Design Sociology, AI, and the Future of Work with Dr Gary David

Gerry Scullion: [00:00:00] Hey, folks, and welcome back to another episode of This is HCD. My name is Gerry Scullion, and I'm a human-centered service design practitioner based in the beautiful city of Dublin, Ireland. Today on the show, I'm delighted to welcome Dr. Gary David, a design sociologist from Bentley University in America, in the US, and in this conversation, we speak about absolutely everything. Now, I was really interested, and it piqued my interest about design sociology. What does that really mean? He hosts his own podcast called Experience by Design, and he spent 26 years watching workplaces evolve from the every dorm room h- has an ethernet port to, uh, please close your laptops. We get into AI as a hammer in the wrong hands, and why approving an entire stack of medical records with one click might not be the UX win that it looks like, and what designers actually need to do when leadership isn't convinced that their work [00:01:00] matters. We really spoke, uh, at length about that. What does the future of work look like around AI? I know it's a great conversation 'cause I've managed to, be part of it, but it's really suitable, and it's prevalent for the world that we're in at the moment, where we're seeing lots and lots of introductions of AI into organizations. Sometimes it's not the right outcome. It's not the outcome that they've potentially hoped for, and Gary is the person to really talk to about these kind of situations. I know you're gonna love it. Let's jump straight in. Gerry, how do you describe what you do and your experience and where you're from? Um- Yeah ... imagine we just bumped into each other at a dinner party, and they're like, "Hey, this is my mate Gerry." How'd you respond? Dr. Gary David: Well, if I was at a dinner party, I'd probably be standing alone in a corner not talking to anybody- but that would not make for an interesting podcast, [00:02:00] unfortunately, so we'll pretend- Yeah ... I'm social. So the, I, so I have a sociology background, a PhD in sociology, and also a undergraduate degree in psychology, which essentially means nothing other than I took, nine classes or whatever it was. But I was interested in understanding people always, right? What makes people tick? Yeah. That's always been what I've been interested in, and I just found with sociology that I can do that on scale, right? Yeah. Where psychology, the unit of analysis might be an individual- Mm-hmm ... for sociology, the unit of analysis is more than one individual. It could be two people. It could be entire societies. Yeah. So for me, sociology just becomes a handy tool to understand the world around me, whether it be on a small, micro level or a large, macro level or the meso level in between. That's what drew me to sociology originally. Gerry Scullion: It, it's interesting you call it a tool. Dr. Gary David: Yeah. Gerry Scullion: How do you find the tool i- is it something that you have and that's it, or is it something that c- is constantly evolving? Dr. Gary David: I always like to think that [00:03:00] there's, to use a simplification, three kinds of people, those are, who are naturally good at something, those who could be good with additional training and effort, and those who sh- should probably stay the hell away from it. So that's for anything, right? And so, you know, I used to run marathons. I trained a lot. Mm-hmm. No matter how much I trained, I was never gonna be at the front of the Boston Marathon, right? Yeah. It's just not there, but at the same time, I had enough talent to get away with being relatively decent. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: And so I think as a tool, sociology is something that is unique in that we are all sociologists of a sort. Mm. If you're a competent social being, you have to be a sociologist because you have to continually adapt to context and situation- Yeah ... as you move through life. Then sociology becomes about turning what we already know into something that we're aware of, and then also elevating those skills. Gerry Scullion: Of those three different types of people that you said about, you know, staying the [00:04:00] hell away from it- Dr. Gary David: Yeah, yeah ... Gerry Scullion: is there anyone in that category that you think should stay the hell away from sociology? Dr. Gary David: Yeah, I do, actually. I mean, I think that some, for the way I do sociology and the way I think you get closer to human experience and phenomena is by- Mm-hmm engaging directly with people. Yeah. There are those who just c- aren't good at engaging directly with people. I'm teaching a class on right now, ethnography for experience design, and when- Mm-hmm ... you're doing ethnography, engaging in the world, talking with people, being outside of the usability lab, you really have to be flexible. You have to adjust. You have to take things in s- stride. You have to be a bit of a salesperson to get people interested in what you're trying to do. Yeah. So there's a lot of, quote-unquote, people skills involved in being a sociologist. Because especially as a tool, we were trying to do something with it, 'cause ultimately you're engaging with people. Yeah. Dr. Gary