Design and Competitive Advantage in Technology Driven Sectors Dos Puntos The Role of Usability and Aesthetics in Duth IT Companies

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Design and Competitive Advantage in Technology-Driven Sectors: The Role of

Usability and Aesthetics in Dutch IT Companies
G. Gemser a; D. Jacobs a; R. Ten Cate a
a
Faculty of Management and Organization, University of Groningen, The Netherlands
Online Publication Date: 01 December 2006
To cite this Article Gemser, G., Jacobs, D. and Cate, R. Ten(2006)'Design and Competitive Advantage in Technology-Driven Sectors:
The Role of Usability and Aesthetics in Dutch IT Companies',Technology Analysis & Strategic Management,18:5,561 — 580
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Technology Analysis & Strategic Management
Vol. 18, No. 5, 561 –580, December 2006
Design and Competitive Advantage in

Technology-Driven Sectors: The Role of
Usability and Aesthetics in Dutch IT
Companies1
Downloaded By: [Universidad Nacional de Colombia - Free Trial] At: 18:56 10 November 2008
G. GEMSER, D. JACOBS & R. TEN CATE

Faculty of Management and Organization, University of Groningen, The Netherlands
ABSTRACT This exploratory study examines the relationship between design and competitive
advantage in a technology-driven sector. The sector chosen as a research setting is the Dutch
information technology (IT) sector. The research on managerial perceptions of the benefits and costs
of design focused on the design dimensions of usability and aesthetics. Semi-structured interviews
with managers from eight IT companies were conducted to collect empirical data and two feedback
sessions were organized to verify the conclusions drawn. As expected, it was found that design is a
relatively under-utilized strategic tool in the Dutch IT sector. Sensitivity to usability and aesthetics
throughout the NPD process, however, seems necessary considering the tendency towards price
competition in the IT sector as a consequence of overcapacity and standardization of IT technology
and functionality, and an increasingly critical attitude of customers towards the costs of IT. The only
solution to this cost trap would seem to be to add real value.
Introduction
An increasing number of companies are investing in design in order to gain a competitive
edge in the marketplace.2 Design-intensive companies—often defined operationally as
companies with relatively large design budgets—are not only found in industry sectors
where design has traditionally played an important role, such as those of fashion and furniture,
but also in technology-driven industries. In these latter types of industries, technical and/or
functional requirements generally dominate the process of new product development (NPD)
instead of the product dimensions of usability and aesthetics.3 An example of a technology-
driven company that nonetheless invests considerably in design is Apple, which had a huge
commercial success with the stylishly designed iMac computer. Nokia is another example of
a company that not only invests heavily in technology but also in design, and where this
attention to design plays a key role in explaining the company’s success.4
Correspondence Address: Gerda Gemser, Faculty of Management and Organization, University of Groningen,
PO Box 800, 9700 AV Groningen, The Netherlands; Tel: þ31-50-3637085; Fax: þ31-50-3637110.
E-mail: g.gemser@rug.nl
0953-7325 Print=1465-3990 Online/06=050561–20 # 2006 Taylor & Francis

DOI: 10.1080=09537320601019719
562 G. Gemser et al.
Even though design investments in technology-driven industries are increasing, design

is still a relatively under-utilized strategic tool.5 The principal aim of this study is to
provide insight into managerial perceptions of the benefits and costs of design in a tech-
nology-driven sector, and to assess whether the role of design in this sector may increase in
the near future as competition intensifies and technological differentiation may become
more difficult. Managerial perceptions are considered essential, since a company’s man-
agement ultimately determines the extent of design investments. The technology-driven
sector chosen as a research setting is the Dutch information technology (IT) sector.
The discussion about the meaning of design is a confusing one, not in the least because
the term design is used in English to describe a range of design disciplines and professions,
including industrial, graphic and interior design.6 To complicate matters further, the term
design in the IT sector—the empirical setting for this research—is often used to indicate a
broad set of activities in the NPD process, namely those activities taking place between the
specification of requirements and the actual programming and coding. Therefore, it is
necessary to have a clear definition of the term design. However, there are innumerable
ideas of what design actually entails. This apparent lack of uniformity in the definition
of design, even among professional designers, reflects in part the different perspectives
on the function of design, and, with it, the contribution of designers.7 This study concen-
trates particularly on the contribution made by design in two product areas, namely usabil-
ity and aesthetics. In adopting this focus, it is not the intention to suggest that design does
not contribute to other areas such as product functionality, for it often does. However,
since technical and functional requirements often dominate development efforts in tech-
nology-driven sectors rather than usability and aesthetic requirements,8 it was considered
that more insight would be gained by focusing on these last two design dimensions,
particularly as relatively less attention has been paid to them.
The rest of the paper is structured as follows. The second section briefly discusses the
concepts of usability and aesthetics followed by a discussion of the relationship between
design investments and competitive advantage. How the study was organized, which kind
of companies and informants were interviewed, which kind of topics were raised in these
interviews, and how the empirical findings were processed are described in the third
section. The main findings of the field research are discussed in more depth in the
fourth section. This is followed by the fifth and final section, which consists of a short
summary of the paper and some concluding remarks.
Theoretical Framework
Design Dimensions: Aesthetics and Usability
This study investigates the potential benefits of design for companies operating in
technology-driven sectors and in particular the IT sector. As stated earlier in the paper,
the study focuses on the contribution of design in product aspects that relate directly to
the user, that is, aesthetics and usability. These concepts will be defined and discussed
in this section. The discussion focuses mainly on design in an IT context, but other
fields are referred to occasionally in order to clarify the issues.
One of the major contributions of design for the IT sector seems to be improving the
usability of a product. According to Jokela et al.,9 the standard definition of usability,
adopted by an increasing number of practitioners and theorists, is the one provided in
Usability and Aesthetics in Dutch IT Companies 563
ISO standard 9241-11. According to this source, usability is ‘the extent to which a product
can be used by specific users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and
satisfaction in a specified context of use’.10 Sensitivity toward usability and user consider-
ations during the NPD process has also been described as user-centred or human-centred
design.11 Different methods and tools have been developed in the field of software and
information systems that provide guidance in the realization of usability.12 Hohmann,13
for example, identified ten design principles that are assumed to improve usability.
These principles are consistency, meaning that ‘similar parts are expressed in similar
ways’, the use of concrete metaphors, providing feedback, preventing errors, providing
corrective advice, putting the user in control, the use of a simple and natural dialogue,
speaking the users’ language, minimizing user memory load and providing shortcuts for
more experienced users.

