Design Works: A Guide to Creating and

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Heather M A Fraser
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 Design Works

Revised and Expanded Edition

DESIGN WORKS
A Guide to Creating and Sustaining Value
through Business Design

Revised and Expanded Edition

Heather M.A. Fraser

© Heather M.A. Fraser 2019
Rotman-UTP Publishing
University of Toronto Press
Toronto Buffalo London
utorontopress.com
Printed in the U.S.A.

ISBN 978-1-4875-2290-2

Printed on acid-free paper.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Fraser, Heather M.A., 1957–, author

Design works : a guide to creating and sustaining value through
business design / Heather M.A. Fraser. – Revised and expanded
edition.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4875-2290-2 (softcover)

1. Organizational change. 2. Business planning. I. Title.

HD58.8.F73 2019 658.4’06
C2018-905717-3

University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance

to its publishing program of the Canada Council for the Arts and
the Ontario Arts Council, an agency of the Government of
Ontario.
Dedicated to the memory of my parents,
Elizabeth and Herbert.
CONTENTS

Introduction

PART ONE THE PRACTICE OF BUSINESS DESIGN

1 Overview of Business Design
2 Preparing for Your Quest
3 Contextualizing Your Challenge
4 Gear 1: Empathy & Deep Human Understanding
5 Gear 2: Concept Visualization
6 Gear 3: Strategic Business Design & Activation
7 Leading Innovation & Transformation

PART TWO TOOL KIT

Preparing for Your Quest
Contextualizing Your Challenge
Gear 1: Empathy & Deep Human Understanding
Gear 2: Concept Visualization
Gear 3: Strategic Business Design & Activation

Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
INTRODUCTION

When I wrote the first edition of this book in 2012, enterprises

around the world were wrestling with how to awaken their capacity
to innovate. A lot has transpired since then. Increasingly, innovation
is no longer seen as a stream of activity but rather the nature of
business itself. To thrive and survive, an enterprise must be
continually searching for new ways to create and sustain value to
the market and capture value to fuel the enterprise.
To help unlock enterprise potential, many enterprises have
evolved their ideology and practices. Design thinking has become all
the rage, and innovation labs and incubators have popped up
everywhere. Yet, despite these well-intended efforts to ignite
innovation, some fundamentals are often missing in building an
enterprise’s capacity to continually innovate and to more seamlessly
integrate “business” and “design”:

Embedding design thinking takes more than a few short boot

camps and playbooks that oversimplify the complexities of
turning ideas into business.
New ideas must be explicitly linked to the enterprise strategy and
integrated into the running of an enterprise.
Integration of data analysis and validation is key to building a
business case. Numbers matter when it comes to making a
business investment. Fact-based reasons to believe build
confidence in the innovation pathway.
Innovation is a shared quest. It calls for engagement throughout
the enterprise and of leadership at all levels.
Innovation is much more than an application of methods. It calls
for the right mindset and regulation of thinking modes.
 These are the critical factors that have inspired this second
edition. This book is intended to bring Business Design into the
current context and reflect work in this discipline since the first
edition and a broader view of how to create value, based on my
thirty-nine-year career and the learning of others. My precept is that
business is a very creative act, and that everyone in an organization
can and should contribute to creating and delivering new value. I
continue to believe that there is an opportunity to inject more
“design” into business and more “business” into design.

Background
My personal background includes a decade at Procter & Gamble,
where I listened to consumers, made prototypes to get executive
input to product and marketing ideas early on, and crafted
bulletproof business plans. Working across disciplines at P&G was
always rewarding, because people across all functions in that
company had something insightful and clever to contribute.
Wondering what it would be like to be creative all the time, I decided
to jump the fence and go into advertising and design.
In the next fifteen years, I learned a lot about the magic of
imagination and the value of making ideas tangible. I also learned
that strategy is often inspired by a novel idea. While I initially
resisted that notion because I was a strategist, I came to appreciate
the truth in that notion. As humans, we naturally begin with insights
and ideas, not strategies, though we absolutely need to have a clear
strategy to optimize our way forward.
I then met Roger Martin, the visionary dean of the Rotman School
of Business with an ambition to transform business education. He
offered me the opportunity to bring those two worlds together and
contribute to an experiment in business education, centered on the
notion of Business Design. The idea behind Business Design: to
integrate the best practices of business with design-inspired
mindsets and methods to help organizations tackle their innovation
challenges. In collaboration with David Kelley (co-founder of
innovation consultancy IDEO and Stanford’s d.school) and Patrick
Whitney (dean of the Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of
Technology), we set off to design a fresh approach to education and
business innovation. Our approach would focus on how to best meet
customer needs, generate breakthrough solutions for customers, and
translate those big ideas into focused and actionable business
strategies that would greatly increase the chances of innovation
success. This was the inspiration for the 3 Gears of Business Design:
Empathy and Deep Human Understanding, Concept Visualization,
and Strategic Business Design, as you will read about in chapter 1.
In 2005, Roger brought an exciting opportunity to this group. One
of the world’s most admired companies believed that design thinking
could play a key role in unlocking innovation, defining more
competitive strategies, and ultimately delivering greater value to the
market and the enterprise. That company was my alma mater,
Procter & Gamble. A.G. Lafley, P&G’s CEO at the time, wanted to
propel P&G’s level of innovation and growth into the future by
pushing the value of design beyond its current application in product
and packaging. To lead this quest, he appointed Claudia Kotchka, a
P&G business leader with a strong track record for results and a
passion for design as the company’s first vice-president of Design
Innovation and Strategy. Our integrated approach was first put to
the test with the Global Hair Care Team in December 2005 and
subsequently refined and rolled out to the enterprise globally to
fortify P&G’s reputation as one of the most innovative companies in
the world. Part 1 of this book ends with an interview with Claudia on
her tips to lead such a massive global enterprise transformation.
Concurrent with scaling the P&G program, we launched a full-
scale initiative to advance the practice of Business Design and
formed a strategy innovation lab called DesignWorks at Rotman. Our
ambition was to turn this design-inspired approach into a
methodology that could be applied in a deliberate, rigorous manner
to full-scale innovation projects. Over the next seven years, we
engaged in a combination of teaching, research, experimentation,
and practice activities aimed at advancing the discipline.
 We worked with top industry executives and business teams
across a variety of sectors and companies, including P&G, Nestlé,
Pfizer, Medtronic, Whirlpool, Frito-Lay and SAP, as well as public
institutions and government teams. We applied Business Design to
many sectors and countries, including extensive work in Singapore.
There our program entailed a broad-scale program for business
executives commissioned by the Singapore government agency,
SPRING, an organization dedicated to developing a productive,
innovative, and competitive small-to-medium-enterprise sector to
create meaningful jobs for Singaporeans. We developed and
delivered a comprehensive “teach the teachers” certification program
to transfer Business Design knowledge and skills to the faculty of
Singapore Polytechnic. Their ambition was to play an important role
in Singapore’s national agenda to embed design broadly into their
workforce.1 They have achieved remarkable results, as told in
chapter 7 of this book.
All of these activities enabled us to build out our methodologies
and test the value of Business Design with many different
organizations and types of challenges. This work culminated in the
first edition of the book, which captured the learning from those
years at Rotman and the mounting evidence that Business Design

