Good design, bad design and the Apple problem: Insights from Don Norman

The 88-year-old designer, author of books like The Design of Everyday Things, Emotional Design, Design for a Better World was in India as advisor to BITS Design School, Mumbai, for a three-city tour

Don Norman, known as the father of user experience (UX) design and a former vice president of advanced technology at Apple, tells Veenu Sandhu in a conversation in New Delhi why built-in obsolescence in Apple products is a concern and how the Indian jugaad can be a powerful solution when paired with expert guidance. The 88-year-old designer and author of books like The Design of Everyday Things, Emotional Design, and Design for a Better World was in India as an advisor to BITS Design School, Mumbai, for a three-city tour. Edited excerpts:

You have been an advocate of “human-centred design”, and now your approach is focused on “humanity-centred design”. Could you elaborate?

I helped develop the concept of human-centred design in the 1970s and ’80s, focusing on people’s needs and quality of life, and addressing the right problems. Many people, like engineers and those in business, are great at solving problems, but do they ever ask: “Is this the right problem?” We, as designers, optimise for people. Other fields might optimise for costs or schedules, and those are important, but people are more important.

I was vice president at the Apple Advanced Technology Group, and involved in designing many of its products. But I like to say I design designers, because I’m an educator, mainly through my books.

At one point, I realised my books were making things easier to use and understand, but the world has many problems. I spent a lot of time trying to understand the problems of the world, which are well understood, by the way. So there was nothing I could add. And I tried to understand the solutions to those problems, which are well understood, so I had nothing to add, but nothing was being done.

So, I used other people’s analyses of problems and solutions but put them into my own framework.

To do this, I had to do things. I spent a lot of time trying to understand the history of the world, especially colonialism. I studied economics. I went to a wonderful conference called ‘The Waste Age’ at the Design Museum in London, which made me realise how waste is a major issue.
 

I’m most famous for my book, The Design of Everyday Things. It’s been around for 40 years, and today I am here to tell you that it is wrong. What’s wrong about it? Nothing. I still teach it and believe in all it has to say. What’s wrong is what’s not in the book, which is: How we destroy the environment to manufacture wonderful products that cannot be repaired. Apple hopes that you buy a new phone every two or three years. Because it is so difficult to take apart when it is over, we throw it away. In Ahmedabad, for example, there is a big pile of burning electronic junk.

This has to change. We have to design things differently; those that last longer, are easy to repair and upgrade, and don’t destroy the environment. That’s called the circular economy, but it’s not easy to do because that means changing the way we design, manufacture and sell.

Companies might resist because they make money from selling products, but the shift could be towards providing services instead of products. After all, the phone you hold is not just a phone — it’s a camera, recorder, navigation device, and more. We don’t want to lose that functionality, but we shouldn’t have to replace the phone every few years.

So now, I advocate for what I call “humanity-centred design”, which considers not just our impact upon the environment, but also upon all living things, and upon people’s cultures. We’ve destroyed wonderful cultures, like in India, through the western way of thought. Human-centred design is HCD, and humanity-centred design is HCD-plus. It’s the same principles, but more.

India is a diverse country, both culturally and economically. How can designers account for such vast differences when creating user-friendly products?

Experts understand the problem, but they don’t understand the people. The new philosophy in design is: Let’s not design for people; let’s ask people what they need and help them design it for themselves. Otherwise designers are no better than colonialists, who came to India and said, “We will govern you for you.” 

How does the western design universe view emerging markets like India?

My first visit to India was in the 1990s as vice president of Apple’s Advanced Technology Group, its research arm. There are many Indias. There are very wealthy people, and many parts of India that look just like Europe. Then, of course, there are very many poor people. And a large part of India is agricultural. Western nations, including the US, tend to sell products to the wealthy and westernised, and the only concession they make is to put them in the local language. I am trying to overcome that.

Earlier when I travelled, I loved going to hardware or department stores in different places to see the different tools, and the diverse ways of living. I don’t do that anymore because they all look the same. We have destroyed the differences, and that has destroyed a major part of our lives.

How can India’s long tradition of craftsmanship be integrated with modern design to create meaningful products?

When people ask me, what should Indian designers do, I have a very simple answer: “I am an American, don’t ask me.”

