I quite liked this article today, on design thinking in a hospital setting.

The trauma area at my hospital is similar to thousands of others. When a patient with a gunshot wound or a motor vehicle accident arrives, a bed is prepped, the right supplies are on hand, and up to 20 nurses, respiratory therapists and physicians are ready to spring into action.

There is one difference: The leader of our trauma team now wears an orange vest.

The easy-to-spot garment, called the trauma team leader identification vest, clearly identifies who’s in charge. It’s a simple yet effective innovation created by a nurse after a hectic gunshot trauma simulation, in which a huddle of highly stressed emergency room staff members spoke over one another and there were no clear roles. In particular, no one knew who was leading the trauma code. The orange vest became routine part of emergency care at our hospital earlier this year, and the trauma team reports it has helped clarify who’s in charge and strengthened communication among members.

Really it’s just process-thinking, but at the heart of it, I believe that good design is not just aesthetics but is the consideration of what a Thing is for. Its quiddity, if you will allow me to indulge in one of my favorite words.

I’m trying to learn more about “design thinking” because, unlike process improvement, it seems to encourage people to think from first-principles and to not too caught up with words or other peoples’ models of things.

One of the things that trips up intelligent people on a regular basis is an overreliance on language. If you’re thinking about simply the design of something, of how it’s constructed, you’re more likely to go simple: an orange vest.

As opposed to, say, some sort of verbal cue or a sign or an org chart hidden in some closet somewhere.

Our brains recognize shape and color first, then language and other more subtle forms of visual communication, so an effective communication system will rely on that–the fewer words needed, the more they can be spent on really important things, like the proper dosage of a drug.

I’ve been learning about various process improvement strategies in my day job, and while it’s fascinating to learn about all the different ways men have come up with to classify and describe systems, ultimately most of it is total crap. You don’t need any of their conceptual models to strip away the fluff, break down your system into its necessary parts, and ruthlessly examine what could (and should) change.

What you need to do is break down your ego and all the “reasons” why you won’t do stuff like that. Maybe you feel like you’re too good for that, or you made the system in the first place and don’t want to admit that it’s broken.

Most of the “change management” concepts that I’ve learned are really people management concepts, softening the blows to people’s egos and stroking their pride, making them feel smart and included, to get them on board with your project.

If you can get around all that, you don’t need somebody else’s model to validate your own thinking.

You can look at what you have, and put the orange vest on the team leader.