This is a guest post by Belindar Parmar, CEO of Lady Geek and founder of Little Miss Geek. You can
follow her on Twitter at @belindaparmar
Who on earth would wear one of those?
That's the question I found myself asking after each new wearable product was unveiled at last week's CES. It's a question I suspect many engineers never bother to ask.
I half expected that the Neptune Pine was some kind of hoax. It looked like a lunchbox strapped to the skinny wrist of the booth-babe. I half expected Dom Joly to reveal that this preposterously oversized watch was a sequel his comically oversized cell-phone.
According to its vendor this Android-based watch packed hundreds of features never before seen in a wrist-mounted computer. Their barrage of claims was like a Ronco Veg-o-Matic infomercial ('It slices! It dices!), and just like the kinds of kitchen appliance sold on late night TV, this device is destined to be used once and then forgotten about.
Did the designers stop to consider how their product might be used? How it might fit in with people's lives and add value? Of course not; the whole thing is emblematic of a lack of empathy that pervades the technology industries.
Empathy is the ability to see the world from somebody else's perspective. In order to develop products that customers want to buy the vendors must first attempt to relate to their audience and understand the desires and motivations of their customers.
Unfortunately most technology companies see empathy as a 'soft' and overtly feminine skill that's downgraded compared to the 'hard' skills of engineers. The tech industry traditionally favours individuals who are systemisers -- these are people who are able to work with hierarchies, processes and complex inanimate systems.
These are great skills to have and many of the world's best companies have discovered how to extract the best from this kind of person.
Unfortunately companies dominated by systemisers tend to ignore the human aspect. The end-user does not figure within its circuit schematics and design goals. I've met people for whom the user is an unfortunate and pesky interface problem -- best avoided or left to the marketing types.
Companies have traditionally 'faked' empathy by the use of market-research, focus groups. These establish a sort of feedback loop that rarely informs product development. Systemiser companies tend to use this kind of research to validate and confirm their own thinking. As David Ogilvy once said, companies use market research in the same way that a drunk uses a lamppost -- for support rather than illumination.
A lack of empathy is a hindrance when it comes to designing most technology, but it's a disaster when it comes to wearables, gadgets which are designed to play a constant, active part in our daily lives through interaction with our bodies.
I'm not the first to comment that most wearable tech is ugly and impractical. But would spending more money on designers fix this problem? Probably not, since the companies that are releasing such ill-conceived products lack the kind of empathic culture where good design will prosper. The needs of customers will always be overruled by engineering expediency and ultimately meaningless product cycles.
Take arguably the most high-profile piece of wearable tech launched last year: Google Glass. Google's head-mounted computer can make just about anybody look as if they've been assimilated by The Borg. It is without doubt a masterpiece of engineering but not the sort of thing that can be worn anywhere.
Google's engineers have not thought about the human consequences of wearing technology. How does it make us feel to wear these objects? How will others feel when we are seen wearing these objects? And how do we feel when the device makes us become the centre of unwanted attention?
These fundamental questions are never asked -- or at least the engineers would rather not think about the answers. And the result? Even Google's employees feel awkward wearing it.
The things we wear on our bodies are an extension of ourselves -- a signifier of personality, gender, age, style, background and everything else that makes us who we are. The reason that empathy is often colloquially described as 'putting yourself in someone else's shoes' is because our clothing is more than just some things we buy to cover ourselves up.
Any piece of technology we attach to our bodies has to be
practical. It also has to create an emotional reaction. When
technology companies realise this, wearable tech might just become
wearable.
Parmar's book The Empathy Revolution will be published on May 26th.
Who on earth would wear one of those?
That's the question I found myself asking after each new wearable product was unveiled at last week's CES. It's a question I suspect many engineers never bother to ask.
I half expected that the Neptune Pine was some kind of hoax. It looked like a lunchbox strapped to the skinny wrist of the booth-babe. I half expected Dom Joly to reveal that this preposterously oversized watch was a sequel his comically oversized cell-phone.
According to its vendor this Android-based watch packed hundreds of features never before seen in a wrist-mounted computer. Their barrage of claims was like a Ronco Veg-o-Matic infomercial ('It slices! It dices!), and just like the kinds of kitchen appliance sold on late night TV, this device is destined to be used once and then forgotten about.
Did the designers stop to consider how their product might be used? How it might fit in with people's lives and add value? Of course not; the whole thing is emblematic of a lack of empathy that pervades the technology industries.
Empathy is the ability to see the world from somebody else's perspective. In order to develop products that customers want to buy the vendors must first attempt to relate to their audience and understand the desires and motivations of their customers.
Unfortunately most technology companies see empathy as a 'soft' and overtly feminine skill that's downgraded compared to the 'hard' skills of engineers. The tech industry traditionally favours individuals who are systemisers -- these are people who are able to work with hierarchies, processes and complex inanimate systems.
These are great skills to have and many of the world's best companies have discovered how to extract the best from this kind of person.
Unfortunately companies dominated by systemisers tend to ignore the human aspect. The end-user does not figure within its circuit schematics and design goals. I've met people for whom the user is an unfortunate and pesky interface problem -- best avoided or left to the marketing types.
Companies have traditionally 'faked' empathy by the use of market-research, focus groups. These establish a sort of feedback loop that rarely informs product development. Systemiser companies tend to use this kind of research to validate and confirm their own thinking. As David Ogilvy once said, companies use market research in the same way that a drunk uses a lamppost -- for support rather than illumination.
A lack of empathy is a hindrance when it comes to designing most technology, but it's a disaster when it comes to wearables, gadgets which are designed to play a constant, active part in our daily lives through interaction with our bodies.
I'm not the first to comment that most wearable tech is ugly and impractical. But would spending more money on designers fix this problem? Probably not, since the companies that are releasing such ill-conceived products lack the kind of empathic culture where good design will prosper. The needs of customers will always be overruled by engineering expediency and ultimately meaningless product cycles.
Take arguably the most high-profile piece of wearable tech launched last year: Google Glass. Google's head-mounted computer can make just about anybody look as if they've been assimilated by The Borg. It is without doubt a masterpiece of engineering but not the sort of thing that can be worn anywhere.
Google's engineers have not thought about the human consequences of wearing technology. How does it make us feel to wear these objects? How will others feel when we are seen wearing these objects? And how do we feel when the device makes us become the centre of unwanted attention?
These fundamental questions are never asked -- or at least the engineers would rather not think about the answers. And the result? Even Google's employees feel awkward wearing it.
The things we wear on our bodies are an extension of ourselves -- a signifier of personality, gender, age, style, background and everything else that makes us who we are. The reason that empathy is often colloquially described as 'putting yourself in someone else's shoes' is because our clothing is more than just some things we buy to cover ourselves up.
Parmar's book The Empathy Revolution will be published on May 26th.
