Designer of 2015 trends

This AIGA article is a pretty interesting read. With the design world constantly changing and the role of a communication designer being redefined almost daily, this article comments of many of these shifts. The role of the designer is no longer to simply create something cool to make a client happy. That may be a small part still, but the scope has increased drastically. The designer of now, or 2015, is a problem solver and a thinker. Shortsightedness and lack of concept are the quickest ways to failure in today's design world.

I found this article to be particularly relevant because when the time came to choose a grad school, the focus on design thinking as a degree program was just beginning to develop. Now, while I chose a different path, one that took me to NYC and not Indianapolis, I think what that school was hitting on is going to be incredibly relevant in the upcoming years. Teaching design thinking rather than design execution is the way to go, and having an intrinsic understanding of what design thinking really is is the only way for a designer to keep themselves from becoming disposable.

The issue of meta-disciplinary designers particularly strikes me. Coming from an architecture background with a packaging minor, I've been labeling myself as MULTI-disciplinary now for a few years, however the term meta-disciplinary was completely new to me. Upon reading what it entails in this article, I was excited to realize that many of my fellow architecture friends had chosen this path by taking anthropology minors. They spent time learning culture traits and understanding people and are now stepping into the real world better equipped to design for a group of people.

I think the designer of 2015 sounds far more interesting that the designer of 15 years ago. While some will not adapt to the new scope of the field, those that do will be able to do more for society than designers ever have before.