Design Thinking and Co-creation

Design thinking is a concept that is frequently used in the field of innovation. But have you ever
pondered what it stands for and why it is the most successful tool in an innovator's toolbox?

At the 2016 Innovation Roundtable Summit, Sean Carney, Chief Design Officer and GM
Business Leader Healthcare Transformation Services at Philips, outlines how design thinking,
branded as co creation, has helped them in overcoming several challenges.

The fundamental core of design thinking is its fast and positive approach to putting desperate
things together, solving a problem by envisioning and quickly iterating on the images you
generate. Sean and his colleagues in Philips have coined the phrase "co creation" to describe
their approach to design thinking. This is a customer-centered strategy in which you gather data
and identify the customer's pain points. We can create a visual flow of the client journey and
their pain points by applying this to design thinking. This will be used throughout the product
design stages, and the engagement of customers directly makes this a “co-creation”.

Co creation may be made more effective by implementing the following measures:

 People who can understand and interpret the consumer behaviors are appointed in the
team. (Anthropologists, Sociologists ….). The design thinkers alone may not be able to
handle the tasks. Having a diverse team force increase the efficiency of the approach.
 For lean startup models a patient and customer centered approach is the best. In this
model its always important to ask what exactly your consumers want.
 Integration of teams and activities with stage gate processes.
 A pleasant working environment with a positive atmosphere
 Filtering out the right set of people from the information gathered is very vital.
 Be customer centric, find pain points and work together to solve the problems
Design thinking has gone a long way from its humble beginnings as a tool for developing
products and services. However, its evolution as a customer-centered strategy has changed the
innovation. Sean and his team at Philips have provided new dimensions to design thinking
through their Cocreation, and it is a successful method to solving diverse issues. But always
remember that “Its bright shiny people that creates bright shiny ideas, not just a bright shiny
approach or a tool”