Usability has, in general, clear benefits, which in the end may result in better product
and company performance.14 In the field of IT, usability may result, for example, in
reduced training costs, reduced support and service costs, reduced error costs, increased
productivity of users, increased customer satisfaction and increased maintainability.15
These advantages all relate to the user, but the manufacturer also gains through increased
customer satisfaction. However, as acknowledged by, among others, the well-known HCI
researcher Donald Norman,16 ‘wonderful user experience’ is often not sufficient to obtain
competitive advantage, and should, depending upon the context, be supplemented by
excellence in other product areas, such as functionality and aesthetics, but also marketing
and sales efforts, cost structure, and so on.
Usability may not be easy to realize as it is not always aimed at the original function of a
product, and users may learn about possible uses later. In particular, it is often difficult to
assess and predict the potential of new technologies.17 Ciborra18 used different cases to
illustrates how innovative, strategic applications of IT are not fully designed top-down
or introduced in one shot, but are tried out through prototyping and tinkering. Ciborra
further notes that ‘the early days of the Internet, and its predecessor ARPANET, are
also full of bricolage, hacking, improvisations, and serendipity. ARPANET was not
funded and built to be a medium for interpersonal communication; it was intended to
allow scientists to share computing resources at a distance. It was about networked
time-sharing systems; not about Email’.19 In a similar vein, the results of McLaughlin
and Skinner 20 showed that the usability, and utility, of IT systems is not inherent or
fixed but instead emerges as it becomes part of everyday life in particular organizational
settings.
Thus, people may design systems and products that have surprising opportunities for
innovation hidden in them and are unknown to the designers. Consequently, usability
related to these unintentional and later discovered functionalities would have to be
improved sometime in the future.
As well as usability, the paper focuses on the role of aesthetics within technology-driven
sectors. Aesthetic features determine the appearance of a product, giving it a distinctive21
or expressive22 appearance or image. The appearance of a product may be determined by,
for example, the proportion, contours, colours, shape, materials and/or texture of the
product. A product’s appearance may result in a positive experience and may increase
the acceptance of the product by a targeted customer group, as will be explained below.23
Usability and aesthetics are not two conflicting aspects but, instead, can support each
other. Kristensen and Lojacono,24 for example, noted that ‘the appearance of a product
is . . . a way of providing information about use . . . and the peculiarities of the product (e.g.
reliability and costs)’. Based on existing empirical evidence, Norman25 concluded
‘pleasing things work better, are easier to learn, and produce a more harmonious
result’. Finally, Lidwel et al.26 observed that ‘Aesthetic designs look easier to use and
have a higher probability of being used, whether or not they actually are easier to use’.
Thus, while the presumed tensions between aesthetics and usability are often emphasized,
in practice aesthetics may reinforce a product’s ease of use.27
The physical appearance of a product can have different meanings for all of us. Some
forms and colour combinations have, for example, an exotic connotation while others may
give a modern or, in contrast, a more classic appearance. Designers may consciously try to
infuse their designs with a certain meaning in this way. However, customers do not always
understand the message the designer is intending to put across. According to Kazmierc-
zak,28 designers are only successful when they are able to make the intended meaning
‘cross over’ to the receiver. However, it may be just as interesting to learn from uninten-
tional meanings that might provide unforeseen opportunities. In the words of Press and
Cooper,29 an ‘essential task for designers is to understand how people make sense and
meaning of the things they design, and how they create new experiences with them’.
The Relationship between Design and Competitive Advantage

Design may contribute significantly to the competitiveness of companies operating in
technology-driven sectors. Designers are important arbitrators between technology and
the needs and wishes of the user.30 In the words of Harkins,31 designers are ‘humanizing
the . . . technology, bringing meaning to the objects of our age’. From the perspective of
the company, the contribution of design investments may manifest itself in such perform-
ance measures as increased profitability, increased turnover, lower production costs,
higher productivity of users, reduced support and service costs, a higher degree of customer
satisfaction and loyal customers. To what extent does design indeed result in better company
performance? Empirical studies providing hard financial data on the positive relationship
between design and company or product-performance are relatively limited in number.
However, those studies that are available tend to show that investing, particularly substan-
tially, in design has a positive effect on performance.32 There appears to be a complete lack
of empirical research on the role and impact of design on IT products and companies, though
there are a few empirical studies providing indirect evidence of the benefits of investing in
one of the component elements of design, namely usability. Adamson and Shine,33 for
example, provided evidence of the importance of user-friendliness for end-user satisfaction
with IT systems.
It has been argued that technology development and design investments interact with
each other over time. When the underlying technology of a product has levelled out,
this provides room for, or rather necessitates, investments in design for the creation of
differentiation.34 As Yamamoto and Lambert35 stated, ‘In a crowded marketplace faced
with increasing standardization, attention paid to industrial design could be a key to
enhanced sales performance’. Gemser and Leenders36 provided empirical evidence that
in the Dutch instrument industry, where product technology has begun to level out, the
use of professional design expertise to develop pleasing product appearances and increas-
ing product user-friendliness has indeed been a successful strategy for creating differen-
tiation in the market. The type of development where companies increase their attention
Figure 1. Increasing design consciousness as a combination of inside-out and outside-in

developments
to usability and aesthetics as technological differentiation becomes more difficult and

competition increases over time is termed a development ‘from the inside-out’.
As noted by Veryzer and Borja de Mozota,37 the degree to which design is integrated in
the NPD process varies across companies. In some companies, design is ‘treated as almost
an afterthought or something that is ‘applied’ once a product is developed’, while in other
companies design is ‘deeply intertwined with NPD’. According to Ulrich and Eppinger,38
the integration of design within the NPD process is dependent on the type of industry
involved: ‘typically, . . . design is incorporated into the product development process
during the later phases for a technology-driven product. . . . and throughout the entire
product development process for a user-driven product’. As well as the type of industry,
a company’s experience with design also seems to play a role in the degree to which
design is incorporated in the NPD process. For example, in a large-scale empirical research
on design investments by French small and medium-sized companies, both user-driven and
technology-driven, it was found that companies investing regularly in design generally
implement design in an earlier phase of the NPD process than companies investing only
occasionally.39 The development where companies begin exploiting design’s potential to
the full and integrate designers throughout the whole NPD process instead of solely at
the end to gift-wrap a product is characterized as a movement from the outside-in. These
two developments relating to increasing design consciousness are combined in Figure 1.
As illustrated in Figure 1, increasing design consciousness then combines an inside-out
development—with attention first being paid predominately to functionality in NPD
projects and then also to investing in usability and aesthetic aspects—with an outside-in
development—where professional designers are fully integrated in the product-development
process and are not only used for gift-wrapping. Thus, in this research, design consciousness
is defined in terms of sensitivity to usability and aesthetics during the NPD process and in
terms of integration of professional designers in the whole NPD process.
Research Method and Research Setting

