
Why Design Thinking Works - helloworld
https://hbr.org/2018/09/why-design-thinking-works
======
fermienrico
I do not understand what Design Thinking is. Can someone explain in _plain_
English without the business verbiage?

Every time I come across Design Thinking, it just smells like bullshit - get a
bunch of people together, give them post it notes and open walls. IBM’s DT
website does not help nor do videos on YT.

What is Design Thinking?

~~~
ArtWomb
Crash course on Stanford's D.School page:

[https://dschool.stanford.edu/resources-
collections/a-virtual...](https://dschool.stanford.edu/resources-
collections/a-virtual-crash-course-in-design-thinking)

Juul serves as a foundational example of design thinking. In the words of the
founders, both grads of the Product Design masters program, the concept was
not to create an "electronic cigarette" but to annihilate the concept of
cigarettes altogether in favor of a true 21st century innovative delivery
system. Regardless of your position on the societal ills of underage nicotine
dependency, it's a fascinating case study to see how a niche product (Plume, I
believe it was called?) for loose-leaf cannabis and extracts dubbed the
"iPhone of vapes" evolved into a $15B household brand.

How Juul, founded on a life-saving mission, became the most embattled startup
of 2018

[https://www.fastcompany.com/90262821/how-juul-founded-on-
a-l...](https://www.fastcompany.com/90262821/how-juul-founded-on-a-life-
saving-mission-became-the-most-embattled-startup-of-2018)

I think the real skill involved is Visual Thinking. Good old fashioned pencil
and paper flow state ideation. If there is one practice I wish I had spent
more time acquiring it would definitely be illustration / drafting ;)

~~~
pavelrub
I find in interesting that, to the question of "can someone explain in plain
English what is Design Thinking?", your answer is a link to a Stanford crash
course, and some story about a company that produces vapes, with a link to a
long-winded article about them.

This makes me strongly suspect that Design Thinking is indeed BS.

~~~
sizzle
I would argue design thinking had less to do with Juul's success than, say,
quality product design from multiple product iterations, quality hardware, and
quality electrical engineering that can be mass produced like an Apple
product.

Quality that starts with the electronics and ends with an appealing form
factor and sleek fit and finish. Of course the UX needs to be thoughtful and
as least frustrating as possible, which arguably has more to do with your
typical interaction design and usability testing methods in the realm of UX
design and research.

Juul combined great product design, engineering, product iteration, and
support from management from the top down to make the best product possible
that is typically seen in design driven companies such as Apple.

I think design thinking definitely has the power to break down silos in
organizations with heavy engineering culture but you need the right org chart
and executive support to create game changing products no matter how much
'design thinking' goes on behind closed doors. I agree it is a hot marketing
buzzword sold to clients to win business as mentioned by others, and that we
need to acknowledge the fact that you need executive management support at the
highest levels or you're dead in the water.

Was design thinking responsible for the Tesla Model 3, or was it more about
innovation in tech and manufacturing combined with quality electrical and
hardware engineering + funding driven by a leader with a vision hell-bent on
creating a game changing product and fostering a culture conducive to that end
goal.

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lordnacho
My wife went on a workshop at a Big 4 about Design Thinking.

Everyone sat through it and then one of the ladies turned about and blurted
out "it's just thinking! Why is it called Design Thinking?"

~~~
evrydayhustling
Yeah... an acid test for these things is often, "what are you telling me _not_
to do?"

In my encounters with design thinking, the controversial "don't" has actually
been frequent, iterative release. For some folks, design thinking is a defense
of a "measure twice, cut once" waterfall-y approach to product development.

That might make a lot of sense for some things, like physical consumer
products, where a ton of branding and manufacturing go into each release. I
think it's a bad idea for most software, where the ease of distribution means
that you can learn from your market much more dynamically.

~~~
AndyNemmity
The times I've been a part of it, it's been in time boxed proof of concept
situations where you're outlining a customer's desire, and then coming up with
solutions for it, then delivering on them with an iterative process.

It's worked out better than any other process I've been apart of, but it may
just be some other factor than it's value. The companies that were open and
interested in using it, were often... of a generally higher quality of talent,
and perhaps better outcomes is natural no matter what process is used.

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munchbunny
For the people who are reading this and going "well, duh?" I think that's
actually a very instructive reaction.

The analysis/brainstorming/prototyping/testing cycle (usually what "design
thinking" refers to) is burned into many of us just because that's how we've
been doing/aspiring to do things for years.

However, you have to remember that's not how a lot of people were doing
things, and many of those people (I won't claim all of them, no process is
universal) could probably benefit from judiciously adopting the practices.

~~~
freddie_mercury
A lot of people say "duh" but when was the last time they actually prototyped
anything in the work or personal lives before doing it?

