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Ideas Made to Matter

Design thinking, explained

Rebecca Linke

Sep 14, 2017

What is design thinking?

Design thinking is an innovative problem-solving process rooted in a set of skills.The approach has been around for decades, but it only started gaining traction outside of the design community after the 2008 Harvard Business Review article [subscription required] titled “Design Thinking” by Tim Brown, CEO and president of design company IDEO.

Since then, the design thinking process has been applied to developing new products and services, and to a whole range of problems, from creating a business model for selling solar panels in Africa to the operation of Airbnb .

At a high level, the steps involved in the design thinking process are simple: first, fully understand the problem; second, explore a wide range of possible solutions; third, iterate extensively through prototyping and testing; and finally, implement through the customary deployment mechanisms. 

The skills associated with these steps help people apply creativity to effectively solve real-world problems better than they otherwise would. They can be readily learned, but take effort. For instance, when trying to understand a problem, setting aside your own preconceptions is vital, but it’s hard.

Creative brainstorming is necessary for developing possible solutions, but many people don’t do it particularly well. And throughout the process it is critical to engage in modeling, analysis, prototyping, and testing, and to really learn from these many iterations.

Once you master the skills central to the design thinking approach, they can be applied to solve problems in daily life and any industry.

Here’s what you need to know to get started.

Understand the problem 

The first step in design thinking is to understand the problem you are trying to solve before searching for solutions. Sometimes, the problem you need to address is not the one you originally set out to tackle.

“Most people don’t make much of an effort to explore the problem space before exploring the solution space,” said MIT Sloan professor Steve Eppinger. The mistake they make is to try and empathize, connecting the stated problem only to their own experiences. This falsely leads to the belief that you completely understand the situation. But the actual problem is always broader, more nuanced, or different than people originally assume.

Take the example of a meal delivery service in Holstebro, Denmark. When a team first began looking at the problem of poor nutrition and malnourishment among the elderly in the city, many of whom received meals from the service, it thought that simply updating the menu options would be a sufficient solution. But after closer observation, the team realized the scope of the problem was much larger , and that they would need to redesign the entire experience, not only for those receiving the meals, but for those preparing the meals as well. While the company changed almost everything about itself, including rebranding as The Good Kitchen, the most important change the company made when rethinking its business model was shifting how employees viewed themselves and their work. That, in turn, helped them create better meals (which were also drastically changed), yielding happier, better nourished customers.

Involve users

Imagine you are designing a new walker for rehabilitation patients and the elderly, but you have never used one. Could you fully understand what customers need? Certainly not, if you haven’t extensively observed and spoken with real customers. There is a reason that design thinking is often referred to as human-centered design.

“You have to immerse yourself in the problem,” Eppinger said.

How do you start to understand how to build a better walker? When a team from MIT’s Integrated Design and Management program together with the design firm Altitude took on that task, they met with walker users to interview them, observe them, and understand their experiences.  

“We center the design process on human beings by understanding their needs at the beginning, and then include them throughout the development and testing process,” Eppinger said.

Central to the design thinking process is prototyping and testing (more on that later) which allows designers to try, to fail, and to learn what works. Testing also involves customers, and that continued involvement provides essential user feedback on potential designs and use cases. If the MIT-Altitude team studying walkers had ended user involvement after its initial interviews, it would likely have ended up with a walker that didn’t work very well for customers. 

It is also important to interview and understand other stakeholders, like people selling the product, or those who are supporting the users throughout the product life cycle.

The second phase of design thinking is developing solutions to the problem (which you now fully understand). This begins with what most people know as brainstorming.

Hold nothing back during brainstorming sessions — except criticism. Infeasible ideas can generate useful solutions, but you’d never get there if you shoot down every impractical idea from the start.

“One of the key principles of brainstorming is to suspend judgment,” Eppinger said. “When we're exploring the solution space, we first broaden the search and generate lots of possibilities, including the wild and crazy ideas. Of course, the only way we're going to build on the wild and crazy ideas is if we consider them in the first place.”

That doesn’t mean you never judge the ideas, Eppinger said. That part comes later, in downselection. “But if we want 100 ideas to choose from, we can’t be very critical.”

In the case of The Good Kitchen, the kitchen employees were given new uniforms. Why? Uniforms don’t directly affect the competence of the cooks or the taste of the food.

But during interviews conducted with kitchen employees, designers realized that morale was low, in part because employees were bored preparing the same dishes over and over again, in part because they felt that others had a poor perception of them. The new, chef-style uniforms gave the cooks a greater sense of pride. It was only part of the solution, but if the idea had been rejected outright, or perhaps not even suggested, the company would have missed an important aspect of the solution.

Prototype and test. Repeat.

You’ve defined the problem. You’ve spoken to customers. You’ve brainstormed, come up with all sorts of ideas, and worked with your team to boil those ideas down to the ones you think may actually solve the problem you’ve defined.

“We don’t develop a good solution just by thinking about a list of ideas, bullet points and rough sketches,” Eppinger said. “We explore potential solutions through modeling and prototyping. We design, we build, we test, and repeat — this design iteration process is absolutely critical to effective design thinking.”

Repeating this loop of prototyping, testing, and gathering user feedback is crucial for making sure the design is right — that is, it works for customers, you can build it, and you can support it.

“After several iterations, we might get something that works, we validate it with real customers, and we often find that what we thought was a great solution is actually only just OK. But then we can make it a lot better through even just a few more iterations,” Eppinger said.

Implementation

The goal of all the steps that come before this is to have the best possible solution before you move into implementing the design. Your team will spend most of its time, its money, and its energy on this stage.

“Implementation involves detailed design, training, tooling, and ramping up. It is a huge amount of effort, so get it right before you expend that effort,” said Eppinger.

Design thinking isn’t just for “things.” If you are only applying the approach to physical products, you aren’t getting the most out of it. Design thinking can be applied to any problem that needs a creative solution. When Eppinger ran into a primary school educator who told him design thinking was big in his school, Eppinger thought he meant that they were teaching students the tenets of design thinking.

“It turns out they meant they were using design thinking in running their operations and improving the school programs. It’s being applied everywhere these days,” Eppinger said.

In another example from the education field, Peruvian entrepreneur Carlos Rodriguez-Pastor hired design consulting firm IDEO to redesign every aspect of the learning experience in a network of schools in Peru. The ultimate goal? To elevate Peru’s middle class.

As you’d expect, many large corporations have also adopted design thinking. IBM has adopted it at a company-wide level, training many of its nearly 400,000 employees in design thinking principles .

What can design thinking do for your business?

The impact of all the buzz around design thinking today is that people are realizing that “anybody who has a challenge that needs creative problem solving could benefit from this approach,” Eppinger said. That means that managers can use it, not only to design a new product or service, “but anytime they’ve got a challenge, a problem to solve.”

Applying design thinking techniques to business problems can help executives across industries rethink their product offerings, grow their markets, offer greater value to customers, or innovate and stay relevant. “I don’t know industries that can’t use design thinking,” said Eppinger.

Ready to go deeper?

Read “ The Designful Company ” by Marty Neumeier, a book that focuses on how businesses can benefit from design thinking, and “ Product Design and Development ,” co-authored by Eppinger, to better understand the detailed methods.

Register for an MIT Sloan Executive Education course:

Systematic Innovation of Products, Processes, and Services , a five-day course taught by Eppinger and other MIT professors.

• Leadership by Design: Innovation Process and Culture , a two-day course taught by MIT Integrated Design and Management director Matthew Kressy.
• Managing Complex Technical Projects , a two-day course taught by Eppinger.
• Apply for M astering Design Thinking , a 3-month online certificate course taught by Eppinger and MIT Sloan senior lecturers Renée Richardson Gosline and David Robertson.

Steve Eppinger is a professor of management science and innovation at MIT Sloan. He holds the General Motors Leaders for Global Operations Chair and has a PhD from MIT in engineering. He is the faculty co-director of MIT's System Design and Management program and Integrated Design and Management program, both master’s degrees joint between the MIT Sloan and Engineering schools. His research focuses on product development and technical project management, and has been applied to improving complex engineering processes in many industries.

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What Is Design Thinking & Why Is It Important?

• 18 Jan 2022

In an age when innovation is key to business success and growth, you’ve likely come across the term “design thinking.” Perhaps you’ve heard it mentioned by a senior leader as something that needs to be utilized more, or maybe you’ve seen it on a prospective employee's resume.

While design thinking is an ideology based on designers’ workflows for mapping out stages of design, its purpose is to provide all professionals with a standardized innovation process to develop creative solutions to problems—design-related or not.

Why is design thinking needed? Innovation is defined as a product, process, service, or business model featuring two critical characteristics: novel and useful. Yet, there’s no use in creating something new and novel if people won’t use it. Design thinking offers innovation the upgrade it needs to inspire meaningful and impactful solutions.

But what is design thinking, and how does it benefit working professionals?

What Is Design Thinking?

Design thinking is a mindset and approach to problem-solving and innovation anchored around human-centered design . While it can be traced back centuries—and perhaps even longer—it gained traction in the modern business world after Tim Brown, CEO and president of design company IDEO, published an article about it in the Harvard Business Review .

Design thinking is different from other innovation and ideation processes in that it’s solution-based and user-centric rather than problem-based. This means it focuses on the solution to a problem instead of the problem itself.

For example, if a team is struggling with transitioning to remote work, the design thinking methodology encourages them to consider how to increase employee engagement rather than focus on the problem (decreasing productivity).

The essence of design thinking is human-centric and user-specific. It’s about the person behind the problem and solution, and requires asking questions such as “Who will be using this product?” and “How will this solution impact the user?”

The first, and arguably most important, step of design thinking is building empathy with users. By understanding the person affected by a problem, you can find a more impactful solution. On top of empathy, design thinking is centered on observing product interaction, drawing conclusions based on research, and ensuring the user remains the focus of the final implementation.

The Four Phases of Innovation

So, what does design thinking entail? There are many models of design thinking that range from three to seven steps.

In the online course Design Thinking and Innovation , Harvard Business School Dean Srikant Datar leverages a four-phase innovation framework. The phases venture from concrete to abstract thinking and back again as the process loops, reverses, and repeats. This is an important balance because abstract thinking increases the likelihood that an idea will be novel. It’s essential, however, to anchor abstract ideas in concrete thinking to ensure the solution is valid and useful.

Here are the four phases for effective innovation and, by extension, design thinking.

The first phase is about narrowing down the focus of the design thinking process. It involves identifying the problem statement to come up with the best outcome. This is done through observation and taking the time to determine the problem and the roadblocks that prevented a solution in the past.

Various tools and frameworks are available—and often needed—to make concrete observations about users and facts gathered through research. Regardless of which tools are implemented, the key is to observe without assumptions or biased expectations.

Once findings from your observations are collected, the next step is to shape insights by framing those observations. This is where you can venture into the abstract by reframing the problem in the form of a statement or question.

Once the problem statement or question has been solidified—not finalized—the next step is ideation. You can use a tool such as systematic inventive thinking (SIT) in this stage, which is useful for creating an innovative process that can be replicated in the future.

The goal is to ultimately overcome cognitive fixedness and devise new and innovative ideas that solve the problems you identified. Continue to actively avoid assumptions and keep the user at the forefront of your mind during ideation sessions.

The third phase involves developing concepts by critiquing a range of possible solutions. This includes multiple rounds of prototyping, testing, and experimenting to answer critical questions about a concept’s viability.

Remember: This step isn’t about perfection, but rather, experimenting with different ideas and seeing which parts work and which don’t.

4. Implement

The fourth and final phase, implementation, is when the entire process comes together. As an extension of the develop phase, implementation starts with testing, reflecting on results, reiterating, and testing again. This may require going back to a prior phase to iterate and refine until you find a successful solution. Such an approach is recommended because design thinking is often a nonlinear, iterative process.

In this phase, don’t forget to share results with stakeholders and reflect on the innovation management strategies implemented during the design thinking process. Learning from experience is an innovation process and design thinking project all its own.

Check out the video about the design thinking process below, and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more explainer content!

Why Design Thinking Skills Matter

The main value of design thinking is that it offers a defined process for innovation. While trial and error is a good way to test and experiment what works and what doesn’t, it’s often time-consuming, expensive, and ultimately ineffective. On the other hand, following the concrete steps of design thinking is an efficient way to develop new, innovative solutions.

On top of a clear, defined process that enables strategic innovation, design thinking can have immensely positive outcomes for your career—in terms of both advancement and salary.

As of December 2021, the most common occupations requiring design thinking skills were:

• Marketing managers
• Industrial engineers
• Graphic designers
• Software developers
• General and operations managers
• Management analysts
• Personal service managers
• Architectural and engineering managers
• Computer and information systems managers

In addition, jobs that require design thinking statistically have higher salaries. Take a marketing manager position, for example. The median annual salary is $107,900. Marketing manager job postings that require design thinking skills, however, have a median annual salary of $133,900—a 24 percent increase.

Overall, businesses are looking for talent with design thinking skills. As of November 2021, there were 29,648 job postings in the United States advertising design thinking as a necessary skill—a 153 percent increase from November 2020, and a 637 percent increase from November 2017.

As businesses continue to recognize the need for design thinking and innovation, they’ll likely create more demand for employees with those skills.

Learning Design Thinking

Design thinking is an extension of innovation that allows you to design solutions for end users with a single problem statement in mind. It not only imparts valuable skills but can help advance your career.

It’s also a collaborative endeavor that can only be mastered through practice with peers. As Datar says in the introduction to Design Thinking and Innovation : “Just as with learning how to swim, the best way to practice is to jump in and try.”

If you want to learn design thinking, take an active role in your education. Start polls, problem-solving exercises, and debates with peers to get a taste of the process. It’s also important to seek out diverse viewpoints to prepare yourself for the business world.

