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In the great 1980s movie 
"The Blues Brothers,"

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there's a scene where John Belushi
goes to visit Dan Aykroyd in his apartment

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in Chicago for the very first time.

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It's a cramped, tiny space

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and it's just three feet away
from the train tracks.

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As John sits on Dan's bed,

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a train goes rushing by,

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rattling everything in the room.

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John asks, "How often does
that train go by?"

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Dan replies, "So often, you won't
even notice it."

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And then, something falls off the wall.

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We all know what he's talking about.

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As human beings, we get used
to everyday things

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really fast.

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As a product designer,
it's my job to see those everyday things,

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to feel them, and try
to improve upon them.

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For example, see this piece of fruit?

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See this little sticker?

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That sticker wasn't there
when I was a kid.

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But somewhere as the years passed,

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someone had the bright idea
to put that sticker on the fruit.

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Why?

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So it could be easier for us 


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to check out 
at the grocery counter.

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Well that's great,

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we can get in and out of
the store quickly.

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But now, there's a new problem.

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When we get home and we're hungry

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and we see this ripe, juicy piece
of fruit on the counter,

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we just want to pick it up
and eat it.

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Except now, we have to look
for this little sticker.

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And dig at it with our nails,
damaging the flesh.

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Then rolling up that sticker --

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you know what I mean.

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And then trying to flick
it off your fingers.

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(Applause)

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It's not fun,

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not at all.

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But something interesting happened.

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See the first time you did it,
you probably felt those feelings.

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You just wanted to eat the piece of fruit.

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You felt upset.

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You just wanted to dive in.

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By the 10th time,

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you started to become less upset

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and you just started peeling
the label off.

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By the 100th time,
at least for me,

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I became numb to it.

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I simply picked up the piece of fruit,

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dug at it with my nails,
tried to flick it off,

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and then wondered,

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"Was there another sticker?"

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So why is that?

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Why do we get used to everyday things?

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Well as human beings,
we have limited brain power.

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And so our brains encode the 
everyday things we do into habits

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so we can free up space 
to learn new things.

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It's a process called habituation

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and it's one of the most basic ways,
as humans, we learn.

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Now, habituation isn't always bad.

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Remember learning to drive?

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I sure do.

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Your hands clenched at 10 and 2
on the wheel,

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looking at every single
object out there --

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the cars, the lights, the pedestrians.

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It's a nerve-wracking experience.

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So much so, that I couldn't even
talk to anyone else in the car

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and I couldn't even listen to music.

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But then something interesting happened.

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As the weeks went by,
driving became easier and easier.

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You habituated it.

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It started to become 
fun and second nature.

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And then, you could talk 
to your friends again

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and listen to music.

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So there's a good reason why
our brains habituate things.

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If we didn't, we'd notice
every little detail,

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all the time.

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It would be exhausting,

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and we'd have no time
to learn about new things.

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But sometimes,
habituation isn't good.

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If it stops us from noticing 
the problems that are around us,

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well, that's bad.

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And if it stops us from noticing 
and fixing those problems,

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well, then that's really bad.

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Comedians know all about this.

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Jerry Seinfeld's entire career was built
on noticing those little details,

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those idiotic things we do every day
that we don't even remember.

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He tells us about the time 
he visited his friends

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and he just wanted to take 
a comfortable shower.

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He'd reach out and grab the handle
and turn it slightly one way,

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and it was 100 degrees too hot.

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And then he'd turn it the other way,
and it was 100 degrees too cold.

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He just wanted a comfortable shower.

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Now, we've all been there,

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we just don't remember it.

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But Jerry did,

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and that's a comedian's job.

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But designers, innovators 
and entrepreneurs,

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it's our job to not just notice
those things,

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but to go one step further
and try to fix them.

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See this, this person,

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this is Mary Anderson.

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In 1902 in New York City,

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she was visiting.

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It was a cold, wet, snowy day
and she was warm inside a streetcar.

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As she was going to her destination,
she noticed the driver opening the window

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to clean off the excess snow
so he could drive safely.

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When he opened the window, though,
he let all this cold, wet air inside,

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making all the passengers miserable.

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Now probably, most of those 
passengers just thought,

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"It's a fact of life, he's got
to open the window to clean it.