This section clarifies the methodology used in this exploratory study of the perceived value
of design investments in a technology-driven sector.
The research setting was the Dutch IT sector. This research focuses only on companies
developing and selling computer software, both customer-specific and mass-produced.
This thus excludes companies producing computer hardware, which is a relatively small
group in the Netherlands.40 Therefore, in the rest of the paper the term ‘IT sector’ only
refers to companies producing software.
There was a boom in the IT sector during the period from 1995 to 2000. From 2001
onwards however, this growth decreased and in 2002, the IT sector even made a negative
contribution to the economic growth of the Netherlands.41 Thus, when interpreting the
empirical results, it should be taken into account that the growth years are over and that
this could have had an effect on the extent to which IT companies were prepared to
invest in innovation and design.
Informants from academia and industry (n ¼ 25) were interviewed in a pilot study. These
informants were academics doing research in a relevant area or managers from IT companies.
There were two main purposes of these open and unstructured interviews. The first was to
obtain a list of names of IT companies that might be worth including in the sample, and, sec-
ondly, to gain more insight into the Dutch IT sector in general and the role of design therein.
The names of the companies obtained from these interviews were divided into two broad cat-
egories: IT companies delivering IT services, and IT companies making IT products. Based
on the findings of the pilot study, the hypothesis was developed that IT companies delivering
IT services would have a lower design consciousness, while those producing IT products
would have a more developed design consciousness. Although the total sample was not con-
structed in a random fashion but was based on the suggestions of the informants interviewed
in the pilot study, the companies selected from each of the two sub-categories (each contain-
ing 12 potential company names) were selected at random. Four companies in each sub-cat-
egory, resulting in a sample size of eight IT companies, were interviewed. The sample
included both relatively large and small-sized companies and companies involved in different
sub-sectors (see Table 1). This diversity is a first indication that the findings are representative
of the Dutch IT sector as a whole. Verification of the findings in a later phase with experts and
informants from the industry (see below) provided support for the belief that the results of the
study were at least representative of the Dutch IT sector as a whole. Since the Dutch IT sector
does not seem to be structurally different to IT sectors in other developed countries, as the
informants interviewed acknowledged, it may be assumed that the findings might also
apply elsewhere, although future research is necessary to confirm this.
The empirical data was collected from responses made by key informants who were
knowledgeable about the issues being researched. The majority of these informants
were senior managers. One or two informants per company (n ¼ 10 in total) were inter-
viewed. The choice for in-depth interviews with senior managers of IT companies and
not for other research methods, such as an examination of products or a review of
design processes, was made because the researchers were particularly interested in the
current and future role of design in IT companies as perceived by senior management,
assuming that it is this senior management who ultimately make the decision whether
to invest or increase investment in design or not.
Two researchers were present at each interview. This not only helped when collecting
the data, but also facilitated data analysis. The interviews took place in the period
January –February 2004 and most were held on the premises of the companies concerned.
The same interview guidelines were used with all the informants. Permission was obtained
to tape-record the interviews and transcribe them later. Although the interviews usually
only lasted for about 90 minutes on average, several person-days were required to
arrange, conduct and analyse each of them.
Table 1. Profile of the interviewed companies
Type of company BIK Code Number of employees Design consciousness
Company 1 7200 500– 1000 Low

Delivers IT services;
develops mainly
customer-specific
software products, aims
at B2B market
Company 2 7222 .1000 Low
develops mainly
customer-specific
at B2B market
Company 3 74204 .1000 Low
Delivers IT services,
adapts existing software
to customer’s wishes,
aims at B2B market
Company 4 7200 250– 500 Low
and, to a limited extent,
develops generic
at B2B market
Company 5 7222 100– 250 Low-Medium
Develops generic
at B2B market
Company 6
Develops generic 7222 1 – 50 Medium
at B2B and B2C market
Company 7 7222 1 – 50 High
Develops websites,
aims at B2B market
Company 8 7222 50 – 100 High
Develops computer
games, aims at B2C
market

Only the first mentioned BIK code is given or the most relevant BIK code. BIK code ¼ Chamber of Commerce
business code.
Interview guidelines were developed with open-ended questions for use in gathering the
required data from the companies. The questions included in the interview guidelines
were derived from earlier studies on the economic impact of design, although they were
adapted to the IT context42 and the results from the pilot study. A pilot study to test the
guidelines was not considered necessary since most of the questions were taken from pre-
vious research and used after some adaptation. In addition, since the interviews were face-
to-face, and conducted by two researchers, it was assumed that any misunderstanding of
the questions could easily be corrected and/or sufficient time could be devoted to any
relevant topic that the informant might raise that was not included in the interview guide-
lines. There are three parts to the interview guidelines. Part 1 contains questions about
general attributes of the company and the interviewee. Part 2 is the most important and
contains general questions about product development and specific questions about
design. Part 2 includes questions about R&D/NPD investments, design investments, the
product development process, the number and educational background of in-house
designers, co-operation between in-house or external designers and other people involved
in product development, and, naturally, the perceived benefits and/or costs of design.43
Part 3 contains questions aimed at exploring the informant’s opinion on the role of
design in a more meso/macroeconomic perspective. The interview guidelines are included
as an appendix to this paper.
The field research yielded mostly qualitative data, that is, data in the form of words. As
noted by Dougherty and Hardy,44 ‘qualitative researchers generally use two approaches to
data analysis: an in-depth analysis to uncover key themes and an analysis of how strongly the
proposed themes feature the data’. The first approach was used here since the researchers
had little a priori knowledge about the role of design in the IT branch and one of the
main aims was to explore relevant issues. As advised by Miles and Huberman,45 the data
analysis process consisted of concurrent flows of activity—data reduction, data display,
and the drawing and verification of conclusions. In order to condense the data, the most rel-
evant facts and statements of the informants and their companies were grouped according to
different topics. Examples of such topics are ‘Definition of design’, ‘Changing role of design
over time’, ‘Innovativeness of the company in general’ and ‘Design investments of the
company’. This clustering made it easier to note regularities and patterns in the data set.
The creation of data displays such as graphs and charts also helped to note patterns.
Two feedback sessions were organized with small groups of managers and experts from
the IT and design sector in the second stage of the research in order to verify the tentative
conclusions emerging from the data. The first feedback session was a normal round-table
discussion, while the second one used a specific setting, with each of the participants
seated in front of a computer on which he or she could type his/her comments. The
main findings of the research were discussed during both sessions, with feedback being
stimulated by asking the participants whether they agreed with specific questions or prop-
ositions such as ‘attention for usability and aesthetics will increase the more technology
and functionality are standardized’; ‘attention to usability and aesthetics is limited in
the IT sector because customers do not see the value added of these product dimensions
and are unwilling to pay for it’; and ‘if those who are responsible for product functionality
are trained in computer science or engineering and those that are responsible for usability
and aesthetics are trained in design fields such as interaction and graphic design, effective
co-operation is often lacking because of different mindsets’. Overall, the participants in
the two feedback sessions supported the empirical findings and conclusions (provided
in the penultimate section of this paper).
Results
Design Consciousness within the IT Sector
As described in the previous section, the companies in the sample were originally
divided into two distinct categories based on their presumed level of design
consciousness: companies delivering IT services versus those making IT products. The

