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The Power of Design

Want to innovate? Want to forge lasting connections with customers? Want to outflank competitors? Want to grow? The creative and incisive folks featured in our second annual report on the Masters of Design have a lot to teach you.

Mentors to the Masters

Introducing the six-person, all-star jury -- drawn from academia, business, and design -- who helped select this year's masters.

More from the Mentors to the Masters

Design ideas and insights from the six-person, all-star jury -- drawn from academia, business, and design -- who helped select this year's masters.

Taking the Public Pulse on Design

They get it -- even if others don't. That's the message from our new survey.

Strategy by Design

In order to do a better job of developing, communicating, and pursuing a strategy, the head of Ideo says, you need to learn to think like a designer. Here's his five-point plan for how to make the leap.

What P&G Knows About the Power of Design

Your products run for election every day, says Procter & Gamble CEO A.G. Lafley. And good design is critical to winning the campaign.

Designer Approved

Who knows better than a top designer what the best-designed products are? We asked our five Masters of Design winners to share their top picks for home, office, and the road.

Fast Take: Creating a Design-Centric Culture

Few people have had as much experience trying to inculcate design into a traditional corporate culture as Claudia Kotchka, P&G's VP for design innovation and strategy. Here are some of her lessons.

Fast Take: Brian Collins's Brain Candy

Ogilvy & Mather president Bill Gray says "a floating zeitgeist seems to nest" in Brian Collins's department. Here are some ideas that Collins says are currently hovering over his group's ninth-floor offices.

Fast Take: Building Blocks

Joshua Prince-Ramus's approach to designing an innovative building and a collaborative firm.

Fast Take: Spin Cycle

Here's how Chuck Jones is making the case at Whirlpool that design means business.

Fast Take: Bruce Mau's Moonshots

How do you begin tackling big projects that take on messy, undefined problems? Here are Bruce Mau's first three moves for embarking on what he calls "man-on-the-moon missions."

Fast Talk: Apple in Their Eyes

Digital-audio players weren't exactly virgin territory when Apple entered the fray in 2001. But the iPod -- with its sublime design, intuitive usability, and unparalleled cool quotient -- set a new standard by which all other MP3 players would be judged. Four rivals talk about designing their answer to an icon.

Faster Talk: Apple in Their Eyes

Digital-audio players weren't exactly virgin territory when Apple entered the fray in 2001. But the iPod -- with its sublime design, intuitive usability, and unparalleled cool quotient -- set a new standard by which all other MP3 players would be judged. Expanding on the feature that ran in the magazine, six rivals talk about designing their answer to an icon.

The Case for Design

Steelcase Inc. chief James P. Hackett on design as a competitive advantage, the collaborative shift, and coveting the life of a hotel-desk clerk.

Next

Death to the Cubicle!

Want some quiet time? If you work in a cubicle, forget it. Those low walls are great for spontaneous collaboration, but also for spontaneous interruption. Here, a view to something better.

Now Hiring

A CFO is a CFO. But for the growing number of techies who toil at making products and services more user- friendly, job titles are more fungible -- and more confusing. Are these people designers, or engineers?

Top Designers. No Brands

If you've ever shopped at Japanese retailer Muji, you've probably bought products from some of the world's top designers. The fact that you don't know who they are is part of the point.

CEO See-ya!

This month: Jure Sola, CEO of Sanmina-SCI.

How to Act Like a Designer

If you're in any business, you're in the design business. We're all designers now. That's cool, but it's also daunting. How can civilian sales reps and IT geeks incorporate a design sensibility into their work and life? We posed that question to several top designers: How can we be, well, more like them? Here's what they suggested.

...Or Just Look Like One

Admit it: From the day you peered into Daniel Libeskind's oversized spectacles, you've ached to look more like him and his ilk -- you know, "I'm creative and you're not." Here, we've mapped the essential designer fashion strategy, so that anyone -- even Larry in accounting -- can look hip, creative, and somehow more interesting to have at dinner parties.

Rethinking Redesign

Redesigning a beloved product isn't easy -- just ask the team behind New Coke. Any new iteration must retain the essence of the original yet offer a jolt of innovation. We dissected a few recent redesigns to see how they measured up. Our expert rater: Julie Anixter, executive director for brand experience at design consultancy Lipson Alport Glass & Associates.

"USB: Not Just for Your Mouse Anymore"

Thumb drives just not doing it for you anymore? Check out these gizmos designed for a relaxing coffee break -- or a manicure. And you don't even have to leave your desk!

Intelligent Design

You don't have to wear black and read pricey journals to get the latest insider thinking from the design world.

More Intelligent Design

You don't have to wear black and have an MFA, or spring for pricey journals, to get the latest insider thinking from the design world. Here, expanding on the feature in the magazine, are seven smart blogs worth following.

My Dream Home

Like general contractors with a psych degree, the architectural firm called fathom plumbs the depths of your soul to design the house you want. Our writer gets the blueprints of his dreams.

Office Handbook

Chapter 51: Office Design.

"Outside the Box": The Inside Story

Our Debunking Unit takes on the mother of all consultantese: the box, and how to think outside of it.

Playbook

Be Cooler by Design

What you need to know about working with designers.

Every Move You Make

Our new feature traces the key decisions in a leader's career. This month: design mavens and twins George and John Kembel.

Be the Next Jonathan Ive

Design recruiter RitaSue Siegel divulges what companies want in design executives (think Apple), why collaborative is the new cocky, and how the bottom line is as important as blueprints.

CEOs Toe-dip Into Design

What would Herman Miller do?

Improving the Chain Gang

Staying in a drab chain hotel can suck the life out of any traveler. We asked three design professionals their strategies for bringing the surroundings up a notch.

Readers' Choice

It may be hard to quantify the emotional impact of a 30-seconds spot, but that's just what Erik du Plessis sets out to do in The Advertised Mind.

The Corporate Shrink

Can a bad temper be a good motivator? Plus, the tale of the two-faced employee.

More Great Stuff

The Power of Great Design

This month's letter from the editor.

Tracing Our (Grass) Roots

With our November issue, Fast Company will celebrate 10 years of publication. Each month until then, we'll review one of our favorite editions from the first decade.

Feedback

Letters. Updates. Advice.

Brenda's Back. Others Won't Be So Lucky.

A report from the past.