David: And any time you engage with people, that's tricky business, which is different than, I'm gonna put out a survey through Qualtrics or SurveyMonkey or something like that, and then just, [00:05:00] wait for the results to roll in. Yeah. That's a skill too, I'm not diminishing it, but it's a different skill set than having to go out and engage- Gerry Scullion: Absolutely with people. And converse, and- Right ... you know, e- explain to people and interact with people. So can we just go back to that, that third segment, if you want? I- is it fair to say then that transfers to design as well, like in design research in particular? Uh, is there a, a segment that you believe maybe is best not suited to practice? Dr. Gary David: Not necessarily. I think, you have to take design as a process, and at there's various points along the way of that process, there's plenty- Mm ... of jobs for everyone to do, right? Yeah. We just talked about, coding. I don't know what I'm doing. You know, I- Mm ... I would love to have an engineer work with me. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: It doesn't mean that I want the engineer to go out doing other stuff, where another person, I mean, that the very nature of a corporation is to have people who have specialized skill sets that are working [00:06:00] together in some coordinated way to achieve some kind of outcome. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: This is like we have creatives trying to do their own operations. Walt Disney needed Roy Disney, Steve Jobs needed Steve Wozniak. So you, you need the right people for the right job, and luckily in the design process, there are enough slots for different kinds of people- Absolutely ... to engage and work together, and I think that's where the key part of it, work together- Absolutely to achieve an outcome. Gerry Scullion: Now, before we, we started recording, we were talking a little bit more around people from different perspectives. Mm. Um, it could be political leanings, it could be belief systems that really can hinder conversations and relationships to blossom. I come from Ireland, and, you know, there's, there has been a, a period of our history we refer to as the Troubles that really- Right brought peace to the island of Ireland. And it's not perfect, but it's, it works at the moment and, uh, has worked for the last 25 years. [00:07:00] I'd love to get your understanding, 'cause America's in a, a, a kind of a sticky situation at the moment, and we were... I, I was conversing with a few different practitioners, and they were talking about how difficult it would be go to, to go to America and maybe start working alongside people who think very, very differently to how they see the world at the moment. As a sociologist, I'd love to get your perspective on that, on how you can actually prepare for working with known knowns and people who maybe think radically different to how you see the world. Dr. Gary David: Yeah, I think one of the key things to think about is what are deal breakers in terms of the divergence of opinion or thought or ideology. Mm. So take for instance, there's a whole subsegment of folks who might say something like, "Empathy is overrated." You know- Yeah ... empathy is a weakness, this kind of toxic masculinity on the internet that empathy is a bad thing. Well, [00:08:00] okay. Yeah. Like, that's kind of a non-starter since it's a foundational aspect of what it is we do. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, "Oh, empathy is weakness." Well, all right, I guess we really can't do a whole lot more, can we? So you take it, like, at that extreme, and then you move into, well, I mean, what's the difference of opinion? What's the deal breaker? One of the things that I did was I looked at software development teams around the world, and we looked at not just... When mo- people usually do that kind of work, they're like, "Well, how are the Indians different than the Americans?" I even did it in Ireland, right? The Irish are different than the Americans and the Indians. Well, if you start from a foundation of difference, you can find differences. Mm. Okay, let's flip that. What do we have in common? Can we create a situation in which the salience of shared identity becomes more elevated? And so I engaged in a number of exercises that were based in sociology around how can we surface the things we hold in common so that we can align around those things and not focus [00:09:00] on the social distance that exists. And it's what's, what I call a pronoun progression, going from us and them orientation to a you and I orientation. Yeah, the Irish I don't like, but Gerry, he's all right. He's one of the good ones. Oh, thanks. To... Yeah, you're welcome. To the we orientation, which is we have a lot in common despite these other things. So can you find that alignment around something shared and- Is there a deal breaker that if somebody is against empathy, well, I can't- Yeah ... I can't really work with you. Or if they have some prejudicial attitudes or something that doesn't work, if they were completely anti- Gerry Scullion: Yeah ... Dr. Gary David: you know, Irish, well, I mean, there's not much I can do there. Gerry Scullion: O- one of the