer, from
function, form, and the overall usefulness is what makes something better, not
only aesthetics and arbitrary features. Being better not only differentiates
Apple, but it benefits Apple customers in the long run.
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Work and win as a team – Jonathan Ive doesn’t work
alone, he has his hand picked team of fellow designers. This tight knit team
have been selected due to their focus, commitment and the similarity in their
goals. Although he is head designer at Apple, Inc. “Jonathan never stood on a chair or made any speeches. But if he hadn’t
believed we could do it, we wouldn’t have believed it.”[i] Ive believes in
his team, and supports them, works with them, as opposed to ordering them and
showing dominance. Devotion to and from his team is what makes them so
successful.
Embrace
technology – Instead of hiring more
designers and other employee’s to his team, Jonathan Ive acknowledges that
technology is amazing, it is vast, capable of extraordinary things that
sometimes humans cannot do. He doesn’t replace the design process with
technology, he doesn’t use technology to take shortcuts, he embraces technology
to enhance the design process. He uses prototyping equipment and modelling
software to assist him and his team in experimenting and conveying their ideas.
By using technology, Ive is supplementing his design process, accelerating
modelling processes, testing scenarios, watching, learning and moving forward
to adapt and improve designs.
Stick to
what you’re good at – Ive used to work at a design
firm as a consultant, when eventually he realised that consultancy wasn’t for
him, and that he wished to be at the forefront of the design process. “I
was terrible at running a design business, and I really wanted to just focus on
the craft of design.” (‘Radical Craft’ conference in 2006)
Once Ive figured out what he was
good at and what he wasn’t so good at, he decided that he was most valuable at
Apple, Inc. as a designer and so this is what he set out to do.
“I worked out what I was good at and what I was bad at. It became pretty clear
what I wanted to do. I was really only interested in design. I was neither
interested, or good at building a business.”[iii]
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Keep the
faith – Shortly after Ive joined
Apple, the company simply wasn’t producing anything the deign department was
designing. Designers’ work wasn’t satisfying Apple executives obsessions with
marketing data and information gathered through focus groups. “When I joined Apple the company was in decline. It seemed to
have lost what had once been a very clear sense of identity and purpose. Apple
had started trying to compete to an agenda set by an industry that had never
shared its goals.”[iii]
At this point in time, Steve Jobs
was currently not working for Apple, Inc. although he returned in 1997,
stopping the production of many Apple products and creating countless
redundancies. Over time, Jobs saw Ive’s work and the skills that he possessed
and even though it may have been a hard task, constantly getting criticised and
worked hard, he kept focussed and had faith in his abilities, and soon became
Senior Vice President of Industrial Design at Apple Inc. and his faith in the
fact that Apple was more than just another company trying to make money proved
to be true.
Conceptual
Framework
Apple - Designed by Apple - Intention
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpZmIiIXuZ0
Although
Apple Inc. has an action plan, a strategic outline, a scheme, a system, a
process, every product they have designed and produced has been time consuming,
rigorous and full of countless ‘back to the drawing board’ situations.
"Our Signature" - Apple Inc. Ad
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4KoIvjR8AM
Apple
Inc. and Jonathan Ive’s team of designers begin the design process by thinking
to themselves “What do we want people to feel?” The answer to this is delight, surprise, love, connection.
Apple
considers “how it will make someone feel”
when designing a new product. They want to know the effect that their products
will have on the user. Amongst other methods, Apple, Inc. have beta testers,
who through the iOS Developer Program, who get given prototypes and new products
before they hit the market commercially, so that they can test them first hand
and provide feedback on what they think of the product.
Will it
make life better? Does it deserve to exist? These are two more questions Apple
Inc. and Jonathan Ive and his team ask themselves when designing new products.
Ive must think to himself, “why are we designing this if it doesn’t make life
better; what benefits will the user get; is it worthy of being made?” These are
questions that are asked, and that are tested, they are researched and
justified, validated, and the products that Ive and his team produce, do make life better, and they do deserve to exist, because they do.
A quote
from one of Apple’s very intuitive and creative advertisements, “we spend
a lot of time on a few great things, until every idea we touch enhances each
life it touches.” Ive and his team are constantly spending time
experimenting and elimination ideas. This is a vigorous and lengthy process,
although that’s what is to be expected with anything creative or design
related.
"Objectified' : Jonathan Ive
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUHROAtyGIg
Conceptual
Map
Many aspects of Apple’s product development
process have long been shrouded in mystery. But Apple’s product process has
held a strong fascination for many over the years as it defies long-held
conventions about how it should work for companies as large as it is. While
some of these points have been revealed before, there is much that has been
held close to Apple’s chest, per say.
This is the framework on which every Apple
product development is hung:
I have
decided to demonstrate Jonathan Ive and Apple Inc.’s conceptual map as a series
of steps. The way I have chosen to illustrate the conceptual map is through a
progressive series of graphic illustrations. I have decided to illustrate the
design process by using apples (I know, how cliché) to represent each stage of
the process, beginning with an apple core (conception), with the apple slowly
regenerating with each step, and finally ending as a complete apple
(near-complete), the Apple Inc. logo. I also decided to keep it quite minimalistic, to tie in with the minimalism of Apple designs.
1. Every
product at Apple starts with design – no limitations, no finances considered,
the design department and Jonathan Ive and his team, are the pinnacle of all
apple products.
2. A
start-up is formed – Ive and his team decide on a product and go off on their
own, away from other Apple Inc. departments, so that they are free from any
‘structure’ the company follows.
3. Weekly
review of products - conducted at the beginning of the week. This is done to
ensure that every aspect of the design is covered and to discover any problems
and implement any changes that have arisen.
4. Once a product is done, it is designed, built, tested again.
This is due to the fact that a lot of the time, journalists, etc. pay of
Chinese factory workers to leak prototypes. It is for this reason; Apple
redesigns the products and remanufactures it, explaining the evident
differences from those leaked versions we see, to the final product Apple
officially releases.
5. The
packaging room – a department specifically allocated for the testing of packaging
for new products. At one point before a new iPod had been released there was an
employee who spent hours every day for months simply opening the hundreds of
box prototypes within in order to experience and refine the unboxing process.
6. The launch is controlled
by the “Rules of the Road” – rules of the road refers to the action plan that
is put in place for the product launch. This action plan is significantly
detailed and highly confidential.
Jonathan Ive's commitment to the design process is exactly the reason
why he said "we maybe would have a difference of opinion, but i can say
it' just that way because that's the way we wanted it to be. There's not an
excuse." Ive has four key qualities that make him who he is - a genius in
his own right. Passion, belief, and most importantly, the commitment to strive
for perfection. Ive does not simply design to make money, he designs for the intended
user, he wants to know what they want from his products, he wants to know the
way his products make them feel, he wants to enhance their lives, and it is for
these reasons i truly to admire not only the work that he produces, but the way
in which he produces his work. His methods, his techniques, his passion.
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