A lot of people may be "aspiring" to do it but few people actually do it.

I worked at a relatively progressive, design-centric company and even there
"design thinking" tended to be relegated to a handful of projects and wasn't
the norm/default.

~~~
rorykoehler
I do this for everything I do. Always did. Sometimes the prototype evolves
into the product/service to save time but everything starts as a prototype. I
don't know how else you could successfully deliver anything?

~~~
freddie_mercury
I never really understand the goal of comments like this. Since we don't have
access to your entire work history, it is impossible for us to judge a claim
that, literally, every single feature you've ever built in your entire career
-- even that one about allowing people to export to CSV -- involved you
following the steps of:

"[On immersion] identify hidden needs by having the innovator live the
customer’s experience."

"The final stage in the discovery process is a series of workshops and seminar
discussions"

"In the next step, articulation, innovators surface and question their
implicit assumptions."

And so on. Design thinking isn't "building a prototype". That is but one small
part among many.

You have workshops for everything you build? You do contextual inquiries,
sitting in a customer office all day to see what their interactions are like,
for every feature you build? You sit down with paper prototypes (not even code
yet) with actual customers?

For every single feature you build? Even when a customer just wants a button
to sort Column X?

I guess I'm dubious but if you've managed to create a work environment where
that's the expectation, then more power to you.

Design thinking is time consuming and expensive. That is why it is rarely
used.

~~~
rorykoehler
That's not what design thinking is for. Design thinking is one level up. You
are creating a new product or large feature not some small aspect of a feature
of said product (ie CSV export).

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kriro
I think that all these "happy meeting room" type of methods seem very biased
towards extroverted people which feels like a bad idea and a major missed
opportunity. Of course I don't find it shocking to read this article in HBR
since business schools (and Harvard in particular) have very extroverted-
centric cultures.

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stergios
"Design Thinking" is a semi-recent moniker for design methodology centered
around product design. Its real value is for younger and inexperienced
designers. It is easily accessible even by high-school students. [1]

If you are a product designer who has 10 to 15 years experience bringing
products to market, then IMHO there's not much in design thinking that you
have not already seen. But if you are an undergrad or MS student with little
work experience then it is a very useful structured thought process centered
around product design.

If you are a mechanical design engineer in the sense of Shigley design
thinking does not have a lot to offer your work product.

    
    
        [1] http://www.thedfarm.org/s2/?page_id=1009

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onoj
Might work, otherwise just a word pitch on past "business improvement"
protocols and snake oil

~~~
adzicg
If I remember correctly, the key case study in Change By Design (that started
he whole Design Thinking movement) was Nokia Ovi. So even ‘might work’ needs
to be put into a time bound context. At the point when Brown wrote the book it
was ‘working’, and there were claims in the book how Nokia is reinventing
itself driven by design thinking, but then the whole ship sank soon after.

~~~
onoj
my understanding (without research) was that one of the founders of IDEO
created the concept so they could broaden their client pool from traditional
design to finance / business consulting.

[https://trydesignlab.com/blog/great-design-thinking-tim-
brow...](https://trydesignlab.com/blog/great-design-thinking-tim-brown-ideo/)

------
ThomPete
Design Thinking doesn't "work" it works for those who sell it sure. But for
everyone else its all based on whether the people who have the power in the
organizations understands the value and is able to formulate that into useful
tasks.

One of the biggest differences between a person like Jack Dorsey who really do
understand the value of design and is able to formulate at the C Level and
then someone like McKinzey who might just claim they are (or parts of them
are) design led but don't really mean it because they don't really understand
it is the ability to use sesign as a strategic parameter.

Design Thinking doesn't solve the fundamental issue which is transcendence
between analysis and outcome. Someone have to be able to take the insights and
turn them into something of value. The analysis is not the value in itself.

Or put another way what Design Thinking doesn't solve is transcendence between
idea and execution.

So don't buy the BS and I say that as someone who consult companies on how to
use design and design thinking strategically.

~~~
uxcolumbo
Can you dive in a bit deeper... what do you mean with 'Don't buy the BS?'

Design Thinking to me essentially is user centered design, I don't think
you're saying UCD is BS.

What I'm reading is that without getting buy-in from execs, engineering etc -
'design thinking' is useless.

What did you do, so the 'design thinking' piece transcended into execution /
desired outcome.

Or did you only work on projects where the value of 'design thinking' was
already understood, i.e. design was seen as an executive priority.