In addition, if you’re considering adding design thinking to your skill set, think about your goals and why you want to learn about it. What else might you need to be successful?

You might consider developing your communication, innovation, leadership, research, and management skills, as those are often listed alongside design thinking in job postings and professional profiles.

You may also notice skills like agile methodology, user experience, and prototyping in job postings, along with non-design skills, such as product management, strategic planning, and new product development.

Is Design Thinking Right for You?

There are many ways to approach problem-solving and innovation. Design thinking is just one of them. While it’s beneficial to learn how others have approached problems and evaluate if you have the same tools at your disposal, it can be more important to chart your own course to deliver what users and customers truly need.

You can also pursue an online course or workshop that dives deeper into design thinking methodology. This can be a practical path if you want to improve your design thinking skills or require a more collaborative environment.

Are you ready to develop your design thinking skills? Explore our online course Design Thinking and Innovation to discover how to leverage fundamental design thinking principles and innovative problem-solving tools to address business challenges.

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What is design thinking?

Discover what is design thinking and why it’s important, including the five stages of design thinking. Deep dive into a few case studies and learn how to apply design thinking.

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Design thinking is a mindset that breeds innovation. While it’s based on the design process, anyone in any profession can use it when they’re trying to come up with creative solutions to a problem. 

In this guide, we’ll walk you through what design thinking is and why it’s important, including the five stages of design thinking. Then we’ll present a couple of design thinking case studies and wrap up with a primer on how to apply design thinking. And don’t worry, this guide is broken down into easily digestible chunks, as follows:

Let’s get started!

What is design thinking? A definition

Design thinking is an approach used for problem-solving. Both practical and creative, it’s anchored by human-centred design.

Design thinking is extremely user-centric in that it focuses on your users before it focuses on things like technology or business metrics. 

Design thinking is also solution-based, looking for effective solutions to problems, not problem-based, which looks at the problem itself and tends to focus on limitations. 

Design thinking is all about getting hands-on with solutions. The aim is to quickly turn your ideas into testable products so you can see what works and what doesn’t.

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Why is design thinking important? 

Design thinking is important because it challenges assumptions and fosters innovation. While many ways of thinking rely on the habits and experiences we’ve formed, they can limit us when it comes to thinking of design solutions. Design thinking, however, encourages us to explore new ideas. 

It’s an actionable technique that allows us to tackle “wicked problems,” or problems that are ill-defined. For example, achieving sustainable growth or maintaining your competitive edge in business count as wicked problems, and on a broader scale, poverty and climate change are wicked problems too. Design thinking uses empathy and human-centred thinking to tackle these kinds of problems.

Who uses design thinking?

The short answer? Everyone! Design thinking can help you in whatever your role or industry. People in business, government, entertainment, health care, and every other industry can benefit from using design thinking to come up with innovative solutions. 

The most important thing design thinking does is help people focus on their customers or end users. Instead of focusing on problems to fix, design thinking keeps things user-centric, which boosts customer engagement. 

What are the 5 stages of design thinking?

According to the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford University (known as d-school), the five stages of design thinking are: 

Although these stages appear to be linear, following one after the other, design thinking isn’t a linear process. Stages are often run in parallel or out of order, or repeated when necessary.

Phase 1: Empathise 

Your goal here is to research your users’ needs to gain an empathic understanding of the problems they face. You’ll get to know your users and their wants and needs so you can make sure your solutions put them front and centre. This means setting aside your own assumptions and getting to know your users on a psychological and emotional level. You’ll observe, engage, watch and listen. 

Phase 2: Define

Here you state your users’ needs by compiling the information you gathered during the Empathise phase and then analysing it until you can define the core problem your team has identified. 

You do this by asking questions like: what patterns do you see in the data? What user issues need to be resolved? The conclusion of this phase comes when you’ve figured out a clear problem statement that is defined by the users’ needs. For example, “Bank customers in Glasgow need…”

You can learn more about how to write a problem statement in this guide.

Phase 3: Ideate

In this phase, you’ll generate ideas and solutions. You and your team will hold ideation sessions where you can come up with as many ideas as possible. No idea is too silly for this stage. The important thing is getting all ideas out on the table. There are a variety of techniques you can use, like brainstorming and mind mapping, to come up with solutions. This phase ends when you’ve managed to narrow down your ideas to just a few of the best ones.

Phase 4: Prototype

Your goal in this phase is to find the best solution to the problem by prototyping —that is, producing scaled down versions of the product or its features found in the previous phase. You’ll put each solution to the test by improving, redesigning, accepting, or rejecting it.

Phase 5: Test

Here you’ll try out the solutions you arrived at in the previous phases by user testing them. However, while this is the final stage of design thinking in theory, it’s rarely the final stage in reality. Design thinking often includes going back to previous phases to find other solutions or to further iterate or refine your existing solution.

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Design thinking examples and case studies

Now that you understand the theory and process of design thinking, let’s look at some examples in action where design thinking had a real-world impact.

Case Study 1: American Family Insurance’s Moonrise App

American Family Insurance, a company that offers life, business, auto, and home insurance, came to design company IDEO with the goal of innovating in a way that would help working families. 

Stages 1 & 2: Empathise and Define

While American Family thought their customers might benefit from budgeting tools, IDEO found from their research in the Empathise phase that, actually, people needed a way to build up their savings against unforeseen needs.

They noticed a lot of people had meticulously planned budgets, which made budgeting tools a moot point. But they were living just within their means and an extra expense, like a doctor’s visit or kid’s basketball uniform, could throw their budget off. These people didn’t want to take on debt though, they wanted extra work so they could have a cushion.

Stages 3 & 4: Ideate and Prototype

IDEO took that idea and ran with it, creating Moonrise, an app that matches people looking for work with extra hours and income. Today’s businesses depend on on-demand work but the temp agencies they work with tend to want permanent placements. Moonrise does things differently. It enables companies to find people who are already employed elsewhere for short-term work through a simple text message interface. The employers can list shifts on the platform and workers are paid as soon as they finish their shifts.

Stage 5: Test

To test the app, 11 Moonrisers, six employers, and a team of designers and programmers were assembled for a one week period to work out the kinks in the platform. 

Based on the test’s success, American Family Insurance now owns the startup Moonrise, which launched in Chicago in 2018 and has since expanded to additional states. In 2018, over 7,000 shifts have been fulfilled and over $500,000 has been earned by people on the app.

Case Study 2: GE Healthcare’s Scanning Tools

GE Healthcare has cutting-edge diagnostic imaging tools at its disposal, but for kids they’re an unpleasant experience. 

“The room itself is kind of dark and has those flickering fluorescent lights…. That machine that I had designed basically looked like a brick with a hole in it,” explained Doug Dietz , a designer who worked for GE. How could they make the experience better for kids?

The team at GE began by observing and gaining empathy for children at a daycare centre and talking to specialists who knew what paediatric patients went through. The team then recruited experts from a children’s museum and doctors from two hospitals. This gave them a lot of insight into what children went through when they had to sit for these procedures and what could be done to lessen the children’s stress.

Stages 3, 4 & 5: Ideate, Prototype, and Test

The first prototype of the new and improved “Adventure Series” scanner was invented. Through research and pilot programs, the redesign made imaging machines more child-friendly, making sure they have other things to focus on than the scary looks and sounds of the machine. For example, the Coral City Adventure in the emergency room gives children an underwater experience where they get into a yellow submarine and listen to the sound of harps while their procedure takes place.

Patient satisfaction scores increased to 90% and children no longer suffer such anxiety about their scans. The children hold still for their procedures more easily, making repeats of the scans unnecessary. There’s also less need for anesthesiologists, which improved the bottom line for those hospitals that used the scanning machines because more patients could get scanned each day.

How to apply design thinking 

If you want to apply design thinking in your own work, follow these steps and best practices:

• Improve design thinking skills. Use training to explain, improve, and practically implement the phases of design thinking. You can do this in several ways such as workshops, online courses, or case studies shared with your team.
• Identify the correct problem. Listen to users and ask them unbiased questions in order to understand their perspectives. Engage with everyone and stay open-minded, so you can identify the correct problem, not the problem you or your organisation thinks users are having. 
• Have more debriefs. Be open about what went right and what went wrong in your process. Openly discuss why things succeeded or failed and why. View failure as learning, not as an excuse to give up.
• Iterate and iterate some more. The goal of design thinking is finding the best answer possible—and that probably won’t come in the first round of iteration. You’ll need to test and iterate as much as possible with new ways to solve the problem.

Design thinking is so popular—and so effective—because it places the user’s needs front and centre. For more user-centric design tips, learn how to incorporate user feedback in product design , get to grips with user research ethics , and learn how to conduct effective user interviews .

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Design Thinking 101

July 31, 2016 2016-07-31

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In This Article:

Definition of design thinking, why — the advantage, flexibility — adapt to fit your needs, scalability — think bigger, history of design thinking.

Design thinking is an ideology supported by an accompanying process . A complete definition requires an understanding of both.

Definition: The design thinking ideology asserts that a hands-on, user-centric approach to problem solving can lead to innovation, and innovation can lead to differentiation and a competitive advantage. This hands-on, user-centric approach is defined by the design thinking process and comprises 6 distinct phases, as defined and illustrated below.

The design-thinking framework follows an overall flow of 1) understand, 2) explore, and 3) materialize. Within these larger buckets fall the 6 phases: empathize, define, ideate, prototype, test, and implement.

Conduct research in order to develop knowledge about what your users do, say, think, and feel .

Imagine your goal is to improve an onboarding experience for new users. In this phase, you talk to a range of actual users.  Directly observe what they do, how they think, and what they want, asking yourself things like ‘what motivates or discourages users?’ or ‘where do they experience frustration?’ The goal is to gather enough observations that you can truly begin to empathize with your users and their perspectives.

Combine all your research and observe where your users’ problems exist. While pinpointing your users’ needs , begin to highlight opportunities for innovation.

Consider the onboarding example again. In the define phase, use the data gathered in the empathize phase to glean insights. Organize all your observations and draw parallels across your users’ current experiences. Is there a common pain point across many different users? Identify unmet user needs.

Brainstorm a range of crazy, creative ideas that address the unmet user needs identified in the define phase. Give yourself and your team total freedom; no idea is too farfetched and quantity supersedes quality.

At this phase, bring your team members together and sketch out many different ideas. Then, have them share ideas with one another, mixing and remixing, building on others' ideas.

Build real, tactile representations for a subset of your ideas. The goal of this phase is to understand what components of your ideas work, and which do not. In this phase you begin to weigh the impact vs. feasibility of your ideas through feedback on your prototypes.

Make your ideas tactile. If it is a new landing page, draw out a wireframe and get feedback internally.  Change it based on feedback, then prototype it again in quick and dirty code. Then, share it with another group of people.

Return to your users for feedback. Ask yourself ‘Does this solution meet users’ needs?’ and ‘Has it improved how they feel, think, or do their tasks?’

Put your prototype in front of real customers and verify that it achieves your goals. Has the users’ perspective during onboarding improved? Does the new landing page increase time or money spent on your site? As you are executing your vision, continue to test along the way.

Put the vision into effect. Ensure that your solution is materialized and touches the lives of your end users.

This is the most important part of design thinking, but it is the one most often forgotten. As Don Norman preaches, “we need more design doing.” Design thinking does not free you from the actual design doing. It’s not magic.

“There’s no such thing as a creative type. As if creativity is a verb, a very time-consuming verb. It’s about taking an idea in your head, and transforming that idea into something real. And that’s always going to be a long and difficult process. If you’re doing it right, it’s going to feel like work.”  - Milton Glaser

As impactful as design thinking can be for an organization, it only leads to true innovation if the vision is executed. The success of design thinking lies in its ability to transform an aspect of the end user’s life. This sixth step — implement — is crucial.

Why should we introduce a new way to think about product development? There are numerous reasons to engage in design thinking, enough to merit a standalone article, but in summary, design thinking achieves all these advantages at the same time.

Design thinking:

• Is a user-centered process that starts with user data, creates design artifacts that address real and not imaginary user needs, and then tests those artifacts with real users
• Leverages collective expertise and establishes a shared language, as well as buy-in amongst your team
• Encourages innovation by exploring multiple avenues for the same problem

Jakob Nielsen says “ a wonderful interface solving the wrong problem will fail ." Design thinking unfetters creative energies and focuses them on the right problem. 

The above process will feel abstruse at first. Don’t think of it as if it were a prescribed step-by-step recipe for success. Instead, use it as scaffolding to support you when and where you need it. Be a master chef, not a line cook: take the recipe as a framework, then tweak as needed.

Each phase is meant to be iterative and cyclical as opposed to a strictly linear process, as depicted below. It is common to return to the two understanding phases, empathize and define, after an initial prototype is built and tested. This is because it is not until wireframes are prototyped and your ideas come to life that you are able to get a true representation of your design. For the first time, you can accurately assess if your solution really works. At this point, looping back to your user research is immensely helpful. What else do you need to know about the user in order to make decisions or to prioritize development order? What new use cases have arisen from the prototype that you didn’t previously research?

You can also repeat phases. It’s often necessary to do an exercise within a phase multiple times in order to arrive at the outcome needed to move forward. For example, in the define phase, different team members will have different backgrounds and expertise, and thus different approaches to problem identification. It’s common to spend an extended amount of time in the define phase, aligning a team to the same focus. Repetition is necessary if there are obstacles in establishing buy-in. The outcome of each phase should be sound enough to serve as a guiding principle throughout the rest of the process and to ensure that you never stray too far from your focus.

