THE FUTURE OF

DESIGN THINKING
BY FRESH CONSULTING
freshconsulting.com
TABLE OF CONTENTS

2 Today’s Need for Design Thinking

3 The Rise of Design Thinking

4 What is Design Thinking?

5 Step 1: Establish Empathy for Your Users

6 Step 2: Engage in Holistic Analysis of the Problem

7 Step 3: Create Iterative Visualization of Ideas

8 Step 4: Conduct Cycles of Testing and Exploration

9 Case Studies in Design Thinking

10 Design Thinking Outlook

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Today’s Need for Design Thinking

The complexities of the modern world continue Instead, design thinking shifts problem-solving
to push today’s businesses to find creative to be undertaken with a holistic design eye,
solutions to their most significant challenges. an analytical mind, and an empathetic human
Thriving, let alone surviving, is more difficult touch – ingredients that juxtapose humans
than ever in a global, ever flattening competitive and business. Even though a chief designer
marketplace where every industry has become has not always had a seat in the C-suite or
saturated with the latest efficiencies and tools of the boardroom, innovation itself is often the
the trade. combination of design and numerical justification.

Lacking vision and imagination, more traditional That’s probably why Roger L. Martin, former Dean
organizations have begun to suffer from of the Rotman School of Management, labeled
obsolescence. With the rapid pace of change, the future of innovation – historically something
big companies can die quickly when they lack a 1) new that has 2) value – as “design thinking”
culture of innovation. A new mode of thinking, when he said, “The most successful businesses in
feeling, and operating has been rapidly emerging: the years to come will balance analytical mastery
one that focuses on experiences where design with intuitive originality in a dynamic interplay
plays a central role. that I call design thinking.”

Design thinking is a holistic process that is Design itself speaks words for you and is
unmatched in its ability to explore visual synergistic and scalable with almost any function,
solutions to complex problems. At its heart is industry, or vertical. Putting the lens of design
the quest for new incremental or breakthrough on any problem allows its practitioners to look
innovations. The innovations of today aren’t as past the status quo of knowledge work and gain
easily uncovered by merely analyzing data and new insights for the most nebulous or rigid of
crunching the numbers. problems.

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The Rise of Design Thinking

Design thinking is present across an array of industries have implemented the design thinking
industries, and organizations continue to adopt it process to dive deeper into their respective
looking to equip their teams with a mindset that challenges. As more businesses find success
is prepared for the future. Professionals in tech, through design thinking, the more prevalent the
healthcare, finance, education, retail, and other process has become.

Design Thinking Stats

1. Researchers at the Hasso Plattner Institute studied the impact of design thinking on for-profit and
nonprofit organizations. From ~300 responses, they found sustainable improvements were made to
both company processes and customer experiences.

2. The Design Value Index Study from 2015 showed that Nike, Starbucks, Target, and 13 other design-
driven businesses had 10-year returns that outperformed their peers on the S&P 500 by 211 percent.

3. In a survey called “Creative Difference” done by design firm Ideo, 100 companies were assessed in
an attempt to quantify innovation. It found when teams iterate on five or more different solutions their
product launch is 50 percent more likely to succeed. When those surveyed answered that they felt they
were able to challenge the status quo, the chances of a failed launch decreased by 16.67 percent.

4. Some 1,600 results of book titles that include “design thinking” now appear on Amazon, most of which
were published within the past decade.

5. In a Google Scholar search, “design thinking” appears in 17,300 scholarly articles published since 2013.

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What is Design Thinking?

Design thinking is a multi-stage process that applies a designer’s mindset to organizational and global
complexities, in traditionally designed areas, and non-traditional functional areas (e.g., not only product
design, but also business strategy, finance, medicine, agriculture, city planning, etc.).

We can identify four key components of design thinking:

1. Establish Empathy for Your Users

Design thinking is a real user-centered process. You are addressing the needs
of real users by seeing the world through their eyes.

2. Engage in Holistic Analysis of the Problem

Tackling vague, unknown problems can seem insurmountable when relying on
linear processes and singular perspectives.

3. Create Iterative Visualization of Ideas

Along the design thinking journey, the creation of visual design artifacts assists
in easing concepts and project pieces into reality.

4. Conduct Cycles of Testing and Exploration

Testing is an iterative process that can take place at any stage of design
thinking, and it exposes hidden usability issues.

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Step 1: Establish Empathy for Your Users

Design thinking is a real user-centered process. Through empathy and the use of a shared
You are addressing the needs of real users by emotional language, you can humanize and
seeing the world through their eyes. You are simplify the creative solutions that you produce
discovering how the user thinks and feels, and and iterate upon. In this stage, you observe,
evaluating that qualitatively and quantitatively. engage, and make tangible the problems that
were once intangible to stakeholders.