I have been to some design schools that are trying to teach the old way of design, and I think that is wrong because what they are doing is simply recreating the way people lived in the past. I have also talked to a large number of Indian designers who are taking this old way of designing, but putting it in the context for the 21st century. That’s what is needed. And that, right here, is one way of doing it (points to an ornately carved mirror frame in the room) – it’s a traditional design and yet modern.

India is at the forefront of frugal innovation, or ‘jugaad’. What’s your take on this approach, and how can it align with more structured design thinking?

If I understand the concept of ‘jugaad’ properly, then I think in many ways, it is the correct way. Finding your own simple, frugal solution to a problem rather than buying something that will not really fit in the situation is good. In that sense, ‘jugaad’ is the future because the solutions have to come from you. That said, while designers should not be designing for you, they should come in as advisors and educationists to provide the guidance, expert knowledge and resources that work both for the people and the environment – keeping a humanity-centred approach in mind.

On the topic of machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI), how will these impact designers?

As designers, when we turn to AI and machine learning, we must acknowledge that it’s not human. How does it fit into a human-centric approach? Is it a major challenge for designers, or is it just another tool?

Let’s consider this: the challenge isn’t just for designers but for the world as a whole. Let me give you a bit of history. When the Industrial Revolution started in the 1700s in England, it drastically transformed people’s lives. The first major impact was on textile weaving — those who were weavers lost their jobs to machines, and many couldn’t find new ones as they lacked other skills. This scenario illustrates how technology can disrupt lives.

All technology changes how we live and work. I read a great article about AI and life. It argued that what defines humans is our ability to invent technology — tools, weapons, fire, clothing, cooking methods, and utensils — all of which are artificial. Every one of these inventions changed our lives. If we adapt and learn how to use them, they can improve life. But for individuals whose jobs are displaced by technology, it’s challenging.

Take photography as an example. When it was first developed, painters were shocked. They thought, “What’s the point of painting now?” They mainly painted landscapes and portraits, and the camera could do this more accurately. But painters adapted and shifted focus. Today, portraits are more about expressing emotions or capturing something personal. That’s why some people don’t like modern portraits — they say, “That’s not what the person looks like.” But it’s not supposed to; it’s meant to show the person’s impact on the world, much like Picasso's style of painting multiple perspectives of a face in one image.

Now, let’s talk about AI. It’s artificial — it’s not human. And it’s not intelligent — it’s essentially stupid because it doesn’t understand what it’s doing. However, it’s improving rapidly. The AI we use today won’t be the same as what we’ll use five years from now. It will displace jobs. For example, right now, you’re recording this interview. You could feed this recording into an AI system and ask it to summarise it into an 800-word article. It can do that. But will it be as good as what a human can write? Probably not. Still, it can be useful in jump-starting the writing process, especially for those moments when you’re staring at a blank screen.

Many people find AI helpful in getting started, even if the output is completely wrong. It gives them something to work with, which makes it easier to refine. Artists and designers are concerned that AI can draw better than they can. My response is: yes, but drawing isn’t the most important part of design. You need to know what to draw and how to interpret the drawing. Let the AI handle the detailed drawing so you can focus on solving the design problem.

Some designers are already discovering that AI makes them better designers, just as some writers find it makes them better writers. I had a friend send me a long paper, and I didn’t have time to read it, so I asked an AI to summarise it. The AI generated a decent abstract. I sent it to my friend, who said it was good but missed the most important point of the paper. I told him, “That’s okay. You just need to add the key point, and you’ve got a great abstract.” He agreed, finding it helpful.

However, I later thought: maybe the AI missed the most important point because my friend didn’t emphasise it enough in the paper itself. It was a revelation for him too. In this way, AI presents challenges and opportunities. I tell all my students to start using it now because soon, companies will expect you to be proficient in it. It won’t replace you; it will make you a better designer by freeing you from repetitive tasks, allowing you to focus on what only a human can do.

This isn’t limited to design. It’s happening in all fields, even sports. Umpires make errors because they’re human and can’t perceive everything at once. AI is already being used to decide whether a ball is in or out in sports like tennis. This will extend to other sports like cricket and football too. AI will handle certain decisions, but it won’t replace the players or the sport itself.