The packaged and accessible nature of design thinking makes it scalable. Organizations previously unable to shift their way of thinking now have a guide that can be comprehended regardless of expertise, mitigating the range of design talent while increasing the probability of success. This doesn’t just apply to traditional “designery” topics such as product design, but to a variety of societal, environmental, and economical issues. Design thinking is simple enough to be practiced at a range of scopes; even tough, undefined problems that might otherwise be overwhelming. While it can be applied over time to improve small functions like search, it can also be applied to design disruptive and transformative solutions, such as restructuring the career ladder for teachers in order to retain more talent. 

It is a common misconception that design thinking is new. Design has been practiced for ages : monuments, bridges, automobiles, subway systems are all end-products of design processes. Throughout history, good designers have applied a human-centric creative process to build meaningful and effective solutions.

In the early 1900's husband and wife designers Charles and Ray Eames practiced “learning by doing,” exploring a range of needs and constraints before designing their Eames chairs, which continue to be in production even now, seventy years later. 1960's dressmaker Jean Muir was well known for her “common sense” approach to clothing design, placing as much emphasis on how her clothes felt to wear as they looked to others. These designers were innovators of their time. Their approaches can be viewed as early examples of design thinking — as they each developed a deep understanding of their users’ lives and unmet needs. Milton Glaser, the designer behind the famous I ♥ NY logo, describes this notion well: “We’re always looking, but we never really see…it’s the act of attention that allows you to really grasp something, to become fully conscious of it.”

Despite these (and other) early examples of human-centric products, design has historically been an afterthought in the business world, applied only to touch up a product’s aesthetics. This topical design application has resulted in corporations creating solutions which fail to meet their customers’ real needs. Consequently, some of these companies moved their designers from the end of the product-development process, where their contribution is limited, to the beginning. Their human-centric design approach proved to be a differentiator: those companies that used it have reaped the financial benefits of creating products shaped by human needs.

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

The specific term "design thinking" was coined in the 1990's by David Kelley and Tim Brown of IDEO, with Roger Martin, and encapsulated methods and ideas that have been brewing for years into a single unified concept.

We live in an era of experiences , be they services or products, and we’ve come to have high expectations for these experiences. They are becoming more complex in nature as information and technology continues to evolve. With each evolution comes a new set of unmet needs. While design thinking is simply an approach to problem solving, it increases the probability of success and breakthrough innovation.

Learn more about design thinking in the full-day course Generating Big Ideas with Design Thinking .

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What is Design Thinking, and how is it used to problem solve?

• 27 Feb 2024

Stuck in a rut, struggling to find innovative solutions? Traditional problem-solving methods might leave you feeling frustrated and limited. Enter design thinking : a human-centered approach that unlocks creativity and fosters innovative solutions to complex challenges.

This blog will equip you with the knowledge and tools to use design thinking effectively, empowering you and your team to tackle any obstacle head-on. Let’s dive in and explore the transformative power of design thinking.

What IS design thinking?

Design thinking isn’t just for designers. It’s a flexible framework for anyone seeking solutions that are:

• Desirable : meeting the needs and desires of users.
• Feasible : practical and achievable within constraints.
• Viable : sustainable and commercially viable.

Forget linear problem-solving — design thinking is iterative and collaborative . It involves five key stages:

• Empathize : Understand your users deeply through observation, interviews, and empathy exercises.
• Define : Clearly define the problem based on user insights, not assumptions.
• Ideate : Brainstorm a wide range of potential solutions, thinking outside the box.
• Prototype : Build low-fidelity prototypes to test and refine your ideas quickly.
• Test : Gather feedback from users and iterate on your prototypes based on their responses.

Think of it like building a product: you start with understanding your users’ needs, then explore various possibilities, test them, and refine your approach based on real-world feedback.

How can design thinking help you solve problems?

The beauty of design thinking lies in its versatility. It can be applied to various scenarios, from developing new products and services to improving internal processes and even tackling social challenges .

Here are just a few examples:

• A company struggling with customer retention might use design thinking to understand their customers’ frustrations and develop solutions to improve satisfaction.
• A non-profit organization might use design thinking to design a more effective educational program by understanding the needs of both students and teachers.
• A team facing communication challenges within their department might use design thinking to develop a more collaborative work environment.

Putting design thinking into practice

Ready to unleash the power of design thinking? Here are some tips to get you started:

• Assemble a diverse team : Bring together individuals with different perspectives and backgrounds to generate richer ideas.
• Start small : Choose a manageable problem to tackle first and experiment with the design thinking process.
• Emphasize empathy : Put yourself in your users’ shoes and understand their needs deeply.
• Embrace failure : View setbacks as opportunities to learn and iterate.
• Build prototypes : Don’t wait for everything to be perfect. Get your ideas out there and test them early and often.
• Iterate and improve : Based on user feedback, continuously refine your solutions until they truly address the problem.

Resources to help you on your design thinking journey

Remember, you don’t have to navigate the design thinking journey alone. Here are some resources to help you:

• The Interaction Design Foundation (IDF) : A comprehensive website offering free articles, courses, and tools related to design thinking.
• IDEO U : An online learning platform with design thinking courses and resources from the renowned design firm IDEO.
• Stanford d.school : The Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford University, offering courses, workshops, and resources on design thinking.

Bonus Tip: If you’re looking for a user-friendly platform to create and share your prototypes, try Biteable . Create engaging video presentations, explainer animations, and even interactive prototypes – perfect for testing your design thinking solutions with users.

Unlock better solutions with design thinking

By embracing the human-centered approach of design thinking, you can unlock new possibilities and tackle problems with creativity and innovation. Start your design thinking journey today and see how it can transform your problem-solving approach for the better.

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• How to solve problems using the design ...

How to solve problems using the design thinking process

The design thinking process is a problem-solving design methodology that helps you develop solutions in a human-focused way. Initially designed at Stanford’s d.school, the five stage design thinking method can help solve ambiguous questions, or more open-ended problems. Learn how these five steps can help your team create innovative solutions to complex problems.

As humans, we’re approached with problems every single day. But how often do we come up with solutions to everyday problems that put the needs of individual humans first?

This is how the design thinking process started.

What is the design thinking process?

The design thinking process is a problem-solving design methodology that helps you tackle complex problems by framing the issue in a human-centric way. The design thinking process works especially well for problems that are not clearly defined or have a more ambiguous goal.

One of the first individuals to write about design thinking was John E. Arnold, a mechanical engineering professor at Stanford. Arnold wrote about four major areas of design thinking in his book, “Creative Engineering” in 1959. His work was later taught at Stanford’s Hasso-Plattner Institute of Design (also known as d.school), a design institute that pioneered the design thinking process. 

This eventually led Nobel Prize laureate Herbert Simon to outline one of the first iterations of the design thinking process in his 1969 book, “The Sciences of the Artificial.” While there are many different variations of design thinking, “The Sciences of the Artificial” is often credited as the basis. 

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A non-linear design thinking approach

Design thinking is not a linear process. It’s important to understand that each stage of the process can (and should) inform the other steps. For example, when you’re going through user testing, you may learn about a new problem that didn’t come up during any of the previous stages. You may learn more about your target personas during the final testing phase, or discover that your initial problem statement can actually help solve even more problems, so you need to redefine the statement to include those as well. 

Why use the design thinking process

The design thinking process is not the most intuitive way to solve a problem, but the results that come from it are worth the effort. Here are a few other reasons why implementing the design thinking process for your team is worth it.

Focus on problem solving

As human beings, we often don’t go out of our way to find problems. Since there’s always an abundance of problems to solve, we’re used to solving problems as they occur. The design thinking process forces you to look at problems from many different points of view. 

The design thinking process requires focusing on human needs and behaviors, and how to create a solution to match those needs. This focus on problem solving can help your design team come up with creative solutions for complex problems. 

Encourages collaboration and teamwork

The design thinking process cannot happen in a silo. It requires many different viewpoints from designers, future customers, and other stakeholders . Brainstorming sessions and collaboration are the backbone of the design thinking process.

Foster innovation

The design thinking process focuses on finding creative solutions that cater to human needs. This means your team is looking to find creative solutions for hyper specific and complex problems. If they’re solving unique problems, then the solutions they’re creating must be equally unique.

The iterative process of the design thinking process means that the innovation doesn’t have to end—your team can continue to update the usability of your product to ensure that your target audience’s problems are effectively solved. 

The 5 stages of design thinking

Currently, one of the more popular models of design thinking is the model proposed by the Hasso-Plattner Institute of Design (or d.school) at Stanford. The main reason for its popularity is because of the success this process had in successful companies like Google, Apple, Toyota, and Nike. Here are the five steps designated by the d.school model that have helped many companies succeed.

1. Empathize stage

The first stage of the design thinking process is to look at the problem you’re trying to solve in an empathetic manner. To get an accurate representation of how the problem affects people, actively look for people who encountered this problem previously. Asking them how they would have liked to have the issue resolved is a good place to start, especially because of the human-centric nature of the design thinking process. 

Empathy is an incredibly important aspect of the design thinking process.  The design thinking process requires the designers to put aside any assumptions and unconscious biases they may have about the situation and put themselves in someone else’s shoes. 

For example, if your team is looking to fix the employee onboarding process at your company, you may interview recent new hires to see how their onboarding experience went. Another option is to have a more tenured team member go through the onboarding process so they can experience exactly what a new hire experiences.

2. Define stage

Sometimes a designer will encounter a situation when there’s a general issue, but not a specific problem that needs to be solved. One way to help designers clearly define and outline a problem is to create human-centric problem statements. 

A problem statement helps frame a problem in a way that provides relevant context in an easy to comprehend way. The main goal of a problem statement is to guide designers working on possible solutions for this problem. A problem statement frames the problem in a way that easily highlights the gap between the current state of things and the end goal. 

Tip: Problem statements are best framed as a need for a specific individual. The more specific you are with your problem statement, the better designers can create a human-centric solution to the problem. 

Examples of good problem statements:

We need to decrease the number of clicks a potential customer takes to go through the sign-up process.

We need to decrease the new subscriber unsubscribe rate by 10%. 

We need to increase the Android app adoption rate by 20%.

3. Ideate stage

This is the stage where designers create potential solutions to solve the problem outlined in the problem statement. Use brainstorming techniques with your team to identify the human-centric solution to the problem defined in step two. 

Here are a few brainstorming strategies you can use with your team to come up with a solution:

Standard brainstorm session: Your team gathers together and verbally discusses different ideas out loud.

Brainwrite: Everyone writes their ideas down on a piece of paper or a sticky note and each team member puts their ideas up on the whiteboard. 

Worst possible idea: The inverse of your end goal. Your team produces the most goofy idea so nobody will look silly. This takes out the rigidity of other brainstorming techniques. This technique also helps you identify areas that you can improve upon in your actual solution by looking at the worst parts of an absurd solution. 

It’s important that you don’t discount any ideas during the ideation phase of brainstorming. You want to have as many potential solutions as possible, as new ideas can help trigger even better ideas. Sometimes the most creative solution to a problem is the combination of many different ideas put together.

4. Prototype stage

During the prototype phase, you and your team design a few different variations of inexpensive or scaled down versions of the potential solution to the problem. Having different versions of the prototype gives your team opportunities to test out the solution and make any refinements. 

Prototypes are often tested by other designers, team members outside of the initial design department, and trusted customers or members of the target audience. Having multiple versions of the product gives your team the opportunity to tweak and refine the design before testing with real users. During this process, it’s important to document the testers using the end product. This will give you valuable information as to what parts of the solution are good, and which require more changes.

After testing different prototypes out with teasers, your team should have different solutions for how your product can be improved. The testing and prototyping phase is an iterative process—so much so that it’s possible that some design projects never end.

After designers take the time to test, reiterate, and redesign new products, they may find new problems, different solutions, and gain an overall better understanding of the end-user. The design thinking framework is flexible and non-linear, so it’s totally normal for the process itself to influence the end design. 

Tips for incorporating the design thinking process into your team

If you want your team to start using the design thinking process, but you’re unsure of how to start, here are a few tips to help you out. 

Start small: Similar to how you would test a prototype on a small group of people, you want to test out the design thinking process with a smaller team to see how your team functions. Give this test team some small projects to work on so you can see how this team reacts. If it works out, you can slowly start rolling this process out to other teams.

Incorporate cross-functional team members : The design thinking process works best when your team members collaborate and brainstorm together. Identify who your designer’s key stakeholders are and ensure they’re included in the small test team. 

Organize work in a collaborative project management software : Keep important design project documents such as user research, wireframes, and brainstorms in a collaborative tool like Asana . This way, team members will have one central source of truth for anything relating to the project they’re working on.

Foster collaborative design thinking with Asana

The design thinking process works best when your team works collaboratively. You don’t want something as simple as miscommunication to hinder your projects. Instead, compile all of the information your team needs about a design project in one place with Asana. 

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Design Thinking: How it works [Theory, Practice & Examples]

So you’ve heard of Design Thinking , but it sounds a bit like hocus-pocus? Imagine standing at the entrance of a sleek, futuristic museum, greeted by a door that refuses to budge. Frustration mounts as you struggle to figure out how to open it, but then, a child approaches, effortlessly pushes the door, and you follow suit, feeling a blend of awe and embarrassment. That moment captures the essence of design thinking—a concept that, like that perplexing door, may initially seem locked, yet holds the key to unlocking innovation, creativity, and problem-solving potential in today’s complex world. In a hurry? Skip the theory and get straight to the 5 stages of design thinking .

Design thinking, a term that has surged in popularity, transcends the realm of aesthetics and reaches into the very core of how we tackle challenges , both big and small. It’s a methodology that isn’t confined to designers alone but is a powerful tool for anyone seeking novel solutions, whether in business, education, healthcare, or even personal life. Design thinking isn’t just a buzzword – it’s a dynamic and transformative approach that promises to reshape how we approach problems and create solutions.

