design thinking resumen

Qué es el design thinking, definición, características y usos

Actualizado: 29 de febrero de 2024

Publicado: 10 de mayo de 2022

¿Alguna vez has pensado cómo hicimos volar un avión?

Es una pregunta bastante complicada de responder, pero ¡vaya que fue posible de lograr! A lo largo de la historia, hemos encontrado soluciones a diversos tipos de problemas de formas inimaginables. Así también se alcanzaron los éxitos más grandes del mercado y los modelos de negocio más disruptivos, como Amazon, Netflix y Apple.

Aquí te hablaré sobre una de las mejores vías para innovar: el design thinking o pensamiento de diseño.

Qué es design thinking

• Historia del design thinking

Para qué sirve el design thinking

Cómo puede ayudar a tu negocio el design thinking, características del design thinking.

• Las etapas del design thinking
• Los 4 pasos esenciales del design thinking

Herramientas para el design thinking

• 3 usos del design thinking en acción

El design thinking, o pensamiento de diseño, es un proceso de trabajo que ayuda a los equipos a desarrollar su creatividad. A pesar de que fue desarrollado en torno al diseño, permite llegar a ideas innovadoras en otras áreas como los modelos de negocio, el marketing, los productos e incluso la educación.

Se basa en un enfoque colaborativo y creativo que incluye la empatía, la definición del problema, la generación de ideas, la prototipación y la experimentación. Esta metodología se utiliza en una amplia gama de contextos, desde el diseño de productos y servicios hasta la estrategia empresarial y el desarrollo social.

• Fomenta la innovación.
• Se centra en las necesidades del usuario.
• Promueve la colaboración multidisciplinaria.
• Proporciona un enfoque iterativo para la resolución de problemas.

Desventajas

• Necesidad de tiempo.
• Se necesitan recursos para implementarse adecuadamente.
• Posibilidad de sesgos en el proceso de empatía.
• Dificultad para medir el éxito de las soluciones generadas.

Historia del desing thinking

Design thinking nació desde el diseño participativo, el diseño centrado en el usuario, el diseño de servicio y el diseño con visión humana. El término puede rastrearse hasta 1987, con el libro  Design Thinking  del profesor Peter G. Rowe , que estaba enfocado en arquitectura y planificación urbana. El diseñador  Rolf A. Faste  desarrolló este concepto y aseveró que se trata de un método de acción creativa que va más allá de una sola disciplina.

Fue en la Universidad de Stanford donde el Design Thinking comenzó a tomar forma gracias al trabajo de David Kelley, fundador de la firma de diseño IDEO, y de Terry Winograd, profesor de ciencias de la computación. En 2005, Kelley y su hermano Tom, también cofundador de IDEO, fundaron el Instituto de Diseño de Hasso Plattner (HPI) en la Universidad de Stanford, donde se estableció un programa de maestría en Design Thinking.

El Design Thinking se convirtió en una metodología popular en el ámbito empresarial gracias a su enfoque centrado en el usuario y su capacidad para generar soluciones innovadoras a problemas complejos. Desde entonces, ha sido adoptado por empresas de todo el mundo, así como por organizaciones sin fines de lucro y gubernamentales, como una herramienta efectiva para la innovación y la resolución de problemas.

El design thinking permite construir ideas innovadoras al resolver problemas poco definidos o particularmente desafiantes, así como al orientarse hacia las soluciones. Además, es un medio para generar mayor valor al usuario en los productos y servicios.

Gran parte del éxito de un negocio depende de la capacidad de sus equipos para entender las necesidades de los clientes y crear soluciones innovadoras en consecuencia. El design thinking es un método que se utiliza para llegar a estas soluciones, y también ayuda a:

• Observar detenidamente al público objetivo , así como empatizar con sus necesidades y preferencias:  una de las claves para el éxito de cualquier proyecto está en comprender a las personas hacia las que está encaminado, tanto como  buyer personas  como en cada cliente en particular.
• Encaminar el sentido en las peticiones de los clientes:  reconocer lo que sustenta cada petición es vital para crear un plan.
• Rediseñar los problemas con una visión humana:  a menudo, solemos pensar los problemas desde una perspectiva técnica. Design thinking ayuda a poner el foco en las personas.
• Adoptar un enfoque de alto involucramiento al hacer prototipos y pruebas:   logra que los equipos estén inmersos y comprometidos para aplicar los hallazgos en un proceso.
• Simplificar los procesos:  un pensamiento de diseño ayuda a encontrar el hilo en situaciones complejas, y así reducir los pasos para llegar a un fin.
• Reinventar modelos de negocio:  cuando un modelo de negocio está agotado o el mercado se ha transformado, podrás orientar las soluciones en el nuevo entorno.
• Mediar la visión de diversas partes interesadas:  es común que en un solo proyecto convivan visiones distintas, por lo que el design thinking ayuda a encontrar el equilibrio y a buscar un compromiso entre estos puntos de vista.
• Mejorar la experiencia de los usuarios :  al adoptar un enfoque en el usuario final, el design thinking puede ayudar a optimizar cada una de sus interacciones con el producto.

Normalmente, para implementarlo,  se conforman equipos de trabajo multidisciplinarios que aportan ideas diversas.

El consejo de Andrea Cohen, Field Marketing Manager en HubSpot El Design Thinking nos brinda la capacidad de adaptarnos rápidamente, centrarnos en las necesidades reales de las personas y desarrollar soluciones creativas y efectivas.

1. Pone al usuario en el centro

Como puedes ver al conocer sus fases, el design thinking toma como principal pilar a las personas que usarán el producto o el servicio que resulta de todo el proceso. Porque, si no le sirve ni aporta valor a la gente que lo comprará, ¿cuál es el caso de crearlo en primer lugar? Por eso es tan importante que  la empatía sea el arranque .

2. Busca que el proceso sea divertido

Gracias a las diferentes herramientas que utiliza y la forma en que involucra a usuarios, equipos y creadores, el design thinking está hecho para la innovación sea como un juego, no una serie de pasos rígidos. Cada empresa encontrará las actividades que mejor funcionan para ella , y en ocasiones los intercambiará en función de un proyecto en particular. Así, no se convierte en un trayecto aburrido, sino en uno que cambie y se adapte a las necesidades de quien lo utiliza.

