What is Design Thinking and Why Is It Getting Popular?

SRISHTI DOKRAS
B.Arch. (Institute for Design Education and Architectural Studies) Nagpur India
Visiting Architect, Australia.Dubai & USA
Consultant - Design and Architecture, Esselworld Gorewada International Zoo -Largest in
Asia
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“If I’d asked my customers what they wanted, they’d have said ‘a faster horse.’” Henry Ford

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ABSTRACT

Design Thinking is an inter-active process in which we seek to understand the user, challenge
assumptions, and redefine problems in an attempt to identify alternative strategies and solutions that
might not be instantly apparent with our initial level of understanding. At the same time, Design
Thinking provides a solution-based approach to solving problems. It is a way of thinking and working
as well as a collection of hands-on methods. Here is the A to Z of the process. The design thinking
process has become increasingly popular over the last few decades because it was key to the success
of many high-profile, global organizations—companies such as Google, Apple and Airbnb have
wielded it to notable effect, for example. This outside the box thinking is now taught at leading
universities across the world and is encouraged at every level of business.

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 “The design thinking process has become increasingly popular over the last few decades because it
was key to the success of many high-profile, global organizations—companies such as Google, Apple
and Airbnb have wielded it to notable effect, for example. This outside the box thinking is now taught
at leading universities across the world and is encouraged at every level of business.”1

Design Thinking is essentially a problem-solving approach specific to design, which involves assessing
known aspects of a problem and identifying the more ambiguous or peripheral factors that contribute
to the conditions of a problem. This contrasts with a more scientific approach where the concrete and
known aspects are tested in order to arrive at a solution.

Design has been practiced for ages: monuments, bridges, automobiles, subway systems are all end-
products of design processes. Throughout history, good designers have applied a human-centric creative
process to build meaningful and effective solutions. Despite examples of human-centric products,
design has historically been an afterthought in the business world, applied only to touch up a product’s
aesthetics. This topical design application has resulted in corporations creating solutions which fail to
meet their customers’ real needs. Consequently, some of these companies moved their designers from
the end of the product-development process, where their contribution is limited, to the beginning. Their
human-centric design approach proved to be a differentiator: those companies that used it have reaped
the financial benefits of creating products shaped by human needs.

In order for this approach to be adopted across large organizations, it needed to be standardized. Cue
design thinking, a formalized framework of applying the creative design process to traditional business
problems.

What — Definition of Design Thinking

Design thinking was coined in the 1990's by David Kelley and Tim Brown of IDEO, with Roger Martin,
and encapsulated methods and ideas that have been brewing for years into a single unified concept. It
asserts that a hands-on, user-centric approach to problem solving can lead to innovation, and innovation
can lead to differentiation and a competitive advantage. This hands-on, user-centric approach is defined
by the design thinking process and comprises 5 distinct phases, as defined and illustrated below. Both
the industrial revolution and World War II had pushed the boundaries of what we thought was
technologically possible. Engineers, architects and industrial designers—as well as cognitive
scientists—then began to converge on the issues of collective problem solving, driven by the significant
societal changes that took place at that time. Design thinking emerged, or should we say converged, out
of the muddy waters of this chaos from the 50s and 60s onwards.

Cognitive scientist and Nobel Prize laureate Herbert A. Simon was the first to mention design thinking
as a way of thinking in his 1969 book, The Sciences of the Artificial. He then went on to contribute

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many ideas throughout the 70s which are now regarded as principles of design thinking. From the 1970s
onwards, design thinking started to combine the human, technological and strategic needs of our times
and progressively developed over the decades to become the leading innovation methodology it is
today. Design thinking continues to gain ground across a wide range of industries and is still explored
and enhanced by those at the forefront of the field.

How - The Process

By using design thinking, you make decisions based on what future customers really want instead of
relying only on historical data or making risky bets based on instinct instead of evidence. Design
thinking utilizes elements from the designer's toolkit like empathy and experimentation to arrive at
innovative solutions. It is not an exclusive property of designers—all great innovators in literature, art,
music, science, engineering, and business have practiced it. What’s special about Design Thinking is
that designers’ work processes can help us systematically extract, teach, learn and apply these human-
centered techniques to solve problems in a creative and innovative way – in our designs, in our
businesses, in our countries, in our lives. Some of the world’s leading brands, such as Apple, Google,
Samsung and GE, have rapidly adopted the Design Thinking approach, and Design Thinking is being
taught at leading universities around the world, including Stanford, Harvard and MIT. But do we know
what Design Thinking is? And why it’s so popular?

Interactive process: Thus it is an iterative process in which we seek to understand the user, challenge
assumptions, and redefine problems in an attempt to identify alternative strategies and solutions that
might not be instantly apparent with our initial level of understanding. At the same time, it provides a
solution-based approach to solving problems- a way of thinking and working as well as use of hands-
on methods. Here one needs a deep interest in developing an understanding of the people for whom
we’re designing the products or services. Once we observe we develop empathy with the target user
and questioning the problem, questioning the assumptions, and questioning the implications. This
makes it extremely useful in tackling problems that are ill-defined or unknown, by re-framing the
problem in human-centric ways, creating many ideas in brainstorming sessions, and adopting a hands-
on approach in prototyping and testing. This type of thinking also involves ongoing
experimentation: sketching, prototyping, testing, and trying out concepts and ideas.