Design Thinking: A Definition

Design thinking is a transformative problem-solving approach that puts human needs and experiences at its core. At its essence, it’s a structured methodology that empowers individuals and organizations to tackle complex challenges by fostering empathy, creativity, and innovation. Unlike traditional problem-solving methods, design thinking is not confined to a linear path; instead, it encourages dynamic and iterative thinking to arrive at innovative solutions (see also: Innovation Management ).

Historical Background

To truly grasp the significance of design thinking, it’s essential to delve into its historical roots. The concept finds its origins in the mid-20th century, primarily within the field of industrial design. Visionaries like Herbert A. Simon and L. Bruce Archer were among the early proponents of this methodology, emphasizing the importance of user-centered design . Over the decades, design thinking evolved, incorporating insights from various disciplines, such as psychology, engineering, and business. It gained prominence in the corporate world thanks to influential figures like David Kelley of IDEO and the Stanford d.school, which helped popularize and formalize the design thinking process we know today.

Design Thinking Core Principles

• Empathy : Design thinking starts with deep empathy for the end-user. This means understanding their needs, desires, and pain points on a profound level. Empathy forms the foundation upon which innovative solutions are built.
• Iteration : Design thinking embraces the idea that the first solution is rarely the best one. It encourages continuous refinement and iteration of ideas through prototyping and testing. This iterative process allows for the discovery of unexpected insights and improvements.
• User-Centricity : The user is the focal point of the entire design thinking process. Solutions are not imposed from the top down; they emerge organically from an understanding of the user’s perspective and needs.
• Collaboration : Design thinking thrives on interdisciplinary collaboration . It brings together individuals with diverse skills and perspectives to foster creative problem-solving.

These principles, combined with a structured framework, make design thinking a potent methodology for addressing a wide range of challenges , from designing user-friendly products to solving complex organizational problems.

The Stages of Design Thinking

While Design Thinking is often described as a mindset, at it’s core it is a five step process.

Stage I: Empathize

The journey of design thinking commences with a crucial first step— empathy . In this initial stage, designers and problem-solvers immerse themselves in the world of the end-user, seeking to understand their needs , desires, and challenges on a profound level. This isn’t a casual observation – it’s a deep dive into the user’s experiences. Empathy involves conducting interviews, surveys, and even shadowing users in their daily routines. The goal? To gain insights that go beyond what’s explicitly stated—to uncover the unspoken, the latent, and the emotions that influence user behavior. Empathy is the bedrock upon which the entire design thinking process rests, for it’s from this wellspring of understanding that innovative solutions emerge. If you want to learn more about understanding different personalities, take our DISC-Test.

Stage II: Define

With a wealth of empathetic insights in hand, the next stage is to distill these observations into a clear and concise problem statement . What are the specific challenges and pain points that need to be addressed? Defining the problem is a pivotal moment in the design thinking process because it frames the entire journey. It’s about reframing the issue to focus on what truly matters to the user. This stage requires a delicate balance of precision and creativity—precision in articulating the problem, and creativity in reframing it to inspire fresh ideas.

Stage III: Ideate

Now, armed with a well-defined problem, the design thinking process enters the ideation stage —a veritable playground for creative brainstorming. Here, the emphasis is on quantity rather than quality, as the goal is to generate a broad spectrum of ideas, no matter how wild or unconventional they may seem. Ideation sessions often involve cross-functional teams engaging in free-flowing discussions, sketching, and mind mapping . It’s in this stage that the magic of creativity takes flight, and seemingly impossible solutions begin to take shape.

Stage IV: Prototype

Ideation is a boundless landscape of possibilities, but to transform these concepts into tangible solutions, the process moves to prototyping . Prototypes are simplified representations of the envisioned solutions, ranging from paper sketches to interactive mock-ups. The purpose of prototyping is to bring ideas to life in a tangible form that can be tested and refined. It’s an essential step to bridge the gap between abstract concepts and real-world applicability. Prototypes serve as a canvas for experimentation and iteration, allowing designers to uncover flaws, make improvements, and fine-tune their solutions.

Stage V: Test!

The final stage of design thinking is where ideas are put to the test in the real world . Testing involves presenting prototypes to the end-users and gathering their feedback . This user-centric approach ensures that the proposed solutions align with the users’ needs and expectations. The feedback loop is iterative, often leading back to the ideation and prototyping stages as insights are gained. This process of testing and refinement continues until the most suitable and effective solution emerges, ready to address the defined problem effectively.

In these stages, design thinking transforms from a theoretical concept into a hands-on, user-driven methodology that fosters innovation and creative problem-solving. Each stage plays a vital role in the iterative process that leads to meaningful solutions.

Design Thinking Examples & Benefits

To truly appreciate the transformative power of design thinking, let’s turn to real-world examples where this methodology has reshaped industries and solved complex problems.

Case Studies

One such shining example comes from Airbnb . In its early days, Airbnb faced a significant challenge: how to establish trust between hosts and guests in the sharing economy. By applying design thinking principles, they delved deep into the user experience, empathizing with both hosts and guests. They introduced features like user profiles, reviews, and a secure payment system, all aimed at fostering trust and confidence. This approach not only propelled Airbnb’s growth but also revolutionized the hospitality industry.

Another compelling case is that of the healthcare giant, Mayo Clinic . In an industry fraught with complexities and patient-centric challenges, Mayo Clinic turned to design thinking to improve patient experiences. They revamped waiting areas, redesigned appointment scheduling, and introduced user-friendly mobile apps for patients to access their medical records. These innovations not only improved patient satisfaction but also enhanced the overall quality of care.

Benefits of the Design Thinking Process

Design thinking isn’t just a methodology; it’s a mindset that empowers individuals and organizations to navigate the complexities of our modern world effectively. Its benefits extend far beyond problem-solving and innovation, permeating into the very fabric of how we approach challenges and create solutions:

• Fosters Innovation : Design thinking places the user at the core of problem-solving, encouraging innovative thinking that leads to groundbreaking solutions.
• Promotes Adaptability : In an ever-changing world, design thinking equips organizations with the ability to pivot and evolve in response to shifting market dynamics and customer preferences.
• Enhanced User Satisfaction : Whether in product design or service delivery, design thinking ensures that solutions precisely meet user needs and expectations, resulting in happier and more loyal customers.
• Encourages Collaboration : Design thinking fosters a culture of collaboration among multidisciplinary teams, promoting teamwork and creativity.

Read more about the benefits in this review of educational research: Having good design thinking skills can assist in solving really complex problems.

Challenges and Criticisms

While design thinking has garnered widespread acclaim, it’s not immune to criticism, and one prevalent concern is the risk of over-hyping. In the rush to embrace this transformative approach, there’s a danger of viewing it as a panacea for all organizational challenges. Design thinking, like any methodology, has its limitations. It’s not a one-size-fits-all solution, and not every problem requires a design thinking approach. Over-hyping can create unrealistic expectations , leading to disappointment when results fall short. It’s essential to strike a balance between recognizing design thinking’s potential and acknowledging its boundaries.

Implementation Challenges

Implementing design thinking within organizations can be a journey fraught with challenges. Resistance to change is a common stumbling block. Employees accustomed to traditional problem-solving methods may find it challenging to adapt to the iterative and user-centric nature of design thinking. Another challenge is the need for time and resources . Design thinking, when done right, demands investment in research, prototyping, and user testing, which can strain budgets and schedules. Additionally, maintaining a consistent commitment to the process throughout the organization can be difficult. Without leadership support and a culture that encourages experimentation and learning from failures, design thinking initiatives may falter. Addressing these challenges requires a thoughtful and strategic approach to ensure that design thinking becomes ingrained in the organizational DNA .

How to Incorporate Design Thinking

Design thinking isn’t reserved for designers alone – it’s a mindset that anyone can cultivate to enhance problem-solving skills and drive innovation in their work and daily lives.

Practical tips for individuals

• Start with Empathy : Whether you’re designing a product or tackling a personal challenge, begin by understanding the needs and perspectives of those involved. Ask questions, actively listen , and put yourself in their shoes.
• Embrace Iteration : Don’t settle for the first solution that comes to mind. Be open to refining and iterating on your ideas. Embrace failure as a learning opportunity.
• Diverse Perspectives : Seek input from people with different backgrounds and viewpoints. Collaborative brainstorming can lead to more creative and effective solutions.
• Prototype and Test : Even in non-design contexts, consider creating prototypes or mock-ups to visualize your ideas. Test them with potential users or stakeholders to gather feedback.
• User-Centric Approach : Always prioritize the end-user or recipient of your work. Your solutions should address their needs and provide value.

Organizational Integration

To foster a design thinking culture within organizations, several steps can be taken:

• Leadership Buy-In : Leaders should champion the adoption of design thinking, setting an example for the rest of the organization. They should communicate its value and allocate resources for its implementation (see also “ Leadership test “)
• Training and Education : Offer design thinking training and workshops to employees at all levels. Equip them with the skills and knowledge to apply design thinking methodologies.
• Cross-Functional Teams : Encourage collaboration across different departments and disciplines. Create teams that bring together diverse skills and perspectives for problem-solving.
• Design Thinking Spaces : Designate physical or virtual spaces where employees can brainstorm, prototype, and test ideas. These spaces should be conducive to creativity and collaboration.
• Reward Innovation : Recognize and reward employees who contribute innovative ideas and solutions through design thinking. Create incentives for innovation and risk-taking.
• Feedback and Continuous Improvement : Establish mechanisms for collecting feedback on design thinking initiatives. Use this feedback to refine processes and adapt to evolving needs.

By following these steps, individuals can harness the power of design thinking in their personal and professional lives, while organizations can create an environment where design thinking thrives, leading to innovative solutions and a more agile , customer-centric approach.

It’s worth emphasizing that design thinking holds greater importance than ever before. It equips individuals and organizations with the tools to navigate change effectively , foster innovation, and create solutions that prioritize the needs of users, transcending disciplinary boundaries.

Consider embracing design thinking in your own context . Whether you’re seeking solutions in your daily life or aiming to cultivate a culture of creativity within your organization, the key lies in embracing empathy, collaboration, and a willingness to experiment. These qualities unlock the potential of design thinking.

In the words of the iconic designer and innovator Steve Jobs , “ Design is how it works .” Let design thinking be the guiding light in our intricate world, where innovation and user-centric solutions pave the path forward. Its enduring relevance underscores our innate capacity to create, adapt, and thrive .

You might also be interested in: Pareto Concept – Why it still works!

Additional Resources

For readers eager to dive deeper into the world of design thinking, there is a wealth of resources available to further your understanding and expertise:

• “ Design Thinking for Strategic Innovation ” by Idris Mootee: This book offers a strategic perspective on design thinking and its application in business.
• “ Change by Design ” by Tim Brown: Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO, provides valuable insights into the design thinking process and its potential for innovation.
• “ The Design Thinking Playbook ” by Michael Lewrick, Patrick Link, and Larry Leifer: A comprehensive guide to practical design thinking methods and tools.
• IDEO U ( https://www.ideou.com/ ): IDEO U offers online courses and resources on design thinking, innovation, and leadership.
• Stanford d.school ( https://dschool.stanford.edu/ ): Explore Stanford University’s d.school website for design thinking tools, case studies, and free resources.
• Nielsen Norman Group ( https://www.nngroup.com/ ): The Nielsen Norman Group offers valuable insights and research on user-centered design and usability.
• Coursera Design Thinking Specialization : This series of courses offered by the University of Virginia on Coursera provides a comprehensive understanding of design thinking principles and their application.
• edX Design Thinking MicroMasters Program : This program by Rochester Institute of Technology on edX covers design thinking, innovation, and leadership.

VIDEO: Doreen Lorenzo about Design Thinking (TedTalk)

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Design Problem Statements: What They Are and How to Frame Them

Even exciting product ideas can flop without an understanding of the user problem to solve. A design problem statement is an essential step in the design process for creating products that truly matter.

By Jordan DeVos

Jordan’s expertise spans across brand strategy, service design, and UX. She works with organizations to help strengthen teams and innovate.

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In 2006, Microsoft made the competitive move and released Zune, its version of the futuristic, one-buttoned, every-song-in-your-pocket iPod. The onscreen colors were punchy and the interface was type-led with a beautiful minimalist font. It was a bold move to challenge Apple, but in the world of product, success is not always about being first .

It could be argued that the Zune-only features, such as wirelessly sending a song from one Zune to another (an innovative feature in the mid-aughts) were just as good as the iPod-exclusive features, making Microsoft’s product a seemingly strong contender. But instead, it was a failure.

You could unearth countless reasons why the Zune wasn’t a success (and probably a pile of reasons why it should have been). One major underlying cause was that Microsoft had not identified a problem the Zune would solve. There were no clear user needs that the iPod was failing to meet or any new innovation that would shake things up. The Zune was solving nothing.

If there is no problem, there is no solution, and no reason for a company to exist. – Vinod Khosla, Khosla Ventures (a Silicon Valley venture capital firm)

What Exactly Is a “Design Problem”?

We’ve all had them, solved them, and most definitely caused them. But to put it in simple terms is a challenge in itself. The Oxford dictionary says a problem is “a matter or situation regarded as unwelcome or harmful and needing to be dealt with and overcome.” True, but this implies there is an awareness of the desired outcome. With all due respect to the brilliant minds at the Oxford Dictionary, this definition is missing an important component of most examples of design problems: unconscious desires .

Inventor of the automobile, Henry Ford, knew about this layer of desire when he famously said, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” He knew that the unwelcome matter at hand was that horses were too slow. But this wasn’t really the problem that needed solving. There was a deeper need that his customers couldn’t articulate.