theories around this is you just don't go to the areas where you know that there's gonna be, uh, you know, a large difference. Right. I'm not entirely sure if that's the right approach. H- how do you work towards setting those boundaries at the start of those kind of [00:10:00] relationships, in your opinion? Dr. Gary David: Well, you know, I, I think about Anthony Bourdain, right? Gerry Scullion: Mm-hmm. Dr. Gary David: The, the great Anthony Bourdain- Yeah ... who would travel around to places that, you know, had different opinions than him- Yeah ... and would engage with them directly around a shared experience, right, which is eating. Mm-hmm. Eating is a foundational human experience- Yeah that brings people together. It's the reason why we call it breaking bread together, right? The Last Supper. The act of eating together s- figures prominently in human history. Yeah. So all right, we can go to that level. Now again, if somebody's against my existence- Gerry Scullion: Mm-hmm Dr. Gary David: I can try to humanize them, humanize myself to them, and people try it all the time. I can try to find commonality and bridge gaps, or I can just say, you know, "Screw you." Like, why is it my job to convince you that I'm human? Yeah. And so I, I think it... You know, I don't wanna be evasive, but it does depend on the context and the severity. Real quick, you know, United States for Black [00:11:00] Americans, there's a thing called the Green Book, which would indicate to Black American families or individuals traveling to the United States where you could stay, where you could go, where you should avoid, right? Yeah. And so, like, once again, are, is it your job to go into a place that doesn't like me and convince them that they should, or should I just maybe choose my friends more wisely? Oh, versus work, and this is why I study work, which is if we're thrown together, now how do we build workplace communities around shared elements and see that we're all in this kind of together? Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: Looking at situations and contexts that draw people into a shared, with a shared identity and a group relationship in mind so that we can work together collaboratively to achieve some goal. Gerry Scullion: Y- your expertise and your focus within Bentley, uh, where you're working in the States is in the design sphere, experience design. Mm-hmm. You've got a, a faculty there. What do you see as [00:12:00] being the biggest challenges for designers when they're going into organizations that maybe don't really understand or accept the strategic nature of design? Yeah. What advice do you give to people in that space? Dr. Gary David: It de- I would say, again, it depends on what kind of design, so if it's UX or customer experience or employee experience or Gerry Scullion: brand- Anything within strategic. Dr. Gary David: Yeah. So- It becomes tricky because, like, take UX, for example. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: And I'm not a UX designer. I'm not a UX professional. I teach in a UX program, which is an interesting story, but I- Mm-hmm ... I'm not formally trained as a UX person. Yeah. So is UX positioned at the beginning of a product life cycle or at the end, right? Yeah. If it's at the end, well, it's not necessarily strategic. It's additive, in my opinion- Yeah ... where we're trying to say, "Well, we've built the thing. Now we should probably take a look and see if it works. Well, it doesn't work in these ways. Oh, too late. Out of budget." Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Tick box done. Dr. Gary David: Yeah, right, versus are we at the beginning of it where we are really looking at the research these individuals are [00:13:00] providing to guide our decision-making, which is more strategy. Yeah. Is it just enhancing something we already do to increase our productivity? Is it, or is it- causing us to rethink our direction in a fundamental way. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: And, I think how do you change people's minds? That's the ultimate questions. Customer experience professionals dealing with the same thing. I had a podcast episode where, you know, I asked my guest, who's a CX professional, given the amount of con- of customer experience material in the world today, more than ever in human history, why are people still not sure of its ROI? It's like the more stuff we put out, they're still not sure. There seems to be something else going on here, right? Yeah. Why is there a disconnect? And that goes into, I think, a more fundamental question around business education or the culture- ... of business. That if you have to convince peop- you know, people in leadership that your customers, your users, your employees are important, that's a fundamental problem. Gerry Scullion: [00:14:00] Yeah. Dr. Gary David: And so it, I think that in some respects, changes in leadership or changes in how we do business education- ... Dr. Gary David: Becomes the important place to start. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Gerry, you mentioned that you've been in Bentley for 29 years. Okay. Dr. Gary David: 26. Yeah. Gerry Scullion: No, well, 26. 