is a learnable innovation discipline that can transform the way

enterprise teams create new value, shape strategies, and
mobilize support;
has the potential to bring out the creative side of everyone
without compromising the rigor required to make a meaningful
market impact;
helps get to bigger ideas faster by engaging teams in a common
ambition, with the buy-in and know-how required to make
important things happen; and
brings a valuable balance to conventional business planning by
expanding opportunities and devising breakthrough business
strategies.
 To test this premise outside the academic realm, I established a
practice in 2012 called Vuka Innovation, to put Business Design to
work, do research into what helps and hinders enterprise-wide
innovation, and advance the discipline of Business Design. Some of
that work is shared in this second edition to further demonstrate
how Business Design can help create and sustain new value.

Common Enterprise Challenges

Some of the challenges that enterprises face have not changed, as I
often hear.2

“We are not different enough. The changes we are making are
incremental and not truly innovative.”

“We are spending time and money on a lot of initiatives, but we

wonder if we are investing in the right things – those that really
matter to our customer.”

“We’ve been stumped by the same challenge for years. We can’t

seem to make any meaningful headway. We need a new
approach.”

“We operate in a mature, saturated industry. It’s hard to find

ways to drive growth.”

“How can we maximize the impact of design in a risk-averse,

data-driven organization?”

“How can we create a stronger appetite to experiment and learn

in the market?”

“We can’t afford to always outsource the innovation process.

How do we engage our enterprise to participate in this process
to gain first-hand market insight?”
 If any of these resonate with you, I am hoping that the practice
of Business Design as presented in this book can give you some
practical principles, frameworks, and tools to tackle these issues,
from insights and ideation through to strategy and activation. This
edition reflects the insights, observations, questions, and feedback
from a wide range of enterprises and moves beyond the contents of
the first edition to address more deeply how to create positive
change in business culture. It shares the key principles, frameworks,
and tools that innovation pioneers have found most valuable in their
ambitions to transform and advance their businesses, building on the
work we did at Rotman through 2012 and the work we (at Vuka
Innovation) and others have done since.

How This Book Works

Part one of this book is about the practice of Business Design –
what it is, how it is done, and what it can yield. This practice is
anchored in the 3 Gears of Business Design, a framework for
thinking about how to design new solutions and strategies for
success. I begin with an Overview of Business Design and move
through Preparing for Your Quest and Contextualizing Your
Challenge, followed by chapters on each of the 3 Gears. I conclude
part one with a chapter on Transformation, sharing learning from
others on how to embed these innovative practices into your
enterprise culture.
Each chapter in part one (after the Overview of Business Design)
begins with a story to illustrate the application of Business Design,
followed by a brief overview of the goals, activities, and outcomes
for that phase of development and principles to guide you through
those activities. Each chapter ends with an inspiring interview with
people who bring these principles to life.
Part two is your Tool Kit and includes the methods and tips that
others have found most valuable. Each tool includes brief
instructions and examples from a variety of projects. These tools can
enrich your discovery and development processes and unlock the
ingenuity of your enterprise teams.
This book is designed to serve as an ongoing reference, not a
one-time read. Its value will be determined by what you do with it.
Here are some things you might do as you read this book:

Reflect on your current state. What’s your biggest challenge?

How ahead of the game are you in creating your future? What is
your success rate with big, breakthrough ideas? What holds you
back from getting big ideas to market? What factors – structural,
operational or cultural – are slowing you down?

Have a disruptive project in mind. Think about that challenge

and define it more specifically. This may be an unfulfilled ambition or
major challenge that you haven’t been able to tackle for some
reason within your current way of working. With a real-world
challenge in mind, this book will enable you to imagine how a
Business Design approach can help you tackle a challenge that is
important to you.

Apply these methods and reflect. Don’t be afraid to experiment

with methods. If you discover that one method brings a fresh
perspective to your development efforts, inject it into ongoing
projects. This is the best way to see immediate value in your newly
discovered skills. Every time you put Business Design into practice,
ask yourself what was different from how you normally work and
how it enhanced your capacity to innovate. At the same time, reflect
on what makes intuitive sense. There’s a lot of common sense at the
root of Business Design.

Appreciate the deeper value of Business Design. This

approach can enrich your ability to generate new insights and ideas.
It can also help you get to bigger ideas faster. Spending time on the
more critical elements of innovation (customer needs, game-
changing ideas, and strategies to realize new value) can save you
time and money. Business Design is a natural way to create and
capture new value.

