Joannes studied archaeology and Oriental linguists at K.U.Leuven. He founded Namahn in 1987 as a one-person consultancy and over 20 years, has built the practice into a team of 15 designers. As well as leading his business, Joannes has a busy agenda lecturing at universities and product design schools internationally and he frequently speaks at conferences. His passions outside work include photography, dance, futurology, not forgetting his wife and three children (plus several goldfish).
How did you first start in the business of interface design?
A fortunate chain of events: at the beginning of the 1980s, I worked as an executive secretary in both the US and Belgium. I developed a fascination for computers and discovered I had a talent for communication. I wrote software manuals for senior executives and designed dashboards for project managers. I realized the gap between what software users needed and what they got was enormous. When I came to write my first user interface style guide in New York, I discovered the science of user-centered design (UCD).
People are central to the work you deliver. You also have a ‘people-centered’ approach to running your business…
Yes, we practice open management, which means open-bookkeeping and complete transparency. We function entirely as a team, each of us is exposed, there’s nowhere to hide! I’ve always believed that the people I work with have a right to know what’s happening in the company. Namahn only attracts people who embrace this openness and feel comfortable with it. We like to be challenged intellectually but we also put high value on our lives outside work.
You have your studio in the Namahn building and you also live here. There’s still plenty of space left, so how do you plan to use it?
After 10 years in residence, we’re at last making full use of this big building. In addition to the living area, offices and music studio of the Belgian composer Walter Hus, we are creating areas for creativity: art, design, music and theatre performance, dance and exhibitions. Our architect Wim Cuyvers is also highly provocative about public/non-public space. His designs play with geometry, light and space – and this space will be for both action and meditation. Wim is pushing me to make part of this new space semi-public. Our neighborhood is one of the poorest in Brussels. It’s troubled and struggling but also very proud. As part of this community, we can certainly share what we have created.
What are your plans for Namahn’s future?
I’m still busy making us into the most distinctive and reliable supplier of user-centered design for digital products in Belgium and I certainly want to become more valuable to customers. But I also want to move to the higher ground. We’re heading towards designing for digital products with a high level of complexity – technical, socio-technical or political – where a lot of stakeholders are involved. The complex behind-the-scenes systems I’m talking about are those used by a small group of specialised operators, where a good interface is not so much an added value (in terms of likeability and learnability) but a fundamental requirement. For example, emergency response, process control, cockpits and intensive care. Someday, we’ll expand our services to Germany, the Netherlands and France. We’re perfectly positioned geographically and as a multi-lingual team, we’re able to serve these markets well.