Richard Buchanan is a “design theorist” whose career revolves around human-centered design thinking principles. In his paper, Design Research and the New Learning , he alludes to a user’s unarticulated need when he defines design as “the human power of conceiving, planning, and making products or services that serve human beings in the accomplishment of their individual and collective purposes.” It’s the user’s purpose that needs attention, not simply an unwelcome situation. This deeper need is at the root of what a user desires, whether or not they can articulate it.

Ford’s customers thought they needed a faster version of what they already had. But Ford understood their deeper purpose: to get from one place to another faster . This distinction helped him avoid simply engineering a faster horse and instead opened the doors to create something that had never existed before.

A problem isn’t simply an unwanted situation or a matter that deviates from the norm—although these are still valid definitions of a problem. For designers and creative problem solving, a problem is an unmet need that, if met, can satisfy the user’s purpose.

Why Frame a Problem?

Framing a design problem is the first step in a human-centered design process . It prioritizes the elements just discussed: the user and the purpose they desire to accomplish. This means that an initial round of user research can be revolutionary in uncovering deep-rooted desires. Conducting user interviews or desktop research, such as competitive analysis, can reveal insights into potential users and what problems they face.

For instance, “New mums need a way to feel connected to a support group because they spend a large amount of time alone with their babies and end up feeling isolated and lonely,” is one of many design problem statement examples a designer might create when tasked with creating a product for parents. These mums have a deep-rooted desire to know they’re not alone, and a new product might help them accomplish the purpose of feeling connected.

A design team could develop an app, a social network platform, or even a brick-and-mortar venue where mums could gather. The problem statement would guide the team in navigating decisions and features, like, should we use AI? What other apps should it link to? How could the environment be designed? The framed problem provides a framework for crafting the best solution for the user.

By framing the problem with a statement narrow enough to bring focus yet broad enough for creativity, the product design team can stay simultaneously focused on design problem-solving and open to innovative possibilities.

Identifying Barriers and Opportunities

When you know the direction you want to go, you can see what’s in front of you. With a clearly defined problem that’s rooted in a user’s purpose, it’s easier to see what barriers are in the way of reaching that end goal. And if the problem is clearly stated at the start of a project, it can act as a lens through which to find additional opportunities that might have gone unnoticed.

Aligning the Team Around Design Problem Solving

Without realizing it, members of a team—stakeholders, designers , developers, and even users—each have a different image in their head of what the end product should be. They are each thinking about it in a slightly different way informed by different mental models . Arguably the biggest impact of framing a problem is how it aligns these varying views.

The best design thinking problem statement examples collect multiple perspectives within a framework that sparks effective conversations and decisions. Once an articulated statement is made, expectations for the team can be managed and efforts are aligned.

Guiding the Project and All Future Decisions

A product team can function without a problem defined—it happens all the time. But when an explicit statement declares what problem needs to be solved, every effort is focused on that single outcome.

A well-framed product design problem statement that is documented as part of a product design brief is a simple tool to weigh options and measure success. A good design problem statement will leave room for creativity, but it ultimately provides a clear lens through which to view each element of the project.

Outlining the problem statement and the design process steps acts as a filter that sifts out superfluous or irrelevant ideas and retains only the ones that meet the need. As the design process progresses, the team should refer to the initial problem statement and ensure that what is being designed still addresses the core problem statement documented in the product design brief.

God gave us ten styluses … let’s not invent another. – Steve Jobs on his distaste for the Apple Newton’s unnecessary stylus pen

Saving Time and Money in the Long Run

With a shared perspective and sign-off on the ultimate purpose of the product, the design process can run more efficiently. There will always be inevitable tangents and dead ends in innovative projects, but even these learnings can be more insightful when everything is driven by finding a solution to a single problem.

Working from a shared understanding of the design problem needing to be solved can also prevent public embarrassment—apart from a failed product. When Juicero launched its extravagant juicing machine, it was met with jabs and jeers because it charged a premium price for what anyone can do with their hands—squeeze fresh juice from a packet. It managed to raise $120 million in investments but suspended sales 16 months after launching.

Ultimately, the product brought very little value to juice-lovers because it solved a non-existent problem. Not every idea should be executed, and a well-framed problem statement can help determine which ones should just stay in the sketchbook.

Helping Connect Emotionally to the User

A problem can’t be defined unless you know who is struggling. By taking the time to conduct research and speak to potential users and ask questions about their current situation and how they feel about it, your team can suddenly step into the shoes of the user.

The emotional engagement needed at the problem framing stage aligns the product with the person it’s meant to serve. The user’s motivations, desires, and fears can create a framework for measuring all ideas and proposals. Seeing a problem from a human perspective will inevitably illuminate intuitive and emotional insights that will make a product more lovable.

How Can a Problem Be Framed?

Even though the benefits of framing a problem are significant, it’s often a skipped step. It’s not uncommon to receive a thoroughly constructed design brief that includes everything from visual direction and functional requirements. And sometimes that’s all you need when you join the team.

But if you’re at the beginning of a project and the visual and functional decisions are already being made, it’s worth taking a step back to define the problem the product is solving. Sometimes there is plenty of time to do this, other times there’s resistance and limited resources. Regardless of where you find yourself, there are methods that can help bring a level of clarity to everyone involved.

If I had an hour to solve a problem, I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes thinking about solutions. – Albert Einstein

The Four Ws: Questions to Answer

Ideally, this is a method that gathers key stakeholders around a pile of Post-its and a large wall. By asking four simple questions, everyone can put their own thoughts up and together synthesize the content to find focus and clarity.

• Who is affected? Who is experiencing the problem? Can this user be further specified (by demographic, persona, motivation, reason for being in the situation)?
• What is the problem? What are the struggles? What task needs to be accomplished? What pain point needs to be relieved?
• Where does it happen? What is the context in which the user experiences the problem? Is it in a physical or digital space? Who else is involved?
• Why does it matter? Why is this problem worth solving? What value does it bring to the user? What value does it bring to the business?

Empathy Map: Putting Yourself in the User’s Shoes

Empathy maps are a common tool used in UX design and can be helpful in many stages throughout a product’s development. Here, at the start, it instantly connects the team to the user to find out what their purpose might be. Depending on the amount of time you have for the problem framing stage, this method can involve user interviews and observational shadowing.

• Hear and see. What kind of comments or concepts does the user encounter? What are others saying that the user is exposed to? What does the user observe others doing around them? (This category illustrates the user’s surroundings.)
• Say and do. What are the user’s comments and behaviors? What are they saying out loud to others? What do they do in practice? (These are things that are explicitly done and can be clearly observed.)
• Think and feel. What does the user think but keep to themself? How do they emotionally react to a situation? What are their desires? (These aren’t always apparent by simply observing a user, but can be revealed through conversational interviews. It takes some digging to understand what is happening on a subconscious level, but this is where great insights can be found.)
• Pains and gains. What frustrations does the user have? What about the experience is unnecessary or disappointing? In contrast, what about the experience is improving the life of the user? What works well? Where or when is the user happiest? (These are the outcomes of the experience.)

The Final Problem Statement

This is a simple but really effective way to bring focus to the insights you’ve uncovered and the ultimate problem you can frame. The design problem statement structure template is like a page from MadLibs, a sentence with blank spaces to fill with your insights. It creates a concise statement rooted in your team’s collective thinking. It’s important to keep the statement specific enough so there is a shared vision for the product, but broad enough to allow for creativity and new insights.

Here are a few design problem statement example formats:

• e.g., “I am a new mum trying to take care of my baby in the best way possible, but I don’t know if I’m doing a good job because I’m always at home alone and don’t have anyone to talk to about it, which makes me feel isolated and alone.”
• e.g., “New mums need a way to connect with other mums because they are often at home alone during the day and feel isolated and alone.”
• e.g., “Our new mum has the problem that she has no one to talk to about the best way to care for her baby when she is at home alone every day. Our solution should deliver a way for her to feel connected to other mums so she feels less isolated and alone.”

Every Good Problem Framing Phase, No Matter How Simple, Should:

• Avoid proposing solutions. It’s easy to think in the tangible terms of features and functionality, but these will only distract from first understanding the fundamental problem.
• Ask why. It’s a simple question to help find insights under the surface. But as Fast Company contributor Tina Seelig writes , asking “why” lets you see a situation from a different angle.
• Reflect. Make time to step back and look for connections and patterns. This is where insights lie that can set a product apart from competitors.
• Keep it universal. Avoid using jargon or any unnecessary complexities. The problem should be simple for anyone to understand, and ideally, to retell. Equipping team members to easily talk about what you are trying to achieve will build confidence and passion within the project.

Forget the Horse, Deliver a Car

What is a design problem statement? Some clients may set a brief that clearly defines the problem to solve. Others might not know about this crucial stage. Therein lies an opportunity for you to lead the client in taking a step back and evaluating why this product will exist. Together you can align the team, craft a framework, and kick off an effective and efficient process.

Perhaps the greatest value of this step is understanding the human psyche. Framing a problem from a customer’s perspective lets you more effectively deliver what people never knew they needed. Dave Thomsen, a former IDEO designer, writes that a human-centric approach leads to great user benefits and purpose.

When designers design a product that deeply connects to a user’s desired purpose, it becomes easier to build a product experience and a brand that connects to people on an emotional level. In turn, these will not only be more successful products but will prove to be more purposeful and meaningful in the lives of the people who use them.

Further Reading on the Toptal Blog:

• E-commerce UX: An Overview of Best Practices (with Infographic)
• The Best UX Designer Portfolios: Inspiring Case Studies and Examples
• The Importance of Human-centered Design in Product Design
• Heuristic Principles for Mobile Interfaces
• Anticipatory Design: How to Create Magical User Experiences

Understanding the basics

What is included in a design brief.

A design brief includes a clear design problem statement and the proposed solution to that problem. The brief will also outline the overall design process and expectations between the client and the team. Finally, it should include a basic schedule of deliverables and designate responsibilities.

What is the designing process?

The design process in general is the process by which a problem is identified, understood, and addressed through design. Decisions in the design process should ideally be informed by research, data, and a clear understanding of the target user.

What is design thinking approach?

Design thinking approach is a methodology in which the creative strategies and process-based solutions learned in the field of design can inform creative problem-solving in any field or discipline. The approach is a popular and effective tool in the world of product development.

What does design thinking do?

Design thinking is the process by which teams can apply the insights and process-based creative problem-solving strategies to product development, business, and other fields and professions.

What is problem solving in design?

Problem-solving is one of the main goals of design that characterizes it beyond a more freely creative venture. Designers identify problems to solve and then apply research to making design decisions to address the core problem.

What is a good problem statement?

With a good problem statement, UX designers have a clearly-defined understanding of the user and their core problem. The problem statement should avoid proposing a firm solution in the beginning, which should be uncovered through research and iterative design exploration.

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Jordan DeVos

New York, NY, United States

Member since March 28, 2018

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What is design thinking and why is it important?

Here’s what you need to know about this creative problem-solving technique, including a definition and why it’s taking the business world by storm.

Design thinking started out as a process for creating sleek new technology and products. But this methodology is now widely used across both the private and public sectors, for business and personal projects, all around the world.

Design-thinking methodology was popularized by design consulting firm IDEO . The methods gained momentum in the larger business world after Tim Brown, the chief executive officer of IDEO, wrote an article in 2008 for the Harvard Business Review about the use of design thinking in business—including at a California hospital, a Japanese bicycle company, and the healthcare industry in India. Today, one of the most popular courses at Stanford University is Designing Your Life , which applies design thinking to building a joyful career and life.

Here’s what design thinking is, how it works, and why it’s important.

What is design thinking? 

Design thinking is a process for solving problems by prioritizing the consumer’s needs above all else. It relies on observing, with empathy, how people interact with their environments , and employs an iterative, hands-on approach to creating innovative solutions . 

Design thinking is “human-centered,” which means that it uses evidence of how consumers (humans) actually engage with a product or service, rather than how someone else or an organization thinks they will engage with it. To be truly human-centered, designers watch how people use a product or service and continue to refine the product or service in order to improve the consumer’s experience. This is the “iterative” part of design thinking. It favors moving quickly to get prototypes out to test, rather than endless research or rumination. 

In contrast to traditional problem-solving, which is a linear process of identifying a problem and then brainstorming solutions , design thinking only works if it is iterative. It is less of a means to get to a single solution, and more of a way to continuously evolve your thinking and respond to consumer needs.

Why is design thinking important? 

Design thinking enables organizations to create lasting value for consumers. The process is useful in any complex system ( not just design systems ) because it:

Aims to solve a concrete human need

Using an observational, human-centric approach, teams can uncover pain points from the consumer that they hadn’t previously thought of, ones that the consumer may not even be aware of. Design thinking can provide solutions to those pain points once they’re identified.

Tackles problems that are ambiguous or difficult to define

Consumers often don’t know what problem they have that needs solving or they can’t verbalize it. But upon careful observation, one can identify problems based on what they see from real consumer behavior rather than simply working off of their ideas of the consumer. This helps define ambiguous problems and in turn makes it easier to surface solutions. 

Leads to more innovative solutions

Humans are not capable of imagining things that are not believed to be possible, which makes it impossible for them to ask for things that do not yet exist. Design thinking can help surface some of these unknown pain points that would otherwise have never been known. Using an iterative approach to tackle those problems often lead to non-obvious, innovative solutions .   

Makes organizations run faster and more efficiently

Rather than researching a problem for a long time without devising an outcome, design thinking favors creating prototypes and then testing to see how effective they are. 

The five stages of the design-thinking process 

Design thinking follows a five-stage framework. 

1. Empathize

In this first stage, the designer observes consumers to gain a deeper understanding of how they interact with or are affected by a product or issue. The observations must happen with empathy, which means withholding judgment and not imparting preconceived notions of what the consumer needs. Observing with empathy is powerful because it can uncover issues the consumer didn’t even know they had or that they could not themselves verbalize. From this point, it’s easier to understand the human need for which you are designing. 

