OPTIMISM QUOTIENT

“…there is a sort of innate optimism in all works of the imagination”

This thought, by Bachelard on page 153, is great. The act of imagining is optimistic. The act of problem solving is optimistic.  How can you do any of this if you are not optimistic?

To design and problem solve we need hope. Hope that we can provide innovative and efficient solutions for those who pay us. Hope that we have within us the rich visual memory that we can draw from.

To design and problem solve we need confidence. We need to be confident that our abilities and our methods will produce a design solution that is creative and effective.

How we draw has a huge impact on our optimism. Narrow, opaque drawing promotes pessimistic thinking. Wide open transparent drawing promotes optimistic solutions.

Our clients deserve optimistic solutions from us. Our clients deserve solutions that have hope and confidence.

What if we developed an Optimism Quotient both for our drawings and our designs? What if we developed a common understanding of design optimism. What if we used an Optimism Quotient to discuss and communicate our work? And then what if we used an Optimism Quotient to evaluate our work?

Wouldn’t it be great if, say, a municipal review board did not center their discussion on style and whether it has a gable roof or not. But rather they based their evaluation of appropriateness on how optimistic the building is?

We are starting to develop a series of quotients. We introduced Metaphor Quotient some pages ago. Now let’s add Optimism Quotient.

Who knows. By the time this is all said and done, we will have a set of numerical values which allow a rational and quantifiable design discussion.