“You can’t understand what a business needs until you speak candidly and openly with the people who own, manage and work at it. Rogers communicates with hundreds of businesses every day in various ways, and we are learning from those conversations,” says Geoffrey Booth, a lead contributor to the newly launched Rogers RedBoard Biz Blog.

In August and September 2010, Thornley Fallis & 76design worked with Rogers to design, build and launch a new forum for discussions with small and medium businesses – RedBoard Biz.

Rogers created RedBoard Biz as a place to share proven tools and know-how that businesses can use to be more successful. Posts will contain news about Rogers products and services, and how businesses are using them. RedBoard Biz will also provide ideas and advice on a broad range of topics of interest to businesses.

The Rogers Redboard Biz Blog was developed following the great success of Rogers Redboard, a hub for consumers to discuss news and ideas as well as industry trends. Launched in March 2010, Redboard continues to gain in popularity.

Earlier this year, Thornley Fallis & 76design worked with the Office of Consumer Affairs at Industry Canada as Secretariat for the Consumer Measures Committee to design and develop a new online presence for the Canadian Consumer Handbook.

Launched in April 2010, the handbook provides users with a searchable and easy-to-navigate platform as well as the option to build a customized handbook that only contains information they are interested in.

The Handbook is intended to help users become better-informed and more confident consumers. It offers information on a wide range of topics such as online shopping, contracts, housing and home renovations, identity theft, collection agencies, and much more, to help users build their buying skills.

Along with consumer tips, the Handbook includes a directory of government and non-government contacts useful to consumers.

The Handbook was created and is updated by the Consumer Measures Committee. This Committee is a joint federal/provincial/territorial committee which provides a forum for national cooperation to improve the marketplace for Canadian consumers, through the harmonization of laws, regulations and practices and through actions to raise public awareness.

It is with great pleasure that we announce the launch of the City of Ottawa’s Light Rail website!

Many Ottawans felt as though they were left in the dark when it came to the City’s big Light Rail Transit (LRT) plans. Well folks, there is no longer any need to feel mal-informed. Thornley Fallis and 76design in collaboration with the Light Rail Implementation Team have created an “information-sharing mechanism” that arms the citizens of Ottawa with more than sufficient information relating to the project plan.

The communications efforts applied by Thornley Fallis & 76design were strategic and smart; we have received positive results on the site and its search functions, information content, structure and ease-of-use.

The website in particular has proven to be the most crucial piece of the puzzle. The website we’ve created is meant to engage the entire City; to provide all the facts our users require to fully understand the project and to provide them with a platform to communicate their feelings towards the project.

With the integration of various social media tools (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube), interested citizens are able to keep up-to-date and connect with the Light Rail Implementation Team with any questions or concerns. Any questions submitted to the team will be answered in a timely fashion; responses will then be posted on the website. The LRT website helps make a difference by providing comfort to Ottawans by reminding them that Light Rail green and it will only improve the City.

Since yesterday’s launch, the LRT project is getting great media play, print and radio; it is noted that there are happy people all around.

As designers during these rapidly changing times it is more important than ever to exercise flexibility and adaptability in the approach we take to our work. With the competitive nature of our business, the ever evolving vehicles of communication and the state of our recovering economy, our clients have become pretty demanding when it comes to us delivering the goods. If we can’t deliver to their expectations, they know someone else is waiting in the wings, hungry and ready to take over. 

I said it before and I’ll continue to say it “one size does not fit all”. Each client we work for and every individual project we work on has unique objectives and goals and therefore we need to make sure that we take a unique approach to each one and that means being flexible. 

A lot of times it’s smooth sailing. Good ideas flow quickly and client “buy-in” happens without a hitch. However, there are those occasions when things become a little more challenging, when it takes more time and effort than normal to deliver “the goods”. It’s during these times that we ask ourselves “what happened?” The reality is a number of things could have happened and the fact of matter is you still need to deliver. Great designers find a way to adapt on the fly, extending themselves further and further with each new challenge that’s thrown their way. In the end it’s a win-win situation, the client gets delivery of a project and the designer has taken the opportunity to grow and work beyond their past limitations. We are fortunate enough at 76design to have on staff a group of great designers that have shown me the true meaning of adaptability and flexibility. I’d like to take this opportunity to say, “thanks guys!”

Being a designer is not always easy. Deadlines can be tight, projects can be challenging, clients can be really demanding. But being adaptable in the face of challenge makes it easier for everyone involved and that’s a good thing.

To further illustrate my point I leave you with a quote from the late great Bruce Lee, one of the greatest martial artists in history, “Be formless, shapeless like water. Now you put water in a cup, it becomes the cup. You put water into a bottle and it becomes the bottle. You put it in a teapot it becomes the teapot. Water can flow or it can crash. Be water my friend.” 

Sometimes, to keep myself sane during long work days, I tend to doodle and draw — it’s just what I do and have done since a wee lad.
I was going through some old notebooks and found a few characatures of some co-workers I sketched.
More to come …

For the second year in a row some coworkers and I have decided to be thrifty with our holiday gift exchange by designing and creating personalized CDs filled with music that we think the other person will like.

It started off with a hat, tiny pieces of paper, and the Christmas Party. It was then that we drew the name of our sucker, err, recipient. The hardest part, in my opinion, is trying to figure out what the giftee will like on their CD. There are several people in the office who are extremely transparent with their choice of music, but then there are others who never leave their iPod alone long enough to take a peek.

We’re lucky enough to be a tight knit crew, so the CDs always seem to have a personal touch that ends up being a big success. Our collection of disc cover designs this year included favourite fonts, colours, even condiments (images, and believe it or not, actual fresh pepper).

For the past few hours it’s been pretty quiet in the office except for the headphones of everyone listening to their CDs. Well, that and the munching of Brett‘s mom’s delicious cookies.