In this second stage, you gather your observations from the first stage to define the problem you’re trying to solve. Think about the difficulties your consumers are brushing up against, what they repeatedly struggle with, and what you’ve gleaned from how they’re affected by the issue. Once you synthesize your findings, you are able to define the problem they face. 

The next step is to brainstorm ideas about how to solve the problem you’ve identified. These ideation sessions could be in a group, where your team gathers in an office space that encourages creativity and collaboration , an innovation lab , or can be done solo. The important part is to generate a bunch of different ideas. At the end of this process, you’ll come up with a few ideas with which to move forward. 

4. Prototype

This is the stage that turns ideas into an actual solution. Prototypes are not meant to be perfect. The point of a prototype is to come out quickly with a concrete version of the idea to see how it is accepted by consumers. Examples of prototypes include a landing page to test consumer desire for a product or a video that demonstrates streamlined logistic processes. 

Once you give a prototyped solution to consumers, you must observe how they interact with it. This testing stage is the one in which you collect feedback on your work. 

The design-thinking process is an iterative, rather than linear, one. At the end of the fifth stage, you’ll likely have to go back to one or several of the other stages. Perhaps the testing has shown you need to develop another prototype, for which you’d return to the fourth stage. Or perhaps it’s shown that you’ve misdefined the consumer’s needs. If so, you would have to return to an earlier stage of the process. 

What industries and roles can benefit from design thinking?

While design thinking originated with designers, it is now widely used by people from all disciplines . Even among design agencies the work is famously cross-functional: IDEO and similar agencies hire non-designers—chefs, engineers, social scientists, biologists—and integrate them into their project teams to add perspective.

Our growth innovation team at WeWork comprises a designer, who focuses on applying this method for the end consumer of a project; a technologist, who uses this technique to deliver value to engineers; and a business strategist, who applies this method to deliver value for business owners and various stakeholders.

Design thinking has been used at Kaiser Permanente to overhaul the system of shift changes among nursing staff. It has helped the Singapore government make the process for securing a work pass in the nation-state easier and more human. Design thinking has been used to solve business problems at companies like Toyota, Intuit, SAP, and IBM .  

One reason for the proliferation of design thinking in industries is that it’s useful to break down problems in any complex system, be it business, government, or social organizations. It can be used to explore big questions about how to respond to the growth of technology and globalization, how to pivot in response to rapid change, and how to support individuals while catering to larger organizations.

Design thinking can be used by all departments in a business. It can be fostered by bright, airy physical workspaces that cater to the way employees prefer to work. To employ design thinking in all projects, managers should first define the consumers they’re trying to help and then employ the five stages of design thinking to define and tackle the identified problems. Employing a design-thinking process makes it more likely a business will be innovative, creative, and ultimately more human.

Related articles

This article was originally published on October 18, 2019, and has been updated throughout by the editors.

Graham Tuttle was a director of growth innovation at WeWork. He has more than a decade of experience in design and new product development. Prior to WeWork, Tuttle worked at frog in design strategy, helping global enterprises and startups take a user-centered approach to product development, innovation, and investment strategy. He has an M.B.A. and a masters of design from the Illinois Institute of Technology and contributed to the development of 101 Design Methods: A Structured Approach for Driving Innovation in Your Organization , a step-by-step guidebook for innovation planning.

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The 5 Stages in the Design Thinking Process

Design thinking is a methodology which provides a solution-based approach to solving problems. It’s extremely useful when used to tackle complex problems that are ill-defined or unknown—because it serves to understand the human needs involved, reframe the problem in human-centric ways, create numerous ideas in brainstorming sessions and adopt a hands-on approach to prototyping and testing. When you know how to apply the five stages of design thinking you will be impowered because you can apply the methodology to solve complex problems that occur in our companies, our countries, and across the world.

Design thinking is a non-linear, iterative process that can have anywhere from three to seven phases, depending on whom you talk to. We focus on the five-stage design thinking model proposed by the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford (the d.school) because they are world-renowned for the way they teach and apply design thinking.

What are the 5 Stages of the Design Thinking Process

The five stages of design thinking, according to the d.school, are:

Empathize : research your users' needs .

Define : state your users' needs and problems.

Ideate : challenge assumptions and create ideas.

Prototype : start to create solutions.

Test : try your solutions out.

Let’s dive into each stage of the design thinking process.

• Transcript loading…

Hasso-Platner Institute Panorama

Ludwig Wilhelm Wall, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Stage 1: Empathize—Research Your Users' Needs

Empathize: the first phase of design thinking, where you gain real insight into users and their needs.

© Teo Yu Siang and the Interaction Design Foundation, CC BY-NC-SA 3.0.

The first stage of the design thinking process focuses on user-centric research . You want to gain an empathic understanding of the problem you are trying to solve. Consult experts to find out more about the area of concern and conduct observations to engage and empathize with your users. You may also want to immerse yourself in your users’ physical environment to gain a deeper, personal understanding of the issues involved—as well as their experiences and motivations . Empathy is crucial to problem solving and a human-centered design process as it allows design thinkers to set aside their own assumptions about the world and gain real insight into users and their needs.

Depending on time constraints, you will gather a substantial amount of information to use during the next stage. The main aim of the Empathize stage is to develop the best possible understanding of your users, their needs and the problems that underlie the development of the product or service you want to create.

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

Define: the second phase of design thinking, where you define the problem statement in a human-centered manner.

In the Define stage, you will organize the information you have gathered during the Empathize stage. You’ll analyze your observations to define the core problems you and your team have identified up to this point. Defining the problem and problem statement must be done in a human-centered manner .

For example, you should not define the problem as your own wish or need of the company: “We need to increase our food-product market share among young teenage girls by 5%.”

You should pitch the problem statement from your perception of the users’ needs: “Teenage girls need to eat nutritious food in order to thrive, be healthy and grow.”

The Define stage will help the design team collect great ideas to establish features, functions and other elements to solve the problem at hand—or, at the very least, allow real users to resolve issues themselves with minimal difficulty. In this stage, you will start to progress to the third stage, the ideation phase, where you ask questions to help you look for solutions: “How might we encourage teenage girls to perform an action that benefits them and also involves your company’s food-related product or service?” for instance.

Stage 3: Ideate—Challenge Assumptions and Create Ideas

Ideate: the third phase of design thinking, where you identify innovative solutions to the problem statement you’ve created.

During the third stage of the design thinking process, designers are ready to generate ideas. You’ve grown to understand your users and their needs in the Empathize stage, and you’ve analyzed your observations in the Define stage to create a user centric problem statement. With this solid background, you and your team members can start to look at the problem from different perspectives and ideate innovative solutions to your problem statement .

There are hundreds of ideation techniques you can use—such as Brainstorm, Brainwrite , Worst Possible Idea and SCAMPER . Brainstorm and Worst Possible Idea techniques are typically used at the start of the ideation stage to stimulate free thinking and expand the problem space. This allows you to generate as many ideas as possible at the start of ideation. You should pick other ideation techniques towards the end of this stage to help you investigate and test your ideas, and choose the best ones to move forward with—either because they seem to solve the problem or provide the elements required to circumvent it.

Stage 4: Prototype—Start to Create Solutions

Prototype: the fourth phase of design thinking, where you identify the best possible solution.

The design team will now produce a number of inexpensive, scaled down versions of the product (or specific features found within the product) to investigate the key solutions generated in the ideation phase. These prototypes can be shared and tested within the team itself, in other departments or on a small group of people outside the design team.

This is an experimental phase, and the aim is to identify the best possible solution for each of the problems identified during the first three stages . The solutions are implemented within the prototypes and, one by one, they are investigated and then accepted, improved or rejected based on the users’ experiences.

By the end of the Prototype stage, the design team will have a better idea of the product’s limitations and the problems it faces. They’ll also have a clearer view of how real users would behave, think and feel when they interact with the end product.

Stage 5: Test—Try Your Solutions Out

Test: the fifth and final phase of the design thinking process, where you test solutions to derive a deep understanding of the product and its users.

Designers or evaluators rigorously test the complete product using the best solutions identified in the Prototype stage. This is the final stage of the five-stage model; however, in an iterative process such as design thinking, the results generated are often used to redefine one or more further problems. This increased level of understanding may help you investigate the conditions of use and how people think, behave and feel towards the product, and even lead you to loop back to a previous stage in the design thinking process. You can then proceed with further iterations and make alterations and refinements to rule out alternative solutions. The ultimate goal is to get as deep an understanding of the product and its users as possible.

Did You Know Design Thinking is a Non-Linear Process?

We’ve outlined a direct and linear design thinking process here, in which one stage seemingly leads to the next with a logical conclusion at user testing . However, in practice, the process is carried out in a more flexible and non-linear fashion . For example, different groups within the design team may conduct more than one stage concurrently, or designers may collect information and prototype throughout each stage of the project to bring their ideas to life and visualize the problem solutions as they go. What’s more, results from the Test stage may reveal new insights about users which lead to another brainstorming session (Ideate) or the development of new prototypes (Prototype).

It is important to note the five stages of design thinking are not always sequential. They do not have to follow a specific order, and they can often occur in parallel or be repeated iteratively. The stages should be understood as different modes which contribute to the entire design project, rather than sequential steps.

The design thinking process should not be seen as a concrete and inflexible approach to design; the component stages identified should serve as a guide to the activities you carry out. The stages might be switched, conducted concurrently or repeated several times to gain the most informative insights about your users, expand the solution space and hone in on innovative solutions.

This is one of the main benefits of the five-stage model. Knowledge acquired in the latter stages of the process can inform repeats of earlier stages . Information is continually used to inform the understanding of the problem and solution spaces, and to redefine the problem itself. This creates a perpetual loop, in which the designers continue to gain new insights, develop new ways to view the product (or service) and its possible uses and develop a far more profound understanding of their real users and the problems they face.

The Take Away

Design thinking is an iterative, non-linear process which focuses on a collaboration between designers and users. It brings innovative solutions to life based on how real users think, feel and behave.

This human-centered design process consists of five core stages Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype and Test.

It’s important to note that these stages are a guide. The iterative, non-linear nature of design thinking means you and your design team can carry these stages out simultaneously, repeat them and even circle back to previous stages at any point in the design thinking process.

References & Where to Learn More

Take our Design Thinking course which is the ultimate guide when you want to learn how to you can apply design thinking methods throughout a design thinking process. Herbert Simon, The Sciences of the Artificial (3rd Edition), 1996.

d.school, An Introduction to Design Thinking PROCESS GUIDE , 2010.

Gerd Waloszek, Introduction to Design Thinking , 2012.

Hero Image: © the Interaction Design Foundation, CC BY-NC-SA 3.0.

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How to Write a Problem Statement for Design Thinking

Jack O’Donoghue

In today’s post, I’ll show you exactly how to write a problem statement and give you some practical steps and exercises to start immediately.

Let’s dive right in.

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Table of Contents

Did you know, why do we use problem statements in design thinking, what’s the difference between a good and a bad problem statement, how do you write a problem statement for design thinking, what are some examples of good and bad problem statements, frequently asked questions.

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Problem statements are used in the Design Thinking process to help you stay focused and make good decisions.

A problem statement is a short description of a specific problem that needs to be solved. It’s used to help teams understand the problem so they can work towards solving it.

A good problem statement highlights the gap between where you are and where you want to get to. When businesses and designers want to make something better, a problem statement tells them what’s wrong and needs to be fixed.

We also use problem statements to prioritize where we should focus our attention. For example, we might have a list or backlog of problem statements arranged in the order of how important they are to solve. We can work down the list and start new projects to solve the problems.

“A problem well stated, is a problem half solved.” John Dewey

A good problem statement is clear and easy to understand, it includes relevant and useful information, and it’s based on the evidence you’ve collected from user research.

A problem statement tells you who has the problem, what the problem is, when it happens, where it happens, and most importantly, why the problem is happening.

They should be insightful and help you understand details about the problem that helps you solve it. A problem statement shouldn’t tell you how to solve the problem or how to approach solving the problem; it simply states what the problem is. 

If it’s a big, complicated problem, writing a longer, more descriptive problem statement is ok. If it’s a small, simple problem, then one or two sentences will do.

If a problem statement is difficult to understand, it won’t get solved very well. You could end up solving the wrong problem, or it could end up wasting your time and money.

A good problem statement is broad enough that you can start thinking of lots of different ideas and directions and narrow enough to focus on what’s important and stay on track.

In the design thinking process, during the empathy stage, we gather the information we need to help us understand the problem. This is the part where we do all the user research to help us understand our customer’s needs (user needs). 

Once we have the user needs and we’ve got some insight into the problems they have, we move into the define phase . This is where we decide who we should design for and what problem we should solve. We decide who the specific user is and what is their core problem.

An effective problem statement will make sure we’re solving the right problem when we move into the next stage – ideation. Ideation is when we generate ideas and look for a creative solution to our problem. The problem statement will be used during ideation to keep us focused on user needs.

Identify the Problem

In some cases, the problem might be felt so strongly that it’s easy to identify. 

For example, you might have noticed a big drop in conversions since you added some new features to your landing page. In this case, since you have an idea of what the problem is, you can jump to the next step and start defining the problem.

Sometimes, it might not be obvious what problems there are and which ones need fixing. This is often the case when we’re being proactive and trying to find ways to improve our design and user experience.

Spend some time thinking about which parts of your design are really important to get right. Which parts matter most to your customers and your stakeholders? Which parts haven’t been improved in a while and might need some love?

Now that you know where to look for problems, you can start your investigation. Your goal is to spend some time talking to people and looking at data to help you find a problem worth solving.