Why Design Thinking

Thinking like a designer can transform the way organizations develop products, services, processes,
and strategy. To be successful, an innovation process must deliver three things: superior solutions,
lower risks and costs of change, and employee buy-in 2. This approach, which IDEO, an international

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 design and consulting firm founded in Palo Alto, California, in 1991; calls design thinking, brings
together what is desirable from a human point of view with what is technologically feasible and
economically viable. It also allows people who aren't trained as designers to use creative tools to address
a vast range of challenges.

Design Thinking Approach

The elements of design thinking combine to form an iterative approach—it relies on the human ability
to be intuitive, to recognize patterns, and to construct ideas that are emotionally meaningful as well as
functional. There are many variants of the Design Thinking process in use today, and they have from
three to seven phases, stages, or modes. However, all variants of Design Thinking are very similar. All
variants of Design Thinking embody the same principles, which were first described by Nobel Prize
laureate Herbert Simon in The Sciences of the Artificial in 1969. Here, we will focus on the five-phase
model proposed by the Hasso-Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford, which is also known as d.school.
We’ve chosen d.school’s approach because they’re at the forefront of applying and teaching Design
Thinking. The five phases of Design Thinking are as follows:

• Empathise – with your users

• Define – your users’ needs, their problem, and your insights

• Ideate – by challenging assumptions and creating ideas for innovative solutions

• Prototype – to start creating solutions

• Test – solutions

1. Stage 1: Empathize—Research Your Users' Needs

The first stage of the design thinking process allows you to gain an empathetic understanding of the
problem you’re trying to solve, typically through user research. Empathy is crucial to a human-centered
design process like design thinking because it allows you to set aside your own assumptions about the
world and gain real insight into users and their needs.

2. Stage 2: Define—State Your Users' Needs and Problems

in the Define stage, you accumulate the information you created and gathered during the Empathize
stage. You analyze your observations and synthesize them to define the core problems you and your
team have identified so far. You should always seek to define the problem statement in a human-
centered manner as you do this.

3. Stage 3: Ideate—Challenge Assumptions and Create Ideas

Designers are ready to generate ideas as they reach the third stage of design thinking. The knowledge
from the first two phases enables a kick- start to “thinking outside the box.” Here designers look for

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alternative ways to view the problem and identify innovative solutions to the problem statement
created.

4. Stage 4: Prototype—Start to Create Solutions

Design teams will produce a number of inexpensive, scaled-down versions of the product (or specific
features found within the product) to investigate the problem solutions generated in the previous stage.

Because this is the model stage-or prototype stage. An experimental phase, the aim of which is to
identify the best possible solution for each of the problems identified during the first three stages.

Stage 5: Test—Try Your Solutions Out

Designers or evaluators rigorously test the complete product using the best solutions identified in the
Prototype phase. This is the final phase of the model but, in an iterative process such as design thinking,
the results generated are often used to redefine one or more further problems. Designers can then choose
to return to previous stages in the process to make further iterations, alterations and refinements to rule
out alternative solutions.

Design Thinking is often referred to as ‘outside the box’ thinking, as designers are attempting to
develop new ways of thinking that do not abide by the dominant or more common problem-solving
methods.

1. At the heart of Design Thinking is the intention to improve products by analyzing and
understanding how users interact with products and investigating the conditions in
which they operate.
2. At the heart of Design Thinking lies also the interest and ability to ask significant
questions and challenging assumptions.
3. One element of outside the box thinking is to falsify previous assumptions – i.e., to
make it possible to prove whether they are valid or not. Once we have questioned and
investigated the conditions of a problem, the solution-generation process will help us
produce ideas that reflect the genuine constraints and facets of that particular problem.
4. Design Thinking offers us a means of digging that bit deeper; it helps us to do the right
kind of research and to prototype and test our products and services so as to uncover
new ways of improving the product, service or design.

A Third Way: The techniques and strategies of design belong at every level of business. Change by
Design is not a book by designers for designers; creative leaders who seek to infuse design thinking

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into every level of an organization, product, or service to drive new alternatives for business and society
also practice this.2 The design process often involves a number of different groups of people in different
departments; for this reason, developing, categorizing, and organizing ideas and problem solutions can
be difficult. One way of keeping a design project on track and organizing the core ideas is using a
Design Thinking approach. Product thinking enables designers to build better products. It’s a way of
examining every design decision in context with the problem the user wants to solve. However, for
some product thinking is just a new buzzword that does not necessarily bring anything new compared,
for example, to design thinking. Whether it is a new approach or not, you can use the concept product
thinking as an advocacy tool. Analyse your internal audience and see what word makes more sense to
accomplish your aims and convey the ideas!

It involves ambiguous or inherently subjective concepts such as emotions, needs, motivations, and
drivers of behaviours. This contrasts with a solely scientific approach, where there’s more of a distance
in the process of understanding and testing the user’s needs and emotions — e.g., via quantitative
research. Tim Brown sums up that Design Thinking is a third way: Design Thinking is essentially a
problem-solving approach, crystalized in the field of design, which combines a holistic user-centered
perspective with rational and analytical research with the goal of creating innovative solutions.

