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We hear it all the time in our industry. Good design relies on empathy. Being able to understand, perceive or feel another person’s feelings facilitates having an insight that generates an innovation.  But why isn’t sympathy part of the design approach?

Sympathy:  the tendency to help others in order to prevent or alleviate their suffering.

An example:  The baby is crying. I don’t know why she is crying, because she can’t tell me. But I’m going to try every trick I know to get her to stop.

So for comparison, empathy is like walking a mile in someone else’s shoes and then, based on that experience, redesigning the shoes.  Sympathy is like calling the guy a taxi so he doesn’t have to walk in the first place.

Sympathy helps fix an immediate problem. Empathy helps provide a permanent solution.

And now for what prompted this post in the first place.

Earlier this week I heard an interview with Maurice Sendak, whom most of us know as the author of Where the Wild Things Are, on Fresh Air. While I am a big fan of NPR, I’m not always into what Fresh Air serves up. But this interview, at various points, stopped me in my tracks.

Terry Gross is interviewing Sendak, now age 83, about the publication of his new book, Bumble-ardy. But the interview takes an interesting and moving turn as Sendak contemplates the recent loss of his partner and, basically, life from the perspective of a guy at the tail end of it.  

Here’s a snippet:

“I have nothing now but praise for my life. I’m not unhappy. I cry a lot because I miss people. They die and I can’t stop them.

They leave me and I love them more. … What I dread is the isolation. … There are so many beautiful things in the world which

I will have to leave when I die, but I’m ready, I’m ready, I’m ready.” 

Upon hearing this, I had a never-before-felt flash of insight into an elderly person’s perspective. The bittersweet joy of aging—or rather, having aged– was so poignant. I knew I was feeling empathy, not sympathy, because in a wee way I felt jealous.  How brilliantly painful a life lived must seem.  I came into work wiping away tears.

Perhaps you have to hear the interview to really understand what was so moving about it.

Here is the whole thing, if you have 20 minutes to spare.

If not, start at 15:30 and listen for a mere one minute and 15 seconds and let me know how or if you are moved.

Do you feel like you’ve walked a bit in his shoes?

Or are you compelled to save him from the “deepest pain and the wondrous feeling of coming into [his] own”?

If you don’t make it all the way to the end of the interview, I’ll tell you the last thing Maurice Sendak says, “Live your life. Live your life. Live your life.”

And if that doesn’t make you well up, let me know if I can ever call you a taxi.

We’ve been fortunate again this year to have a fantastic group of interns at Design Concepts! And this week, we’ll say goodbye to two members of the team – Chris Westphal and Josh Dryden. It’s been wonderful having them here!

Josh will return to the Cleveland Institute of Art for his senior year in the industrial design program. Chris will continue his doctorate in mechanical engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

They have both been invaluable additions to our design teams. In addition to their work on a variety of projects, both Chris and Josh were among those who worked on the “noisy box” project – a sensory stimulation device for children with visual and other impairments.

Thank you, Josh and Chris, for spending your summer with us!

We’ve been fortunate to have lots of visitors this summer. We’ve welcomed two groups from the University of Wisconsin’s College of Engineering Camp Badger outreach program, as well as high school students from around the country participating in the College’s Engineering Summer Program.

While they’re here we introduce them to the kind of work we do, lead them on a tour of the shop, and set them loose on a brainstorming session. These incredibly bright, curious and creative students are excited about design and never cease to amaze us with their fresh take on traditional problems.

Thanks everybody, for taking time to visit!

For quite some time, mankind/womankind (especially American mankind/womankind) has enjoyed the pastime of chasing around an oblong ball and running into each other at high speed.  Yes I’m talking about football, the single greatest sport of all time in my professional computer geek opinion

The biggest problem over the years with football has been that the participants of the game get beaten to a pulp on a regular basis, and the lingering effects of these beatings are still not fully understood.  If you look at the lifespan of former NFL athletes, there are some very scary statistics out there that playing professional football can have grave long-term consequences on the human body (especially the brain).

Over the past few years, football helmet manufacturers have been trying to create better products that protect the precious cargo stored within them, but what is pretty amazing is how slowly the NFL has embraced these new products.  High school and college football players have been flocking to these newer helmets, but the highest level of competition doesn’t have any rules in place for the safety of their helmets.  In fact, they have a contract with only one specific helmet manufacturer (Riddell), and if any player wants to wear a different helmet, they MUST cover up the name of the manufacturer!

Enter the School of Biomedical Engineering and Sciences of Virginia Tech and Wake Forest.  They developed a standardized testing procedure to effectively rate the safety of helmets for how well they can help protect from concussions.  Their study can be found here http://www.sbes.vt.edu/nid.php.

One of the biggest findings was that there is no correlation between price and safety, and that the most popular helmet in the NFL is one of lowest rated!  With the exploding concussions statistics in the NFL, many players are now switching, but it still makes you wonder why the NFL isn’t mandating more safety for their most precious commodity, their players.  They spend countless hours making up new rules about how person A is allowed to hit person B, but they don’t require that either person be wearing safer helmets.

As you look over the list of helmets, I’d like to point out one in particular that was styled and revolutionized right here at Design Concepts, the Schutt DNA:  http://www.design-concepts.com/portfolio/industry/sports-recreation/schutt-dna-football-helmet

(I’ll also point out that it has the best safety/cost ratio… just sayin’)

Design Concepts will be here, there and everywhere July 23 and 24!

First, a team of staff members are continuing the tradition and participating in the annual Scenic Shore 150 bike ride to raise much needed funds for the Wisconsin chapter of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Riders take to their bikes for two-days traveling 150 miles along Wisconsin’s scenic Lake Michigan shoreline while supporting a great cause.

Next, despite the heat, staff members are fighting hills, streams, barbed wire and even flames as they participate in the Tough Mudders competition to raise funds for the Wounded Warrior Project. This isn’t your grandfather’s fundraiser, with an industrial strength obstacle course and insanely rigorous physical challenges. Toss in 95 degree heat, and we’ve got ourselves some really Tough Mudders!

And, finally, we’re sponsoring the Startup Accelerator at Sector 67 here in Madison! The day will be a fascinating “unconference” that brings together lots of talented people to talk about design and entrepreneurship and more.

You can’t miss us this weekend – we’re everywhere!