26. Yeah. Yeah. Know. It's, it's a long, kind of period where you've seen a lot of change. How have you seen the workplace evolve since you started in Bentley, and where do you feel we're at right now? I'd love to get your thoughts on that question. Dr. Gary David: I was, well, at least in my workplace, I can talk about it quickly, kind of give it some context. I mentioned this to the class the other day. When I first started in 1999, uh, my school branded itself as every student has a laptop- Yeah ... and they can bring their laptop to class to enhance their learning. And that in every dorm room we have a port per pillow, so we said an Ethernet port- ... [00:15:00] that you, you can plug into 'cause Wi-Fi not so good. Yeah. And so we are going to advance business education through the integration of technology into the classroom, right? Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: Today, don't open your laptops. Yeah. Keep them in your bag because they are distracting you from being able to focus on what we're doing here. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: And so I've seen this thing go full circle, where we gotta bring technology into the classroom, and now that we have technology into the classroom, how do we get it out? To the point- Yeah ... where professors are going, "We're gonna do in-class writing assignments." Without laptops, you have to actually write, which is kind of a challenge for some of my students 'cause they don't learn cursive anymore. Gerry Scullion: Right. Dr. Gary David: And so we're kind of going back to analog. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: You know, it's almost like peo- hipsters buying albums. We're going back to analog, and I think that- That's brilliant ... we're kind of wrestling with, sure, we have these advanced tools, but like the monkey with the hammer, [00:16:00] are we deploying them in a way that's constructive and not destructive? Do Gerry Scullion: you think this is a positive or a negative? I'd love to get your perspective on- Which part, the Dr. Gary David: mon- giving a monkey a hammer? Gerry Scullion: Re- the return, like, the, the, there's a, there is a shift. I, I'm seeing it, like, and I'm feeling it myself- Yeah ... like, you know, the return- Yeah ... to the iPod and the return to- Dr. Gary David: Yeah ... Gerry Scullion: writing and, ver- very much tactile kind of approaches. Dr. Gary David: Nobody wants, and no one's gonna know what this is probably, but no one wants to put an 8-track player back in their car. Gerry Scullion: Of course they do. Dr. Gary David: Yeah. Gerry Scullion: Pe- people who listen to this, th- this podcast, un- uh, well, as much as I'd like to think that there's, Dr. Gary David: you know, people- They want an Gerry Scullion: 8-track that Dr. Gary David: goes ka-chunk in the middle- Yeah ... of the song? Gerry Scullion: I know, yeah, like e- even I was even looking at it the other day, I was like, didn't realize, um, we have two cars, one of the cars is a CD player, and- Oh, neither of ours we've just, we've recently moved house, and we were having an argument over whose CDs these were, okay, me and my, me and my wife- Yeah ... and it turns out they were mine, okay? Like, and they were the ones that I'd accumulated when [00:17:00] I was in Australia. I still don't know where the other ones are. I've got hundreds and hundreds of other ones. And my children were, like, fawning over this box- Mm and they ran out to the car when I was taking them out, a couple of weeks ago, and they had a stack of CDs, and they wanted me to put them on and listen to them. They were f- you know, going through, they'd never seen CDs before. Dr. Gary David: Right. Gerry Scullion: And I can see that same sort of behavior trickling through into many generations, myself included. I found myself flicking through the CDs, and it's just so better. Right. It's so much better to be able to, to feel these things. Dr. Gary David: And, you know, liner notes were a thing that, of the past, right? That liner notes- Mm-hmm ... used to be a thing on an album that you'd read, that you could, you know, the people who wrote the liner notes, that was a whole art form. Yeah. And I think for any of this, right, it's the right tool- Mm-hmm ... for the right job. Yeah. It's what we might call, like, a bricolage approach, that what's the right tool for the right job? And so for designers, or for any, you know, we're all designers of some sort. I, I- Mm-hmm ... in the classroom when I'm teaching, I'm designing an experience, right? Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: What is the right [00:18:00] tool for the right job? Not that you can't use laptops in the classroom, but when should we use laptops? Not that you can't use AI, but when should you use, use AI? Not that you shouldn't listen to a CD, but you know what? You don't wanna go out listening to a CD while you're jogging. Trust me- Yeah ... we tried. Yeah. It didn't work out well. Gerry Scullion: No. Dr. Gary David: You know, it, it's, it... I would much rather listen to my phone because it's- Yeah ... not going to skip. I'm certainly not gonna lug around a record player when I'm- Yeah ... out for a jog. Yeah. So what's the right tool for the right job? And we have to achieve a level of maturity in our strategy, not just to chase the next shiny key or the next techno- bright widget- Yeah and to think more s- more intentionally about what's the right tool for the right job, and how do we know it's the right tool for the right job? Well, we have to look at the outcomes. