Why does design matter? I would invite anyone reading these words to look around them, wherever they are, and ask the question: What is there, in my immediate environment, that’s truly natural? The odds are there will be very little – most aspects will be the result of human intervention. So, in general terms, design is really important in the sense that in all kinds of ways great and small it forms our material world.

Two factors are crucial for the work of any designer. Firstly, the arena in which most design is practised is that of business, where profit is necessary to survive. If designers cannot contribute to the economic viability of a company, there is no reason to employ them. The particular contribution designers can make is to design products, communications, environments and services – and the combination of all or some – into systems that are tangible interfaces connecting companies to their customers. Engineers ensure things work, marketers position goods appropriately, but designers specialise in the detailed interaction between what a company produces and the lives of its users, which is a different matter from the cosmetic function often assigned to it.

The second imperative is that what is designed becomes part of a wider social and economic world – of the home, workplace, school, church, mall, place of entertainment and so on. Only if what is designed is affordable, useful, accessible and pleasurable will it sell and give continuing satisfaction. In other words, I’m suggesting that users ultimately determine what constitutes value and innovation, and a focus on their needs and an emphasis on providing greater and deeper satisfaction to them is the key to sustainable profitability.

To successfully achieve this will require substantial changes from both designers and managers. Designers need to take on board new methodologies enabling them to better understand user needs, both actual and latent, and to comprehend design functions at a strategic and planning level, enabling them to function not as second-rate artists but first-rate business professionals. None of this will be possible, however, unless design in any company – large or small – is effectively managed. Markets do not just exist, I believe, but are created, and the best way to achieve this is by embedding design into all aspects of corporate activities. Understanding, by management of the full complexity of design, how it can best be matched to company needs and most effectively integrated into development processes at all levels is imperative – and the precondition on which all else hinges.