findings from the interviews, however, resulted in a further split of the category of IT
companies making products into two different sub-categories, namely IT companies
developing generic product software and IT companies developing content-driven
product software. This decision was based on the fact that the latter category was far
more design conscious than the first mentioned group. While the latter group includes
companies that focus on both usability and aesthetics during NPD projects and, in
general, use professional designers throughout the entire NPD process to realize these
aspects, the former group, while embracing a more user-friendly approach in NPD pro-
jects, paid little attention to aesthetics and professional designers were often only
included in the latter phases of the NPD process. For this reason, the companies were
divided into three distinct categories rather than two. The attention paid to usability
and aesthetics during the NPD process for each of these three categories is shown in
Figure 2.
A development over time concerning the emphasis management places on functionality
versus usability and/or aesthetics is seen when the design consciousness of the IT
companies in the sample is analysed.
Group 1: Companies producing customer-specific applications

Companies from the first group, consisting of IT companies delivering customer-specific
applications, have until now concentrated mainly on functionality, although gradually they
are paying more attention to usability. However, even though these companies generally
Figure 2. The change in emphasis on design aspects in sampled IT companies

acknowledge the value of usability, this is given low priority because other aspects are
considered to lead to a higher return. In the words of two different managers:
It would increase the quality perception [of our products] if we tackled the issue of
usability in a better fashion. . . . I do acknowledge the importance of design [in terms
of usability] but it is not listed very high on my priority list. . . . Other aspects are
more important in our market . . . the return is higher if I spend my money on
other areas.
It is certainly recognized, also by the company’s management, that that aspect [i.e.
the usability aspect] is something which should be taken into account. Only it is
something that does not belong to the primary working area, it is more a fringe area.
As pointed out by all four managers in this group, most of their customers do not consider
usability and aesthetics important ingredients in the success of IT projects. These custo-
mers attach much more importance to the functionality and the costs of an IT project in
the short term. Customers have little affinity with aspects such as usability and aesthetics,
and seem unwilling to pay for it. This is partly a result of the fact that functionality can be
measured easily, while usability and aesthetics cannot, so that it is easier to sell function-
ality to the customers. To some extent, this is also a result of the fact that the customers, or
at least those deciding which system to buy, have a technical background themselves
(often being engineers) or are managers that are mainly concerned with the short-term
cost aspects.
According to some of our informants, customers need education about the economic
return of investing in usability and aesthetics. This study might be a first step in this edu-
cation process.
In my opinion, customers need to be educated in what they really should be asking

[from IT services companies] and what they could benefit from. . . . We can tell
them, of course, but if customers themselves have insufficient insight and are
unable to see it beforehand and do not have a specific case example or . . . do not
have a feeling that it also applies to them, then they will not ask for it.
Besides there being a traditional engineering culture in many IT service companies (see
also below), and the difficulty of quantifying its impact, explanations for the meagre atten-
tion paid to usability and aesthetics may also be found in the fact that customers generally
only become aware of their usability and aesthetics requirements later on in automation
projects. However, it is recognized that IT projects often fail because of a lack of attention
to aspects that are directly related to the user:
Two-thirds of the IT projects fail. What is the cause? It all is related to people . . .
The human factor, since an end user is involved.
Effectiveness [of the software implementation] is thus low. Because we are not able
to complete the implementation phase in a good way. If you look at the interface side
of the story, the aesthetics, there should be more attention paid to the look and feel
and the ‘eatability’ of software. Thus not putting an emphasis on ‘it is able to do that
and that’ [i.e. on functionality], but on ‘how do I handle the software in a company
situation’. How can you improve that acceptability process?
Besides these factors, the intensified nature of the competitive environment has led to a
buyers’ market. As happens in other sectors with overcapacity, at some stage many com-
petitors start to compete mainly on the basis of price factors and cost instead of thinking
about adding value. This tendency may have been reinforced by dissatisfaction at the cus-
tomer level caused by the high levels of failed IT projects. Consequently, many customers
have started to look very critically at their IT expenditure.
Group 2: Companies producing generic product software

Similar issues emerged when looking at the design consciousness of the second group, that
of companies developing generic product software. Even companies where the
management sees the relevance of usability more clearly have relatively few specialists
employed in this field. Usability is translated strongly as consistency, which in one
company is safeguarded on the basis of a style guide to corporate design and in another
on the basis of a design library. Consistency and attractiveness of the programme make
it more efficient and in this way less expensive for the customer, as was noted by one
manager.
Usability is an aspect considered not only in the NPD phase but also in the implemen-
tation and post-implementation phases. One manager stated that his company strives to
sell software systems that are easy to install, and has adopted a zero migration approach
that makes it much easier for a customer to replace older software by a new version, thus
reducing the total cost of ownership. It was recognized that usability may not only result in
lower costs for the customer but also for the IT manufacturer, since this may lead to
spending less on problem-solving resources at the help desk department:
If you look at the development process by itself, it may definitely cost less [if no
attention is paid to design]. However, if you look at the products in their totality,
thus not only what it costs to make them but also what it costs in terms of customer
service afterwards, then I do not think that it will be much cheaper. You need to look
further than only at how many hours it takes to make it.
The awareness of the value added by aesthetics is increasing among this second sample
group of companies as an increasing number of customers prefer their programs to have
an attractive design.
It [i.e. the software product] has to be quick and efficient, but we also take care that it
looks good. That provides us with a competitive advantage.
It [aesthetics] became an issue since we were considered as the ‘grey screen