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Am I right in saying that in your area of expertise is workplace studies and sociology? Dr. Gary David: Yep. Gerry Scullion: In the current world that y- we're all [00:19:00] living in, like the, the advent of AI, it's seemingly extremely difficult for graduating students in design now to access the workplace. You know, the challenges are there. You know, what used to be 50 applicants for a graduate position are now closer to 500, so it's much more difficult to catch that first break. And you know it's extremely important for the industry to be able to give those first breaks to designers, otherwise we'll lose them to other disciplines. Dr. Gary David: W- Gerry Scullion: what are those challenges for the l- the lucky designers who get into the workplace at the moment? What challenges are they facing, in your experience, in your academic experience, that are out there in the professional world? What can they do about it? Dr. Gary David: Yeah, I think that immediately comes to mind is demonstrating worth, which is the age-old question. Yeah. How do we demonstrate that what we're doing is worth it and [00:20:00] is- Yeah ... strategic and not just a checkbox? And I've seen this, whether it be customer experience or user or employee, a student experience and the like. Yeah. Patient experience might be a little bit different, at least in the United States, because hospital patient scores can be pegged to earnings, to reimbursement. Okay. So there is some, you know, skin in the game regarding those scores. But, you know, otherwise, if my customers aren't happy but they're returning, do I care? Well, how do you make that argument? Again, if you're trying to make an argument to a C-level person that you should care about your customers and they're not convinced, inherently that's a good thing automatically Then that's a tough challenge to overcome. So I think that, as always, we have to peg our role to returns that matter to the people who make decisions. Unfortunately, that's just the nature of the game. However, we also have to be in a position to educate- Gerry Scullion: [00:21:00] Yeah ... Dr. Gary David: about other things that matter- Gerry Scullion: Yeah ... Dr. Gary David: that we could expand beyond and to show, if not, there's many kinds of ROI, not just- Yeah profitability. And so how do we start to educate, whether as individuals, as educational institutions, or as professional organizations, that these things matter in these various ways, and if you adopt these kinds of strategies, then we will perform at a level beyond our competition. Yeah. And so building those cases becomes critically important, which is the challenge we've been doing. This is not- Mm ... a new challenge, right? I don't think that challenge has gone away. I think also the fewer people there are always in any situation, the more that those fewer people now stand for everybody. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: You know what I mean? I- So if you're like the only Irish person I know, all Irish people become you. It's your responsibility. Yeah. So the fewer people, the greater the responsibility to [00:22:00] carry the reputation of a field, unfortunately. Gerry Scullion: It's, um, it's brilliant to hear that there's a design practice in the States in particular that are teaching sociology within that faculty. I'm not too sure, 'cause I'm not too close to design academia, but is that a, a normal kind of introduction to bring sociology into the design faculty? Dr. Gary David: No, not at all. I think I'm probably a unusual one- Mm ... in many ways, as people will tell you. But- ... you know, design work, it depends- Join the club ... it depends what you mean by design work, right? So at least in- Yeah ... UX, more psychologically rooted, not surprisingly. Yeah. Human computer interaction, I mean, a lab- cognitive processes, you know, all the th- all the stuff, so it's very psychology. Yeah. I began teaching in my program because the founder of our program, Dr. Bill Ribbons, is now retired. Mm. He's like, "Oh, you're an ethnographer." Yeah. "Can you teach ethnography?" Sure. "Can you teach it to graduate students in [00:23:00] UX?" Our program is called Human Factors. Yeah. And I said, sure. I had no idea what UX was Gerry Scullion: Mm-hmm Dr. Gary David: Not a clue. And so I just started this process of teaching, this is about maybe 17 or 18 years ago- Yeah ... teaching this graduate class in ethnography for UX students without having any clue what any- Yeah ... of this stuff was. Now, I was a, an applied and clinical sociologist, so- Mm ... I, I was familiar with applying what I know to create solutions for people. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: And so I was doing design work, but I wouldn't have called it design work at the time. It was later on I'm like, "Oh, okay, I get this." Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: And so it is unusual, but I think it's probably because sociology doesn't train sociologists in communicating to a broader audience bes- beyond ourselves. Gerry Scullion: Yeah, and I mean, like, to qualify that, within research, which is a large part of design, we [00:24:00] probably touch on a lot of aspects that are within the sociology kind of- Oh, Dr. Gary David: yeah ... Gerry Scullion: faculty. But to have a dedicated sociology piece within the program is something that I'm like, "Well, that's, that's actually pretty cool." Um- Dr. Gary David: Well, Gerry Scullion: let's look Dr. Gary David: at, like for instance, I'll talk about HCI. How many of my students- Yeah ... have heard of HCI? All of them. All right. How many of you have heard of computer-supported cooperative work? None. This comes out of Scandinavia in the '90s, right? Yeah. CSCW, and that's inherently sociological and ethnographic, and it's always been there, but I think that especially in the United States, if I was gonna be an armchair, sociologist for a second, our culture is so predicated on the elevation of the individual- Gerry Scullion: Yeah Dr. Gary David: that the collective gets lost. And so- ... the sociology of things gets lost because we spend so much time talking about single persons rather than entire groups. Gerry Scullion: Mm-hmm Okay. [00:25:00] So explain that a little bit more. I've heard the term before, but I want you to go into it a little bit more, um, around what that gives the student and where that kind of gives them a super or maybe an edge when they're looking for a job. I'm interested- I'll give you- ... in that aspect. Dr. Gary David: Yeah. So I'll give you an example from my own research- Yeah ... on electronic health record systems. So from a UX standpoint- Gerry Scullion: Mm-hmm ... Dr. Gary David: we might look at the user interface, the user experience the... what individual healthcare professionals go through when using a medical record, electronic medical record system. Okay? Yeah. Fine, fair enough. So we can test it in the lab and look at the colors and look at the button size and look at the placement and figure out the workflow and all that kind of good stuff. That doesn't matter necessarily about how they're gonna use it when the technology fundamentally changes relationships and power in these organizations. Gerry Scullion: Hmm. Dr. Gary David: So it used to be the case that doctors could largely author the medical [00:26:00] records themselves to suit their own needs. Gerry Scullion: Wow. Dr. Gary David: Now, who's in charge of it? Well, it's not the doctor, it's the people in the, information systems part of the organization- Yeah ... that are dictating- Yeah ... to doctors, "Before you can order a test, you need to have these boxes checked." Or if you want, you know, not only is this gonna be visible to you, but it's gonna be visible to anybody else with access to the system. One time I was asking my daughter's pediatrician when I was doing this research "Can... You have an electronic medical record, right?" He's like, "Yeah." "Can any other doctor see your patient's records?" And he said, "No. Why would I want that?" And I said, "Well, why wouldn't you want that?" He's like, "Well, if anybody wants to look at my patient's medical records, I wanna know why and what the situation is so I can understand what's happened." Okay, now we're gon- now we're getting to social relationships, right? Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: If, uh, if, if billing and reimbursement is- Yeah ... influencing what's in the electronic medical records system- Yeah ... and [00:27:00] how doctors are using it, it no longer becomes principally about clinical care- Yeah ... and it becomes about something else. Now we're into a larger systems consideration. You're hearing more and more people talk about systems design, systems engineering, collaborative systems. Yeah. So when you go from the human computer interac- human computer interaction into systems- Yeah ... that jump is sociology, right? Nice. And that's where the sociologist is now situated to think about the broader impacts and the interconnections of, technological design and use. Gerry Scullion: Yeah, absolutely. There's so many questions I have about that one particular one. W- going back to your pediatrician, was there a follow-on discussion after that about why or there's, like, do, do you get into the whole kind of like, "Well, it might be nice for other people to be able to see and make sure that there's trust and [00:28:00] transparency to, that you're doing the right thing"? W- what followed on in that conversation? Can you remember? Dr. Gary David: Well, yeah. He basically was talking about how he, it's his patient, he doesn't necessarily want, not want to share- Yeah ... the medical record, and we can talk about what is the medical record if you want, but also he wants to be aware of what's happened. Gerry Scullion: Mm. Dr. Gary David: And so he wants to be familiar with what the concern is or what the issue is that might have transpired which necessitated somebody else to get access to that thing, which is completely- But- ... reasonable, you know, thing to want- Yeah ... for, Gerry Scullion: for a p- for a pediatrician ... fair point. But, but why would it be made private? Like, like what's the argument for that? Dr. Gary David: Well, it's, it's private. It's private. It's not necessarily made private. Mm. It's more he wants to know what's happening. Yeah. It's his job to have an understanding of what is happening to his patients. