February 2006

Intelligent About Design

Last summer when I visited my father, I found him using an old garden hose with many holes, one of them near the end where it attached to the faucet on the side of the house. A less tight person might have bought a new hose; a less creative one might have used duct tape to repair it. Dad had stuck the handle of an old frying pan into the ground between the house and the leak so that the water spray hit the pan just right to form an array that watered his petunia bed.

In this issue, we have written about teaching normal people to become crazy designers like my dad. We also offer you a revised magazine design. We hope the latter is not as full of holes as Dad’s garden hose, but we would be pleased if a few ideas leak out to water your own projects.

“Good design must work,” Stanford President John Hennessy reminds us in our story about the University’s new Hasso Plattner Institute of Design, where Business School professors and students argue and create alongside those from other schools. “Great design,” Hennessy adds, “moves me with simplicity, with adaptation to the human mind and body.”

My father’s simple design adapts to his body and mind. At age 85, it’s easier for him to think up a design from what’s close at hand—an old frying pan—than to remember where he put the duct tape. It also takes fewer steps on his bad feet than shopping for a new hose in a big-box hardware store. I can’t say I would trust Dad’s creativity for handling ClassNotes, but he would be a fine adjunct professor in James Patell’s class on Entrepreneurial Design for Extreme Affordability.

For this publication, we sought advice instead from you readers and from magazine professionals. Since nobody was complaining about the design before, our changes are modest updates. Based upon what some of you told us, we’ve decided to boldface names in the front sections, as well as in ClassNotes, so you can scan quickly for those who are familiar. That may not water your petunia bed, but we trust it will keep you nourished between class reunions.

About This Issue

Dean's Column

Letters to the Editor

Kathleen O'Toole
Editor