“Design is not only human-centered; it is deeply human in and of itself. It relies on our ability to be
intuitive, to recognize patterns, to construct ideas that have emotional meaning as well as
functionality, to express ourselves in media other than words or symbols. “

– Tim Brown, Change by Design

Science and Rationality in Design Thinking

An integral part of the Design Thinking process is the definition of a meaningful and actionable problem
statement, which the design thinker will focus on solving. This is perhaps the most challenging part of
the Design Some of the scientific activities will include analyzing how users interact with products and
investigating the conditions in which they operate: researching user needs, pooling experience from
previous projects, considering present and future conditions specific to the product, testing the
parameters of the problem, and testing the practical application of alternative problem solutions. Unlike
a solely scientific approach, where the majority of known qualities, characteristics, etc. of the problem
are tested so as to arrive at a problem solution, Design Thinking investigations include ambiguous
elements of the problem to reveal previously unknown parameters and uncover alternative strategies.

After arriving at a number of potential problem solutions, the selection process is underpinned by
rationality. Designers are encouraged to analyze and falsify these problem solutions so that they can

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arrive at the best available option for each problem or obstacle identified during each phase of the design
process.

With this in mind, it may be more correct to say that Design Thinking is not about thinking outside of
the box, but on its edge, its corner, its flap, and under its bar code, as Clint Runge put it.

Design Thinking is for Every body

Tim Brown also emphasizes that Design Thinking techniques and strategies of design belong at every
level of a business. Design thinking is not only for designers but also for creative employees,
freelancers, and leaders who seek to infuse design thinking into every level of an organization,
product or service in order to drive new alternatives for business and society.
“Design thinking begins with skills designers have learned over many decades in their quest to
match human needs with available technical resources within the practical constraints of business. By
integrating what is desirable from a human point of view with what is technologically feasible and
economically viable, designers have been able to create the products we enjoy today. Design thinking
takes the next step, which is to put these tools into the hands of people who may have never thought
of themselves as designers and apply them to a vastly greater range of problems.”

Design Thinking is an iteractive process in which knowledge is constantly being questioned and
acquired so it can help us redefine a problem in an attempt to identify alternative strategies and solutions
that might not be instantly apparent with our initial level of understanding. Design Thinking is often
referred to as ‘outside the box thinking’, as designers are attempting to develop new ways of thinking
that do not abide by the dominant or more common problem-solving methods – just like artists do. At
the heart of Design Thinking is the intention to improve products by analyzing how users interact with
them and investigating the conditions in which they operate. Design Thinking offers us a means of
digging that bit deeper to uncover ways of improving user experiences.

“The ‘Design Thinking’ label is not a myth. It is a description of the application of well-tried design
process to new challenges and opportunities, used by people from both design and non-design
backgrounds. I welcome the recognition of the term and hope that its use continues to expand and be
more universally understood, so that eventually every leader knows how to use design and design
thinking for innovation and better results.”

– Bill Moggridge, co-founder of IDEO, in Design Thinking: Dear Don

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Why Is Design Thinking so Important in Today’s World?
Over recent decades, it has become crucial to develop and refine skills which allow us to understand
and act on rapid changes in our environment and behavior. The world has become increasingly
interconnected and complex, and design thinking offers a means to grapple with all this change in a
more human-centric manner.
Design teams use design thinking to tackle ill-defined or unknown problems (otherwise known as
wicked problems) because the process reframes these problems in human-centric ways, and allows
designers to focus on what’s most important for users. Design thinking offers us a means to think
outside the box and also dig that bit deeper into problem solving. It helps designers carry out the right
kind of research, create prototypes and test out products and services to uncover new ways to meet
users’ needs.
Design thinking improves the world around us every day because of its ability to generate ground-
breaking solutions in a disruptive and innovative way. Design thinking is more than just a process, it
opens up an entirely new way to think, and offers a collection of hands-on methods to help you apply
this new mindset.

The Origin of Design Thinking

IDEO was formed in 1991 as a merger between David Kelley Design, which created Apple
Computer’s first mouse in 1982, and ID Two, which designed the first laptop computer, also in 1982.
Initially, IDEO focused on traditional design work for business, designing products like the Palm V
personal digital assistant, Oral-B toothbrushes, and Steelcase chairs. These are the types of objects
that are displayed in lifestyle magazines or on pedestals in modern art museums.

By 2001, IDEO was increasingly being asked to tackle problems that seemed far afield from
traditional design. A healthcare foundation asked us to help restructure its organization, a century-old
manufacturing company wanted to better understand its clients, and a university hoped to create
alternative learning environments to traditional classroom.

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 REFERENCES

1. https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/product-thinking-is-problem-solving

2. Why Design Thinking Works,Jeanne Liedtka, Harvard Business Review, 2018,

https://hbr.org/2018/09/why-design-thinking-works

3. Change by Design: How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires

Innovation Kindle Edition, Tim Brown