The Highlander Theory & The Honda Skydeck

It was a concept that I’ve heard before, but it never really resonated with me until just about every speaker at this year’s UX Week commented on it in one way, shape, or form. The concept is the Highlander Theory, as in:

In any given project, you can only innovate once.

No really, there can be only be one.

Seriously.

Call it what you will: self-demonstrative design, intuitive design, etc…every design construct you put in front of anyone has about 15 seconds to explain:

How it is innovative in some way, shape, or form.
How the user already knows how to use it.

If you’re going to accomplish that, you only have room to innovate once. You can have any number of features that might be considered cutting-edge or some such adjective, but they all have to be in support of that 1 problem you’re looking to solve in an innovative fashion.

Recently, I found a perfect example of this in the Honda Skydeck concept car. What I love about the Skydeck is that its designers sought to innovate around the interior experience of a car. They left the exterior to be more-less what we’d expect- a concept we all understand and allows us to place the experiences point of innovation into a context that is digestible in 15 seconds.

One one level, I’d say brilliant. On another level, I’d say damn fine design.