Design in 3540 seconds!
It was the summer of 2012. I was in the process of applying for a Masters in Design in visual communications or interaction design.
For these courses, unless you are willing to shell out millions in fees to private institutes, there are broadly only two major examinations in India. First is NID DAT which provides entrance to all the National Institute of Design (NIDs) and second is CEED (common entrance examination for design) which provides entrance to all the Indian Institute of Technology (IITs).
Now NID has a rare combination of ‘National’ and ‘Design’ in its name itself. I mean, what more can you ask? Obviously it is the most known institute for design and synonymous with words like ‘open mind’, ‘free thinking’ and ‘creativity’.
On the other hand, I had developed a bias against the IITs. Firstly, because I didn’t want to be an engineer (while my family did); secondly because almost everyone wants to be there (or is at least expected to want to be there!) and finally, because I had this perception that you have to be a nerd to go there (please don’t judge me for this).
While CEED is one of the major examinations for design in India, ironically not many even know that the institutes under its umbrella even have a design course. The race to get into their engineering courses has mostly overshadowed everything else. (FYI, they even have humanity studies.)
CEED provides an all-India rank of the applicants. Candidates use this rank further to apply at different IITs to initiate their independent entrance process. I scored a not-so-bad 109 rank and started applying to these IITs.
Fast forward a few weeks, it was a Sunday morning. One of the IITs had invited me for its admission process which included a round of written/sketch test followed by an interview. I sat down for the test and started reading the question paper. To my amusement, it said at the top left:
Time Allotted: 3540 seconds!
To add to it further, it turned out to be 59 minutes. I mean fifty effing nine minutes!…not even an hour! This…was deep.
I instantly took a picture of the question paper and posted it on my facebook wall saying:
“Nerdy IITians! Look how they write 59 minutes…(not even 60)”
(again, don’t judge me…yet)
Fast forward a month, I ended up joining the institute. (go on…you may judge me now.)
After a few days in the college, I found out who supervised the admission process. During his lectures he used to say that questions are beautiful, so one day I couldn’t help but ask him why did he choose to write time like that? Why did he mess with my brain?
He replied with a smile, “exactly for this reason!”
That’s it.
It felt like I was in the middle of a Dolly-Zoom scene. Like I knew the answer clearly and yet was craving for more.
“So what does a good teacher do? Create tension — but just the right amount.” -Don Norman
He wanted me to pay attention and he did that in the simplest way possible. In the process, he planted a tension in my mind that still lingers. Often, this ‘tension’ fuels my thoughts and has helped me stay curious. Over time I realized that the true value of design is not always about creating ‘something new’ or something that necessarily looks and feels as if it has been ‘designed’. Rather, its about achieving the purpose/ goal/ intent in the simplest way possible. Perhaps the reason why some of the best designs are the ones that we often interact with but hardly notice.
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