THE Idea

So coming up with an idea for something that solves a problem that has not been done already proved to be more frustrating than we expected. Ideas were flying all over the place but thinking of an actual issue and problem that indeed needs solving proved to be THE HARDEST part ever!! So many ideas were discarded because as soon as we thought of them we would directly contradict them, challenging them to see if they actually serve a purpose or if they can be simply overpassed by a work-around. Our first batch of ideas that we came up with, which were feasible design ideas that we could produce on one hand, on the other, they did not solve a big enough problem and a result didn’t meet our mentors approval. This meant that our first goal had been met. We had failed! So let the learning begin!

 

In the team I have to admit we have had our dark moments where frustration had us down but this group has proved to be more than just a generic group of individuals brought together by an assignment. We have become friends who treat each other with respect and no matter how frustrated we get, we always clear things up and calm each other down, making sure that we are all on the same page and what is being done is for the sake of the project and not our own personal glory.

 

We wanted to be realistic and think of something with a mind-blowingly simple product that we would design to and prototype ourselves down at the Knight’s Park workshop facilities. We were stuck until finally we were stuck no more! Megha had found a problem we could work on solving! The physical pain and mental frustration caused by the carrying of heavy plastic shopping bags seems to us like an issue we can all relate to and that we really don’t have a solution for when we have a lot of shopping. Our survey gave us the insight that indeed there was no real solution to the problem and that people were not aware of products such as this. Yes this product already exists but the materials and design used are not of the upmost appeal to all thus giving us space to come up with something efficient, different, artistic and discrete. We now have a direction and I am finally going to be putting on my green apron and get to some good old-fashioned wood crafting!! Words cannot describe the emotion. Seriously I cannot wait to get my hands dirty!!

 

See you in the workshop!!

 

Yiannis (Johnny) 

Designing a Business Model

We had been told about the moment when we would come to form into groups and put everything we had been taught so far into effect to create an actual product and a business. At first the task sounded much more intimidating than it turned out to be and that fear was soon driven away by our egger excitement to get dirty, fall down, get back up and make this happen! We were soon to be knees deep in muddy brainstorming waters, searching for a tribe of customers to target and a product to serve their unsatisfied needs!

Our thinking process was guided by Corrine Beaumont Lean Tribe Canvas, which helped us to put things in perspective and consider potential loopholes in our model and ways to avoid leaving such holes. The focus on a specific target tribe and coming up with a model that works for that specific tribe was something that we were encouraged to do for if our scope was too big we would not have clear focus on the tribe’s characteristics. Our brand model was to be supported by a story of a persona that would describe our tribe, his problem, the problem-solving product and its UVP. While choosing the appropriate channels of distribution, methods of promotion, production costs and defences against competitors make the challenge even more factual and realistic.

This will challenge our team Work In Progress in coming up with a creative solution for an every-day problem of our chosen tribe. As the future is known to be full of surprises we stay positive that we will come up with an idea that not only we will be passionate about but an idea that will be driven by values of empathy, innovation, creativity and high spirits that will promote a higher purpose and not just another faceless cold product.

We definitely have a lot of work to do and it definitely won’t be easy. I’ve got an adventurous feeling about the future of this group and I feel that there will be a lot more fun than trouble to remember by when this is all gone.

Team Work In Progress:

Megha Agarwal

Hannah Sutherland

Lucas Elvira Linares

And me

Yiannis Avraamides (Johnny)

FRIEZE Art Fair

We had been told about it, encouraged to read about it and we were given a ticket for it to experience it first hand. I had gone there to observe the whole thing with an unfiltered mind and try to appreciate the works of art. Well although I succeeded to a large degree to observe without judgement, I could not completely scratch off some of my beliefs towards what art is and should be. So I shall try and stay impervious to my own views and will not express any anger towards work of art that I believe were of no true artistic aesthetic value.

 

A lot of stuff!! So many galleries from around the world, representing almost twice as many artists and exhibiting all of that information under one roof was indeed something to think about. The way these events function is brought together by a creative group of people and their organisations like Anders Petterson and ArtTactic who came in as a guest lecturer to explain to us how the art market and fairs like Frieze work. The rapid evolution of technology is constantly bringing forward new innovative ways of expressing art through computer online platforms and is a medium that the unknown artist can use but to what extent is that the same with getting direct exposure? And who is to say that the artist will get the exposure that he deserves? To come in direct contact with the artwork and if you are lucky with the artist, creates an ultimate impact which would not be available through other platforms such as online exhibiting. There is a need in the actual contact and effects of the whole engaging experience of standing in front of an incredible piece of art! There is no denying that we have all felt this feeling of admiration before, either in sight of a painting or when experiencing a live musical performance, or when watching a theatrical play or even when staring at a sunset. The direct exposure to all this collective information is an opportunity to both the artist and visitors to be exposed to each other and “acquainted”.

