Competence Development
This page shows my perspective, opinions and development across the five expertise area's that I aim to master in order to become a professional designer.
New Service Blueprints simulates organisation of company
Business Model Canvas helps to evaluate products
Collaborating
Business & Entrepreneurship
For me, this expertise area is all about finding opportunities in innovation and having the right mindset and attitude. Throughout the past year, I have developed a deeper understanding of how designers can bring value not only through creativity but also by strategically navigating markets, identifying niches and opportunities, and understanding the organisation of companies. I have realised that designing a product is only a part of the process, ensuring that it fits into a viable business model and reaches the right audience is equally crucial.
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How I view this expertise area today is in stark contrast to a year ago. In the last year, I have gained a lot of hands-on experience in evaluating user’s and stakeholder’s values with the help of frameworks, mainly through the Design Innovation Methods course. This has allowed me to assess the feasibility and desirability of ideas, before they are launched into the design or development phase. I have learned that asking critical questions early can save a lot of time and resources.
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One thing that hasn’t changed, however, is how this competence enforces me to start working in a professional setting. I feel that Business & Entrepreneurship is the key to working pragmatically and making well-informed decisions that align with real-world needs. It challenges me to think beyond just designing in function or aesthetics, and instead to value collaboration, communication and shared goals, especially when working with other designers or students from different disciplines. Understanding each other’s perspectives, skill sets, shortcomings and ambitions are crucial to deliver worthwhile outcomes, but also vital as learning experiences that help me, and allow me to help others grow.
Creativity & Aesthetics
I see this expertise area as the foundation of industrial design. Being creative enables me to think in new ways, and to integrate new opportunities. Lately, I have started to see creativity more as an continuous process rather than a task with a clear beginning or end. Though I use it exclusively in skills like sketching and ideation, it also influences how I approach problem-solving, collaboration, and technical development. When working in multidisciplinary groups, I often try to find new ways to communicate my ideas, since students from other disciplines may approach problems differently than industrial designers, such as with sketches and low-fidelity prototypes. I have come to realise that creativity is not limited to moments of inspiration, but something that shapes the way I observe, interpret, and respond to the world around me. This has allowed me to be open to experimentation and uncertainties.
I view aesthetics in a very similar way. It is the way we differentiate ourselves from other designers, and where our designs will start to shine from other’s. To give it its own flair, so to say. In the Aesthetics of Interaction course this past year, I described aesthetics as ‘the ability to touch the soul’. Though I have started to get an understanding of aesthetics, I am not yet comfortable with defining my own. I think I need to find it through continuous practice, experimentation and critically reflecting on the choices I make in my designs. I must find what resonates with me. I think I can achieve this through studying other designers’ aesthetics and curating my personal archive, a collection of images, objects, textures, and colours that I can find myself in.
Testing simple electronics
Sketches for multidisciplinary project of automatic cleaning robot
Testing interaction of lo-fi prototype
Testing simple electronics
Temperature and humidity data collector
3D CAD model of Elentia
Data visualised in graphs
Realised design of Elentia
Math, Data & Computing
Compared to Creativity & Aesthetics, this expertise area focuses less on the subjective parts of design, and much more on the objective side. By calculating and predicting values, designers can with precision allow their designs to come to realisation. I see this expertise area, along with Technology & Realisation, as the pillars of engineering within industrial design. They often come together. Without these two areas, design would be very subjective and unreliable.
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Throughout the past year, I have further improved at coding to visualise data and create interactive designs. In the Making Sense of Sensors course, I was able to show correlation between temperature and humidity with heart rate, by building code that could incorporate external data. By combining efforts to code with 3D modelling, I created Elentia, an interactive mediator in professional conversations. Though I find it fun to realise my ideas, I still lack in planning and calculating the construction of designs. I think I have to spend more time testing smaller components, so that when it comes to constructing high-fidelity prototypes, I know how each component will fit. With Elentia, for example, I under-estimated the space and strength that were necessary for the spikes to retract and extend. This forced me to compensate in the visual design of the prototype, making it taller than intended. In the future, I want to spend more time during the testing phase, so I don’t rush the construction phase.
Technology & Realisation
Similar to the previous expertise area, this competence is about engineering and the creation of tangible objects. For me, it is about building skills capable of translating ideas into artefacts, and transforming physical and digital components in the design process. I see Technology & Realisation as the bridge between abstract thinking and physical reality, where concepts are challenged by constraints such as materials, tools, and physics. I enjoy this process as it allows me to think critically and creatively at the same time. I question how I can build something that works as intended, but also looks right, and aligns with its purpose.
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The Sustainability and Design course forced me to rethink how materials are used. When redesigning an automatic card shuffler, I desired to go for a ‘full sustainable’ approach where harmful materials such as plastics aren’t used. I quickly realised that this approach would compromise aspects such as price and durability of the product. Though it is currently not feasible, I want to strive towards a future where responsible material choices are made without sacrificing function, affordability or price. For this reason, I want to invest more time exploring materials. I want to create a prototype that meaningfully integrates digital technology with sustainable or organic materials.
Card shuffler
Evaluation of use phases of card shuffler
User interaction with Body-to-Image
Tape Grass Bike
User & Society
I believe this competence area is what gives industrial design purpose. Without users and stakeholders, we simply would not mind how we design products, which would lead to substandard outcomes. Designing with users and stakeholders in mind ensures that products are not only functional, but also meaningful and impactful. Their input grounds our ideas and helps align our designs with actual needs and behaviours.
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During Project 3 this year, I found that having constant access to user feedback throughout the design process is incredibly helpful. This allowed me to tinker and reiterate on ideas and interactions, which lead to the Body-to-Image design. It is an AI-powered system that translates bodily movement into expressive artwork. Since people have different opinions and perspectives, I had to find a balance between user inputs, which led to a more inclusive and engaging outcome.
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Additionally, I have started this year to get more insight into more-than-human design perspectives. These perspectives culminated into the Tape Grass Bike, a travelling aquarium that supports the life of the tape grass plant. The design raises awareness about its presence in the Dommel river and its role as an invasive species. It taught me a lot about the connections between non-humans and their ecosystems, particularly how each connection has a sense of purpose. I feel the bike is more an artistic creation than a design with purpose. I aim to create designs that allow ecosystems to thrive and become connected to humans, instead of being separated by our differences. For this reason, I want to deepen my understanding of local ecosystems by studying ecological relationships and collaborating with experts in biology or environmental sciences. This will help me design more responsibly and shape impact in multi-species contexts.