Defining the Concept of Design Thinking - Essay Example

DEFINING THE CONCEPT OF DESIGN THINKING Defining the Concept of Design Thinking Introduction Design thinking refers to a formal method for creative and practical solutions and resolutions of problems that is carried out with the aim of an improved future result. In this context, design thinking can be said to be a solution-focused or a solution –based thinking (Cross, 2011). Instead of focusing on solving a particular problem, design thinking has a wider goal of obtaining a better future outcome. Through a consideration of the future and present conditions and the parameters of a problem, a simultaneous exploration of alternative solutions can be pursued in design thinking. Design thinking most commonly occurs in the artificial or built environments. It occurs in artefacts. Design thinking differs with the analytical, scientific methods of solving problems. In essence, the analytical, scientific methods start with a thorough definition of the parameters surrounding a problem in the process of creating a solution to that particular problem. On the contrary, design thinking investigates and identifies with both ambiguous and known aspects of the current problem to discover the hidden parameters and open up alternative courses that may lead to the goal. Design thinking is iterative in that; the intermediate solutions can form potential starting points for the alternative paths. Such intermediate solutions could include redefining the initial problem. Design thinking can be contemplated as a process for problem solving. Unlike analytical thinking, design thinking as a process includes the build-up of ideas with no or few limits on the scope of its brainstorming phase (Ingle, 2013). The nature of the brainstorming phase helps to encourage participation and input from a wide variety of sources and reduces the fear associated with failure in the participants in the ideation phase. The goal of the brainstorming phase in design thinking has been likened with the phrase ‘thinking outside the box’. The approach is a significant contribution at the brainstorming stage since it can help in the discovery of hidden ambiguities and elements of the situation and subsequently identify the faulty potential assumptions. There are several versions of design thinking. However, a commonly used version has seven phases. These are definition, research, ideation, prototyping, choosing, implementation and learning. It is within these seven steps that problems are framed, the right questions are asked, ideas created and the selection of the most satisfactory answers done. The seven phases of design thinking are not linearly related and can occur simultaneously and repetitively. According to Larry Leifer and Christoph Meinel, there are for basic rules of design thinking. The human rule asserts that all design activities are ultimately social in nature. The ambiguity rule states that all design thinkers must preserve ambiguity (Plattner, Meinel and Leifer, 2012). The re-design rule postulates that all design is redesign while the tangibility rule articulates that making ideas tangible will always facilitate communication. These rules are significant contributions to the understanding of the underlying features or characteristics of design thinking. The approaches or techniques applied in the doing of things in design thinking are called design methods. They include interviews, the creation of user profiles, evaluation of existing solutions, the creation of prototypes, mind mapping, the formulation of questions and thorough situational analysis. In the modern world of advanced technology, the relationship between man and machines is merging and the tools have become the extension of mans intelligence (Davis, 2010). Companies around the world and the individuals working in them differ in the levels of creativity and application of creative methods as a competitive tool of innovations in methods of doing business. In such contexts, design thinking is put into a practical use in solving the current and potential future business problems using technology that has been too a product of design thinking. Various strategies are put in use today in the context of the business with the aim of making decisions that make the maximum contribution of benefit to the firm in the end. Diagramatic llustartion of Design Thinking. Source: (Brown 2010). My Definition of Design Thinking In a lay man’s language, design thinking can be understood as a futuristic method of problem solving that broadly involves a creative analysis of the problem at hand with the goal of getting a practical solution that ameliorates the future outcomes. Design thinking is not limited to the particular problem solutions but broadly encompasses all the elements of the current problem that may generate possible solutions to the future outcomes. Examples of Design Thinking Application in a Business World The impact of design thinking on the business strategies widely adopted around the globe in the 21st century cannot be undermined (Brown, 2010). Design thinking has become an important tool for innovation and change in businesses. A strategy in business is a course of action that uses the specification of resources to achieve a desired business objective. Many strategic approaches in the application in business use the intentional, analytical and structured understanding of the market conditions. However, the importance of design thinking in these processes for the generation and communication of intuitive and new insights has increasingly been recognised in the modern business community. Design thinking in these processes helps companies to acquire ideas into the emergent possibilities that are inherently predictable in the market conditions. Such becomes a significant tool for change management in the highly dynamic business world today. In terms of value creation, businesses in the world have increasingly adopted the strategies that favour innovation and creativity. In managing for innovation and creativity, the design thinking processes are importantly used to unlock innovation paths in an organisation amid diversity (Liedtka, King and Bennett, 2013). The connection between innovation, creativity and design has been an area of contention in the recent past. Creativity helps to generate new ideas for the discovery of new business opportunities. Innovation, on the other hand, exploits the new ideas by transforming them into actions. Design thinking forms the link between creativity and innovation in that it shapes the ideas to give them a practical and attractive dimension. There is a growing demand for business organisations to adopt a holistic strategy to the environmental, cultural, political and societal impacts of their operations. Design thinking has been adopted as an innovative problem-solving strategy in the regard of addressing such demands. There many areas of application in the business set up where design thinking is being applied in the business world today. Below is an illustration of application of design thinking. An illustration of the application of Design Thinking Concept in Business: source (Ingle, 2013). Example 1: In the Development of Products It will be remembered that the work of design has historically been treated as a downstream phase in the process of developing products (Martin, 2013). Designers did not have a substantive role to play in the innovation process under traditional approaches. The inclusion of the role of design thinkers in the development of the products has been a practical approach widely practised by manufacturers around the world. The trend has changed from requesting designers to develop an already established idea into products that conform to customer requirements. Rather, the designers are creating the