Here’s a list of ways you could get the information you need to make a decision on where to focus your attention: 

• Speak to stakeholders (stakeholder interviews)
• Speak to a product manager (SME interviews)
• Speak to customers (Customer interviews)
• Look at Google Analytics (Data analysis)
• Go through the design yourself (Current state review)
• Send out a survey (Quantitative survey). 

For the best results, use a mix of these methods. That way, you’ll get a well-rounded view of what people are experiencing and where you can help them.

Define the Problem

The first step in solving a problem is understanding the problem.

You can only successfully solve a problem if you fully understand it.

It’s natural to want to jump straight in and have a go at solving the problem before you’ve fully understood it. But, trust me, you’ll get it right more often when you take the time to really describe the problem in detail and spell out the important parts so that anyone can understand it.

Sometimes a problem might be so big and complicated that we need to break it down into lots of smaller problems.

To get a better understanding of the problem, you’ll need to find people who can help. You’ll need to speak to people with more experience with the problem than you. 

For example, who can you speak to that has seen the impact of the problem firsthand? Maybe some customer service staff or someone from the research or analytics team? Who is it that’s being directly impacted by the problem? Are they customers or employees? Can you speak to them and ask them about their experiences with the problem? 

Sometimes, there’s more to the problem than what’s being felt or observed. For example, there could be a technical limitation that makes life more difficult for people. Maybe someone in the business decided that the problem isn’t worth solving because it’s too expensive or time-consuming compared to their other goals.

To find out, see if you can find other people in the business or the product team that might know more about why the problem exists or how it came to be. 

For example, is there someone in the business that’s responsible for the area where the problem exists? Who might have worked on the problem in the past? Are there any people in the business that have been there a long time that could give you some background information?

Write the Problem Statement

Your problem statement will be used to get your project approved and get your team’s support to solve it.

Take your time to write a clear, accurate problem statement that’s easy to understand. Make sure that when you read it, you feel like you know how to get started and what you can do to begin to solve the problem – make it actionable.

If a problem statement isn’t written very well, or it’s difficult to understand, then it won’t lead to a very good solution. You could end up wasting the time and effort of your team. 

Improve your chances of successfully solving the problem by keeping it focused on the person who experiences the problem – the end user. Write the problem statement from the point of view of the end user. Include details about how it’s affecting them and the goals they’re trying to achieve.

Use the problem statement to describe the gap between where you are and where you want to be. Be careful not to make it so narrow that it describes one particular solution and keep it broad enough that it inspires lots of ideas.

There are lots of different ways to write a problem statement and many different formats. 

Here’s an example of a structure that will work in most cases:

–  Who  is experiencing the problem?

–  What  is the problem they experience?

–  When  do they experience the problem?

–  Why  is it important to solve?

Here are 5 examples of well-written problem statements that inspire ideas and give clues on how you could get started solving the problem:

• People who travel by train aren’t made aware of disruptions impacting their route when they view departure and arrival times. This makes disruptions unavoidable and leads to frustrating journeys and missed appointments.
• Landlords comparing remortgage options don’t have all the information they need to make a decision; this leads to the wrong choices and lost money when they change their minds later.
• Users who have opted out of marketing messages complain that they don’t receive notifications when we award them with points. This costs them more money and makes them feel under appreciated as customers.
• New mums that need support get overwhelmed by conflicting childcare advice when they search online, making them feel confused, alone, and unsupported.
• Students taking more than four modules find it challenging to see when their assignments are due if they have more than 5 due dates, meaning they miss deadlines and lose marks.

Here are 5 examples of poorly written problem statements that don’t inspire ideas in the right way or make it unclear where to start:

• People find it challenging to complete important tasks on our app.
• People need to see all of the data in one view.
• Customers are frustrated that they are losing money. We need an innovative solution.
• New mums don’t feel informed enough to care for their babies confidently; they need a 24-hour service to call for advice.
• Students aren’t sure when assignments are due, they need a new system that organizes class assignments by the due date.

Can you have multiple problem statements?

Yes, you certainly can have multiple problem statements. Complex problems can sometimes be too big to manage in one go. If this is the case for your problem, then absolutely, break it down into more manageable chunks. You can have an overarching problem statement and then a list of smaller problem statements that each address different parts of the problem. That way, you can plan many smaller projects or run another Design Sprint to iterate your way toward solving the bigger problem.

Is a problem statement the same as a research question?

They aren’t the same, but they are similar. A problem statement describes a problem, and we then attempt to solve that problem. Whereas a research question states something that you’d like to learn. We then do some research to achieve our learning objective. When you conduct user research, you’ll typically start by writing some research questions; you’ll then do some activities to get those learnings. Once you’ve gathered some information, you can then use it to write a problem statement.

Can a problem statement be a question?

Yes, you can phrase your problem statement as a question if that’s what works for you. Sometimes people prefer to write opportunity statements, HMW statements, a POV statement, or an innovation challenge statement. As long as it still addresses a real problem and gives you enough insight to make it actionable, then it’s ok. 

A problem statement is a short description of an issue that needs to be addressed. It identifies the gap between the current state and the desired state. 

A good actionable problem statement should be clear, specific, measurable, and achievable. You need a problem statement when you want to improve a design, solve a design challenge, or discover an innovative potential solution. 

When writing your problem statement, consider who your stakeholders are and their needs. Involving stakeholders in the process helps ensure everyone is on the same page from the start, making smooth sailing down the road. 

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What is Problem Statement in Design Thinking? With Example

Sector: UI/UX

Author: Nisarg Mehta

Date Published: 10/26/2020

What is Design Thinking?

What is a problem statement, how empathize phase helps you define the problem better, space saturation and group, wrapping up.

All highly proposed solutions have one thing in common – airtight definitions of problems involved. Only when problems are identified, analyzed, and defined properly can solutions that are airtight and impactful solutions can be developed.

As business owners, it is on us to develop super-resourceful potential solutions to concerns our users are facing on a daily basis. And to develop effective solutions, a lot of disruptors and strategists make use of a super-niche and a systematic process called design thinking.

In simple words, it is a methodology that allows you to develop solutions to some of the most complex concerns people could ever encounter. Through a series of steps that involve understanding human needs, redefining and reassessing the problems inhumane ways, ideating, adopting, prototyping, and testing, seamless solutions to a lot of day-to-day problems are tackled and solved.

Self-timers on your phone camera are one of the simplest examples of design thinking that addresses the concern of people having to extend their arms to take a good photo of themselves without shaking the frame.

Problem statements are definitions of the actual problems faced by consumers or people and reframing them in human-centric ways. The process of the defined problem statement is part of the second stage of the design thinking process. This stage is preceded by a phase called empathize, which involves the identification and observation of problems your users are facing.

For those of you who are new to this, understand that the steps in the design thinking methodology are all interconnected. One cannot happen without the other. That’s why the first stage – empathize – is crucial for you to come up with impactive solutions.

In this stage, we as problem solvers understand and empathize with the problems our consumers face. We take efforts to connect with the problems and gain a holistic and deeper understanding of some of the issues involved. The sense of empathy is vital in design thinking as it allows you to come with the most simplified solutions to problems. It eliminates any instance of assumption and helps you approach problems objectively.

Generally, design thinkers empathize through exposure to

• Diverse opinions
• Perspectives
• Alternative approaches to thinking
• A myriad of questions on issues being faced, any specific patterns in concerns, introducing variants to already existing solutions, and more
• Varied options and more

The Problem Definition Stage

Once this is done, the defining stage begins with the kickstart of two inevitable processes – analysis and synthesis. Let’s quickly look at how they would help you deliver optimized solutions.

As the name suggests, this is where you analyze problems and break them down into fragments for better comprehension. We identify the minutest of details that would make a greater impact in addressing solutions to concerns. It helps us relate to our consumers’ problems better.

With the results of our analyses, we move on to the next element called synthesis. In this stage, we put together the fragments we have collected and dissect the data in hand to come up with insights and patterns for better solution development.

The process of write a problem statement cannot happen without these two processes. They strengthen our approach to defining problem statements and look at multiple ways to solving the problem.

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How to Define a Problem Statement?

Now that you know the impact of the empathize stage, let’s dive into the most critical part of the post – defining the problem statement.

To help you get a start, we are presenting to you three ways to define a problem statement. Let’s look at each individually.

This is the first stage in defining a problem statement that follows the empathize stage. This is where you organize all your findings from the previous stage and group them together. Grouping them could be based on any of the other methodologies you prefer such as mind mapping, clustering, and more.

Space saturation literally means filling up space – like a whiteboard or a wall – with insights, data, and other gatherings. This brings your project team together and ensures you all are on the same page, paving the way for meaningful thinking processes.

It’s a general notion that when you ask the right questions, you will receive the answers and directions that will take you down the right path. This aspect in design thinking incorporates such thoughts. That’s why design thinkers ask four important questions.

The first question is who is experiencing the problem. An idea on this is the persona of your target audience that also includes demographics. Answers to who will allow you to implement features that will address the specific concerns faced by people in this category. For instance, healthcare apps designed for the elderly will have enlarged fonts and icons to accommodate their needs.

This involves addressing what the problem actually is. From the insights gathered during the empathize phase, you could pinpoint the problem and deliver solutions to accomplish them.

This defines the space in which the problem is experienced by people. Is it online, offline, in a specific geographical location, or others? This helps you to have more context to the problem under discussion.

This is perhaps the most important question of all as it helps you understand the purpose of your solution. Why should you address the problem? Is the problem worth solving? What value addition does it offer to users?

After the 4 Ws, the 5 Whys will allow you to dive deeper into addressing the problems and their solutions. One reason we don’t seem to find the most ideal solutions to our concerns is that we don’t seem to find out why we experience things we are facing in the first place.

For instance, a working professional intending to bring in a better fitness regime into their lifestyle often fails to keep up with their goals and visions. So, the problem here is them being unable to join your gym or a fitness program. To find out ideal solutions, let’s ask some questions, shall we?

• Why do they fail to follow a fitness program? Do they have an improper work-life balance?
• Why does their enthusiasm decrease after the initial few months? Is your program not that immersive? Do they need consistent motivation or incremental levels of challenges?
• Why are their fitness goals harder to meet? Are there no tracking systems in place to check caloric intake and burning?
• Why don’t they inculcate motivation from within? Are you not engaging with them enough? Do you have too many members and a few trainers?
• Why do they drop out? Is your pricing too high? Do they need flexible timings?

The questions here are just to help you get started. The more questions you could come up with, the more probabilities you are likely to explore.

So, these were the fundamental things you need to know about defining an effective problem statement. We are confident that you also understand the role of empathizing with your consumers and their problems to give rise to better problem identifications and resolutions.

The process of software development will be seamless if this methodology is followed to the dot. However, this might be too much for you to pull off by yourself. If you’re an entrepreneur single-handedly driving a web development company or a full stack development company , you need additional support in making the most of design thinking.

That’s why we recommend getting in touch with a reliable product development company like us to help you out with this stage. Our services ensure your products identifies the gap and solve real-world problems and bring about dynamic positive changes in your consumers’ life.

So, get started with us today .

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Stage 2 in the Design Thinking Process: Define the Problem

Once you’ve empathized with your users, you can move on to the second stage of the design thinking process and define the problem your users need you to solve..

If you’ve read our introduction to User Experience (UX) Design , you’ll know that UX is essentially about solving the problems that prevent users from accomplishing what they want to do with our product.

Before you can go into problem-solving mode, however, there is one very crucial step that you need to complete—one that will shape your entire design project from start to finish. In the Design Thinking process , this step is what’s known as the “define” stage.

As the second step in the Design Thinking process, the define stage is where you’ll establish a clear idea of exactly which problem you will solve for the user. You’ll then shape this into a problem statement which will act as your northern star throughout the design process.

In this guide, we’ll tell you everything you need to know about this stage in the Design Thinking process, as well as how to define a meaningful problem statement.

Here’s what we’ll cover:

• What is the define stage and why is it necessary?
• What is a problem statement?
• How to define a meaningful problem statement
• What comes after the define phase?

Before we dive in, though, if you’d like an overview of the entire Design Thinking process, check out this video:

1. What is the define stage and why is it necessary?

As the second step in the Design Thinking process, the define stage is dedicated to defining the problem: what user problem will you be trying to solve? In other words, what is your design challenge?

The define stage is preceded by the empathize phase , where you’ll have learned as much about your users as possible, conducting interviews and using a variety of immersion and observation techniques. Once you have a good idea of who your users are and, most importantly, their wants, needs, and pain-points, you’re ready to turn this empathy into an actionable problem statement.

The relationship between the empathize and define stages can best be described in terms of analysis and synthesis. In the empathize phase, we use analysis to break down everything we observe and discover about our users into smaller, more manageable components—dividing their actions and behaviour into “what”, “why” and “how” categories, for example. In the define stage, we piece these components back together, synthesising our findings to create a detailed overall picture.

Why is the define stage so important?

The define stage ensures you fully understand the goal of your design project. It helps you to articulate your design problem, and provides a clear-cut objective to work towards. A meaningful, actionable problem statement will steer you in the right direction, helping you to kick-start the ideation process (see Stage Three of the Design Thinking process ) and work your way towards a solution.

Without a well-defined problem statement, it’s hard to know what you’re aiming for. Your work will lack focus, and the final design will suffer. Not only that: in the absence of a clear problem statement, it’s extremely difficult to explain to stakeholders and team members exactly what you are trying to achieve.

With this in mind, let’s take a closer look at problem statements and how you can go about defining them.

2. What is a problem statement?

A problem statement identifies the gap between the current state (i.e. the problem) and the desired state (i.e. the goal) of a process or product . Within the design context, you can think of the user problem as an unmet need. By designing a solution that meets this need, you can satisfy the user and ensure a pleasant user experience.

