A pioneer in advancing the application of user-centered design to the development of products and services, Bob Schwartz has learned many lessons. He’s learned about the importance of context through his work with Motorola, where Schwartz was tasked with leading a team that designed critical communications tools for first responders. At Procter and Gamble, he learned that simple things can make a big difference. During a decade-long stint at the American Red Cross, he learned about humanizing the experience of people who are victims of a natural disaster to improve response efforts.

Bob doesn’t hesitate when asked to distill the common theme that ties all of these lessons together. “Do something that means something,” says Schwartz. “And remember that even simple things can improve a person’s life.”

Living with this mantra, Bob is often frustrated by the barrier people erect between doing good and being good. “I have worked in some big companies and I’ve had highly gratifying experiences while working for non-profits. What I have surmised from both is that it is not always a bad thing to make money while doing some good for the world. Philanthropy can be for profit and still be philanthropy.”

“People will ask me, ‘how can you work in these huge corporations?’. Sure, there are some companies that have less than stellar ethics, and some of the best practices of some companies are not what I would call best practices at all. But there are huge opportunities to create symbiosis between doing good and being good,” says Schwartz. “The intersection of redeeming social causes and the ability for businesses to earn money by doing good is a quid pro quo. Society can benefit and shareholders can benefit.”

As General Manager of Global Design at GE Healthcare, Bob Schwartz sees this principle in play every day. GE has is doing a lot of good, by developing products that are ecologically smarter, accessible to the world’s most vulnerable communities, and better at meeting customer’s unmet needs… and GE also has an obligation to its shareholders to be profitable.

Schwartz points to GE’s “Ecomagination” program as an example. GE saw the market opportunity in creating environmentally smart products. Critics initially dismissed the effort as a marketing ploy. For GE, it was much more: GE wanted to use its capability to create “greener” products to benefit the environment and strengthen the company’s bottom line. Today, Ecomagination is generating billions for GE and enabling the Company to invest heavily in the development of breakthrough technologies that reduce our energy consumption and make products like jet engines more fuel efficient.

Building on the success of Ecomagination, GE recently launched “Healthymagination”, a $6 billion global health care initiative focused on improving access to health care for more people at improved quality and reduced cost.

“Access to doctors isn’t always one of the biggest health care problems in the world, in some places its access to clean water,” says Bob citing one example. He and his Global Design Team are engaged directly in the Healthymagination program. “GE has a large water purification business. We have a huge incentive to innovate and create breakthroughs in this area because it helps society and creates revenue for the company. The two motives don’t have to be mutually exclusive.”

Most recently, Bob has applied this philosophy in his work at GE to improve the patient experience.

Business, Economic forum, Innovation, Design, Economy