Take the time to do it right and commit to action. Business

Design is not about one big “Aha!”; it is about generating both
immediate and long-term impact. Making meaningful market impact
requires time, commitment, and perseverance. As you work through
the process, you will discover new insights, ideas, and “quick wins”
that will allow you to activate your new learning. At every step, ask
yourself, What value have we brought so far? How can we act on it
now?

Teach, propagate, and celebrate. Success inspires success. If

you like where the practice of Business Design takes you, you can
move toward expanding the practice. With some evidence of value,
you can begin to strategically roll out Business Design in a
systematic way and boost your own expertise in the process.

Business Design is a journey of new discoveries and learning that

can transform the way you work and make your work more
meaningful. I’m hoping you’ll gain inspiration from the stories in this
book and also acquire practical ideas on how to enhance your
innovation journey within your enterprise.

A Word on Words
Every discipline has its own nomenclature, which is often dismissed
as jargon. There a few words used frequently in this book that I
have chosen for specific reasons. Here are some of these terms and
a guide to how you should think of them:

Value: The most important notion in Business Design and intended

in the broadest terms to mean anything of relative worth, merit, or
importance – financial or otherwise.
Enterprise: Any organization that aims to create value – public,
private, or not-for-profit. It reflects the spirit of any organization that
is ready to undertake projects of importance.

Stakeholders: Your end customers (consumers, customers, clients,

or guests) as well as important enablers and influencers. In a
comprehensive solution, many of these stakeholders will play a role
in your success.

Frameworks: Not to be confused with methods or tools,

frameworks help anchor, prompt, or organize your thinking.

Methods: Used to refer to a methodology, a way of getting things

done. This word is used interchangeably with “tools.”

Outcomes: I have focused on “outcomes” rather than “results”

because results, in business, are often thought of in financial terms
and take time to realize. Outcomes, however, should be more
immediate and tangible.
Part One

The Practice of Business

Design

The discipline of Business Design is inspired by the many

organizations that have created new value and have demonstrated a
track record of sustained success. This section presents what
Business Design is and how you can put these tried and true
principles and practices to work for you in a deliberate and
consistent way. The goal of Business Design is to catalyze and
accelerate your development on a path to create new value for the
market and for your enterprise.
1
OVERVIEW OF BUSINESS DESIGN
CREATING, DELIVERING, & SUSTAINING
VALUE

The principles of great Business Design are evident in many

successful business ventures. Applying these proven principles
deliberately and consistently can help increase your odds of turning
your insights and ideas into great business. Here is one such
example that brings to life the underlying principles of Business
Design.

In 1992, I facilitated an innovation session in Nestlé’s global training

center in Vevey, Switzerland. When I went to help myself to a cup of
coffee, what I found was unexpected – a rather unique and
extraordinary coffee machine that made an incredible cup of
espresso. All it required of me was the placement of one small, easy-
to-use coffee capsule into the machine and the push of a button!
Fast-forward sixteen years later to 2008. While visiting the
Champs Élysées in Paris, I came upon a magnificent Nespresso
Boutique selling the same coffee system I had discovered more than
a decade earlier in a conference room. Nestlé had leveraged that
coffee system into something much more. Not only did the
Nespresso Boutique experience prompt me to become a loyal
customer of the company, it also drove me to know more about how
they had expanded this idea into such a remarkable business. What
had Nestlé done to create such momentum and turn Nespresso into
such a phenomenal market success?
 Let’s first consider the market in which Nespresso chose to
compete. Coffee is one of the most popular beverages worldwide.
The consumption of coffee worldwide currently exceeds 500 billion
cups a year. Annual consumption has steadily climbed in volume with
the proliferation of cafés, coffee franchises, and specialty coffee
beverages.3 As consumption has escalated, so has competition.
Many companies are jockeying for position to be the one to provide
you with your special coffee occasion.
What if a magical café encounter could be experienced at home?
To the coffee connoisseur, having your own stylish espresso bar at
home and being able to make a perfect cup of coffee at the touch of
a button without any mess is true indulgence. This is where
Nespresso delivered a new and game-changing experience to its
customers.
Your Nespresso experience begins at the moment of its discovery.
Entering a Nespresso Boutique for the first time is a delight to
anyone with an appreciation for coffee and stylish design. Beautiful
and inviting, you might first wonder if you’re entering a café or a
chic art gallery. Brightly colored, high-tech, pre-filled coffee capsules
are artistically displayed along the café’s walls alongside exhibits of
sleekly designed coffee machines and accessories. Your experience is
further enhanced by a Coffee Ambassador who assists you with
coffee selection, as well as an espresso bar where you can taste
various options.
If you are one of the many who purchase a Nespresso system,
your life changes immediately. Not only can you enjoy your favorite
coffee any time you like in the comfort of your home, but you also
receive many perks as a Nespresso Club member. Members receive
special offers and superior customer service either over the phone or
through the online Nespresso Boutique. The company also
effectively communicates their commitment to the environment
through its capsule-recycling program. And if you travel often, you
will be pleased to discover that many luxury hotels provide
Nespresso machines in their rooms.
 Nespresso’s success started with a vision to create the ultimate
coffee experience for coffee lovers around the globe in a unique,
innovative way through a new proprietary coffee system. Through
exquisite design, high-quality manufacturing, and dedicated
customer service, Nespresso brought new value to the coffee
market. These pursuits were combined with sophisticated retail
concepts and well-choreographed fulfillment centers to further
enhance value and customer experience.
How did they effectively turn their ideas into a powerful business?
For one, the company collaborated with some of the best design and
manufacturing companies in the world, like Alessi, Krups, and
Magimix. Nespresso also conceptualized a distinct route-to-market
approach to link their retail boutiques, fulfillment, and customer-
service goals. And the company demonstrated its commitment to
environmental and social responsibilities through its Ecolaboration
initiative, which supports capsule recycling and agricultural
programs. These add up to a distinct and effective business strategy.
With this strategy, Nespresso has grown from one boutique in
2000 to more than 700 worldwide in 2017, and it operates in
seventy-six countries with more than 13,500 employees, 50 per cent
of whom are in direct contact with customers. It has established
more than 100,000 recycling points and home collection in eighteen
countries. With more than 6.5 million Facebook fans and an ever-
expanding club membership, Nespresso has built sales to more than
$4 billion annually.4 Nespresso has successfully leveraged its brand
loyalty, continually expanded its product line and accessories, and
built strong hotel alliances. By all accounts, these are impressive
results!
Nespresso’s remarkable success puts them on the roster of
exceptional companies like Apple, Disney, Procter & Gamble, Netflix,
LinkedIn, Nike, IKEA, Fidelity, Four Seasons, Virgin, and many others
that have enjoyed long runs of success in competitive industries. In
studying these companies, one can appreciate that there are many
things these companies do well. One can also see that there are
three things they all do exceptionally well:
1. Demonstrate a deep, holistic understanding of their customers
and their needs;
2. Continually explore and deliver new offerings and experiences
that uniquely fulfill these needs; and
3. Engage in a distinct combination of activities that leverage their
enterprise activities and capabilities in a way that is difficult for
others to replicate.