3. Da pie a la colaboración constructiva

Trabajar en equipo puede ser caótico, pero el design thinking desea que todos los involucrados tengan una aproximación distinta a él. No se trata de competir con la persona de junto, sino  crear una sinergia que aproveche las cualidades de todos para un bien común: crear un producto o servicio valioso . En lugar de desechar una idea, se discute y se buscan alternativas que la nutran para mejorarla o llevarla por otra dirección más conveniente.

4. Se impulsa con la curiosidad y la creatividad

Todas las personas tenemos un lado creativo. La diferencia está en que no siempre está en las mismas tareas o no se expresa de la misma manera. Por ejemplo, las personas suelen identificar la creatividad con las artes (música, literatura, cine, etc.), cuando en realidad es una habilidad que se utiliza en todo lo que hacemos, desde cómo preparar una comida con los tres ingredientes que quedan en el refrigerador hasta la manera en que un ingeniero crea un algoritmo para hacer más eficiente el análisis de datos.

Y toda creatividad nace de la curiosidad. Una pregunta puede ser el catalizador de un nuevo producto. Lo importante es mantenerla viva para que la otra siga funcionando.

5. Permite las iteraciones

Lo dijimos más arriba: si tienes que fallar más de una vez para alcanzar la solución perfecta, entonces hazlo. El design thinking te da espacio para repetir, las ocasiones que sean necesarias, el proceso para  eliminar errores y explorar otros caminos , especialmente cuando es la primera vez que implementas esta herramienta.

Etapas del design thinking

Esta primera fase es la clave para completar las siguientes. Se trata de poner atención al público que deseas dirigirte para que comprendas sus necesidades, sus problemas y cómo afectan su vida cotidiana. Puedes utilizar entrevistas o convocar a la participación de grupos de personas que representan al segmento que deseas ofrecer tu nuevo producto o servicio. De esa forma,  escucharás de viva voz los aspectos que deberás considerar para realmente crear algo que genere un valor real en la gente .

Se trata de que logres ponerte en los zapatos de los demás y entiendas las razones detrás de sus peticiones. Tus buyer personas podrán ayudarte también en esta etapa, en caso de que no tengas la oportunidad de programar interacciones directas, por lo que no debes dejar fuera una investigación profunda sobre los perfiles que se beneficiarán con tu producto o servicio.

2. Definición

Gracias al trabajo que realizas en la primera fase, tendrás información y datos muy valiosos que te ayudarán a encontrar la forma de definir el problema que vas a resolver. Es decir, que gracias a la fase de empatía, en este momento podrás analizar el material que tienes y te darás cuenta de que hay ciertos obstáculos que se repiten o que se presentan constantemente.

Eso te permite  crear hipótesis y posibles soluciones , comenzando a clasificar esas oportunidades que puedes aprovechar para tu siguiente innovación. 

Ahora es momento de observar esas hipótesis y soluciones posibles para lanzar ideas. En esta fase no existen las incorrectas porque lo importante es comenzar el proceso creativo. Lo más seguro es que lo primero que se te ocurra no sea lo más brillante ni original, pero será lo que te dará impulso para llegar a aquellas que serán valiosas. 

Implementa lluvias de ideas y un tablero para anotar lo que tú y tus equipos proponen , para así también identificar rápidamente aquellas que se repiten o son muy parecidas o, incluso, las que eventualmente serán descartadas por no ser convenientes.

4. Prototipo

Cuando elijas las ideas más valiosas, podrás decidir cuáles de ellas se convertirán en un prototipo. Es decir, si una o más pasarán a la siguiente fase, en la que se les da forma o una representación gráfica que las acerca a lo que podrían ser realmente. Dependiendo del tipo de producto o servicio, el  prototipo  es una maqueta, un mock-up de un artículo, un plano o un dibujo detallado de cómo funcionará. 

La función del prototipo es poner en evidencia qué tan sencillo es utilizar el producto o qué tan práctico puede ser el servicio que estás diseñando.  Por eso es buena idea que las personas que representan tu público objetivo lo conozcan, ya que sus comentarios aportan conclusiones que quizá no habías considerado por involucrarte en su creación.

5. Evaluación

El prototipo se pone en manos de una persona que podría utilizarlo en su día a día. Es alguien que no tiene tu mismo contexto, porque no es parte de tu equipo de design thinking, y, por lo tanto, tal vez le sea más complicado entender funciones, características o por qué un artículo tiene una forma en particular.

Así podrás hacer cambios pertinentes o ajustes antes de fabricar o lanzar un servicio que, si ignoras esta fase, no tendrá la misma aceptación por su dificultad o poca practicidad en su uso.

Ten en cuenta que, incluso, podría ser que en esta quinta fase descubras que es necesario repetir todo el proceso desde el principio, porque si hay errores en tu investigación, análisis de información y creación de ideas, tu prototipo no será el adecuado. Pero eso es lo maravilloso del design thinking:  está hecho para probar y fallar hasta que encuentres la solución ideal .

Tomando en cuanta las fases que ya mencionamos y las características que lo definen, ya podemos mencionar los pasos esenciales que te ayudarán a implementar el design thinking en tu empresa.

Los 4 pasos esenciales del design thinking

1. Identifica el problema y empatiza con tus clientes

La primera tarea será descubrir el problema principal a resolver del cliente y otros puntos de dolor. Recuerda utilizar la empatía para mirar desde el punto de vista del usuario o consumidor. 

Para desarrollar adecuadamente el proyecto, la comprensión es una de las actitudes que te permitirá reconocer mejor las necesidades de los usuarios. Para ello puedes utilizar un mapa de empatía:

Utiliza las herramientas cualitativas de investigación para indagar las necesidades y deseos a fondo. Un buen ejercicio es posicionarte en varios de los escenarios posibles dentro del contexto del cliente.

2. Explora diversas soluciones u oportunidades

Analiza los resultados y piensa en cuáles podrían ser las mejores soluciones que contribuirán cambiar la vida del cliente.

Junto a un equipo de trabajo puedes proponer una serie de ideas encaminadas a crear un diseño innovador que resuelva el problema inicial. Genera la mayor cantidad de ideas, pues entre más opciones tengas más rápido hallarás un buen resultado. Se vale de todo: por más extrañas que puedan parecer algunas ocurrencias, tómalas en cuenta. Utilizar el pensamiento lateral es uno de los mejores aliados para poner la mente a trabajar.

