Global Design Principal Ken Wai recently gave an inspiring speech as the opening speaker for TEDxLujiazui, themed ‘Ideas into Actions’, in Shanghai, China. Titled ‘Idea Detective’, he shared his experiences in digging out the true needs of people.
Ken opened his speech by highlighting a major challenge throughout his professional career as an architect, “People may not know what they want, or how to express their aspirations most of the time, which creates a communication challenge.” He came up with ‘EPIC’ – Engagement, Perception, Intuition and Conviction, a few unique steps to identify people’s real needs, realise their expectations and achieve EPIC successes. He illustrated his ideas with two real life examples and demonstrated how his ‘detective instinct’ helped find out hidden clues for the undefined ideas.
This set of detective skills apply not only to architects but to everyone. “The art of communication demands us all to be ‘idea detectives’ to look for clues and better understand what others really want, while at the same time also helping others to better understand and express themselves,” he said.