supplier’. [Specific software] systems are systems with which one needs to work
in a good and fast fashion. However, the eye wants something too, in particular
when selling these systems. We started to lose more and more deals on that
aspect [of being a grey screen supplier] and we have corrected this in the last 18
months . . . a customer can now [for example] change the look and feel of his
screens as he pleases.
Even though the company of the last informant quoted is now consciously investing in
design, it is apparently still surprised by its success.
We even have a customer (. . .) who is interested in switching [from an old software

system to a new release] just because of the user interface! Nothing more than the
fact of a better user interface (. . .) That is something we never expected. That
customers can even become enthusiastic about these kind of things.
The manager quoted above also emphasized that, while recognizing the importance of
aesthetics, the company only considers it necessary to pay specific attention to it when a
totally new version of a programme is designed. Once this new version is released, the
design is fixed for a few years and no further development as far as aesthetics is concerned
is considered necessary. This means that attention apparently does not have to be paid to
aesthetics continuously as in other industries but can mainly be taken care of in steps.
Once the catching up has been done, it should be possible to hold to the new standard for
some time. This is quite an interesting remark, and one that requires further investigation.
As we discussed previously, the role of design in the IT sector seems to be increasing as
the industry is slowly maturing and some of the underlying technologies and the functions
IT products are able to perform become more and more standardized.
One of the trends in IT is that . . . all kinds of systems will become more standardized
and will be made in such a way that it is relatively easy to replace them and relatively
cheap to buy them from different suppliers, thus companies do not have to spend that
much anymore on IT. . . . But if it becomes a commodity, and if it is cheaper and
easier to construct because of modules, then your competitive advantage will disap-
pear because over time all companies in your market will have the same modules
and technical possibilities, and you cannot compete on those aspects anymore.
Differentiation can then only be obtained by the ‘outer shell’. This will mean that
more attention will have to be paid to image building, feelings, the experiences of
a customer.
In the past we won everything based on the functionality we could offer, and then the
market changed and other things were also taken into account [by the customer].
Total cost of ownership, but also this [user interface and aesthetics]. If functionality
is not important anymore . . . then other aspects become important such as costs to
acquire it, maintenance, and also user friendliness, how it feels, etcetera. Thus,
users’ experiences, yes. As a consequence we have been paying more attention to
these aspects of late, making sure that customer satisfaction is very high.
Group 3: Companies producing content-related IT products

Finally, for the group of companies working in the more content-related fields of IT, such
as web design and video games, aesthetics and usability are the means by which they
differentiate themselves from others. In the area of gaming, it is mainly aesthetics since
the user interface and the technology within this industry are already rather standardized:
‘Where we distinguish ourselves is that we are able to show more visually appealing things
on screen [than competitors], that is the reason why consumers buy it’. Even though the
manager quoted here points out that his company now and in the future will be able to dis-
tinguish itself by means of aesthetics, he also noted that even the visual aspects of video
games may become more and more standardized and that companies thus need to find
other ways to distinguish themselves. The fact that even the use of better aesthetics
may not in itself prove sufficient for continued competitiveness concurs with the findings
of Gemser and Leenders.46
As was found in the second group of companies, there seem to be thresholds and a
relative freezing of aesthetic designs for certain periods. In web design, for example, it
seems the same rules apply as with the design of brands and related house styles –
which are only given a totally new design from time to time. In the gaming industry
also, it appears that companies attempt to develop certain visual styles for their games
and then maintain these styles for a longer period.

Companies in this third group seem more design conscious than software companies.
Comments were made such as ‘We present unique, new design, we are just like fashion
designers’ and ‘On the one hand it [i.e. developing a video game] is just like making a
movie, very creative, but on the other hand it is a very complex software project’. One
manager saw the role of the company in part as raising the design consciousness of the
customer, where the customer, for example, may be one of the companies from the first
group. However, as pointed out by this informant, it is hard to specify beforehand to a cus-
tomer what the benefits are of integrating design in NPD projects while design is often
associated by the customer with extra costs or making things more expensive, so that
they also have to convince the customer that this investment will finally yield a return.
Sometimes, however, they do succeed in convincing customers: ‘Often it is quite a
revelation when they see what we can do for them’.
Co-operation and Educational Background of the Professionals, and the Culture

of the Company
The culture of the IT companies is closely linked with their design consciousness. The IT
companies focusing on client-specific services have a traditional technology-driven
culture, even those companies that employ relatively more IT professionals with a non-
technical educational background. In this context, it was noted that those employees
with a non-technical background adapted themselves relatively quickly to the technol-
ogy-driven culture of these companies. One manager noted that, since their corporate
culture was technology-driven, the dominant view was ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’.
The design-conscious companies belonging to the third, and to a lesser degree, the
second group, on the other hand, have a more user-driven culture, where the dominant
mindset is to develop products in a user-centred way.
The IT companies investigated often do not use their hard core software engineers to
increase the usability and/or look and feel of a product, but instead use employees with
educational backgrounds in such areas as cognitive psychology, anthropology or even
physiotherapy. With the exception of the content-related companies in the sample, the
number of employees with an explicit design background, such as graphic design or inter-
action design, is in general very limited or even non-existent, and employing external
designers occurs either rarely or never.
Co-operation among system analysts and software engineers and the more design-oriented
staff (in-house or subcontracted) is not always a smooth process. In general, the two groups
have very different perspectives, a different mindset, and as such are often unable to
communicate effectively with each other.
Designers often have the tendency to say ‘it should be done in this way because then
the message gets through in the best way, then the user is serviced in the best way’. It
is a rather ‘out-of-the box’ way of looking at a problem. Then they deliver a descrip-
tion to the technicians. These subsequently say ‘but that is not possible in such a
way, that is far too expensive to build or that will result in a system that is far too
slow’. And then you get endless quarrelling between those two parties.
As designer you occupy yourself much more with ‘use’ and ‘how would the user
think about this’. A software programmer is much less interested in this issue.
The designer is the intermediary between the market and the software programmer.
[IT engineers] all have a scientific background; there are relatively few people who
think about what happens with technology from a societal perspective . . . They are
‘freaks’, people with a problem-solving attitude.
The tension is often one between creativity and the technical limitations, either real or
presumed, required to realize this creativity in a cost-effective way. One of the IT companies
sampled started out as a standard design consultancy company with software engineers
only being introduced later on. The founder of this company, having an art background
himself, stated bluntly that whenever his software engineers claimed that something designed
could not be done, he threw them out immediately. His antipathy towards the ‘cannot be done’
attitude of engineers was so intense that he sometimes demanded of customers that there
should be no system engineers participating in the user-oriented phase of the design of the
programs. The other design-driven company in the sample had another approach, however,
noting that whenever there was a conflict between the software engineer and the designer,
the engineer usually won, since the engineer could indicate whether it was possible, also in
terms of costs, while the designer often could not justify his ideas in terms of hard figures.
As our informants acknowledged, to examine how the two mindsets may come together
and how co-operation can be optimized would appear to be an interesting area for research.
Discussion
As recognized by Veryzer and Borja de Mozota,47 even though design can be an important
strategic variable, the topic of design has received relatively limited attention. This paper
is an initial step towards providing insight into managerial perceptions into the costs and
benefits of design in a technology-driven sector. Semi-structured interviews with
managers from eight IT companies were conducted in order to collect empirical data on
managerial perceptions on the role of design.
It was found that the role of design is still limited, in particular in the case of companies
providing customer-specific applications where functionality—generally the responsibility
of system analysts and software engineers—is still predominant. Usability though is
slowly being paid more attention to in the product development projects of these companies.
This is expressed, for example, in more attention being paid to the total cost of ownership of
IT systems. Usability has already gained more attention within IT companies designing
generic product software, and even aesthetics is slowly gaining in importance. In companies’
manufacturing products where the content of IT is predominant, such as video game produ-
cers and website builders, aesthetics is considered to be the main competitive asset, and
designers are used not only for this product area but also for improving usability and
functionality.
The empirical findings indicate that the more IT becomes standardized, the more
companies will have to compete on the real integration of usability and aesthetics in the
NPD process and the integration of professional designers throughout the NPD process.
The empirical findings also indicate that integration within the IT sector may be a punc-
tuated kind of integration,48 with integration coming in stages, and with little development
for a period between these stages. There is an understandable logic here with development
being related to subsequent generations of programs. The findings would suggest,