3. Diseña el producto o proyecto 

Filtra la información más relevante o útil que obtuviste con el análisis de empatía para identificar los principales problemas y concentrarte en el objetivo del diseño. Conjunta ideas con tus equipos para iniciar un  proceso iterativo de desarrollo > prototipo > prueba  hasta llegar al diseño ideal.

4. Lanza el producto al mercado y prueba su efectividad

Finalmente, presenta la solución al mercado; recibe y estudia los comentarios que se generen en torno al uso o consumo del producto para constatar su correcto funcionamiento, o bien para analizar sus fallas y hacer los cambios pertinentes. El feedback que obtengas te servirá para hallar nuevas formas de mejorar.

El consejo de Andrea Cohen, Field Marketing Manager en HubSpot El Design Thinking se basa en la colaboración, la experimentación y el pensamiento creativo para encontrar soluciones efectivas y centradas en el usuario.

1.  Formularios de Google

Imagen de Formularios de Google

Para la fase de empatía, los formularios son una gran herramienta que puede capturar información valiosa sobre tu público objetivo. O si estás por hacer mejoras a un producto o servicio que ya tienes, podrás hacer preguntas puntuales sobre esas características que sospechas debes optimizar.

Con los formularios de Google puedes crear las preguntas que necesitas y establecer respuestas abiertas o que la gente pueda elegir, si necesitas opiniones precisas. Una ventaja de estos formularios, es que además de que pueden responderse desde donde sea (aunque los usuarios no tengan correo de Gmail, por ejemplo), es que te ayuda a organizar las respuestas para que puedas analizarlas mejor, creando gráficas y hojas de cálculo útiles.

Dicho esto, no dudes en utilizarlos también cuando sea momento de probar el prototipo, para recopilar opiniones.

2.  Wisemapping

Imagen de Wisemapping

Los mapas mentales son muy útiles para clasificar información, que es básico para las fases de definición e idea en el design thinking. Wisemapping te da oportunidad de crearlos, según tus necesidades, sin que tengas que pagar, y que puedes compartir con las demás personas involucradas en el proceso.

3.  Prototyping on Paper de Marvel

Imagen de Prototyping on Paper

Para crear tus prototipos, lo más seguro es que no siempre tengas tiempo o recursos para hacer videos muy complicados. Por eso la app Marvel, hecha para la producción de prototipos en equipo, creó Prototyping on Paper, para que lo que haces en una libreta se transforme en una pieza interactiva para iPhone o Android (y también tienen app móvil para esos sistemas operativos).  

Entonces, recordemos:

Conoce algunos ejemplos que te mostrarán todo lo que puedes lograr con un buen proceso de design thinking.

3 usos del design thinking en acción

Con los siguientes ejemplos te podrás dar una idea de cómo otras empresas han obtenido los mejores resultados con el método de design thinking.

1. De librería virtual a la revolución del ecommercer: Amazon 

El caso de Amazon es un ejemplo de cómo el diseño no se limita a la creación de un producto, sino que también atiende a la función de brindar un servicio innovador.

Su creador, Jeff Bezos, al comienzo de su negocio realizó un listado de los productos de bajo coste que más demanda tenían y así llegó a la conclusión de que los libros eran un producto ideal.  Y esa fue la razón por la cual inició una venta de libros por internet .

Después de un análisis constante de mercado , Jeff se dio cuenta de otras demandas que acompañaban la venta de libros por internet y así añadió distintos productos como los CD, DVD, videojuegos, entre otros. 

Pronto Bezos notó los cambios de consumo que la gente tenía en sus compras por internet y decidió resolver y atender aquellos problemas de los consumidores. ¿Y qué podría ser más funcional que una tienda que vende de todo?  De esta forma, rápidamente se abrió camino hasta posicionarse como la tienda en línea más exitosa del mundo , y cambiaría el concepto de comprar y vender. 

Amazon no ha parado, y continúa rediseñando la estrategia del marketplace que no pierde de vista los hábitos, deseos, necesidades y sentimientos del cliente.

2. Tesla aceleró el cambio

A pesar de que la primera idea de un automóvil eléctrico surgió en el siglo XIX, no logró venderse a gran escala. Así como se pensó que un día el uso de los carruajes a caballo sería reemplazado muy pronto por carros a motor, entrado el siglo XXI se anunciaba la llegada del automóvil que funcionaría con energía recargable, a la vuelta de la esquina.

Y en efecto, las llamadas de cambios ecológicos comenzaron a ejercer presión para dejar de usar los motores a gasolina. Pero existía algo más que un estrato de la sociedad esperaba con esta innovación:  las características físicas (como la velocidad), estéticas y de comodidad que otros autos de lujo o deportivos ofrecían.

Entonces, fue la compañía Tesla quien supo atender los requerimientos más exigentes y ofrecer la tecnología del motor eléctrico de Silicon Valley que revolucionaría el mercado.

Así Tesla comenzó el proyecto para cumplir con el primer objetivo de ofrecer un automóvil deportivo premium para  «acelerar la transición del mundo hacia la energía sustentable» .

3. El secador de pelo Dyson Supersonic

El diseñador industrial británico James Dyson ha creado un secador con lo último de la tecnología disruptiva que ha conjuntado con un estilo minimalista para transformar múltiples electrodomésticos comunes. 

El secador se lanzó al mercado después de pasar por rigurosas pruebas con diferentes tipos de cabello. Dyson rediseñó el difusor y la boquilla con un control inteligente que regula mucho mejor el calor.

El proyecto de este producto duró cuatro años , durante los cuales pasó por 600 prototipos para finalmente presentar un secador con un motor digital liviano, pero con una velocidad 8 veces mayor que los convencionales.

¿Cómo aprovecharás el design thinking en tus procesos? ¡Transforma las necesidades de tu público en soluciones únicas! Si quieres ver  ejemplos de design thinking que te servirán de inspiración, consulta nuestra entrada .

Preguntas frecuentes del desing thinking

Qué beneficios puedo esperar al adoptar el design thinking en mi empresa.

