01.01.2006

Commentary

Creative Ranks

Johnathan Ive, Apple's SVP of Design was honored this Friday, December 30, with the title Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) by the queen. Ive is probably most known for rethinking beige boxes that were once the PC standard issue and instead introduced us to organic iMacs and iBooks as well as intelligently minimalist products such as the PowerBook and iPod.

On Thursday, Khoi Vinh of Behavior, announced that he was taking a position as Design Director of New York Times Digital. This is a huge coup for the NYT. Not only does Khoi clearly understand the fundamentals of design (his deft use of grids is enviable), he also knows enough about programming to push the medium.

These two stories brought to mind the advice of a manager and a human resources adviser at one of the tech companies where I once served as a manager.

The company was (or, perhaps, still) known for managers who have little technical abilities and, at times, zero management experience. I worked in a creative group where majority of the designers didn't know what kerning meant let alone understand what a grid is. I was repeatedly chastized by Human Resources and upper management for expecting the design group to have basic design know-how and to have equal proficiency in programming. Worse, they didn't want managers to have any hands-on involvement in design: they flat out wanted managers mostly to be involved in people issues.

Ive and Vinh both reaffirmed for me that my expectations for a creative leader are not unfounded. It's hard to follow, let alone respect, a creative leader who doesn't have hands-on design skills or have first-hand understanding of the technical issues that their designers face. They lack sufficient knowledge to solve problems imaginatively and to push boundaries. Not that I expect every SVP to have a CBE title but I do hope that Ive's and Khoi's abilities and leadership approach become the standard.

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