Missing Link Tech Corp.
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Our Approach
Your product or service is useless if humans don't understand it, cannot operate it, or do not want to use it.

 Advances in technology and in human-centered design practices are working together to change the relationship between designers and users. The first wave of change brought experts from the biological and the social sciences into the design process. Their contributions have included human centered practices such as ergonomics, contextual inquiry and applied ethnography. The evolution of the user/designer relationship is now pointing toward the emergence of a new design space for the 21st century.

The next wave of change is shifting the focus away from domains of expertise and back toward everyday people. In the new design space we can see a participatory approach to the development of a truly human-centered technology.

Changes in the business landscape are pointing to a new design space. The landscape is in a state of turbulence and we are nearing the limits of a technologically-driven and marketing-pushed era. Companies can no longer assume that “if we build it, they will come.” Companies cannot even assume that “if we build it and then market it really well, they will come.” They are smarter now.

Companies are beginning to realize that they need to find ways to get into the hearts and minds of their customers in order to stay in business. The power is shifting from the company to the customer. Ordinary people can have a voice now in the creation of the goods and services that they buy and use. Ordinary people have the ability to say what they think and to demand what they want, when they want it. And they are beginning to speak up.

Changes in the practice of design are pointing to a new design space. The scope of the “user’s” role in design has been getting bigger. Experts from the biological and social sciences have infiltrated to serve the design process, each time enlarging our understanding of the user’s experience.

· Fit to the body was emphasized in the field of ergonomics or human factors in the 1970’s.

· Fit to the mind was seen in the introduction of cognitive ergonomics, leading to new fields such as information design and interaction design in the 1980’s.

· Fit to the social aspects of human behavior came with the advent of applied ethnography and contextual inquiry in the 1990’s.

· Fit to the emotional domain is just now receiving attention, as seen in interest areas such as “affective human factors” in the 2000’s.

· Fit to the dreams and aspirations of the people who will buy and use the goods and services that we design is the next step for the 20XX’s.

 

Fitting to the emotional domain and to the dreams of consumers and users is a challenge. How can you know what someone else is feeling? And how can you know what someone else is dreaming?

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