 

Now all of this is nice and dreamy. But what lies beneath the art? Unfortunately the answer is critics. The way things work is not always the best for everyone but in fact the best for the few. Artists know how hard it is to get your art noticed, to get your book published, to get your album listened and above all liked. It seems that in more ways than one the system is not fair to artists that are genuinely talented and more favourable towards cunning almost obnoxious artists who conceptualise art in order to confuse and trick buyers into believing that a pizza box stuck on a wall is art. I mentioned earlier about the impact of online tools and how upcoming artists choose that medium as an option for when setting up an artistic identity either locally or globally. The Internet is an important tool and if used wisely it can spread a single image or pieces of work like wildfire, creating a mass awareness of the artists existence i.e. Banksy. It seems that the artistic success and status revolves more around networking instead of artistic genius, with a few exemptions. One might have thought that the art industry would be about the art… I guess not… So my suggestion to artists, myself included, is to not get stuck in the land of technicalities and make sure that the message you seek to deliver is strong enough that the impact will not be subject to the same form of criticism coming from the few but from the greater public opinion.

 

Now is that Fair, fair?

Food for thought

 

Yiannis (Johnny)

 

Empathy and Bob’s bare feet

Today’s session was about the concept of prototyping and, why is empathy important and what it achieves. To understand your consumers and their needs you need to empathise with their issues, understand what they like, what are the little things that make a difference to them, what’s their story.

 

So in search of that empathizing story that would make our product the most memorable we were grouped up and sent outside on campus to ask people about their shoes. We walked around and asked about 30 students what they look at when buying shoes, what do they like, how many pairs do they buy in a year, how much do they spend on average and other shoe related questions to see how much significance is given on footwear. The insight that we were seeking can be applied to any market for access to insight information on people’s behavioural and emotional attachment to a specific product.

 

Well we met many different people who all valued their shoes differently. Some were obsessed with shoes and specific types of shoes, confessing their actual shoe number, others wear them just to keep their feet safe and don’t really get excited while an other person did not wear shoes at all! We were walking back to class whilst in a mass crowd of moving people coming out of the Kingston Hill Business School I saw him! He was barefoot! And it was definitely not a hot day outside… After my surprise I started to think about this man and began to empathise him. Why was he barefoot? He seemed to have no problem with it, he seemed happy at the time but for some reason I felt that he had been through a lot of stuff. It created scenarios of what was his thought process of walking outside in this weather without any shoes or socks on. So we decided to create and tell our story through the eyes of “Bob” the barefoot dread-haired man. Attaching a persona with real emotions just like yours and mine and transferring those emotions to every one exposed through the image of Bob, it touches us on a personal level that will most likely make it memorable. And indeed it came to be one of the most memorable stories told in class along with Corrine’s cowboy boots story because they created an emotional connection.

 

When it came to the prototyping test and idea generation, the concept behind it was simply “DO!” meaning just think and draw as many ideas as you can and make it any way you can. We were introduced to the concept of when brainstorming it is best at first to just vomit a bunch of ideas, no matter how silly, bad or good. By encouraging such an approach we enable our creative thinking process to start rolling by thinking of all sorts of creatively crazy ideas and though an analysing process of selection the choice of the most suitable and appropriate direction is chosen. We had nothing and we had to create something. This forced us to use our imagination and enabled us to think on our feet and throw away the box to come up with something that looked like the shoe we had envisioned to fit the profile of Bob’s story.  To create something of meaning out of nothing is the nature of being creatively challenged and I was glad to see that in this exercise, my team and I worked together in the most optimal way to achieve our goal. This will be a good example for future reference to remember upon and reflect on the spirit and communication that was exchanged in the group and the methods in which we carried out our task. Until the next creative challenge I wish you all a good night!

 

 

Yiannis (Johnny) 

LEGO?

 

 

Well I wasn’t expecting to go into class this morning and see our lecturer Mark giving out boxes of LEGO and asking us when was the last time we had played with the colourful blocks; clearly he had something up his sleeve. These LEGO boxes were different to the ones I remembered. They had no instructions towards building something specific and were called “LEGO Serious Play” and seemed to serve some sort of educational purpose.

 

 

 

Soon enough Mark introduced the concept behind this special LEGO box. We were to creatively use the block pieces to construct pieces of plastic miniature art that would represent various situations through metaphors. A rather peculiar method of education that I have to say to some created an ambience of uncertainty but I believe it was rather engaging for everyone. The scenarios that were played were both personal and collective whilst we had to work in a group and individually to make our own parts and for a bigger metaphorical picture.  