A problem statement, or point of view (POV) statement, frames this problem (or need) in a way that is actionable for designers. It provides a clear description of the issue that the designer seeks to address, keeping the focus on the user at all times.

Problem or POV statements can take various formats, but the end goal is always the same: to guide the design team towards a feasible solution. Let’s take a look at some of the ways you might frame your design problem:

• From the user’s perspective: “I am a young working professional trying to eat healthily, but I’m struggling because I work long hours and don’t always have time to go grocery shopping and prepare my meals. This makes me feel frustrated and bad about myself.”
• From a user research perspective: “Busy working professionals need an easy, time-efficient way to eat healthily because they often work long hours and don’t have time to shop and meal prep.”
• Based on the four Ws—who, what, where, and why: “Our young working professional struggles to eat healthily during the week because she is working long hours. Our solution should deliver a quick and easy way for her to procure ingredients and prepare healthy meals that she can take to work.”

As you can see, each of these statements addresses the same issue—just in a slightly different way. As long as you focus on the user, what they need and why, it’s up to you how you choose to present and frame your design problem.

We’ll look at how to form your problem statement a little later on. Before we do, let’s consider some problem statement “do”s and “don’t”s.

What makes a good problem statement?

A good problem statement is human-centered and user-focused. Based on the insights you gathered in the empathize phase, it focuses on the users and their needs—not on product specifications or business outcomes. Here are some pointers that will help you create a meaningful problem statement:

• Focus on the user: The user and their needs should be front and center of your problem statement. Avoid statements that start with “we need to…” or “the product should”, instead concentrating on the user’s perspective: “Young working professionals need…”, as in the examples above.
• Keep it broad: A good problem statement leaves room for innovation and creative freedom. It’s important to keep it broad enough to invite a range of different ideas; avoid any references to specific solutions or technical requirements, for example.
• Make it manageable: At the same time, your problem statement should guide you and provide direction. If it’s too broad in terms of the user’s needs and goals, you’ll struggle to hone in on a suitable solution. So, don’t try to address too many user needs in one problem statement; prioritize and frame your problem accordingly.

Bearing these things in mind, let’s explore some useful methods for creating a meaningful problem statement.

3. How to write a meaningful problem statement

Writing a meaningful problem statement can be extremely challenging. How do you condense all the complexities of the user’s conscious and unconscious desires into one simple, actionable statement? Fortunately, there are some tried-and-tested methods that will help you do just that.

Space saturation and group

One of the first steps in defining a problem statement is to organize your findings from the empathize phase. Space saturation and group is a popular method used by design thinkers to collect and visually present all observations made in the empathize phase in one space. As the name suggests, you will literally “saturate” a wall or whiteboard with Post-It notes and images, resulting in a collage of artifacts from your user research.

As the Stanford d.school explains: “You space saturate to help you unpack thoughts and experiences into tangible and visual pieces of information that you surround yourself with to inform and inspire the design team. You group these findings to explore what themes and patterns emerge, and strive to move toward identifying meaningful needs of people and insights that will inform your design solutions.”

This method should involve anyone who took part in the empathize stage of the design project, and should take no longer than 20-30 minutes.

The four Ws

Asking the right questions will help you put your finger on the right problem statement. With all your findings from the empathize phase in one place, ask yourself the four Ws: Who , what , where , and why?

• Who is experiencing the problem? In other words, who is your target user; who will be the focus of your problem statement?
• What is the problem? Based on the observations you made during the empathize phase, what are the problems and pain-points that frequently came up? What task is the user trying to accomplish, and what’s standing in their way?
• Where does the problem present itself? In what space (physical or digital), situation or context is the user when they face this problem? Are there any other people involved?
• Why does it matter? Why is it important that this problem be solved? What value would a solution bring to the user, and to the business?

Approaching your observations with these four questions in mind will help you to identify patterns within your user research. In identifying the most prevalent issues, you’ll be one step closer to formulating a meaningful problem statement.

The five whys

Another question-based strategy, the five whys technique can help you delve deeper into the problem and drill down to the root cause. Once you’ve identified the root cause, you have something that you can act upon; somewhere specific to focus your problem-solving efforts.

Let’s take our previous example of the young working professional who wants to eat healthily, but finds it difficult to do so. Here’s how you might use the five whys to break the problem down and get to the root cause:

• Why is she not eating healthily? → She orders takeaway everyday.
• Why does she order takeaway everyday? → Her fridge and cupboards are empty.
• Why are the fridge and cupboards empty? → She hasn’t been grocery shopping in over a week.
• Why hasn’t she been grocery shopping? → She doesn’t have time to go to the supermarket.
• Why doesn’t she have time? → She works long hours and is exhausted.

The root cause here is a lack of time, so your solution might focus on efficiency and convenience. Your final problem statement might look something like this: “Young working professionals need a quick, convenient solution to eating healthily.”

4. What comes after the define phase?

By the end of the define phase, you’ll have turned your findings from the empathize stage into a meaningful, actionable problem statement. With your problem statement to hand, you’ll be ready to move on to the ideation phase , where you’ll turn your problem statement into “how might we” questions and generate as many potential solutions as possible.

As you move through the Design Thinking process, you’ll constantly refer back to your problem statement to make sure you’re moving in the right direction. A well-thought-out problem statement will keep you on track, help you communicate your objectives to key stakeholders, and ultimately lead you to that all-important user solution.

Want to learn more about designing user-friendly solutions? Check out these articles:

• UX Best Practices: How Can You Become A Better Designer?
• What Is User Experience Design? Everything You Need To Know To Get Started
• This Is Why Empathy Matters As A UX Designer
• What is lean UX?

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How to create a design thinking problem statement to keep your product on track

We’ve all had days when we can’t decide what music mood we’re in, so we repeatedly hit 'skip' until the car ride is over. When we don’t know what we want, we can’t make a decision. 

For product teams, writing a design thinking problem statement isn’t all that different. 

If you don’t set a direction early in the design thinking process, you and your team will work in circles without any satisfaction or progress. But when you set the tone of your process early on, your team gets into the groove to create a user-first product. 

Last updated

Reading time.

Your design thinking problem statement needs to strike the right balance between focused and flexible to be effective.

This chapter of the design thinking guide reviews design thinking problem statement examples and strategies that will help your team work effectively to create products your users will love. 

Seeing is understanding

Stop guessing: let users show and tell you what they need with insights from Heatmaps, Recordings, and Feedback.

What is a design thinking problem statement?

A design thinking problem statement is a concise and actionable sentence or question that defines your UX purpose and direction. Product teams using design thinking develop problem statements to simplify complex problems and identify the gap between what your product has and what your users need .

Since the design thinking process is non-linear, a consolidated problem statement is essential to improve team collaboration and stay on task. Your problem statement is also helpful in getting stakeholder buy-in for new initiatives or for planning human-centered design products. 

5 examples of design thinking problem statements

Finding design thinking problem statement examples can be tricky since they're not always made public—but that won’t stop us! Let’s review five product design examples and case studies to break down their hypothetical problem statements. 

The following examples will use this problem statement formula: (User) needs a way to (outcome) because (driver). Since UX opportunities come in all shapes and sizes, we have more problem statement formulas further down on the page. 

1. Audiense

Problem: the Audiense team noticed a sudden uptick in people exiting the sign-up process without completing it. 

Example problem statement: New customers need an easier way to complete the sign-up process because they’re getting frustrated during the account setup.  

Solution: Juan Fernandez, Head of Product, used Hotjar Session Recordings to review failed sign-ups and saw that the password validator feature was broken. After they fixed the validator, sign-up rates increased.

Read Audiense's full story here.

2. Zenprint

Problem: the Zenprint team used Google Analytics to compare bounce rates across pages to discover which steps in the ordering process were underperforming. 

Example problem statement: Potential customers need a clearer understanding of next steps because the current page has a high bounce rate.

Solution: the team used Hotjar Heatmaps to see where people spent most of their time on a page, and assessed whether they should spend time there or not. They witnessed users lingering on the pricing page, so they A/B tested the page's UX design. Ultimately, they chose a design that provides clear steps on how to proceed when users hover over a price. As a result, Zenprint's team decreased the drop-off rate of the problematic page by 7% and increased conversions by 2%.

Read Zenprint's full story here.

3. Razorpay

Problem: Razorpay redesigned their dashboard and incrementally released it to small user segments. When users rated the design as 6.2/10, they knew they needed to improve it. 

Example problem statement: Users want an updated dashboard because they’re unhappy with the current version. 

Solution: traditional analytics showed the Razorpay team that engagement with the new dashboard was dropping, but they didn’t know why. They asked users who provided a low rating on the dashboard to explain their feelings in an open-ended survey. Based on user feedback, they improved the dashboard design, which resulted in a 40% increase in satisfaction.  

Read Razorpay's full story here.   

4. Spotahome

Problem: Spotahome heard from a segment of users that updating the in-app calendar was difficult, but the team wasn’t sure what the problem was. 

Example problem statement: The landlord user segment needs a simpler way to use the calendar function, but the cause of frustration is unclear. 

Solution: the team watched Hotjar Recordings to spot the features users struggled with, which convinced the product team to rework a solution and make the calendar easier for landlords to use. 

Read Spotahome's full story here.

Problem: Yatter is a lead generation agency that wanted to increase conversions on a client’s stem cell therapy website. Recordings revealed that visitors would diligently read the text describing the therapy but then exit the page, leading the agency to believe visitors didn’t trust the company. 

Example problem statement: Users need to see social proof because they don’t believe our information is trustworthy. 

Solution: the team used Hotjar Heatmaps to identify their most popular case studies, and placed them at the top of the sales page. After adding the case studies, the page’s conversion rate increased by 10%. 

Read Yatter's full story here.

3 steps to create a design thinking problem statement

Writing an effective design thinking problem statement requires research and brainstorming before you begin. 

Let's go through the three steps to create a problem statement with a mock project management software company to make the process easier to grasp.

1. Identify

Ongoing product discovery is the basis for design thinking problem statements.  

Establishing a product experimentation culture or sending out surveys about a particular job-to-be-done (JTBD) gives you a starting point. Ask yourself: what problems are users facing, and which are most important to them? How can we create customer delight ?

For our mock project management company, identifying user problems could look like this:

A product manager (PM) regularly reviews recordings of new users going through product onboarding. The PM notices that a particular user segment drops off more than others at Step 3 of onboarding, which is to migrate tasks from their current project management software into the new dashboard. 

The product team sends a survey to this user segment with open-ended questions to learn about their goals and challenges. 

💡 Pro tip: use the JTBD framework to stop assuming and start asking.

Kyle Luther Anderson , a product management leader and coach, explained that product teams use the jobs-to-be-done framework to identify, then confirm or deny, user assumptions. He says:

“Your organization has assumptions about what the customer wants, about their unmet needs, and what your customer considers a successful outcome. Oftentimes an org doesn't state assumptions explicitly, and many companies are pretty bad about putting those assumptions to the test. The value of using the JTBD framework is what comes from those questions you ask, what you learn in unbiased research, and really focusing on the customer problem or opportunity.”

Learn more about the JTBD framework here.

After identifying an opportunity, you need to investigate further to understand potential causes or paths forward. Nasko Terziev, a Senior Product Designer at Hotjar, recommends teams think of the product narrative and end-to-end user journey to home in on critical moments.

Where are the moments we are doing well? Where are the moments we are not doing well? We can build those moments into a framework that the whole company can contribute to with this storytelling approach. Get the storyboards and feed data from analytics, sales, customer success, and support.

Here’s how our mock project management app could approach this step:

Reference their previous onboarding flow plans

Look for UX trends in session recordings

Gather user feedback on the frustrating points

✍️ Class is in session!

Hotjar has free courses for product managers and UX designers. 

Learn how to find insights in Recordings or reveal patterns in Heatmaps , then use what you’ve learned to conduct research for your design thinking problem statement.

Now it’s time to consolidate everything into a design thinking problem statement. Here are five formulas you can use as a starting point:

(User) needs a way to (outcome) because (driver). For example: new users need a way to quickly migrate tasks because they'll cancel their trial if onboarding takes too long.

(Audience) wants (outcome), so we will deliver (product) to achieve (result). For example: new users want to add existing projects to their new account quickly, so we’ll create a way to import data so they spend less time onboarding.

‘How might we’ statement. For example: how might we make adding existing project information faster?

Our users want to (task). How can our product achieve (result)? For example: new users want to add current projects to the app. How can our product make setup easy and enjoyable?

Who, what, where, why. For example: new users want to migrate projects, but they’re dropping off at the current step because input options are limited.

Be open to adjusting your problem statement as you learn

Before we send you off to write the next great design thinking problem statement, we leave you with a few words of advice: be flexible and stay curious—your problem statement should leave room for imagination, experimentation, and change.

FAQs about design thinking problem statements

A design thinking problem statement is a tool used in the design thinking process to help product teams and UX designers establish their focus and direction. A practical problem statement gives teams the opportunity to start brainstorming and testing solutions, and is also helpful for communicating ideas to get stakeholder buy-in.

What are some design thinking problem statements?

Design thinking problem statements can take multiple forms. For example:

(User) needs a way to (outcome) because (driver)

(Audience) wants (outcome), so we will deliver (product) to achieve (result)

‘How might we’ statements

Our users want to (task). How can our product achieve (result)?

Who, what, where, why statements

How do you write a design thinking problem statement?

Teams need to complete three steps to create a design thinking problem statement:

Identify user challenges or opportunities.

Investigate the drivers and hurdles for those goals.

Combine the information into a sentence or question that summarizes the situation and has a prompt for thinking of solutions.

Examples of design thinking

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Human-centered design thinking

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