LISTEN

As humans we have very limited ways to input information to us. Basically we hear, talk, see, feel, taste and smell and through these five senses we process the inputs into various feelings, thoughts, likes, dislikes and emotions. These five senses are our interfaces for interaction with the world through our lives. Now not how well do these senses function but how you process them defines who you are. The processing is dependent on our geography, culture, education and various other contexts.

I believe that brands need to emulate these five input senses and then use a higher processing to create a unique identity. Not just commercial brands, but political and social brands need to emulate these as well. Any company which has a recognized mechanism of hearing, an organized mechanism of speaking to its stakeholders will always be close to them. These lead to what we call a feeling of the pulse of people in the democracy. Citizens or stakeholders will always feel secure when they know whom they can talk to, when they know they will be heard and they will hear back. It indeed is a funny situation when citizens can not see the lead, obviously they wouldn’t know who will hear them or talk to them. In my view Indian government needs just a basic input output processes in place.

Brands do it so well. Brand ambassadors work so well in this context, faceless companies become recognized, you start hearing them. Whenever you can interact with a brand in an intimate manner, it leads to experience. Stakeholders usually are very tolerant towards behaviors as long as interaction is happening. I hope as democracy we in India realize these basic principles of living.

I have introduced a Turkish “Designer on the Road” Cagri in earlier issue. He is going around the world working in various design offices and collecting a huge cultural and professional experience. He is at his second stop in this journey at INDI Design. We intend to follow his journey starting with this issue. We have had Anette Hiltunen  with INDI from SDU, Denmark- helping us put POOL on the iPad.

We are listening, do tell us what you are doing..:)