Puedes esperar una serie de beneficios significativos. Estos incluyen una mayor capacidad para resolver problemas de manera creativa y efectiva, una mejor comprensión de las necesidades y deseos de tus clientes o usuarios, y la capacidad de innovar y desarrollar productos y servicios que realmente satisfagan esas necesidades. Además, el Design Thinking fomenta un enfoque centrado en el ser humano, lo que puede mejorar la experiencia del cliente y fortalecer la relación con tu audiencia.

Cuáles son las 5 etapas del Design Thinking

El Design Thinking sigue un proceso de cinco etapas: empatizar, definir, idear, prototipar y testear. Comienza con la comprensión profunda de las necesidades de los usuarios, pasa por la definición clara del problema, la generación de ideas creativas, la creación de prototipos simples y la prueba de estas soluciones con los usuarios.

Cuál es la etapa más importante del Design Thinking

Empatizar: se destaca por su importancia en la comprensión profunda de las necesidades, deseos y contextos de los usuarios. Este paso da las bases para el resto del proceso, permitiendo que las soluciones desarrolladas sean verdaderamente relevantes y significativas para quienes las utilizarán.

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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.

Read next: 10 agile ideas worth sharing

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Using Design Thinking to Craft a Tailored Resume

July 24th 2019

Your resume is (most often) the first introduction a recruiter has to who you are and why you are applying for a job. It’s important to make sure the resume reflects not only your interests, experiences, and skills, but makes a strong case for why you are a great fit for each job you pursue. In this article, we’ll use the five key steps of design thinking to help you tailor your resume for the roles you are applying for.

What is Design Thinking?

Design thinking is a framework that helps us creatively solve problems efficiently. There are five steps to the process: (1) Empathize, (2) Define, (3) Ideate, (4) Prototype, (5) Test. I’ll be showing you how these steps can be applied to creating a resume that communicates your skills and experiences so you stand out to the hiring committee.

Empathize: Understanding who is reading your resume

Users are at the center of design thinking. For resumes, the main user for your resume is the recruiter.

A recruiter’s primary goal can be to find applicants worth passing off to the hiring manager, who often decides if a candidate should move forward in an interview process. They have a set of qualifications and review hundreds (if not thousands!) of applications to narrow down their candidate pool.

Some studies show that recruiters spend an average of 7 seconds on a resume. To get a sense of what this feels like, you can try your hand at reviewing resumes in 6 seconds in this simulation. This statistic may be sensationalized, but regardless, you can expect a recruiter to spend no more than 1-2 minutes when reviewing a resume.

What design principles can we extrapolate from these insights that you should apply to your resume?

Your resume needs to be scannable. The key pieces of information that makes you qualified for the job need to be quickly gleaned. This can be achieved with clear visual hierarchy, concise language, and making sure your resume tells a cohesive narrative.

Your resume needs to be easily summarized. You should help the recruiter advocate for you to the hiring manager. Before putting pen to paper, ask yourself -- if the recruiter were to pitch you as a candidate in 3-4 sentences, what would you want them to say? Make sure your resume communicates this pitch.

Remember, your resume needs to only be a trailer, not an entire movie. All your resume needs to accomplish is to prove that you’re worth getting to know as a candidate. Don’t feel the pressure to condense all your experiences and skills onto one sheet of paper.

Define: Digging into the job description

Look at the job description, and split up the listed requirements into “must haves” and “nice-to-haves.”

Do a little bit more research at this phase, because job descriptions can be vague, and recruiting can be industry-specific or company-specific—informational interviews or even research on LinkedIn can help you understand the difference between required and preferred skills. Use the “must have” skills to synthesize a “how might we” statement that will help you stay focused on what your resume should convey. In design, we frame the problems we are solving for with “how might we” to reinforce the idea that we are open to many different solutions. Every aspect of your resume should be able to tie back to this problem statement.

Example: “How might we craft a resume that demonstrates that I have sufficient project management experience, people skills, and am technically qualified for the People Analyst role at Google”?

Ideate: Connecting the dots

Now, start thinking through how your experiences demonstrate the skills, experiences, and values that the recruiter is looking for. Take a piece of paper and fold it lengthwise to create two columns. Jot down your experiences, key accomplishments, projects, and qualifications on one column. Jot down the Job Requirements on the other. Start connecting the dots -- which of your qualifications demonstrate your ability to meet the job requirements?

Be open at this phase! Look especially at transferable skills, and challenge yourself to make the connection between seemingly irrelevant experiences. For example, even if you’ve held a service job that may seem irrelevant to an office job you’re applying for, you may be able to talk about the people skills you’ve gained from customer service work.

Prototype: Creating Your Resume

Only at this phase should you open your actual resume! Use your two-column chart to edit bullet points for each experience on your resume. This means that your resume may look very different for different roles. You may even leave out a past experience in favor of adding more details to another if that past experience has no direct connection to the job you are applying for. Again, it is more important to create a focused, cohesive narrative with your resume rather than to capture all of your skills and experiences.

After you’ve listed out your experiences, let’s do a temperature check. Does it sufficiently answer your “how might we” statement? Is it scannable and easily summarized?

Test: Don’t skip this step!

As designers, we’re always looking to iterate our designs. You should be doing the same with your resume. The key to testing is simply to put your prototype in front of real people and being open to critique. It’s easy to get attached to something you’ve created, but getting feedback on your resume is key to making sure it makes sense to others, and not just yourself.

Find someone in your network that you trust to understand the job you are applying for and the qualifications it requires. Ask them to read your resume and point out which parts they have questions on or were confused about, and which parts they thought stood out. If you conducted informational interviews with people in similar roles and/or companies, ask them to review it. Oftentimes, they’ll be able to give suggestions that others not in the field or company may not have.

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What is design thinking?

Design and conquer: in years past, the word “design” might have conjured images of expensive handbags or glossy coffee table books. Now, your mind might go straight to business. Design and design thinking are buzzing in the business community more than ever. Until now, design has focused largely on how something looks; these days, it’s a dynamic idea used to describe how organizations can adjust their problem-solving approaches to respond to rapidly changing environments—and create maximum impact and shareholder value. Design is a journey and a destination. Design thinking is a core way of starting the journey and arriving at the right destination at the right time.

