Good design makes good sense
The editor of a national design trade publication recently put forward the opinion that many local authorities aren’t consistent in their approach to design – even going so far as to say that some ‘don’t get’ the discipline’s importance.
Clearly design has always been of great concern to the private sector, which is competing for customers and has traditionally used design to help it stand out from the crowd, create profile, boost sales and ultimately increase profits.
Local authorities have not traditionally had the same drivers.
However, this doesn’t mean that they ‘don’t get’ design or don’t need good design to help them stand out. It just means that heads of communication face a difficult job when making the case for investment in good design during increasingly difficult financial times, when a common perception is ‘Well, that’s pretty – but it’s not important’.
Even though local authorities do not need to use design to compete for customers in quite the same way, it is ever more important that they use design to help their messages stand out. As pressure increases on councils to sell services, such as leisure, the commercial value of design becomes more critical. At the same time it is also an objective which gets harder every day as we attempt to communicate with a public suffering from communications overload. Did you know, for example, that the average person receives a whopping 3,000 advertising messages a day?
So how does good design help?
Good design communicates information and ideas, bad design gets in the way of communicating.
Good design is boundless in this communication – it speaks to everyone, regardless of age, race, gender or nationality, which is of particular importance in today’s multi-cultural society.
Good design speaks volumes about the services you provide. We are all becoming more sophisticated readers of design, with individuals making judgments on the perceived quality of a service, based on its presentation. High quality, consistent design is no substitute for high quality, consistent services, but there is no doubt that a combination of the two produces the best results. Take up of services increases, as does positive perceptions and overall customer satisfaction.
In a nutshell, good design makes sense.