Understanding
Comprehending the users’ and stakeholders’ needs and motivations is a crucial initial step. Elements of
the understanding phase include:

1. Understand business 2. Listen to stakeholders to 3. Define functional and

objectives to define ensure clarity and accuracy technical requirements to
problems establish limitations

User Research
Who is the user? What makes them tick? What do they want? Through various methodologies, user
research can glean the answers to these questions. Research methods include:

1. Use personas 2. Observe users 3. Identify painpoints 4. Outline goals

to create in context via in the user flow with with user stories
empathy enthnographic observation and maps
research

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Step 2: Engage in Holistic Analysis of the Problem

Trying to tackle vague and even unknown Problems are analyzed from multiple perspectives
problems can seem insurmountable when relying as data and heuristics continually inform the
on linear processes and singular perspectives. design team’s decision making. The holistic
Design thinking implements a nonlinear process: analysis provides a 360-degree evaluation that
different design stages can occur in parallel or cultivates prolific ideation and sound solutions.
iteratively.

Analytics and Discovery

The goal in utilizing analytics and discovery is to gauge the effectiveness of a design and ultimately
create intuitive experiences:

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1. Provide designers with 2. Gain an overview

data through metrics of the field with
and analysis competitive analysis

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?

3. Deliver creative 4. Establish benchmarks

solutions with ideation to evaluate the product
and strategy quantitatively and
qualitatively

Interested in learning more? Check out our white paper on Methods of UX Analysis, where we dive
deeper into 8 methods we use at Fresh.

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Step 3: Create Iterative Visualization of Ideas

Along the design thinking journey, the creation The act of creating and experimenting with these
of design artifacts assists in easing concepts imperfect models fuels creative thinking and
and project pieces into reality. Ranging from exposes potential flaws that might have gone
lightweight sketches to interactive prototypes, unnoticed until much further into the design
these visual aids streamline the design process process.
each step of the way.

Wireframes
Using wireframes allows designers to build the skeleton of an interface. Wireframes loosely establish the
structure of the final product, while adhering to usability principles. Higher-fidelity models are built upon
them.

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1. Provide visual 2. Organize label, and 3. Use system/

4. Create taps, clicks,
options with structure content process flows
and swipes with
concept sketching with information to map the user
interaction design
architecture journey

Mockups & Prototypes

Whereas wireframes establish structure, mockups and prototypes bring the interface to life with color,
content, interaction, and motion. These are higher-fidelity models that give a sense of the finished
product.

1. Use brand identity 2. Establish user

integration to establish flows with interactive
consistent personality protytypes

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Step 4: Conduct Cycles of Testing & Exploration

User testing is an iterative process that can take Watching users interact with interfaces and
place at any stage of design thinking. Hidden listening to their feedback saves time and money,
usability issues come to the fore when tools such preventing errors that might linger into the later
as user surveys, interviews, observation, and more stages. Testing ultimately creates polished and
are implemented. intuitive products that function how they were
intended to.

User Testing & Observation

Design thinking is a process that is comfortable with failure. Multiple iterations are expected, and with
each one, the product improves.

Make Changes
User Testing

User Testing
& Observation
Cycle

Idea Generation
Feedback Evaluation

Interested in learning more? Check out our white paper on Methods of UX Testing, where we dive
deeper into 8 methods we use at Fresh.

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Case Studies in Design Thinking

When organizations make a conscious and overt organically from this user-centered process,
effort to incorporate design thinking into their resulting in greater financial rewards and user
work their ability to innovate soars. Valuable loyalty. For those who need more analytical
learnings and creative solutions emerge justification to invest in the creative capabilities of
your team, consider the following case studies.

Transforming a Massive Corporation

In 2000, Procter & Gamble (P&G) hired A.G. Lafley as CEO to revamp its entire
organization. Lafley believed design thinking held the answer to the company’s
downward turn. Focusing on the three core elements of empathy, prototyping, and
strategy, Lafley and his team applied design thinking beyond just P&G’s products. The
company saw profit growth of 15 percent per year and doubled its market value to
nearly $200 billion.

Rebuilding a Website, Thoughtfully

Wacom, a creator of design tools, undertook the refresh of their website with a design
thinking mindset. They identified two distinct customer groups: professionals and
novices. The design team built out an elegant site that was not only aesthetically
pleasing but created a crystal clear delineation between their products. Wacom was
able to innovate their entire business, with a result of a 300% increase in overall site
traffic.

Streamlining Customer Service

Toyota used design thinking to restructure its customer call center in California. New
training, redesigned internal processes, and better software tools were all implemented
with a design thinking mindset. All stakeholders, including service reps, software
engineers, and business executives participated throughout the process. The results
were faster response times, two fewer calls for each customer resolution, and millions
of dollars saved.

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Design Thinking Outlook

Tim Brown, CEO of Ideo, who coined Design And it’s upon these design-led solutions that
Thinking, said, “It’s a methodology always in modern organizations will redesign themselves
pursuit of unforeseen innovation, so reinventing and consequently reinvent themselves to grow
itself might seem like the smart way forward. But and prosper.
in practice, design thinking is a set of tools that
can grow old with us.” Global organizations have already adopted the
process on a global scale, and reaped rewards. In
Design thinking is a practice that will grow with the interest of differentiation and the creation of
the continuous advancements of the modern value, we recommend adopting a design thinking
world. As complexity continues to increase with process for your company.
our confluence of technical advancements, so
does the need to speak with powerful simplicity,
one aspect of good design.

The dual nature of design thinking, both intuitive

and analytical, will help ensure you solve
seemingly insurmountable problems in the
simplest ways.

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