EDIT: typos

~~~
ThomPete
User Centered Design doesn't have to be BS but mostly is because it's used
mostly as a get out of jail card more than as an actual tool.

Here is a critique I made of UCD back in 2010,

[https://medium.com/@hello_world/getting-to-the-customer-
why-...](https://medium.com/@hello_world/getting-to-the-customer-why-
everything-you-think-about-user-centred-design-is-wrong-1c3845092575)

UCD still have the same issue which is that it requires transcendence between
insights and solution which is much less solid than what people suggest.

So what I mean with don't buy the BS is don't think that design thinking as a
process is going to improve anything for you if you don't have the right
people at the right places implementing it and even then it's not actually
clear how much value it provides.

------
paganel
I think that using ethnography just to sell more stuff (because that's what
"know your customers better" actually means) should be the subject of an
ethnographic study about our present-day society in a couple of decades, when
(hopefully) we won't be so fixated anymore on selling stuff that presumably
most of the people don't need.

------
plainOldText
An excellent article.

> To be successful, an innovation process must deliver three things: superior
> solutions, lower risks and costs of change, and employee buy-in. Over the
> years businesspeople have developed useful tactics for achieving those
> outcomes. But when trying to apply them, organizations frequently encounter
> new obstacles and trade-offs. <

It is of extreme importance to realize that any proposed solution will have
its trade-offs and it will be highly depend upon context and actual
implementation.

It’s worrisome to see how many people nowadays, who are in positions of power,
jump on the bandwagon of conventional “wisdom”, failing to realize that down
the road, adopting blindly current solutions might trickle down into unwanted
consequences.

Perhaps social media and the indiscriminate sharing of information, without
proper scrutinization and analysis is not helpful either.

Furthermore, people who are critical, are not always expressing their views
publicly, out of fear of being labeled a certain way.

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bobjordan
I took an executive education course a few years ago through Darden which was
led by the author of this article, Jeanne Liedtka. She co-wrote a step-by-step
guide called "The Designing for Growth Field Book". I've found it useful.

------
jaabe
I work in the public sector of Scandinavia, and I've seen design thinking
work. A muniplacity wanted to do something about the high degree of long-term-
sickness, with a goal of getting people back to health sooner. They set down a
task force filled with design thinkers by education, with that goal, but no
specific anything else (pretty unheard of in the public sector where
everything is typically measured and weighed and only approved after the
analysis and planning is over). After around 6 months, the task force changed
a few things.

One of them was the changing location of the waiting room. It had previously
been in a pass-through corridor, making it very busy and noisy, something that
wasn't good for people with long-term-sickness such as stress. In fact it was
terrible, and such an obvious small fix, but nobody had thought about it
before they asked people what could be improved.

The biggest thing they did, was make a cardboard tool for your long-term-
sickness plan and journal. In short terms, it's a plan with all the meetings
and appointments you're required to go to filled in, with room for comments.
Every time you go to an appointment, the case worker and you write down what
you discuss and agree on during the meeting, and the case worker fills in the
time and place for your next appointment before you leave.

This muniplicity is now significantly better at getting people with long-term-
sickness back to health (and work) than every other muniplicity in the
country. I can't remember the exact numbers but it's somewhere around 30%
which is an insane amount of life quality increased (and money saved). I've
seen it in action and I think Design Thinking can be absolutely brilliant. In
most cases it's not though. Successes like the one I just describe lead other
people to want the same thing, in fact, there is a now national program to
utilise Design Thinking in every muniplicity of Denmark. Which is all well and
good, except change management isn't easy.

Most muniplicities send one or two employees on a three day course to learn
Design Thinking. It's employees who work with lean and other process/project
management types, so they're certainly suited, but you don't really learn
Design Thinking in three days. That the first problem, the far bigger problem
is that nothing changes in the project models we utilise or the way management
orders projects. I mean, sure, you can commit your citizens and do a few
prototypes and that'll probably improve every project, but you're not really
doing Design Thinking if you are still doing the full analysis, the full
planning and the full requirement specification for what results you want from
a project before you start doing your Design Thinking. This lack of
commitment, ownership and focused change management is why Design Thinking is
failing in most muniplacities. It's not just Design Thinking, it's also
Enterprise Architecture, Digitisation, Benefit Realisation and a wide range of
other brilliant tools that fail.

------
revskill
I prefer examples of Why "XXX Thinking do not work". Why ? Because learning
from failures will shape correct lessons. That's how AI works, too.

~~~
yodon
The convergence rate on learning from "x didn't work" is much slower than from
"x did work".

If you're looking for a peak, most of the time you want to climb the gradient
rather than descend it. That statement is true even if you suspect there are
multiple peaks in the landscape.

~~~
julvo
Learning from negative examples can be more effective when we can conclude
that all inputs didn't work. The problem with positive examples is that we
don't know which of the inputs was responsible for the positive result.