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That's just how it is."

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But Mary didn't.

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Mary thought,

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"What if the diver could actually clean
the windshield from the inside

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so that he could stay safe and drive

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and the passengers could 
actually stay warm?"

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So she picked up her sketchbook
right then and there,

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and began drawing what would become
the world's first windshield wiper.

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Now as a product designer,
I try to learn from people like Mary

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to try to see the world 
the way it really is,

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not the way we think it is.

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Why?

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Because it's easy to solve a problem
that almost everyone sees.

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But it's hard to solve a problem
that almost no one sees.

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Now some people think
you're born with this ability

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or you're not,

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as if Mary Anderson was hardwired at birth
to see the world more clearly.

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That wasn't the case for me.

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I had to work at it.

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During my years at Apple,

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Steve Jobs challenged us
to come into work every day,

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to see our products through 
the eyes of the customer,

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the new customer,

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the one that has fears 
and possible frustrations

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and hopeful exhilaration that their
new technology product

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could work straightaway for them.

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He called it staying beginners,

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and wanted to make sure that we
focused on those tiny little details

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to make them faster, easier and seamless
for the new customers.

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So I remember this clearly
in the very earliest days of the iPod.

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See, back in the '90s,

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being a gadget freak like I am,

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I would rush out to the store
for the very, very latest gadget.

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I'd take all the time to get to the store,

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I'd check out, I'd come back home,
I'd start to unbox it.

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And then, there was 
another little sticker:

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the one that said, "Charge before use."

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What!

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I can't believe it!

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I just spent all this time
buying this product

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and now I have to charge before use.

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I have to wait what felt like an eternity
to use that coveted new toy.

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It was crazy.

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But you know what?

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Almost every product back then did that.

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When it had batteries in it,

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you had to charge it
before you used it.

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Well, Steve noticed that

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and he said,

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"We're not going to let that 
happen to our product."

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So what did we do?

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Typically, when you have a product
that has a hard drive in it,

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you run it for about 
30 minutes in the factory

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to make sure that hard drive's going 
to be working years later

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for the customer after they 
pull it out of the box.

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What did we do instead?

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We ran that product for over two hours.

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Why?

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Well, first off, we could make
a higher quality product,

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be easy to test,

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and make sure it was great
for the customer.

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But most importantly,

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the battery came fully charged
right out of the box,

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ready to use.

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So that customer, 
with all that exhilaration,

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could just start using the product.

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It was great, and it worked.

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People liked it.

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Today, almost every product
that you get that's battery powered

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comes out of the box fully charged,

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even if it doesn't have a hard drive.

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But back then, we noticed 
that detail and we fixed it,

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and now everyone else does that as well.

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No more, "Charge before use."

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So why am I telling you this?

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Well, it's seeing the invisible problem,

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not just the obvious problem,
that's important,

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not just for product design,
but for everything we do.

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You see, there are invisible problems
all around us,

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ones we can solve.

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But first we need
to see them, to feel them.

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So, I'm hesitant to give you any tips

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about neuroscience or psychology.

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There's far too many experienced people
in the TED community

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who would know much more
about that than I ever will.

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But let me leave you with
a few tips that I do,

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that we all can do,
to fight habituation.

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My first tip is to look broader.

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You see, when you're tackling a problem,

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sometimes, there are a lot of steps
that lead up to that problem.

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And sometimes, a lot 
of steps after it.

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If you can take a step back
and look broader,

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maybe you can change some of those boxes

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before the problem.

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Maybe you can combine them.

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Maybe you can remove them altogether
to make that better.

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Take thermostats, for instance.

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In the 1900s when they first came out,
they were really simple to use.

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You could turn them up or turn them down.

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People understood them.

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But in the 1970s,

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the energy crisis struck,

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and customers started thinking about
how to save energy.

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So what happened?

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Thermostat designers decided 
to add a new step.

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Instead of just turning up and down,

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you now had to program it.

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So you could tell it the temperature
you wanted at a certain time.

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Now that seemed great.

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Every thermostat had
started adding that feature.

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But it turned out that no one
saved any energy.

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Now, why is that?

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Well, people couldn't predict the future.