This is the inspiration behind the central framework of Business

Design – the 3 Gears. Initially developed in 2005 to help Procter &
Gamble, the concept of the 3 Gears of Business Design has been
used to drive value creation for more than a decade with enterprises
of all types around the world.

The 3 Gears of Business Design

The 3 Gears of Business Design leverage the learning from
successful innovators and address three critical questions: What do
people need? How might we better meet those needs? What is our
strategy to deliver and scale this idea?
Here’s an overview of the 3 Gears of Business Design (Figure 1)
to help you understand how each one can enhance opportunities for
innovation success.5
Fig. 1 The 3 Gears of Business Design
Gear 1: Empathy & Deep Human
Understanding – What do people need?
Great Business Design calls for a deep understanding of people,
especially customers. This requires more than market research and
customer-satisfaction surveys; it calls for an empathetic, holistic
appreciation for people’s needs. When needs are unfulfilled,
customers are not completely satisfied. That represents a
tremendous opportunity for creating new value.
Gear 1 of Business Design entails understanding individuals at a
much deeper level than you may be accustomed to. It calls for
understanding individuals beyond their consumption behaviors and
preferences. It is also valuable to appreciate the broader human
context – the various roles and relationships within the human
ecosystem. It is important to ask, Who matters and what do they
need?
 This process also inspires and motivates teams, as I have heard
through my work that “Connecting with people on a deeper and
more authentic level gives meaning and purpose to our work.”6 Daily
activities naturally assume greater meaning with a stronger sense of
human-centered purpose.
Empathy and deep human understanding in Gear 1 will inevitably
shift your perspective and help identify new opportunities to create
value. Many times, you may find the initial problem was not
adequately defined or was too narrowly framed. Gear 1 helps
reframe human-centered opportunities and provides an inspiring
springboard for exploration in Gear 2.

Gear 2: Concept Visualization – How might we

better meet those needs?
Truly disruptive ideas deliver new experiences that better meet the
needs of your customers and other stakeholders. That calls for an
open exploration of new possibilities that are outside your current
paradigms. Going beyond the familiar and comfortable will lead to
bigger, more holistic solutions that have the potential to create
greater value for the market.
Gear 2 of Business Design encourages exploration of bolder ideas
and the design of experiences that will better meet human needs.
Through this process, you will be able to expand your perspective,
create meaningful new value, and refine your ideas into a distinct
vision for success before committing precious resources and
investments to a particular pursuit. While innovation requires you to
take risks and be courageous, the potential for positive results and
unimaginable outcomes are well worth the journey.
Through the concept visualization process of Gear 2, you will
refresh your vision of how you might bring novel solutions and
better experiences to the lives of your stakeholders. Defining
valuable, high-potential solutions in concrete terms will prepare you
to devise your strategy and activation plan in Gear 3 of Business
Design.
Gear 3: Strategic Business Design & Activation
– What is our strategy to deliver & scale this
idea?
Gear 3 is the essential step in turning ideas into business. Boosting
the odds of innovation success and return on investment requires a
clear strategy, a solid business case, and properly designed systems
to activate and ultimately deliver new ideas at scale.
Gear 3 of Business Design helps you strategically focus your
energy and resources to best realize your vision and goals. This
aspect of Business Design identifies opportunities to monetize your
idea, reveals specific capabilities that must be developed, and
informs the design of management systems to support new ideas
making their way to the market. Through these efforts, your vision
will become more viable and valuable, and ensure that every
important stakeholder wins. And as a result, the entire enterprise
gains increasing potential for competitive advantage in the
marketplace.
Gear 3 of Business Design aims to answer important strategic
questions that will turn your ideas into business and enhance your
competitive advantage. Strategy is the answer to these five
interrelated questions, defined by Roger Martin, former dean at
Rotman School of Management, and presented in Playing to Win:
How Strategy Really Works:7

What is your winning aspiration? The purpose of your

enterprise, your motivating aspiration.

Where will you play? A playing field where you can achieve
that aspiration.

How will you win? The way you will win on the chosen
playing field.
 What capabilities must be in place? The set and
configuration of capabilities required to win in the chosen way.

What management systems are required? The systems

and measures that enable the capabilities and support the
choices.

Gear 3 provides you with clarity on how to activate your new

vision and create new value by making explicit choices. This process
will help you refocus your resources in the most effective way.
When used in combination with the other gears of Business Design,
an enterprise’s potential for success in innovation is greatly
enhanced.
Business Design is a highly iterative process that requires a deep
understanding of people, the exploration of new possibilities, and
the ingenuity to turn new ideas into business. Those who suggest
innovation success can be achieved through boardroom strategy
exercises are missing the importance of connecting with
stakeholders on a human level, engaging others in idea creation,
and forming a cohesive vision and strategy to get there. Likewise,
those who see innovation as unbridled creativity fail to appreciate
the responsibility and commitment needed to deliver on enterprise
goals. Great Business Design recognizes that both creativity and
analytical rigor are critical to innovation and enterprise success.