 

We were engaged through this method to communicate with each other, process information, come up with a concept of metaphors to transfer a meaning whilst being creatively free to express ourselves in any way we wanted to. By working with no conceptually creative limits we were able to en-vision and manifest our creativity through the medium that was presented to us in a fashion that was almost too creative. Something like when an artist is in the zone when painting, or when a musician is in the groove when playing, we were in the now and although thinking was involved, no pre-determined judgemental thinking was present to obstruct us. For a moment and in a rather peculiar way, WE WERE FREE.

 

 

 

I left Mark’s lecture thinking, “ Well that was the easiest morning in class I’ve had since playschool!” thinking of how proud my mother would be if she saw me playing with LEGO’s. But I then laughed at myself and said that this session was one of the smartest ways I have seen anyone engage anyone in an educational activity. It was really useful! The way your brain works when you are searching for metaphors to express a situation and a process, the thinking process of creating structures, projects, activities and then linking them together to reveal the big picture is a rather exciting process. And again the co-operation, communication, understanding and respect amongst the members on the table were of an outstanding level, which made the experience a lot more fun and enjoyable, whilst making the lesson even more memorable.

 

 

 

Yiannis (Johnny) 

Just another philosophic morning

It was a great pleasure to listen to guest Lecturer Vali Lalioti touch upon subjects like the self, introvert’s and extraverts. The things Vali was talking about were not new to me as I do share an interest towards certain types of philosophy and views. The subject of inward reflection towards the self I think in most cases is a common day practice that we all go through and the depth of such self-analysis is determined by how long one can “stare in the mirror”. Going into deeper analysing of such thoughts can get us out of our comfort zone and frustrated quite easily. But this session was nothing like that; far from it actually, it was all good fun and very stimulating!!

 

To me subjects of reflection towards the self, I find quite interesting and look into for my own personal growth and development as a person. The fact that Vali put the whole subject through a business microscope gave the subject an interesting and creative twist. This had sparks in my brain flying, thoughts were jumping in and out saying “I totally agree!” “She’s so right!” “I was just thinking about that yesterday!” “Hey why don’t I do that more?” Seeing someone with a background in science and technology, and a PhD in Computer Sience like Vali, taking on a role of an inspiring motivator, through talking about matters of human behaviour in a linguistic simplicity, was telling me that in the end of the day your academic background does not define you or your career. It’s the knowledge gained from the experiences that we have been actors in, either in our career, life journey of personal development, enlightenment, call it what you like, it depends from what point of view you are looking from. I was always torn between my passion for various forms of creativity, and specifically my passion for music, against the “rational” decision making of having to choose a career path in which would bring me one step closer in building my ivory tower.

 

Vali was talking about the way people work in groups and how when different personalities are put together in a group unbalanced can be caused due to lack of consideration of the other. Each group member should have an equally valued opinion and creative input. Her words were echoes and reflections in my head as they shot me in flashback mode. I was lucky enough to be involved in a very special for me project back home in Cyprus, where the environment was so balanced between the members that brought about an outcome that exceeded our every expectation. My connections made in relation to what Vali was saying and what I had experienced were that firstly there needs to be a driving passion that burns a strong fire in the members will for creating something larger than themselves, something that represents everyone involved, that has a greater meaning. This level of understanding between members puts the project above themselves and in turn, if lucky and depending on how well a person can take constructive criticism, eliminates egoist behavioural mannerisms which only exist to obstruct creativity. So why continue to put our selves in that position and not allow all the creativity and all that could be created by me, you and everyone on the table and come up with the best outcome for the sake of the vision of the project?

 

So bottom line is: be nice, do things that you care for, things you enjoy and are passionate about and look at the big picture.

 

Yiannis (Johnny) 

Οτι κάμεις εν καλό (whatever you accomplish, is good)

Im here for the same reason as you all are, to get a masters degree, you know; that piece of paper that will “mesmerise” my potential future employers. I like to think of it though as more than just a piece of paper and that, the piece of paper is not the whole picture. There is an old saying from where I come from which says, “whatever you accomplish, is good” and what it means is that everything is about experiencing things of a certain or infinite nature. You gain knowledge through experience. And that is what I am here to do, to experience life in another country and its cultures, make connections, to experience my lecturers and my classmates and learn from them, grasp opportunities, get inspired and eventually find my place on this crazy blue marble. 

 

Experiences lead to accomplishments of either an academic, personal or professional nature. I’ve been through a lot of stuff just like all of you and it is through those experiences and accomplishments that we have learned to define who we are. I’ve done this, I’ve seen that, I’ve been here and there; I’m going to do this. We do all this for our own personal reasons whatever they are. But when you seek to accomplish something, I believe that it is important not to just keep your mind on the pot of gold, but to remember to stop and take a look up and appreciate the experience of a rainbow. I am here to learn with an open mind from my experiences and with the hopeful positivity that I will in turn be inspired to set new goals for new experiences that will shape who I am.

 

Thank you all for being part of my experience

 

Yiannis  (Johnny) 

P.s. Sorry it took me so long to upload this..