however, that paying attention to these design aspects is becoming increasingly necessary,
and therefore needs to be more continuous.
The lack of design consciousness on the part of IT service companies, and to a lesser
degree IT companies producing generic IT products, may have resulted or may result in
a loss of competitiveness of these companies. When the crisis in the IT sector in the
past few years is considered, to a large extent caused by customer dissatisfaction
because of failed IT projects, the incorporation of more design dimensions, and the
employment of professional designers, would appear to be necessary and urgent.
Moreover, it may be observed that the more IT technology and functionality is becoming
standardized, the more IT companies will need to find other ways to distinguish them-
selves. At the present time, there is a tendency towards price competition as a consequence
of both overcapacity in the sector and an increasingly critical attitude from the customers
towards the costs of IT as a result of failed projects. The only solution to this cost trap
would seem to be to add real value and in order to add value, it seems necessary to
invest in usability and aesthetics.
The findings show how senior managers of different types of IT companies perceive the
role of design. Professional designers, specialized in usability and/or aesthetics, may thus
use the findings to influence managers of IT companies to involve them throughout the
NPD process. An example here could be that designers should first educate the customers
of the IT manufacturers about the benefits of good design, since the wishes of the customers
have a substantial impact on the tendency of the IT companies to adopt a design-driven
attitude.
Taking into account the small sample size, it is obvious that the results and conclusions
are preliminary and open for discussion and qualification. Indeed, since the research
was exploratory in nature, the results are intended to be a stepping-stone for further
research.
Notes and References

1. Funding from Premsela (the Dutch Design Foundation) and the Association of Dutch Designers (BNO)
is gratefully acknowledged. The authors would like to thank the managers and experts who generously
shared their knowledge of the role of design in the IT sector. The authors are also grateful for the research
assistance provided by Mark Leenders, Rene Spijkerman and Lucie Huiskens.
2. E.g., G. Gemser & M. A. A. M. Leenders, How integrating industrial design impacts on corporate
performance, Journal of Product Innovation Management, 18(1), 2001, pp. 28–38; V. Walsh,
R. Roy, M. Bruce & S. Potter, Winning by Design. Technology, Product Design and International
Competitiveness (Oxford, Blackwell, 1992); Dutch Design Institute (Vormgevingsinstituut) 1994,