Simply put, “design thinking is a methodology that we use to solve complex problems , and it’s a way of using systemic reasoning and intuition to explore ideal future states,” says McKinsey partner Jennifer Kilian. Design thinking, she continues, is “the single biggest competitive advantage that you can have, if your customers are loyal to you—because if you solve for their needs first, you’ll always win.”

Get to know and directly engage with senior McKinsey experts on design thinking

Tjark Freundt is a senior partner in McKinsey’s Hamburg office, Tomas Nauclér is a senior partner in the Stockholm office, Daniel Swan is a senior partner in the Stamford office, Warren Teichner is a senior partner in the New York office, Bill Wiseman is a senior partner in the Seattle office, and Kai Vollhardt is a senior partner in the Munich office.

And good design is good business. Kilian’s claim is backed up with data: McKinsey Design’s 2018 Business value of design report  found that the best design performers increase their revenues  and investor returns at nearly twice the rate of their industry competitors. What’s more, over a ten-year period, design-led companies outperformed  the S&P 500 by 219 percent.

As you may have guessed by now, design thinking goes way beyond just the way something looks. And incorporating design thinking into your business is more than just creating a design studio and hiring designers. Design thinking means fundamentally changing how you develop your products, services, and, indeed, your organization itself.

Read on for a deep dive into the theory and practice of design thinking.

Learn more about McKinsey’s Design Practice , and check out McKinsey’s latest Business value of design report here .

How do companies build a design-driven company culture?

There’s more to succeeding in business than developing a great product or service that generates a financial return. Empathy and purpose are core business needs. Design thinking means putting customers, employees, and the planet at the center of problem solving.

McKinsey’s Design Practice has learned that design-led organizations start with design-driven cultures. Here are four steps  to building success through the power of design:

Understand your audience. Design-driven companies go beyond asking what customers and employees want, to truly understanding why they want it. Frequently, design-driven companies will turn to cultural anthropologists and ethnographers to drill down into how their customers use and experience products, including what motivates them and what turns them away.

Makeup retailer Sephora provides an example. When marketing leaders actually watched  shoppers using the Sephora website, they realized customers would frequently go to YouTube to watch videos of people using products before making a purchase. Using this information, the cosmetics retailer developed its own line of demonstration videos, keeping shoppers on the site and therefore more likely to make a purchase.

• Bring design to the executive table. This leader can be a chief design officer, a chief digital officer, or a chief marketing officer. Overall, this executive should be the best advocate for the company’s customers and employees, bringing the point of view of the people, the planet, and the company’s purpose into strategic business decisions. The design lead should also build bridges between multiple functions and stakeholders, bringing various groups into the design iteration process.
• Design in real time. To understand how and why people—both customers and employees—use processes, products, or services, organizations should develop a three-pronged design-thinking model that combines design, business strategy, and technology. This approach allows business leaders to spot trends, cocreate using feedback and data, prototype, validate, and build governance models for ongoing investment.

Act quickly. Good design depends on agility. That means getting a product to users quickly, then iterating based on customer feedback. In a design-driven culture, companies aren’t afraid to release products that aren’t quite perfect. Designers know there is no end to the design process. The power of design, instead, lies in the ability to adopt and adapt as needs change. When designers are embedded within teams, they are uniquely positioned to gather and digest feedback, which can lead to unexpected revelations. Ultimately, this approach creates more impactful and profitable results than following a prescribed path.

Consider Instagram. Having launched an initial product in 2010, Instagram’s founders paid attention to what the most popular features were: image sharing, commenting, and liking. They relaunched with a stripped-down version a few months later, resulting in 100,000 downloads in less than a week and over two million users in under two months —all without any strategic promotion.

Learn more about McKinsey’s Design Practice .

What’s the relationship between user-centered design and design thinking?

Both processes are design led. And they both emphasize listening to and deeply understanding users and continually gathering and implementing feedback to develop, refine, and improve a service.

Where they are different is scale. User-centered design focuses on improving a specific product or service . Design thinking takes a broader view  as a way to creatively address complex problems—whether for a start-up, a large organization, or society as a whole.

User-centered design is great for developing a fantastic product or service. In the past, a company could coast on a superior process or product for years before competitors caught up. But now, as digitization drives more frequent and faster disruptions, users demand a dynamic mix of product and service. Emphasis has shifted firmly away  from features and functions toward purpose, lifestyle, and simplicity of use.

Introducing McKinsey Explainers : Direct answers to complex questions

McKinsey analysis has found that some industries—such as telecommunications, automotive, and consumer product companies— have already made strides toward combining product and service into a unified customer experience . Read on for concrete examples of how companies have applied design thinking to offer innovative—and lucrative—customer experiences.

Learn more about our Operations Practice .

What is the design-thinking process?

McKinsey analysis has shown that the design-thinking approach creates more value  than conventional approaches. The right design at the right price point spurs sustainability and resilience in a demonstrable way—a key driver of growth.

According to McKinsey’s Design  Practice, there are two key steps to the design-thinking process:

• Developing an understanding of behavior and needs that goes beyond what people are doing right now to what they will need in the future and how to deliver that. The best way to develop this understanding is to spend time with people.
• “Concepting,” iterating, and testing . First start with pen and paper, sketching out concepts. Then quickly put these into rough prototypes—with an emphasis on quickly. Get feedback, refine, and test again. As American chemist Linus Pauling said : “The way to get good ideas is to get lots of ideas and throw the bad ones away.”

What is D4VG versus DTV?

For more than a decade, manufacturers have used a design-to-value (DTV) model  to design and release products that have the features needed to be competitive at a low cost. During this time, DTV efforts were groundbreaking because they were based on data rather than experience. They also reached across functions, in contrast to the typical value-engineering approach.

The principles of DTV have evolved into design for value and growth (D4VG), a new way of creating products that provide exceptional customer experiences while driving both value and growth. Done right, D4VG efforts generate products with the features, form, and functionality that turn users into loyal fans .

D4VG products can cost more to build, but they can ultimately raise margins by delivering on a clear understanding of a product’s core brand attributes, insights into people’s motivations, and design thinking.

Learn more about our Consumer Packaged Goods Practice .

What is design for sustainability?