Important Mindsets, Methods, & Thinking

Modes
Mounting evidence now supports the notion that the application of
design-inspired methods can foster innovative thinking and improve
your success. However, simply mastering specific methodologies is
not enough. While the methods are important, so is your mindset
and how you regulate your mode of thinking (Figure 2).8
Skillful designers have a way of performing their work and relating
to the world. Through education, experience, and practice, they
determine best practices that historically have not been taught in
business schools or incorporated into enterprise practices. For the
innovative leaders at Nespresso, intuition was the initial guide, but
the organization was also able to become more deliberate in its
strategy and value creation over time. That’s what led to its
incredible success, and that’s why Business Design is an exercise in
agility – emotionally, tactically, and cognitively.
Fig. 2 Mindsets, Methods, and Thinking

As in other design disciplines, your ability to excel in Business

Design is dependent on the right mindset and the ability to use
appropriate methods along the way. These methods will unlock your
best thinking and tap into your intuition, imagination, and ability to
create original value – to the market and the enterprise. Practiced on
an ongoing basis, Business Design will become an increasingly
intuitive way to enhance productivity. The following section is an
overview of the mindset, methods, and thinking modes of Business
Design.

Mindset Matters
Having the right mindset from both an individual and team
perspective can be a source of energy and inspiration in the journey
of discovery, creation, and decision-making. However, the wrong
mindset can hinder collaboration and stall progress. Your mindset
affects how you relate to others and your intrinsic motivation in
tackling the challenges at hand, your capacity for learning, and team
productivity.
Mindset facilitates the ability to see and create new value. It
empowers the people within an enterprise to exercise creativity
along with the boldness required to introduce innovations to the
market.
An abundance of research exists that links mindset to
performance. The three key mindsets that are critical to the effective
practice of Business Design in my experience are empathy, positivity,
and courage.

Empathy: Understanding how others see the world is

fundamental to creating new value. At the same time, empathy
enhances the ability to collaborate and work with others, and
nurtures a greater sense of purpose and meaning in daily
activities. An empathetic mindset elevates inspiration, motivation,
and creativity.
Positivity: Nothing kills a creative, pioneering spirit like
negativity. Critical thinking is important, but a positive can-do
attitude and a commitment to seeing challenges and problems as
unique opportunities for innovation are also key. Positivity is
contagious and helps build team conviction and resilience in the
pursuit of a shared vision.
Courage: Any pursuit that is new and has uncertain outcomes
requires courage. Courage is rooted in a commitment to doing
the right thing. In Business Design, that is anchored in putting
people’s needs front and center, exploring and validating new
ways to deliver value, and making sound decisions on how to
move ideas forward.
Methods as a Way of Doing Business
With the right mindset, methods provide a practical way of exploring
new options, building robust solutions, making key decisions, and
taking bold action. Design-inspired methods help us tap into
insights, intuition, imagination, and innate ingenuity through
deliberate tasks. Methods also help accelerate the development
process through a thoughtful and deliberate approach to framing the
questions you must answer and the methods you deploy. This
design-inspired discipline will optimize your innovation pathway.
There are two ways in which methods can push your thinking: to
open up and explore new possibilities (divergent methods) and
synthesize and effectively make decisions (convergent methods)
(see Figure 3). From a Business Design perspective, every stage of
innovation requires both.

Divergent methods are all about exploring options. They enable

you to expand your perspective of the market, discover new unmet
needs, and generate new solutions. Divergent methods also allow
you to consider strategic ways to configure your business model to
deliver your vision.

Convergent methods help you to assess and focus your scope of

consideration by synthesizing core needs, soliciting feedback on
early ideas, and forcing strategic choices. In each phase of
development, there comes a turning point where you must begin to
synthesize and make decisions.

While there are literally thousands of design-inspired methods in

the public domain today, they generally fall into these categories:

Multidisciplinary collaboration: Capitalizing on diverse

perspectives and types of expertise. This leads to richer, more
robust, and more well-considered outcomes.
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 J. C. Hoadley