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They just didn't know how their weeks
would change season to season,

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year to year.

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So no one was saving energy,

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and what happened?

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Thermostat designers went back
to the drawing board

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and they focused on that programming step.

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They made better U.I.s,

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they made better documentation.

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But still, years later,
people were not saving any energy

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because they just couldn't
predict the future.

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So what did we do?

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We put a machine-learning algorithm in
instead of the programming

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that would simply watch
when you turned it up and down,

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when you liked a certain temperature
when you got up,

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or when you went away.

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And you know what?

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It worked.

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People are saving energy 
without any programming.

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So, it doesn't matter what you're doing.

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If you take a step back 
and look at all the boxes,

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maybe there's a way
to remove one or combine them

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so that you can make 
that process much simpler.

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So that's my first tip: look broader.

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For my second tip, it's to look closer.

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One of my greatest teachers 
was my grandfather.

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He taught me all about the world.

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He taught me how things were built
and how they were repaired,

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the tools and techniques necessary
to make a successful project.

253
00:11:57,671 --> 00:12:02,008
I remember one story 
he told me about screws,

254
00:12:02,048 --> 00:12:05,678
and about how you need to have
the right screw for the right job.

255
00:12:05,678 --> 00:12:07,617
There are many different screws:

256
00:12:07,617 --> 00:12:12,487
wood screws, metal screws,
anchors, concrete screws,

257
00:12:12,487 --> 00:12:14,232
the list went on and on.

258
00:12:15,212 --> 00:12:18,485
Our job is to make products
that are easy to install

259
00:12:18,485 --> 00:12:22,219
for all of our customs themselves
without professionals.

260
00:12:22,789 --> 00:12:24,210
So what did we do?

261
00:12:24,720 --> 00:12:27,655
I remembered that story 
that my grandfather told me,

262
00:12:27,655 --> 00:12:28,928
and so we thought,

263
00:12:28,928 --> 00:12:31,428
"How many different screws 
can we put in the box?

264
00:12:31,428 --> 00:12:34,278
Was it going to be two, three,
four, five?

265
00:12:34,278 --> 00:12:36,574
Because there's so many
different wall types."

266
00:12:36,574 --> 00:12:39,304
So we thought about it, we optimized it,

267
00:12:39,304 --> 00:12:43,395
and we came up with three different
screws to put in the box.

268
00:12:43,845 --> 00:12:46,122
We thought that was going
to solve the problem.

269
00:12:46,122 --> 00:12:48,817
But it turned out, it didn't.

270
00:12:49,527 --> 00:12:51,158
So we shipped the product,

271
00:12:51,158 --> 00:12:53,548
and people weren't having
a great experience.

272
00:12:54,128 --> 00:12:55,336
So what did we do?

273
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We went back to the drawing board

274
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just instantly after we figured out
we didn't get it right.

275
00:13:00,545 --> 00:13:04,269
And we designed a special screw,
a custom screw,

276
00:13:04,269 --> 00:13:06,440
much to the chagrin of our investors.

277
00:13:06,440 --> 00:13:09,862
They were like, "Why are you spending
so much time on a little screw?

278
00:13:09,862 --> 00:13:11,861
Get out there and sell more!"


279
00:13:11,861 --> 00:13:15,184
And we said, "We will sell more
if we get this right."

280
00:13:15,904 --> 00:13:17,594
And it turned out, we did.

281
00:13:17,594 --> 00:13:20,888
With that custom little screw,
there was just one screw in the box,

282
00:13:20,888 --> 00:13:23,995
that was easy to mount
and put on the wall.

283
00:13:25,525 --> 00:13:31,625
So if we focus on those tiny details,
the ones we may not see

284
00:13:32,404 --> 00:13:34,228
and we look at them as we say,

285
00:13:34,228 --> 00:13:35,636
"Are those important

286
00:13:35,636 --> 00:13:38,436
or is that the way we've always done it?

287
00:13:38,436 --> 00:13:41,320
Maybe there's a way to get rid of those."

288
00:13:42,220 --> 00:13:46,839
So my last piece of advice
is to think younger.

289
00:13:48,389 --> 00:13:52,545
Every day, I'm confronted with interesting
questions from my three young kids.