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: And if someone can access the record without him knowing it, then- he's not familiar or aware. I'll give you another quick example of the [00:29:00] UX- Yeah ... versus systems consideration. I was talking with a dermatologist, and he said to me, one of the great features I love about our system is the Approve All function." I said, "Well, what's... What do you mean approve all?" He's like, "Oh, it's great. If I have a lot of medical records that I have to approve that I'm backed up on, I can just click a button to select all, and it approves all of them automatically." Why do Gerry Scullion: you gotta say that? Dr. Gary David: I'm like, "What?" He's like, "Oh yeah, it's great." So from a UX perspective, awesome. From a clinical care perspective, what if there's errors in the medical record? Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Why is it asking you to approve them? Dr. Gary David: Right. So the idea of the workflow is he, you know, he might dictate a medical record. It gets tran- you know, transcribed to a study medical transcription. That transcriptionist then uploads it into the electronic health record system. He then is supposed to approve, you know, double-check it, verify it for accuracy- Gerry Scullion: Yeah ... Dr. Gary David: and then approve it. Well, [00:30:00] there is no verification, so now we have potentially an error in the medical record that not only resides in his office but throughout the system for anybody else to access. Gerry Scullion: So- I mean, what could possibly go Dr. Gary David: wrong? What, what could possibly go wrong? Nothing. So from a UX perspective, two thumbs up. Loved it. Yeah. From a patient perspective and even a risk perspective I'm not so sure that's so good. Gerry Scullion: Can I ask you, um, a little bit more around how you teach the students to navigate those kind of quandaries? Because they're entering those workplaces where AI is gonna be, we'd like to think an ally, but sometimes it's gonna be on the other side of the table challenging them with executive approval, and they're like, "Well, actually, these are the reasons why this is a better outcome here." Dr. Gary David: Right. Gerry Scullion: Is there something that you can actually add to that conversation that we as [00:31:00] a, an audience and a, and an in- an industry really can maybe take as a, I guess, just a kernel of information re- regarding dispute resolution? I think it's a really- It's funny 'cause, uh- ... difficult thing Dr. Gary David: to do ... on my podcast recently I've had a few episodes on d- Ah online dispute resolution and dispute resolution. And- Gerry Scullion: It's a huge thing though, and it's ha- happening much, much more. Dr. Gary David: Oh, absolutely. And so again, education, right? Yeah. This goes into the sales part of it, that to do design, to do any marginalized kind of activity- Gerry Scullion: Yeah ... Dr. Gary David: you need to be able to communicate the value and worth of that activity to a broader audience in ways that they can understand, and I've experienced this as a sociologist at a business school. You know- Mm-hmm ... why is sociology at a business school? Well, here's why. I have to explain it in terms that they understand. Translation becomes a key element of working as a marginalized profession- Yeah ... in any industry, okay? And so we have to educate out and talk about critical thinking, critical analysis, [00:32:00] communication skills, collaboration skills- Yeah courage to try new things, creativity. These start to become essential elements of collaborating with AI so that we're not being replaced by it, but that we can show these higher level skills- That this technology is not good at yet. And we're- Mm-hmm ... I think we're seeing this, right? If you look, it's really interesting to see the schizophrenia in the headlines. CEO replaces entire staff with AI. Next headline, CEOs fail to find value in increased productivity in AI. Yeah. So you'll see two different headlines almost right next to each other. Yeah. And so they're tr- you know, people who are in leadership positions are trying to figure it out, and they need assistance in guiding those conversations, and I do think that academia plays an important role here if we're situated to talk with these elements in ways that they get. Absolutely. Gerry Scullion: [00:33:00] Absolutely. ' Dr. Gary David: Cause most academics can't. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. And I Dr. Gary David: know- At iSchool, we're lucky that we do ... Gerry Scullion: you've got a podcast, Gerry, um, that it's had a lot of people, Shang Heng Li, who I know- Dr. Gary David: Yeah ... Gerry Scullion: has been on the podcast, and there's lots of other people. Ali Fawkes, who's a good- Yeah ... friend of the podcast is gonna be on your podcast. Can we just talk a bit more around, you know, how long you've been doing it and, and what kind of guests you tend to have on the podcast? Yeah. I'll go- Uh, just encourage, we can give it a shout-out, and we can include- Oh, thank you ... that link to it in the show notes. Dr. Gary David: Yeah. Your audience can join my tens of listeners in... Gerry Scullion: I don't know it's tens of listeners. I've seen it, so... Dr. Gary David: Yeah. Well, it's, the podcast is called Experience by Design Podcast, and the tagline is, Where we explore experience designs of all kinds. It was started by me- Mm-hmm ... and Adam Gamwell, who's a PhD in anthropology, design anthropologist. Who has a PhD from Brandeis. He does a lot of great design work, and we've worked on projects together. Yeah. [00:34:00] And we started it six years, over six years ago. Mm-hmm. And the reason why we started it in this way was because w- it would be easier to get guests rather than focusing on UX or CX or any particular area. Like, well, let's just kinda be general. Let's be broad. Yeah. Experience design as a concept. And we... Adam had to drop off because of family and work stuff, and I just kept it going by myself. And so I have a range of guests. Like yesterday I talked to a person who does hospitality experiences as travel and tourism that tries to capture local culture, values, flavor, in engaging immersive experiences that are actually relatively small scale, not tech-heavy, but still- Yeah impactful. In the morning I talked to a person about the human experience and mindful experience with the amount of electrical activity in your brain at any particular time. Mm-hmm. And how do we then become more aware of that so we can have more mindful experiences that can lead to greater creativity, productivity, [00:35:00] et cetera? Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: So it, it really does cut across- You have a super broad ... a broad range. Gerry Scullion: Super Dr. Gary David: broad. Super broad. But the point- Yeah ... the, the, the theme, right, that ends up coming out of all of this, not surprisingly- Yeah ... it's, it's about people- Yeah ... obviously. It's about people and their behaviors, and it's about people and their behaviors, and trying to create experiences for them and their behaviors that can lead to some kind of change. Yeah. So no matter what we're doing- As designers, it kind of starts to boil down to these particular elements. People matter, we need to understand who they are and their behaviors- Sure ... we need to design intentionally to effect some kind of outcome. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Dr. Gary David: So experience design becomes about that thing, right? Nice. Whether it's UX or CX or PX or student or employee or brand or digital or whatever, it becomes about those elements, and that's, that's the, the key theme that all of my guests, in an uncoordinated way, all- Mm-hmm ... touch upon. Gerry Scullion: I'm gonna put a [00:36:00] link to Shengong Li's episode. It was the one I listened to and I thought it was very, very good. But I'll put a link to your episode or to your, kind of... i'm a big Pocket Casts lover- Yeah ... so I'll put a link to it on Pocket Casts. I know you've got a page on your website, I'm just on it here at the moment, where it lists out all the places where you can subscribe. Gerry, if people wanna connect with you and find out more information are you on LinkedIn? I think you are on LinkedIn. Absolutely am, yeah. You're on LinkedIn, yeah, yeah. I'm Dr. Gary David: probably the only design sociologist on LinkedIn. It says design Gerry Scullion: sociologist. So I'll put, I'll put a link to your, uh, your LinkedIn there for people to connect with you as well. But look, I wrap, uh, every episode on This Is HCD by thanking people for their time and energy, 'cause we don't run a script on this. Like, it's a, it's an open conversation, and a lot of the questions that I had today were fielded out of natural curiosity around sociology and design, and also navigating the, the complex world that we find ourselves in now. So thank you for giving me the opportunity to ask you, a PhD in [00:37:00] sociology no doubt- Right um, yeah, yeah I know. How many Dr. Gary David: of those are there? Gerry Scullion: I know. But- Too many, it turns Dr. Gary David: out. Gerry Scullion: But you're the first one on the podcast, so like, you know- Right ... yeah, Dr. Gary David: yeah. Gotta be Gerry Scullion: first somewhere. It's, but it has been great to speak with you and, and get to know you a little bit as well, 'cause we've, we've spoken a few times now at this stage. So thanks so much for coming on, Gerry. I really, really appreciate it. Dr. Gary David: No, thanks for having me. I, I love being on this end of the microphone, not having to ask the questions, just having to answer 'em. It's, it's a different, more... It's a d- I wouldn't say more enjoyable, but it is. Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Well, you're a natural. You're a Dr. Gary David: natural. Oh, thank you. Gerry Scullion: You know Dr. Gary David: what I mean? I appreciate it. We'll stay in touch, Gerry. I'm, I'm that part, I'm that part that's just naturally good at Gerry Scullion: it. Yeah, exactly. We'll stay in touch. Dr. Gary David: All right. Cheers.