Design across Europe. Patterns of Supply and Demand in the European Design Market, research by
AEA London.
3. K. T. Ulrich & S. D. Eppinger, Product Design and Development (Massachusetts, McGraw-Hill, 1995),
pp. 168– 169; see also M. Bruce & B. Morris, Challenges and trends facing the UK design profession,
Technology Analysis and Strategic Management, 8(4), 1996, pp. 407 –423.
4. A. Ainamo & M. Pantzar, Design for the information society: what can we learn from the Nokia
experience? The Design Journal, 3(2), 2000, pp. 15– 26.
5. G. Gemser, Design innovation and value appropriation, PhD Thesis, Rotterdam School of Management,
Erasmus University Rotterdam, 1999.
6. V. Walsh, Design, innovation, and the boundaries of the firm, Research Policy, 25, 1996, pp. 509–529;
see also R. Roy & S. Potter, The commercial impacts of investments in design, Design Studies, 14(2),
1993, pp. 171 –193; Bruce and Morris, op. cit., ref. 3.
7. Walsh op. cit., ref. 6; see also Gemser op. cit., ref. 5; Walsh et al. op. cit., ref. 2.
8. Ulrich and Eppinger, op. cit., ref. 2; R. W. Veryzer, The roles of marketing and industrial design in
discontinuous new product development, Journal of Product Innovation Management, 22(1), 2005,
pp. 22–41.
9. T. Jokela, N. Iivari, J. Matero & M. Karukka, The standard of user-centered design and the standard
definition of usability: analyzing ISO 13407 against ISO 9241-11, in ACM International Conference
Proceedings Series, 46, 2003, pp. 53–60.
10. ISO/IEC9241-14, 1998, Ergonomic requirements for office work with visual display terminals (VDT)s –
Part 14 Menu dialogues, ISO/IEC 9241-14, 1998 (E).
11. E.g., D. A. Norman, Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things (New York, Basic
Books, 2004); R. W. Veryzer & B. Borja de Mozota, The impact of user-oriented design on new
product development: an examination of fundamental relationships, Journal of Product Innovation
Management, 22, 2005, pp. 128– 143; K. Vredenburg, S. Isensee & C. Righi, User-Centred Design:
An Integrated Approach (Upper Saddle River, NJ, Prentice Hall, 2002).
12. E.g., D. Norman & S. Draper, User-Centered Systems Design: New Perspectives on Human-Computer
Interaction (Hillsdale, NJ, Lawrence Erlbaum, 1986); D. Hix and H. R. Hartson,, Developing User
Interfaces: Ensuring Usability through Product and Process (New York, John Wiley and Sons,
1993); J. Nielsen, Usability Engineering (San Diego, Academic Press, Inc., 1993); M. B. Rosson and
J. M. Carroll, Usability Engineering: Scenario-Based Development of Human-Computer Interaction
(San Francisco: Morgan Kaufmann, 2002); Vredenburg et al., op. cit., ref. 11; L. Hohmann, Usability:
happier users mean greater profits, Information Systems Management, Fall, 2003.
13. Hohmann, op. cit., ref. 12, p. 73.
14. Veryzer and Borja de Mozota, op. cit., ref. 11; Hohmann, op. cit, ref. 13.
15. Hohmann, op. cit, ref. 13.
16. D. A. Norman, Do companies fail because the technology is unusable? Interactions, July/August, 2005,
p. 69.
17. J. W. Mullins & D. J. Sutherland, New development in rapidly changing markets: an exploratory study,
Journal of Product Innovation Management, 15(3), 1998, pp. 224–236.
18. C. Ciborra, The Labyrinths of Information (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2002).
19. Ciborra, op. cit., ref. 18, pp. 42–43.
20. J. MCLaughlin & D. Skinner, Developing usability and utility: a comparative study of the users of new
IT, Technology Analysis & Strategic Management, 12(3), 2000, pp. 413–423.
21. C. Lorenz, The Design Dimension (Oxford, Blackwell, 1986).
22. T. Kristensen & G. Lojacono, Commissioning design: evidence from the furniture industry, Technology
Analysis & Strategic Management, 14(1), 2002, pp. 107–121.
23. Aesthetics is not equated with beauty in this paper, as this is a highly subjective matter.
24. Kristensen & Lojacono, op. cit., ref. 22, p. 118.
25. D. A. Norman, Emotion and design: attractive things work better, Interactions Magazine, IX(4), 2002,
p. 38.
26. W. Lidwell, K. Holden & J. Butler, Universal Principles of Design (Gloucester, MA, Rockport, 2003), p. 18.
27. For the assumed tension between usability and aesthetics, see also, e.g., Norman, op. cit., ref. 25, for a
more in-depth analysis of the interaction between usability and aesthetics, and also see the special issue
on beauty, goodness, and usability in Human-Computer Interaction, 19(4), 2004.
28. E. Kazmierczak, Design as meaning making: from making things to the design of thinking, Design
Issues, 2, 2003, p.52.
29. M. Press & R. Cooper, The Design Experience (Aldershot, Ashgate, 2003), p. 32.
30. E.g., T. Conran, Terence Conran on Design (London, Conran Octopus, 1996); Ulrich & Eppinger, op.
cit. ref. 3; Veryzer & Borja de Mozota, op. cit., ref. 11.
31. J. K. Harkins, A means to our ends: 3D CAD tools help to accomplish design goals of the ‘90s’, Design
Management Journal, spring, 1994, p. 80.
32. See, e.g., C. D. Black & M. Baker, Success through design, Design Studies, 8(4), 1987, pp. 207–216; Walsh
et al, op. cit., ref. 2; Gemser & Leenders op. cit., ref. 2; Groupe Bernard Juilhet, French SMEs and Design.
Research by order of the French Ministry of Industry (in French) (Paris, 1995); J. H. Hertenstein, M. B. Platt
& R. W. Veryzer, The impact of industrial design effectiveness on corporate financial performance, Journal
of Product Innovation Management, 22, 2005, pp. 3–21.
33. I. Adamson & J. Shine, Extending the new technology acceptance model to measure the end user
information system satisfaction in a mandatory environment: a bank’s treasury, Technology Analysis

& Strategic Management, 15(4), 2003, pp. 442–455.
34. Ulrich and Eppinger, op. cit., ref. 3.
35. M. Yamamoto and D. R. Lambert, The impact of product aesthetics on the evaluation of industrial
products, Journal of Product Innovation Management, 11, 1994, p. 31
36. Gemser & Leenders, op. cit., Ref. 2.
37. Veryzer & Borja de Mozota, op. cit. ref. 11, p. 130.
38. Ulrich & Eppinger, op. cit., ref. 3, p. 169.
39. Groupe Bernard Juilhet, op. cit., ref. 32.
40. Centraal Bureau voor Statistiek (CBS), (Statistics Netherlands), De Digitale Economie 2003,
(Voorburg/Heerlen, CBS, 2003) (in Dutch).
41. Ibid.
42. Gemser & Leenders, op. cit. ref. 2; S. Potter, R. Roy, C. H. Capon, M. Bruce, V. Walsh & J. Lewis, The
benefits and costs of investment in design: using professional design expertise in product, engineering
and graphics projects (Report of the Design Innovation Group: The Open University/Umist, 1991);
Design Innovation Group, Commercial Impacts of Design (CID) Project, Questionnaire of the Design
Innovation Group (Milton Keynes, The Open University/Umist, 1989).
43. Although specific questions on the contribution or perceived contribution of design towards a company’s
performance were asked, specific questions to assess the financial performance of the companies, in
terms of profit, turnover, return on invest, etc., were not. The research is qualitative in nature and, con-
sidering the small sample size, determining a relationship between the financial performance of the
company and design investments was not considered to be very meaningful. This is also not the
purpose of the exploratory research. Instead, the aim was to gain insight into the perceptions that
senior management of IT companies has with regard to the role of design and company performance.
It is assumed here that these perceptions will ultimately will result in either higher or lower investments
in design.
44. D. Dougherty & C. Hardy, Sustained product innovation in large, mature organizations: overcoming
innovation-to-organization problems, Academy of Management Journal, 39, 1996, pp. 1120–1153.
45. M. B. Miles & A. M. Huberman, Qualitative Data Analysis: an Expanded Sourcebook (Thousand Oaks,
Sage Publications, 1994), pp. 10–12.
46. Gemser & Leenders op. cit., Ref. 1.
47. Veryzer & Borja de Mozota, op. cit. ref. 11, p. 129.
48. Following Stephen Jay Gould, in modern evolutionary theory one talks about ‘punctuated equilibrium’
to emphasize that in most cases evolution happens in short spurts in which species adapt to sudden
changes in the environment, followed by long periods of relative equilibrium.
Appendix
Instructions for the interviewer
No definition of design is to be imposed on the informant beforehand. However, the focus
of the interview should be on the role of the following two design dimensions: usability
and aesthetics.
Part I: General Information about the Company and Informant

1. Name of informant
2. Function, responsible for. . ..

3. His/her background (in terms of education, previous jobs, previous functions)
4. Name of company and location(s)
5. Year of establishment; brief history of company
6. Current number of employees, educational background, structure of the organization
7. Core business, sector(s) in which active
8. Generic or customer-specific services/products?
9. Business-to-business or business-to consumer?
10. What are the causes of your competitive advantage? How do you differentiate
yourself from your competitors?
Part II: NPD and the Role of Design