ideas themselves in a manner that reflects the changing needs and specifications of the customers. The new roles of design thinking in the product development are strategic and result in higher value creation opposed to the traditional tactical approaches where the role of design thinking applied only in marketing. Businesses are benefiting from the dramatic new forms of value arising from the involvement of design thinking in the product development process. Example 2: In the Knowledge Work and Service Delivery The majority of the economies of the world are changing from industrial manufacturing to knowledge and service delivery (Menges and Ahlquist, 2011). The terrain of innovation following this trend is expanding. The objectives in the upcoming new direction are no longer founded on the physical products. Rather, they are services, information technology powered interactions, new processes, entertainments and means of collaboration and communication. Design thinking, as applied to these human-centred activities, has made a decisive difference. Service delivery organisations in the health sector have widely adopted the concept of design thinking in an effort to innovate the delivery of medical services to the patients. The interactions between the medics and the patients have been improved as a result of the great role played by design thinkers in the sector. Design thinking is a widely used tool for the improvement of the quality of medical care by innovating the processes of experience and interactions between the patients and the medical practitioners. Businesses in the service sector have often made significant innovations in the line of service creation and delivery. In order to ensure that the concept receives a practical meaning in the service industry, business organisations have moved to training their workers on design thinking techniques (Martin, 2013). Administrators, doctors, nurses, and technicians, have been subjected to design thinking courses as part of their career development agenda. The aim is to inspire the practitioners in the service industry to contribute actively to new and innovative ideas that can boost the quality of service delivery. Example 3: In the Marketing of Products and Services The application of design thinking in the development and innovation of the marketing channels and strategies for both goods and services has become an important trend in the modern business world. The creation of quality products and services in not adequate for organisations (Plattner, Meinel and Leifer, 2012). The ultimate goal lies in making the maximum possible returns from the sale of the products and services. How well an organisation markets its products or services depends on the quality of the marketing strategies and their compatibility with the applied channels. The inclusion of design thinking in the role of marketing has resulted in the development of strategies that best access the target consumers. As a result, organisations have moved from the adoption of a single marketing strategy into a combination that optimises the revenues. Both target marketing and mass marketing strategies have been innovated through proper understanding of the defining features the customer base. The achievement of the marketing objectives requires the involvement of design thinkers in the marketing teams and training the marketers on the design thinking process to improve competitiveness in the market. Example 4: In Research and the Management of Change in Business Organisations The nature of the business environment in the modern world requires that business organisations should remain in a constant state of innovations in their business processes in order to remain relevant and competitive. The high dynamicity of the business environment has been steered up by the continuous advancement in technology. Innovation, therefore, is critical and businesses should ensure the effectiveness and efficiency of their processes (Liedtka, 2014). Design thinking has been incorporated in the research and development processes of business organisations for the provision of new and innovative ideas that seek to align the processes to goals. There has increasingly been a need for the business organisations to keep in touch with the changes that occur in the daily operations (Liedtka, King and Bennett, 2013). These changes have majorly resulted from the increased use of sophisticated technological expertise as a competitive business tool. The managers have the responsibility to manage proactively the changes that may negatively affect the operations of companies. Design thinking has been used as a valuable tool that helps business organisations to anticipate the changes before they occur. It has been an important tool in its very nature that focuses on future outcomes that result from environmental and technological changes. Managers are better placed to ensure that all aspects of anticipated change are properly managed and controlled to avoid the risk of failure. Futher illustration is indicated below. Diagamatic illustration of design thinking application in Business world: source ( Cross 2011). Case Study 1: Application of Design Thinking in Critix Company ABSTRACT: The concept of design thinking has been applied in the Critix Company championed by Catherine Courage, their Senior Vice-President of customer experience. To integrate the design-thinking concept in all of its processes, the company has so far trained about 7500 of its employees through internal design thinking courses. Reference: Brown, T. (2010). Change by design. [Concordville, Pa.]: Soundview Executive Book Summaries. Case Study 2: Application of Design Thinking in Kaiser Permanente Healthcare ABSTRACT: In the process of improvement of the experiences of its medical practitioners and patients in the delivery of quality health services, the large health care unit has embarked on the implementation of design thinking in its primary processes. The administrators, nurses and the doctors in the group have been taken through training on design thinking with the aim of integrating the culture of design thinking into the entire system. Reference: Davis, B. (2010). Business Innovation & Creativity 2010 Teaching of the Thinking Design to Business Application . Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2(4), pp.6532-6538. References Brown, T. (2010). Change by design. [Concordville, Pa.]: Soundview Executive Book Summaries. Cross, N. (2011). Design thinking. Oxford: Berg. Davis, B. (2010). Creativity & Innovation in Business 2010 Teaching the Application of Design Thinking to Business. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2(4), pp.6532-6538. Ingle, B. (2013). Design thinking for entrepreneurs and small businesses. Liedtka, J. (2014). Linking Design Thinking to Innovation Outcomes: the Role of Cognitive Bias Reduction. Academy of Management Proceedings, 2014(1), pp.10628-10628. Liedtka, J., King, A. and Bennett, K. (2013). Solving problems with design thinking. New York: Columbia University Press. Martin, R. (2013). The design of business. Menges, A. and Ahlquist, S. (2011). Computational design thinking. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons. Plattner, H., Meinel, C. and Leifer, L. (2012). Design thinking research. Berlin: Springer. Appendix Design Thinking Applied Task The value of design thinking extends beyond the business application to many other fields and disciplines. Its importance in the modern world’s undertaking is highly valuable in both business, psychology, education, engineering and many other disciplines. Source: Evidence from Seminar Key Theory reading The contribution of Tim Browns book ‘Change by Design is a significant contribution to the understanding of the design thinking concept as applied in the business world today. Read More