290
00:13:52,545 --> 00:13:54,316
They come up with questions like,

291
00:13:54,316 --> 00:13:57,224
"Why can't cars fly around traffic?"

292
00:13:57,644 --> 00:14:01,420
Or, "Why don't my shoelaces
have Velcro instead?"

293
00:14:02,490 --> 00:14:04,389
Sometimes, those questions are smart.

294
00:14:05,409 --> 00:14:07,947
My son came to me the other day
and I asked him,

295
00:14:07,947 --> 00:14:11,123
"Go run out to the mailbox 
and check it."

296
00:14:11,123 --> 00:14:14,891
He looked at me, puzzled, and said,

297
00:14:15,311 --> 00:14:20,225
"Why doesn't the mailbox just check itself
and tell us when it has mail?" (Laughter)

298
00:14:20,225 --> 00:14:23,878
I was like, "That's a pretty 
good question."

299
00:14:24,878 --> 00:14:27,492
So, they can ask tons of questions

300
00:14:27,492 --> 00:14:32,210
and sometimes we find out
we just don't have the right answers.

301
00:14:32,210 --> 00:14:38,017
We say, "Son, that's just the way
the world works."

302
00:14:38,017 --> 00:14:40,567
So the more we're exposed to something,

303
00:14:40,567 --> 00:14:42,764
the more we get used to it.

304
00:14:42,764 --> 00:14:44,894
But kids haven't been around 
long enough

305
00:14:44,894 --> 00:14:46,794
to get used to those things.

306
00:14:46,794 --> 00:14:48,611
And so when they run into problems,

307
00:14:48,611 --> 00:14:50,834
they immediately try to solve them,

308
00:14:50,834 --> 00:14:53,576
and sometimes they find a better way,

309
00:14:53,576 --> 00:14:56,280
and that way really is better.

310
00:14:56,280 --> 00:15:02,119
So my advice that we take to heart
is to have young people on your team,

311
00:15:02,119 --> 00:15:04,225
or people with young minds.

312
00:15:04,225 --> 00:15:06,576
Because if you have those young minds,

313
00:15:06,576 --> 00:15:09,736
they cause everyone in the room
to think younger.

314
00:15:09,736 --> 00:15:14,100
Picasso once said, 
"Every child is an artist.

315
00:15:15,090 --> 00:15:20,406
The problem is when he or she grows up,
is how to remain an artist."

316
00:15:21,785 --> 00:15:25,734
We all saw the world more clearly
when we saw it for the first time,

317
00:15:25,734 --> 00:15:28,308
before a lifetime of habits 
got in the way.


318
00:15:28,998 --> 00:15:31,341
Our challenge is to get back there,

319
00:15:31,341 --> 00:15:33,586
to feel that frustration,

320
00:15:33,586 --> 00:15:35,926
to see those little details,

321
00:15:35,926 --> 00:15:37,666
to look broader,

322
00:15:37,666 --> 00:15:39,422
look closer,

323
00:15:39,422 --> 00:15:41,092
and to think younger

324
00:15:41,792 --> 00:15:43,710
so we can stay beginners.

325
00:15:44,150 --> 00:15:45,373
It's not easy.

326
00:15:45,373 --> 00:15:46,908
It requires us pushing back

327
00:15:46,908 --> 00:15:50,109
against one of the most basic ways
we make sense of the world.

328
00:15:51,689 --> 00:15:52,732
But if we do,

329
00:15:52,732 --> 00:15:55,243
we could do some pretty amazing things.

330
00:15:55,243 --> 00:15:57,890
For me, hopefully, that's better
product design.

331
00:15:58,940 --> 00:16:03,517
For you, that could mean something else,
something powerful.

332
00:16:06,105 --> 00:16:09,169
Our challenge is to wake up 
each day and say,

333
00:16:09,169 --> 00:16:12,344
"How can I experience the world better?"

334
00:16:12,344 --> 00:16:17,193
And if we do, maybe, just maybe,

335
00:16:17,193 --> 00:16:21,388
we can get rid of these
dumb little stickers.

336
00:16:22,248 --> 00:16:23,797
Thank you very much.

337
00:16:23,797 --> 00:16:26,274
(Applause)