As consumers, companies, and regulators shift toward increased sustainability, design processes are coming under even more scrutiny. The challenge is that carbon-efficient production processes tend to be more complex and can require more carbon-intensive materials. The good news is that an increased focus on design for sustainability (DFS), especially at the research and development stage , can help mitigate some of these inefficiencies and ultimately create even more sustainable products.

For example, the transition from internal-combustion engines to electric-propulsion vehicles  has highlighted emissions-intensive automobile production processes. One study found that around 20 percent of the carbon generated by a diesel vehicle comes from its production . If the vehicle ran on only renewable energy, production emissions would account for 85 percent of the total. With more sustainable design, electric-vehicle (EV) manufacturers stand to reduce the lifetime emissions of their products significantly.

To achieve design for sustainability at scale, companies can address three interrelated elements at the R&D stage:

• rethinking the way their products use resources, adapting them to changing regulations, adopting principles of circularity, and making use of customer insights
• understanding and tracking emissions and cost impact of design decisions in support of sustainability goals
• fostering the right mindsets and capabilities to integrate sustainability into every product and design decision

What is ‘skinny design’?

Skinny design is a less theoretical aspect of design thinking. It’s a method whereby consumer goods companies reassess the overall box size of products by reducing the total cubic volume of the package. According to McKinsey analysis , this can improve overall business performance in the following ways:

• Top-line growth of 4 to 5 percent through improvements in shelf and warehouse holding power. The ability to fit more stock into warehouses ultimately translates to growth.
• Bottom-line growth of more than 10 percent . Packing more product into containers and trucks creates the largest savings. Other cost reductions can come from designing packaging to minimize the labor required and facilitate automation.
• Sustainability improvements associated with reductions in carbon emissions through less diesel fuel burned per unit. Material choices can also confer improvements to the overall footprint.

Read more about skinny design and how it can help maximize the volume of consumer products that make it onto shelves.

Learn more about McKinsey’s Operations Practice .

How can a company become a top design performer?

The average person’s standard for design is higher than ever. Good design is no longer just a nice-to-have for a company. Customers now have extremely high expectations for design, whether it’s customer service, instant access to information, or clever products that are also aesthetically relevant in the current culture.

McKinsey tracked the design practices of 300 publicly listed companies  over a five-year period in multiple countries. Advanced regression analysis of more than two million pieces of financial data and more than 100,000 design actions revealed 12 actions most correlated to improved financial performance. These were then clustered into the following four themes:

• Analytical leadership . For the best financial performers, design is a top management issue , and design performance is assessed with the same rigor these companies use to approach revenue and cost. The companies with the top financial returns have combined design and business leadership through bold, design-centric visions. These include a commitment to maintain a baseline level of customer understanding among all executives. The CEO of one of the world’s largest banks, for example, spends one day a month with the bank’s clients and encourages all members of the company’s C-suite to do the same.
• Cross-functional talent . Top-performing companies make user-centric design everyone’s responsibility, not a siloed function. Companies whose designers are embedded within cross-functional teams have better overall business performance . Further, the alignment of design metrics with functional business metrics (such as financial performance, user adoption rates, and satisfaction results) is also correlated to better business performance.
• Design with people, not for people . Design flourishes best, according to our research, in environments that encourage learning, testing, and iterating with users . These practices increase the odds of creating breakthrough products and services, while at the same time reducing the risk of costly missteps.
• User experience (UX) . Top-quartile companies embrace the full user experience  by taking a broad-based view of where design can make a difference. Design approaches like mapping customer journeys can lead to more inclusive and sustainable solutions.

What are some real-world examples of how design thinking can improve efficiency and user experience?

Understanding the theory of design thinking is one thing. Seeing it work in practice is something else. Here are some examples of how elegant design created value for customers, a company, and shareholders:

• Stockholm’s international airport, Arlanda, used design thinking to address its air-traffic-control problem. The goal was to create a system that would make air traffic safer and more effective. By understanding the tasks and challenges of the air-traffic controllers, then collaboratively working on prototypes and iterating based on feedback, a working group was able to design a new departure-sequencing tool  that helped air-traffic controllers do their jobs better. The new system greatly reduced the amount of time planes spent between leaving the terminal and being in the air, which in turn helped reduce fuel consumption.
• When Tesla creates its electric vehicles , the company closely considers not only aesthetics but also the overall driving experience .
• The consumer electronics industry has a long history of dramatic evolutions lead by design thinking. Since Apple debuted the iPhone in 2007, for example, each new generation has seen additional features, new customers, and lower costs—all driven by design-led value creation .

Learn more about our Consumer Packaged Goods  and Sustainability  Practices.

For a more in-depth exploration of these topics, see McKinsey’s Agile Organizations collection. Learn more about our Design Practice —and check out design-thinking-related job opportunities if you’re interested in working at McKinsey.

Articles referenced:

• “ Skinny design: Smaller is better ,” April 26, 2022, Dave Fedewa , Daniel Swan , Warren Teichner , and Bill Wiseman
• “ Product sustainability: Back to the drawing board ,” February 7, 2022, Stephan Fuchs, Stephan Mohr , Malin Orebäck, and Jan Rys
• “ Emerging from COVID-19: Australians embrace their values ,” May 11, 2020, Lloyd Colling, Rod Farmer , Jenny Child, Dan Feldman, and Jean-Baptiste Coumau
• “ The business value of design ,” McKinsey Quarterly , October 25, 2018, Benedict Sheppard , Hugo Sarrazin, Garen Kouyoumjian, and Fabricio Dore
• “ More than a feeling: Ten design practices to deliver business value ,” December 8, 2017, Benedict Sheppard , John Edson, and Garen Kouyoumjian
• “ Creating value through sustainable design ,” July 25, 2017, Sara Andersson, David Crafoord, and Tomas Nauclér
• “ The expanding role of design in creating an end-to-end customer experience ,” June 6, 2017, Raffaele Breschi, Tjark Freundt , Malin Orebäck, and Kai Vollhardt
• “ Design for value and growth in a new world ,” April 13, 2017, Ankur Agrawal , Mark Dziersk, Dave Subburaj, and Kieran West
• “ The power of design thinking ,” March 1, 2016, Jennifer Kilian , Hugo Sarrazin, and Barr Seitz
• “ Building a design-driven culture ,” September 1, 2015, Jennifer Kilian , Hugo Sarrazin, and Hyo Yeon

Want to know more about design thinking?

