I wrote last week about work-life balance and the importance of building an identity that comprises both personal and professional value. It really got me thinking about value in a larger sense and how critical our definition of value is in driving the way we create the world.
If you really think about it, our definition of value is THE foundational driver for everything that we do. Very few actions are taken without the expectation of gaining some kind of value in return. It sets up all of our incentives and motivations.
This has huge ramifications because it means that the only way to really change behavior or improve outcomes is to shift the definition of value for a person or society. And if we think about big D design, the kind of design that underlies systemic issues and societal structures, it means that tackling systemic problems within the confines of our current value system is likely a Sisyphean effort. Our existing incentives are what got us here. They can’t also get us out. For example, how do you truly solve climate change and environmental degradation without shifting the perceived value we put on consumerism? Without that kind of shift, we're forced to fall back to solutions - like carbon capture technology - that look to not just paper over root causes but continue to enable them. We design bandaids instead of cures.
This is where the importance of leadership and representation come into play. Take the pandemic (please 😉 ), over the last few months a significant portion of the population has emerged as anti-mask and anti-social distancing because the definition of value that has been molded for them is one that puts individual freedom of choice ahead of collective action. This definition has been created by the actions of those in positions of leadership. When we are in a position to influence, what we say, do, and present directly correlates to what others view as valuable - this is at all scales of influence from presidents to parents.
I saw Neil deGrasse Tyson speak a few years back and he presented the idea that what we put on our money is indicative of what we value as a society. He walked through examples of currencies from around the world adorned with mathematical and scientific equations, and pictures of scientists, inventors, and Nobel prize winners - both men and women, which he then juxtaposed with the US where bills are adorned almost exclusively with white male politicians. It was an impactful enough juxtaposition that it's the only thing I remember from the entire 90-minute talk. Our choices carry weight and the things we take the time to enshrine matter.
It's also apropos that I'd be writing this on the tail end of Black Friday/Cyber Monday as consumerism plays such a deep role in our definition of value.
In the opening of Design for the Real World, Victor Papanek talks about needs, saying:
"The economic, psychological, spiritual, social, technological, and intellectual needs of a human being are usually more difficult and less profitable to satisfy than the carefully engineered and manipulated 'wants' inculcated by fad and fashion ... [and so the] important values of real things has been driven out by phony values of false things."
I've taken up the idea of "Design Like You Mean It" as a sort of daily mantra to keep myself mindful about the decisions I'm making in my work and life (because we are all designers shaping our lives on a daily basis). I think that examining our definitions of value is a critical step in bringing intention to our decisions. What do I value? What do you value? What do we value? And how might our current definition of value be enabling us to move forward or holding us back?
Jesse