A Comparative Study On The Influence Of Design Innovation Performance In Different Ways Of Communication

Designer plays an important role in the process of product development and design innovation, and the dominant position is gradually highlight as well as the design innovation is taken by companies. The activities of design team can’t do without the communication among the designers, including team works, geographic distribution, information requirements, knowledge sharing and exchange. Especially network technique has evolved by leaps and bounds, there is a fundamental change in the communication of design teams:more convenient, more quickly and more highly effective, and without the limits of space and time. Although the organizational communication has been studied in many studies, there is still little studies on the new way of communication effects the design innovation efficacy.Firstly, this based on the present researches on innovation performance theory and results, following the characteristic of design innovation process, divided it into three stages, design problem analyzing, design idea generation, design scheme decision, focus on conceptual design in the early stages of the innovation process. The way of communication in design communication is defined and the researches are reviewed, based on communication media theory and communications effectiveness researches, hypotheses and research model are proposed.Secondly, we used laboratory experiment method to compare and analyze the impact of innovation performance under the face-to-face communication (FTF) and instant message communication (IM) in these three stages. Recruiting42industrial design specialized undergraduate students to form14groups of design teams, participated in the experiment. Data was collected through statistics the number of valid information, draft quality evaluation, draft innovation evaluation. Using SPSS13.0statistical analysis of the data, results showed that:there is a significant difference between the numbers of valid information from FTF and IM groups in design analysis stage. There is a significant difference ideas and draft qualities between the two ways of communication during the stage of idea generation. In design decision phase, there is a significant difference between the innovative evaluations of the final draft, especially in the originality of idea. Unfortunately, there is no significant difference in the reality of the idea.In the end, the experiment results indicated,(1) the different ways of communication had significant influence on the innovation performance of design innovation stages.(2) Communication effectiveness depends on the choice of communication in pre-design innovation phase.(3) In concept generation and development period, the idea output is related with the choice of communication, but the quality of the idea is more dependent on the designer’s own design capability and experience.(4) The richness of the communication media will influence the final decisions and the originality of ideas.