Related articles.

Skinny design: Smaller is better

The business value of design

More than a feeling: Ten design practices to deliver business value

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Why Design Thinking Works

• Jeanne Liedtka

While we know a lot about practices that stimulate new ideas, innovation teams often struggle to apply them. Why? Because people’s biases and entrenched behaviors get in the way. In this article a Darden professor explains how design thinking helps people overcome this problem and unleash their creativity.

Though ostensibly geared to understanding and molding the experiences of customers, design thinking also profoundly reshapes the experiences of the innovators themselves. For example, immersive customer research helps them set aside their own views and recognize needs customers haven’t expressed. Carefully planned dialogues help teams build on their diverse ideas, not just negotiate compromises when differences arise. And experiments with new solutions reduce all stakeholders’ fear of change.

At every phase—customer discovery, idea generation, and testing—a clear structure makes people more comfortable trying new things, and processes increase collaboration. Because it combines practical tools and human insight, design thinking is a social technology —one that the author predicts will have an impact as large as an earlier social technology: total quality management.

It addresses the biases and behaviors that hamper innovation.

Idea in Brief

The problem.

While we know a lot about what practices stimulate new ideas and creative solutions, most innovation teams struggle to realize their benefits.

People’s intrinsic biases and behavioral habits inhibit the exercise of the imagination and protect unspoken assumptions about what will or will not work.

The Solution

Design thinking provides a structured process that helps innovators break free of counterproductive tendencies that thwart innovation. Like TQM, it is a social technology that blends practical tools with insights into human nature.

Occasionally, a new way of organizing work leads to extraordinary improvements. Total quality management did that in manufacturing in the 1980s by combining a set of tools—kanban cards, quality circles, and so on—with the insight that people on the shop floor could do much higher level work than they usually were asked to. That blend of tools and insight, applied to a work process, can be thought of as a social technology.

• JL Jeanne Liedtka is a professor of business administration at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business.

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5 Design Thinking Skills for Business Professionals

• 11 Jan 2022

What do companies such as Apple, Moderna, IBM, T-Mobile, Ford, Barclays, and Nike have in common? Each has embraced the concept of design thinking in their development of new products and services—and been rewarded for doing so.

Design thinking is a powerful tool all professionals can benefit from. By developing design thinking skills, you can become a more creative problem-solver, regardless of your role. This, in turn, can empower you to embrace and facilitate innovation within your organization to effect real, lasting change.

Here’s a look at what design thinking is, design thinking skills you should develop to advance your career, and the types of professionals who can benefit most from those skills.

Access your free e-book today.

What Is Design Thinking?

Design thinking is an approach to problem-solving in which the practitioner seeks to understand a potential product or service’s end user, including their goals, challenges, and aspirations. They then use that knowledge to conceive solutions.

As a methodology, design thinking is meant to be iterative. It constantly forces the practitioner to challenge their assumptions about the problem, the user, and the solution as a means of verifying they’re correct—or forcing innovation to find a more accurate answer.

Design thinking is typically broken out into four key phases:

• Clarify: In this phase, the practitioner narrows down the focus of the design thinking process. They identify the problem that will be explored to ensure the best possible outcome.
• Ideate: In this phase, the practitioner generates ideas for solutions. They should regularly challenge their assumptions to overcome biases and think of truly unique and innovative ideas.
• Develop: In this phase, the practitioner experiments with the solutions they conceived in the ideate phase. Prototypes should not be expensive or considered “final,” but rather as tools to test and learn from.
• Implement: Finally, the practitioner must test each prototype. The goal is to learn and collect as much data as possible and use it to further iterate on potential solutions.

While the four phases feed into each other, the implement phase is not meant to be the end of the line; instead, it’s a trigger to revisit the earlier phases and iterate on both the problem and solution.

Design Thinking Skills

1. emotional intelligence.

Emotional intelligence is a core skill for anyone interested in design thinking. This is because design thinking requires the practitioner to empathize with the end user and understand their dreams, goals, desires, and challenges on an intimate, personal level. Without the willingness to empathize, none of the other phases in the design thinking process can be completed.

In addition to empathy, other important emotional intelligence skills you should develop to connect with your ideal users include self-awareness, self-regulation, and motivation.

2. Consensus Building

In the early phases of the design thinking process, it’s important for all team members to come to a consensus on the challenge being addressed. Who’s the ideal buyer or end user of the product or solution? What’s the problem being solved for? How will you define success? Without agreement around these questions, the entire process can break down and be stalled by inaction.

By becoming skilled in consensus building, you can ensure your project is always moving forward. That doesn’t mean your team will always be right just because they agree on something or that you shouldn’t challenge assumptions. Even failure can provide data you can use to improve the next iteration of a solution.

Problem framing is a tool often used in design thinking when a team doesn’t agree on a solution. It requires team members to take a step back and reframe the problem they’re trying to solve. This simple act can give everyone clarity and help build consensus around a solution while ruling out those that don’t address the problem.

3. User Research

User research is the act of understanding a product or service’s end user to get a better sense of the problems they face, their goals, and the unique criteria they’ll use to identify a solution. It’s through user research that you can begin to empathize with your end user, define and frame the problem, and ideate.

There are many methods you can use to complete this research. Some of the most effective include:

• User surveys: Surveys can be an extremely valuable way to collect a large amount of user data that informs your process. In designing user surveys, it’s critical to avoid mistakes that could adversely affect your results.
• User interviews: In a user interview , you speak with someone you consider your product or service’s ideal customer or end user. You then ask them questions that reveal key details about their needs and wants.
• Direct observation: Direct observation involves finding someone you consider to be your ideal end user, then observing them as they complete a task. For example, you might ask them to use your product or solve a problem.

With user research, practice makes perfect. The more you perform, the more comfortable you become—helping you be more effective the next time you’re tasked with it.

4. Journey Mapping

Journey mapping is the process of charting your target customer or end user’s journey as they choose a solution to their problem. What are they seeing, feeling, and thinking?

A journey map typically has three stages:

• Awareness of a problem or need: The individual becomes aware of the symptoms of a problem, challenge, or opportunity but doesn’t yet know how to define it.
• Consideration of possible solutions: The individual has defined their problem or opportunity and is now considering different options for moving forward.
• Deciding how best to proceed: The individual has narrowed down their options and is now making their final decision.

