How must AIGA adapt for the future?
This year, the country is astir with the belief that
transformational change is needed across many dimensions of
economic and social life. The same conditions—economic turmoil and
the search for optimism and innovation—also beset the future role
and strength of the design profession in the United States and
abroad.
This article reveals the background we are providing to chapter
leaders as we embark on a six-month effort to ascertain the
interests of all members in order to restructure AIGA in time for
its hundredth anniversary, in 2014.
Yet, for our new strategy to be effective, we must make tough
choices. Therefore, this effort is not a request for a wishful
shopping list, but a call to define AIGA's fundamental role in
building a future for you and your profession.
Although AIGA is nearly a century old, one of its strengths has
been to adapt regularly to changes in the profession. Otherwise, it
would still be an exclusive club of white male printers, publishers
and lithographers in midtown New York.
Not only does the organization need to adapt to serving new
design disciplines, what professionals need from a community of
designers is changing as well. Who we serve, what we do, how we
communicate and how an association can support the next generation
have all changed dramatically over the past decade.
Over the next six months, we will engage in a number of
activities to gather the information needed to lead AIGA into the
future:
| January |
Biennial member survey conducted by email/web |
| January through March |
Small but representative roundtable discussions at chapters and
student groups, chaired by chapter and group leaders |
| April |
Spring retreat and meeting of the board of directors to
consider all input, including parallel board recommendations |
| June |
Annual leadership retreat of chapter and community leaders to
build consensus toward new directions |
Garnering thoughtful member input through each of these
mechanisms is critical. The decisions on the future of AIGA will be
based on what we hear from all sources, and made with chapter
representatives at the leadership retreat in June. New directions
will be launched as early as October 1, depending upon the
resources required.
Same mission, new approach
Going into this process, we are working with the following basic
assumptions:
- We are not seeking to change AIGA's mission, which remains
relevant and inclusive: to advance designing as a professional
craft, strategic tool and vital cultural force. What may change
is how we go about pursuing the mission in support of members. Our
immediate goals, in the broadest sense, are to assure relevance,
leadership and opportunity for designers.
- Typically, as members provide feedback, there is a conflict
between a desire for direct, personal membership benefits and more
intangible benefits such as promoting increased respect for the
profession. A clear strategy must prioritize these two options, for
we will always have limited resources.
- As we refine AIGA for the next decade of the 21st century, the
focus should be on those whose association it will become. The
center of gravity of activities must shift from established and
mid-career professionals toward the next generation of
designers.
- In conceiving a new AIGA, the legacy should not dominate, but
neither should it be ignored. AIGA's history and cumulative
experience represent a validation to members who have few
traditions to claim as their own, and also help to give the
profession's voice greater credibility when AIGA advocates for
members' interests. New ideas should appeal to today's, and
tomorrow's, designers, without seeming faddish or fleeting.
- Strategic choices should be made considering the
characteristics, competencies and trends projected for successful
designers in the year
2015, who must be: socially responsible, media agnostic,
culturally diverse, accustomed to co-creation dynamics, etc.
What key strategic choices must we make?
Each of the following choices relates to how AIGA commits its
resources beyond the basic membership function. Choosing among the
alternatives is difficult because in many cases, members may want
it both ways. The difficult choice is precisely what AIGA must make
when it determines how to commit limited resources in response to
member preferences.
These choices are included in the 2009 member survey, which was
sent as an email link to all professional and associate-level
members. If you had to choose, which statement from each set of
options best reflects your position on the direction AIGA should
take? Should AIGA focus on:
- Individual benefits now (e.g., discounts on products and/or
services) OR long-term benefits to the profession and its
future (e.g., raising respect for the value of design, raising the
standards of design)
- Issues that relate to designers within the profession (e.g.,
design standards, design research, design curricula) OR
issues that deal with designers' role in business and society
(e.g., promoting the value of design, leadership, gaining a seat at
the table on broader economic, social and political issues)
- Inspired creativity and beauty as the main criteria in design
excellence OR achievement of business objectives as the main
criterion in design excellence
- Activities that provide immediate results and tangible benefits
to individual members OR activities that build stronger
demand for design and designers in the future
- Advocating design's value to business by emphasizing examples
of great design (artifacts) OR examples that show the
contribution that design thinking has in creating value for
clients
- Allocating resources toward developing: case studies with real
metrics (often hard to find) OR demonstration projects
(requires much greater staff resources)
- Maintaining commitment to (financial and staff) support of
local geographic chapters only OR restructuring to create
(financial and staff) support for groups of like-minded members
(e.g., interaction design, educators, in-house)
- Publishing an annual featuring works from AIGA's juried
competitions OR shifting away from the competitions toward
establishing a member gallery and a weekly online publication, with
commentary on selections by guest curators
- Allowing members to create AIGA published content OR
publishing content that is AIGA edited, curated or juried
- Providing design leadership only in the United States OR
providing design leadership here and internationally
Share your views
We will report the results of the survey later this spring, and
encourage you—whether or not you are currently a member—to share
your thoughts on these choices in the open forum provided
below.
About the Author: Richard Grefé is the executive director of AIGA, the professional association for design. He is generally involved in all of AIGA’s activities, although his major contributions are in strategy, formulating new initiatives to enhance the competitive success of designers and advocating the value of design.