1. Without any introduction from the interviewer: how do you define design? (Instruction
to the interviewer: after this question has been answered, explain our focus on usability
and aesthetics.)
2. Do you have a separate NPD/R&D department? How many people are employed in an
NPD/R&D function? What is their educational background in general? How is the
department embedded within the organization? What is the annual average R&D/
NPD budget? How much of your turnover is usually spent on NPD/R&D?
3. Who generally initiates NPD? NPD pull from your customers? Or NPD push from your
company? Are NPD processes structured above all from the perspective of the technol-
ogy or that of the prospective customers?
4. Taking the investment in NPD as 100%, how is this investment then normally divided
over the following categories:
a. Pure research to discover new technology
b. Functionality
c. Usability
d. Aesthetics
e. Production methods
f. Marketing/Sales
5. In comparison to other companies, what is the degree of your innovativeness (low,
medium, high)? How many new products/services are usually introduced per year?
6. Do you in general pay structural attention to design (in terms of usability and aes-
thetics) during NPD processes? In what phase of the NPD process, at the beginning,
at the end, throughout the NPD process?
7. Which of the following aspects does your company largely focus on during NPD
processes:
a. Functionality
b. Usability
c. Aesthetics
8. Is design (in terms of usability and aesthetics) an explicitly used strategic tool in your
company:
a. Do you have a design department? Do you employ designers? What is their
educational background? How is the department embedded within the organiz-
ation? What is the average annual design budget? How much of your turnover
is usually spent on design?

b. Do you include the financial figures on design investments in your annual reports
or pay explicit attention to the topic in policy reports? Are you a member of
design-related branch organizations?
c. In approx. how many percent of the NPD processes do you make use of the
services of professional designers (in the sense that these designers are explicitly
trained in the design fields of usability and aesthetics)? Is design (in terms of
usability and aesthetics) used in all NPD processes or only for specific
customers/market segments and/or products/technologies? Please explain your
company’s reasons.
d. Do you subcontract external professional designers? If no, why not? If you do, in
how many of the NPD processes do you subcontract to professional external
designers? In which phase of the NPD process are they normally involved: at
the beginning, at the end, or throughout the NPD process?
e. Who are in general the project leaders of NPD processes? Those responsible for
technology/functionality, those responsible for usability and/or aesthetics, those
responsible for marketing/sales, etc.?
f. If you do not have professional designers in house, nor subcontract to professional
designers, are there other staff, with a different background, who work on the
product dimensions of usability and/or aesthetics during NPD processes? If so,
what is their background (in terms of education, function within the company)?
9. How is the co-operation between those who deal with usability and/or aesthetics and
other people involved within the NPD process? For example, the co-operation between
software engineers and designers? How is this co-operation organized? How can it be
improved? In cases of conflicts between designers and others within the NPD project,
who in general is given the casting vote?
10. How do you assess the contribution of design (in terms of usability and aesthetics) on
the competitive advantage of your company?
a. Does the % of successfully introduced new products on the market increase?
b. Does the life-cycle time of the product increase?
c. Is your turnover higher?
d. Are the production costs lower?
e. Are you able to service more market segments?
f. Does the number of customers increase?
g. Does the product’s functionality increase?
h. Does the product’s usability increase
i. Does the product’s aesthetic appeal increase?

j. Does the image or reputation of your company increase?
k. Does it increase your profitability?
l. Does it improve the price/quality relationship of your products?
m. Does it increase the degree of differentiation with regard to your direct
competitors?
11. Can you give an assessment of how your employees in general perceive the
importance of design for the company’s competitiveness?
12. How much importance do your customers in general attach to the design dimensions
of usability and/or aesthetics when purchasing your products? Are they prepared to
pay extra for these design dimensions? Do they actively engage themselves in
these design areas?

13. Can you give an assessment of the design strategy of your direct competitors? How
much value do they attach to design?
14. Has the role of design changed over time within your company? If so, please explain.
If not, do you think it will change within the near future? Please explain.
Part III: Design and the Meso/Macro Environment

15. Should the national or regional government be involved in actively stimulating design
investments in IT? If so, what kind of policy instruments could be effective?
16. Should branch organizations (of the IT sector and/or the design sector) be involved in
actively stimulating design investments in IT? If so, what kind of policy instruments
could be effective?
17. Is the Netherlands special with regard to the structure/competitiveness of the IT
sector? If so, in what way? Is the Netherlands substantially different to other devel-
oped countries with regard to attention to design (in terms of usability/aesthetics)?
If so, in what way?
Finally
18. What else might be an interesting topic to discuss in the context of this research on
design? Are there important topics that we have not yet covered?
19. What other interesting companies might be included in our sample and why? Can you
name any interesting experts to interview and why these?

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Design and Competitive Advantage in

G. GEMSER, D. JACOBS & R. TEN CATE

0953-7325 Print=1465-3990 Online/06=050561–20 # 2006 Taylor & Francis

Even though design investments in technology-driven industries are increasing, design

more experienced users.

The Relationship between Design and Competitive Advantage

Figure 1. Increasing design consciousness as a combination of inside-out and outside-in

to usability and aesthetics as technological differentiation becomes more difficult and

Research Method and Research Setting

Table 1. Profile of the interviewed companies

Type of company BIK Code Number of employees Design consciousness

Company 1 7200 500– 1000 Low

consciousness: companies delivering IT services versus those making IT products. The

Group 1: Companies producing customer-specific applications

Figure 2. The change in emphasis on design aspects in sampled IT companies

In my opinion, customers need to be educated in what they really should be asking

Group 2: Companies producing generic product software

It [aesthetics] became an issue since we were considered as the ‘grey screen

We even have a customer (. . .) who is interested in switching [from an old software

Group 3: Companies producing content-related IT products

and then maintain these styles for a longer period.

Co-operation and Educational Background of the Professionals, and the Culture

being related to subsequent generations of programs. The findings would suggest,

Notes and References

Competitiveness (Oxford, Blackwell, 1992); Dutch Design Institute (Vormgevingsinstituut) 1994,

information system satisfaction in a mandatory environment: a bank’s treasury, Technology Analysis

Part I: General Information about the Company and Informant

2. Function, responsible for. . ..

Part II: NPD and the Role of Design

is usually spent on design?

i. Does the product’s aesthetic appeal increase?

these design areas?

Part III: Design and the Meso/Macro Environment

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