I was able to get from our landlord and purchasers of our tools the
necessary extension of time, and made the engine for him. It and the
loom were each a complete success. Mr. Waters told me long after
that he never observed a single variation from exact uniformity of
motion, without which his loom would have had to be abandoned.
I had one day the pleasure of meeting there the president of the
Lancaster mills, the only other great industry of Clinton, who had
come over expressly to examine the running of our engine. Before
he left he said to me that the engine certainly presented a
remarkable advance in steam engineering.
I saw there one thing that interested me greatly. That was, the
method of painting wire cloth. This was carried on in a large tower
high enough to enable a twenty-yard length of the “cloth” to be
suspended in it. This was taken through a tub of paint, and drawn
slowly upward between three successive pairs of rollers, the last pair
of india-rubber, held firmly together. By these the paint was
squeezed into every corner, both sides were thoroughly painted, and
the surplus paint removed, so that every mesh was clear, a uniform
perfection unattainable by hand painting, and two boys would paint
in ten minutes as much as a painter could paint in a day. I think this
was an invention by Mr. Waters.
With the completion of the engine for the Clinton Wire Cloth
Company, the manufacture of the high-speed engine was closed for
three years, from the spring of 1873 to the spring of 1876.
This long rest proved to be most valuable. Looking back upon it, I
have always been impressed with its importance at that very time to
the development of the high-speed system.
The design of the engine needed to be revised, and this revision
involved study, to which time and leisure were essential.
I had also an order from Elliott Brothers of London, to prepare a
new and enlarged edition of the pamphlet descriptive of the Richards
Indicator. I determined to make this a comprehensive book,
embracing new information required by the steam engineer, so far as
I knew it. This was published simultaneously in London and New
York in the summer of 1874.
 I was enabled also to turn to account the report of the experiments
of M. Regnault, which I had been at so much trouble to get, and with
the help of English authorities to prepare and embody in this book
Tables of the Properties of Saturated Steam, which the American
Society of Mechanical Engineers honored me by adopting as its
standard.
I felt warranted in giving to this edition an amended title, as
follows: “A treatise on the Richards Steam Engine Indicator, and the
Development and Application of Force in the Steam Engine.”
This also was a job requiring much time and undivided application.
It is needless to say that without this long and entire rest from
business neither of these tasks could have been undertaken.
I found in the Astor Library a remarkable old book, entitled “Canon
triangulorum,” published at Frankfurt in 1612, containing a Table of
Natural Trigonometrical Functions, computed for every minute of arc,
and extended to the fifteenth place of decimals. The column of
versed sines enabled me to prepare tables exhibiting the rates of
acceleration and retardation of the motion of a piston controlled by a
crank, neglecting the effect of the angular vibration of the
connecting-rod. This effect was afterwards shown separately. For my
treatment of this subject, I must refer the reader to the book itself.
A little incident in connection with this work, which made a deep
impression on my mind, and has since afforded me some food for
reflection, seems worth relating. The printing was done in London,
and I did not see the proof, so I had to take especial pains with the
copy, having no opportunity to revise it. I was living in Harlem, and at
one time having no suitable envelope for mailing, and none being
obtainable there, I took a Third Avenue horse-car for an eight-mile
ride down to the New York post office, intending to get some
envelopes at a stationery store on Beekman Street, and mail the
portion of the copy which I then had ready at the general post office.
I had hardly taken my seat when Mr. Allen got into the car. He was
living in Mott Haven, and I had not seen him for a long time. Besides
ourselves the car was nearly if not quite empty. He came and sat
down by me, and I opened my copy and read to him something in
which I knew he would be interested. He said to me, in his gentle
way, “You would not express it exactly that way, would you?” On the
instant it flashed on my mind that I had made a stupid blunder, and I
replied, “I guess I wouldn’t,” and, thanking him for calling my
attention to it, I left the car, and returned home and corrected it. I
have quite forgotten what the point was, and if I remembered it, I
would not tell. But I have often asked myself who sent Mr. Allen
there, saving me from publishing a mortifying blunder. I expect some
sweet spirit will tell me before long.

The Prototype of the Modern High-speed Engine, Fly-wheel Side.

The Prototype of the Modern High-speed Engine, Crank Side.

 As soon as this book was off my hands, I devoted myself to the
revision and standardizing of the engine.
As made up to that time, it was not reversible, and the valves
could not be handled. It could not therefore be used in rolling-mills,
the field to which I felt already that it was especially adapted.
Moreover, every engine should be capable of being backed in
starting, as otherwise whenever it had stopped with the piston at a
point later than the latest point of cut-off, or say in the last half of the
stroke, which it would do half the time, it would need to be pulled
around by hand to a position in which one of the admission ports
would be open. This in a large engine, or one connected with
extensive lines of shafting, would be a serious matter, so much so
that in some engines little starting cylinders are required.

Longitudinal Section of Cylinder and Valves.

Cross-section of Cylinder and Valves.
 Elevation and Plan of Valve Connections.

I had also determined to use the equilibrium admission valves with

adjustable pressure plates, according to the drawings sent to me by
Mr. Allen in 1863, and to abandon the separate steam chest, and put
the exhaust valves on the opposite side of the cylinder.
Then the engine needed to be standardized, so as to cover the
field with the fewest number of sizes, symmetrically distributed. The
existing practice with all makers of engines had been to let the
purchaser dictate the size and speed of the engine he wanted, a
practice which resulted in a lot of patterns and drawings not adapted
to other people’s requirements, and not properly distributed. For an
organized manufacturing business, this habit must be entirely broken
up.
Mr. Allen had in his shop in Mott Haven an unoccupied second
story, in which I had stored our patterns and drawings and drawing
implements. Here I established my quarters, and spent my working
hours until this second job was finished.
 The two perspective views of opposite sides of the engine, show
these changes as they appear externally, and the remaining views
show some constructive details.
These latter show the exhaust valves transferred to the front side
of the engine, and located so as to drain the cylinder, and the
admission valves set at different elevations, to accommodate the
differential connection, the abandonment of the separate steam-
chest, and this chest with the exhaust chambers cast with the
cylinder, with openings over the valves; the levers by which the
differential movements are given to the admission valves; and the
single-link rod, and the gab by which this rod is unhooked, with the
method of moving the admission valves by hand.
In place of the levers on the steam rock shaft, I at that time drew
cast-iron disks, which being polished and vibrating in place I thought
very handsome. They gave me lots of trouble, till I learned enough to
get rid of them, the story of which I will tell by and by. The front view
shows the admission valve stems balanced by being extended
through at the back end, a feature which helped the governor action
when high steam pressures were employed, but which was
abandoned as unnecessary after I abandoned the disks on the
rocker shaft.
 First Arrangement of Exhaust Valves.

The first two figures show the valves in section and the adjustable
pressure plate and mode of its adjustment. The closeness of the
piston to the head may be observed. I never allowed more than one-
eighth inch clearance, and never had a piston touch the head. This
was because the connecting-rod maintained a constant length, the
wear of the boxes being taken up in the same direction.
These illustrations show the exhaust valves after alteration made
several years later in Philadelphia. As first designed by me, these
are shown in the foregoing sectional views. As will be seen, the
exhaust valves lay with their backs towards the cylinder, worked
under the pressure of the steam in the cylinder, made four openings
for release and exhausted through the cover.
I consented to the change in Philadelphia because this
arrangement involved too much waste room, but the change was not
satisfactory after all. I had become possessed with the idea that the
engine running at high speed needed 50 per cent. more room for
exhausting than for admission. This was not the case. I have always
regretted that I did not retain this design, and content myself with
reducing the exhaust area.
 The lightness of the piston in this view will be observed. This was
a special design for adapting the engine to be run at 200 revolutions,
giving 1200 feet piston travel per minute. The stuffing-box was a
freak which was abandoned.
The next figures show the valve-stem guides, rocking-levers,
coupling-rods and gab, which latter when thrown over unhooks the
link-rod, as is done on steamboat engines.
The following figures show the construction of the main bearing
with adjustments on opposite sides, by which the shaft is kept in
exact line, and shows also the solid support of the shaft quite out to
the hub of the crank. This view contains one error. The cap is not
made a binder. I relied on the strength of the thick continuous web of
the bed under the boxes in addition to the depth of the bed. But we
once had a bed break right here under enormous strain, and since
then the caps have been made binders. It will be observed that the
wedges are drawn upward to tighten the boxes. It is not necessary to
explain why.
Main Bearing.
 Front View of Wiper
Section on the Line a-b
Center Line of Shaft

