D3: Design Cube
No process can guarantee a better design, creating a right environment with the right set of people is the only way to bring innovation and design.
Design Cube defines the people, culture and environment aspect which can greatly contribute to build a innovative organization.
People
The growing size and complexity of the software development demand more number of design decision to be made, this involves understanding the business problem, evaluating technical possibilities, designing the solution, converting the solution into technical architecture, and the architecture into implementation, etc. majorities of these design decisions will result in
What to build? - Solution Design
How to build? - Application and Technical Design
How to maintain and scale? - Infrastructure Design
Taking these key design decisions demand, different set of skills, expertise and experience.
However, as Fred Brooks mentioned “deciding on what to build” still remains one of the hardest part of software development.
Our earlier attempt to give this design responsibility to customers, business people and users, has miserably failed, since they failed to recognize technical and aesthetic side of the design. The same way programmer/technical people and UI/Graphics designers have failed to recognize the process innovation, business benefit and ROI.
Even though the customers, users, programmer/technical people and UI/Graphics designers are part of this decision making, D3 defines a “Solution Architect” role to lead and connect these different shareholders and who can provide and visualize the end system by connecting business, technology, aesthetic aspects.
Culture
Building an innovative solutions is a collective effort. Creating a collaborative environment, play an important role in brining different people together. We believe that some of the Agile principles and the values from Extreme Programming (XP) can help you to make this cultural change happen, including
Understanding the importance of each other design areas
Respect for each others skills, expertise and experience
Collaborative decision making
Feedback and Courage
Taking responsibility for the design decisions
Face to face communication
Environment
Apart from people and culture, providing a great environment plays a significant role in brining innovation and design. An ideal environment for Design Cube, should be
Bright
Spacious
Arranged to encourage casual discussions
Equipped with enough white boards
[Sample layout]
