Paper Seminar: Experience Design and the Future of Everything Else

The Paper Seminar series is a perfect opportunity to get up to speed with the entrepreneurship research scene and meet and greet your fellow researchers.

We follow the traditional approach with 30-45 minutes of presentation, followed by comments and discussion.

Paper Abstract

A growing global trend is represented in the fact that today 86% of production within the United States is of so-called “intangibles.” So what are intangibles? Intangibles are generally defined as assets that cannot be seen, touched or physically measured, and are created through time. This touchstone definition is a useful way to begin to think about experience, and in turn, its design – as an intangible. Experience Design is a response to the urgent question: How might design continue to be relevant within what many are calling the I-Cubed (Information, Innovation, Intangible) Economy? A ride on a roller coaster at Disneyland is an intangible that takes place over time, is entertainment and valuable – it was no doubt designed by an interdisciplinary team before we knew to call them “experience designers.” So too health care; it’s also an intangible that takes place over time, gives care and is valuable – but by now health care professionals know to call on experience designers to apply their methodologies such as design thinking, future forecasting, and experience prototyping to improve patient recovery time. Experience Design, in other words, does not end at the limits of art and design, but overflows those borders to include human capital, leadership, research and development, goodwill, innovation, social media, collaboration, organizational ability, intellectual property, systems design, interdisciplinarity, effectiveness, soft power, productivity and new knowledge which have become the real determinants of performance and value in the I-Cubed Economy. And Experience Designers are its change agents.

Biography

Dr. Ronald Jones is the SSES Centre Director at Konstfack. He has an MFA degree from the University of South Carolina, and a Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary Studies from Ohio University. He also holds a Certificate from the Harvard University Graduate School of Education.

After serving nine years as Senior Critic at the School of Art, Yale University, he was appointed Professor of Visual Arts in the School of the Arts, and Director of the Digital Media Lab at Columbia University in New York City. He then served as Provost at Art Center College of Design and became member of the Visiting Faculty at the National Institute of Design in India, and at the Staatliche Hochschule für Bildende Künste, Städelschule Frankfurt, Germany.

Furthermore, he has also served on the faculties of The Royal Danish Academy of Art, Copenhagen, The Rhode Island School of Design, The School of Visual Arts, And The New York, among others.