Eccentric and Crosshead Pin Crank-pin Lubricator.

Lubricator.

The above left-hand cut shows the automatic lubricator of the

eccentric and the cross-head pin. The stud A, on the eccentric strap
and on the strap of the connecting-rod, carries a curved blade, a,
which at the beginning of each forward stroke rises to take the drop
of oil from the stem of the sight-feed lubricator. This is set on an arm
fixed on the cap of the main-bearing and on a bridge between the
upper guide-bars. The drop is made sure to come to this central
point by a wire B filling the brass tube, grooved on opposite sides
and terminating in a point.
The automatic lubrication of the crank-pin presented a still more
serious problem. It was solved by the construction shown, in the right
hand view, which will be understood without further description. It will
be seen that here the oil tube is inclined, and the drop follows it to a
point on its lower side. Both these lubricators proved absolutely
reliable. The last one is equally applicable on double-crank engines.
Fly-wheels.
Made
Dimensions when Practicable
of to Serve also
Cylinders. Travel Indicated Powers. as Belt-Drums.
Revolutions of Piston Without With
of Crank in Feet Conden- Conden- Weight
Bore. Stroke. per Minute. per Minute. sation. sation. Diameter. of Rim. V

Horse Horse
Inches. Inches. Powers. Powers. Feet. Inches. Lbs.
6 12 350 700 25 3 350
7 12 350 700 35 3 6 400
8 16 280 746 45 60 4 650
9 16 280 746 60 75 4 6 700
10 20 230 766 75 100 5 1300
11.5 20 230 766 100 125 5 6 1450
13 24 200 800 130 160 6 6 2100
14.5 24 200 800 160 200 7 2350
16 30 165 825 200 260 8 4000
18 30 165 825 250 330 9 4000
20 36 140 840 320 400 10 6000
22 36 140 840 400 500 11 6000
24 42 125 875 480 620 12
26 42 125 875 560 730 13
28 48 112.5 900 670 870 16
 32 48 112.5 900 870 1140
36 48 112.5 900 1100 1430
40 48 112.5 900 1360 1750
44 48 112.5 900 1600 2100

The powers are those given by an initial pressure of 85 lbs. on the square inch, cut
one quarter of the stroke. For the best economy steam should not be cut off earli
unless a higher pressure is carried. At the latest point of cut off, the powers de
double those given in the above Table. The engines can be worked under
pressures, with corresponding increase of power.

After considerable study I finally adopted the above table of

standard sizes and speeds, covering the ground from 25 horse-
power up with nineteen sizes.
As the bed could not be reversed, I needed both a right-hand and
a left-hand bed for each size. I avoided half of this expense in
patterns by planning two diameters of cylinders with the same
stroke, and making one bed answer for both.
Until I found something else to do, I employed myself in preparing
complete drawings for three or four smaller sizes of engines; a work
which afterwards proved exceedingly useful.
 CHAPTER XXI

Production of an Original Surface Plate.

will introduce here a description of the method of

producing an original surface plate.
The production of mechanically true planes by the
method of scraping was first suggested by Mr.
Whitworth, and was brought to perfection in his works.
Having had and having improved the opportunity there
to study this system, and having employed it largely in the
manufacture of high-speed engines, it seems to me that an account
of it should find a place in these reminiscences, especially as the
importance of mechanical truth is coming to be more and more
realized in this country. I will therefore describe the process of
producing an original standard surface plate.
The first point, of course, is the design. The square form, 30
inches square, has been found most suitable. I could not, however,
use this form myself, a long surface plate being required for the
guide-bars and steam-chest joints of my engine.
The plate must be incapable of deflection. To insure this it is ribbed
on the under side with ribs seven inches deep, and is supported at
three points, equidistant from each other and from the center, so that
its equal support cannot vary, whatever may be the surface on which
it stands. It is provided on two opposite sides with handles, by which
it can be lifted and rotated. The arrangement of the ribs and feet is
here shown.
It must be cast of hard and close-grained iron, which will possess
the most durable qualities, in a baked mold without a cope, so that
the gas shall escape most freely. As cast, the plate should be one
inch thick. About three eighths of an inch is planed off, removing all
dirt, and leaving a perfectly sound surface, with a thickness of about
five eighths of an inch. Three of these plates are made. After these
have been planed, their edges squared and steel handles put in they
are delivered to the fitter.

Surface Plate for Producing a True Plane.

