think carrie, think!

Today at work we had a couple different roundtable discussion sessions with some HR staff. The point of these discussions was to give feedback about our internship experience at IBM. I had some major problems with the way these discussions were run, but anyway…

I mentioned that my idea of IBM Research as a corporation was still very technical – there is very little room for exploring and introducing new methods and ways of thinking. Granted, there is a lot of room for freedom in doing whatever you want in terms of a project and I am grateful for that. But thinking back, all the job offers I received for this summer were similar in that respect, surprisingly – either way, I would have been given my own project and space to innovate. The reason why I chose IBM Research over other companies was because I knew IBM would benefit most from the addition of design thinking (especially since I would not be working at the IBM Research Cambridge site).

So now that my internship is nearing its end, I am still asking myself whether what I’ve been doing will really have an impact on IBM. But most of all, I am asking myself what my role is as an individual designer, contributing to a corporation such as IBM. Is it in my place to try and change old ways of thinking? Or should we wait for other up-and-coming companies to show IBM why new ways of thinking are beneficial? Or is IBM so large that it doesn’t matter what other people say and/or do?

This entry was posted on Friday, July 27th, 2007 and is filed under design, work.