 I will first describe the tool used in scraping. Originally this was a
hooked tool, and the scraping was done by a drawing motion. Two of
these tools were employed, one for the roughing work, in which the
hook projected downward about three quarters of an inch, and the
other for fine scraping. In the latter the hook projected downward
only about one quarter of an inch, and absolute freedom from
vibration was aimed at. These tools were used for a number of
years, but afterwards a radical change was made. The modern
method is to employ a single straight tool, like a carpenter’s chisel,
about an inch and a quarter wide and an eighth of an inch thick, with
a square end. This end is slightly curved, and its corners are
rounded to avoid scratching the plate. The scraping is done by a
pushing motion.
This tool has been found preferable on all accounts. Projections
needing to be removed are in front of the tool, instead of being
covered by it. The tool is perfectly rigid, and can be inclined to the
surface at any desired angle. The cutting edge is a square angle,
and being well supported keeps sharp for a considerably longer time
than when it is an acute angle, and when ground or honed two
edges are formed. Moreover, the pushing motion is preferred.
Two of the plates only are first brought together. For disclosing the
high points, one of these is covered with a raddle made of finely
sifted red lead and oil. This is made quite stiff, and all of it that can
be removed by the palm of the hand is rubbed off, leaving only a
very thin uniform film on the surface. Any dust having been carefully
removed from both surfaces by a soft brush, one of these plates is
inverted on the other, and at one corner each plate is marked in the
edge with a prick-punch. The upper plate is then rubbed about on
the lower one for, say, half a minute. When lifted off, the high
portions of the surfaces are shown on one plate by the raddle put on,
and on the other by that rubbed off. The workman then gives to
these parts of the surfaces a general scraping, giving to his tool a
long sweep, say from four to six inches. This is repeated two or three
times, the stroke being shortened each time, and the upper plate
being placed in a position at right angles with its last one, which can
be determined by the prick-punch marks. This change of position is
necessary to avoid a cross-wind or spiral form. The scraping should
now extend over the entire surfaces, and these should have a
general uniform bearing on each other, with the points of contact
uniformly distributed and equally distinct. The work should be
continued in the same way until all these requirements are fulfilled.
Now appears the use of the third plate. The two surfaces thus
formed are sure to be, one of them convex and the other concave, in
some corresponding degree. The workman now numbers the plates,
by numbers stamped in the edges, these being marked Nos. 1 and
2, and the third plate No. 3. No. 2 is now set aside, and No. 3 is
scraped to fit No. 1. It is thus made a duplicate of No. 2. Next, No. 1
is set aside and Nos. 2 and 3 are brought together. Supposing these
to be convex, they will bear together at the middle point, on which
the upper plate will rock, and the degree of their convexity will thus
be shown. The workman then in the same manner scrapes these
plates equally to the best of his judgment, until their entire surfaces
are brought together, with equal distribution of the points of contact.
These two surfaces will now again be, one convex and the other
concave, though in a much less degree. The next step is to apply
No. 1, which is concave, to either No. 2 or No. 3, and scrape it to fit.
It is then applied to the other, of which it has now been made a
duplicate, and the same process is repeated, until the three plates
can be interchanged in any way, and will have a uniform general
bearing on each other, with equal distribution and distinctness of the
points of contact. We have thus, in a general way, produced three
demonstrated true planes, but the surfaces are yet far from the
desired approximation to absolute truth.
Now follows the fine scraping, which is not attempted until general
truth has thus been established. The object of this is to multiply the
points of contact and perfect their equal distribution and prominence.
For this operation no raddle is used, but the surfaces are rubbed
together dry. When the plates are separated, the points of contact
shine like stars. Here skill and care are pre-eminently required. The
scraping takes off only a dust. If too strong depressions may be
made deeper than before, and requiring the reduction of the entire
surface. The superiority of the modern tool is now especially shown.
By lowering the angle of the tool, the workman presents the slightly
curved edge to the surface in a position as nearly parallel with it as
he desires. Interchanges similar to the former ones are now
repeated, until the bright points are brought as close together as is
desired, with uniform distribution and distinctness. The tedious
operation is now finished, and these bright points remain as
witnesses.
The three plates were necessary to the production of one. They
have also a permanent use. They are indispensable to the
preservation of the true plane, which it has cost so much patient
labor to produce. The date of their completion is stamped on their
edges. Then plates 1 and 2 are put away in the store-room, their
surfaces carefully protected from rust or injury, which last is best
avoided by inverting one on the other, and No. 3 is put into use. A
prominent use is for the production of smaller plates or straight-
edges adapted to special purposes. After a while, perhaps in a little
while, this plate loses its truth by unequal wear. Indeed, speaking
with absolute truth, it may be said that the first time this plate is used
it is ruined. But by taking pains to use different parts of its surface as
equally as possible, it may be kept in fair condition for some time. It
can at any time be restored to its original condition by scraping it to
No. 2, taking the same pains to turn it one quarter way around at
every rub. In the course of time No. 2 will itself become worn
unequally, when its truth can be restored by rubbing it on No. 1.
Finally the three plates can all be restored to their original condition
by rubbing them together interchangeably as at first. Thus the true
plane can be absolutely perpetuated.
The importance of this work can only be realized when we
consider that the true plane affords the only means by which true
cylindrical work also can be either produced or verified. It is thus
seen to be fundamental to all mechanical truth.
 CHAPTER XXII

Efforts to Resume the Manufacture. I Exhibit the Engine to Mr. Holley. Contract
with Mr. Phillips. Sale of Engine to Mr. Peters.

n the years ’74 and ’75 I was filled with eagerness to

get the engine on its legs again, and tried a number of
schemes in vain. One morning I read in the paper that
Alexander L. Holley had just returned from Europe,
where he had been making a tour of the steel-making
establishments, studying both the Bessemer and the
open hearth or Siemens-Martin processes, on a scheme of
interchanging improvements in manufacture between American and
foreign licensees under both these systems.
It occurred to me that Mr. Holley might be the very man I wanted. If
he could be got to recommend the engine to the steel-makers, they
might take it up for their own use. I had not applied the engine in
rolling-mill work, but felt sure that it would prove especially adapted
to that service. So I called on Mr. Holley at his home in Brooklyn. I
had never before met him, but I found that he knew something about
the engine from its exhibition in Paris, and from his brother-in-law,
Frederick J. Slade, then an officer of the New Jersey Steel Company,
and who was one of the engine’s warm admirers. I have already
mentioned Mr. Slade and the help he gave me while in Paris in
solving the problem of piston acceleration.
Alexander Lyman Holley