These stages aren’t necessarily linear. One person can, for example, spend years being aware of a problem or goal, then rapidly consider options and make a final decision. Another person might move back and forth between the first two stages but never move into the final one. Someone might also proceed through all three stages, only to realize they were solving the wrong problem, prompting them to return to the awareness stage.

Journey mapping is a crucial skill for anyone interested in design thinking. It should be informed by user research and will itself inform ideation and prototyping.

5. Brainstorming

In the ideation phase of design thinking, your primary task is to take all the information you’ve gathered—through user research, journey mapping, and empathizing—and use it to think of possible solutions to your end user’s problem. Having the ability to brainstorm potential solutions in a free and creative way is vital.

Some brainstorming methods commonly leveraged in design thinking include:

• Mindmapping: A method for organizing information about a central topic or idea in a nonlinear way to show unique connections
• Storyboarding: A method of walking through the user’s journey leading up to the point where they select a solution and continue to leverage it
• Crowdstorming: Collaborative brainstorming between a large number of people (in a way, reminiscent of crowdsourcing information)
• Prototyping: The process of creating solution prototypes to gauge how they perform and address the user’s problem.

Throughout brainstorming, you and your team should challenge assumptions—about your end user, their challenges, and what a solution might look like—to keep ideas flowing.

Developing Your Design Thinking Skills

Design thinking is a powerful tool for anyone involved in identifying business opportunities, finding market needs, or designing products and services. The following professionals, in particular, can benefit from developing design thinking skills:

• Current or aspiring innovation managers: Design thinking is, at its heart, a framework for innovation. As such, anyone tasked with making their organization more innovative can benefit from learning its methods.
• Product managers and developers: Design thinking empowers professionals to think about their products and services through end users’ eyes, which can lead to innovative developments.
• Marketers: To effectively market a product or service, marketers must intimately understand end users' goals and challenges, as well as the unique differentiators of their solution. Design thinking allows them to do exactly that.
• Entrepreneurs: The frameworks and techniques embraced in design thinking can be directly applied to launching and scaling a new business, which is critical for entrepreneurs.

One of the most effective ways to hone your design thinking skills is to put them into action on the job—but that takes time.

Another option is to complete an online course or workshop that teaches the tenets of design thinking. This is an especially effective path if you want to rapidly improve your design thinking skills, or if you benefit from a more structured learning environment.

Are you ready to develop your design thinking skills and become more effective at innovating within your organization? Explore Design Thinking and Innovation —one of our online entrepreneurship and innovation courses —and learn how to use design thinking strategies and frameworks in your career.

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10 Most In-Demand Soft Skills to Put on Your Resume

L ong gone are the days when listing hard skills was the best (and oftentimes only) way to get your foot in the door at a prestigious company. While technical knowledge and training will always be important, soft skills (or essentially personality traits) are becoming increasingly important to highlight on your resume. And it makes sense, as more companies prioritize work culture and, therefore, the personalities of those they’re hiring.

But which soft skills are the ones that standout the most on a resume? Using data from Indeed.com, CashNetUSA scoured job ads for 46 predetermined soft skills to find the ones that appeared the most on high-paid jobs that surpassed the 75th percentile of wages in America’s most populated cities as well as each state. These are the soft skills that came out on top.

10. Resilience

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 34.29%

Resilience is a soft skill that highlights your ability to handle stress and challenges that come up at work. 

A good example of how to add this to your resume could be, “Showed resilience when leading a team after budget cuts by still delivering work on time and within scope.”

* Data comes from a January 2024 report released by CashNetUSA .

9. Financial Management

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 38.24%

If you’ve ever been in charge of a budget of any size, you can say that you have financial management skills. 

For instance, something like “oversaw the financial management of the freelance budget” could work if you hired contractors for a specific project.

8. Innovation

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 39.24%

Sure, this one makes our eyes roll a bit, too, but in today’s fast-paced world, innovation is key. No one wants an employee that stays stagnant or, worse, digs their heels in at the slight mention of change. 

You know who’s not stagnant? Someone who “excelled at brainstorming and ideation in the innovation process for [fill in project name].” You get it.

7. Emotional Intelligence

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 43.11%

We’re actually pleasantly surprised with this one. After all, we didn’t think corporations necessarily had it in them to care about this.

Jokes aside, having emotional intelligence is something that makes a good team member and an even better manager. After all, it’s hard to resolve team conflicts without it. The more a company emphasizes a “harmonious work environment,” the more this soft skill will matter.

6. Mentoring

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 47.89%

Here’s another managerial skill that job ads like to use to weed out the haves from the have-nots when it comes to managers. Do you actually enjoy mentoring people or have you just fallen up the corporate ladder into a management position?

True leaders will make mentoring a priority and want to highlight it on their resume.

5. Critical Thinking

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 47.94%

“Critical thinking” or “problem solving” can be put in the same bucket as resilience. How did you handle a challenging situation at work? It’s even better if you have data to back up your claim.

Well, maybe you “demonstrated strong critical-thinking skills when analyzing financial reports and making forecasts for the following quarter.”

4. Presentation Skills

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 56%

Presentation skills are the nature of the beast when it comes to today's Corporate America. That's because lots of today’s high-paying jobs require working with cross-functional teams and being able to explain your work in easy, digestible terms.

Think someone on a data science team explaining their findings to a marketing team. Along with "presentation skills," you could also add the specific presentation tools or software you use for your presentations on your resume.

3. Persuasion

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 57.41%

Persuasion sounds rather seductive, but it's crucial when trying to get specific projects across the finish line.

It's also a term that's used a lot in marketing when talking about "persuasive marketing skills" required to communicate well with a customer audience.

2. Negotiation

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 58.26%

This skill goes back to business basics. Proper negotiation skills come in handy in any aspect of life, whether you're negotiating a $1 billion merger or whether or not your toddler can have dessert for breakfast.

That said, it's a skill that takes time to hone — which is why it's considered all the more valuable.

1. Strategic Thinking

Percentage of highly paid jobs requiring the skill: 64.77%

Strategic thinking is essentially a combination of innovation and critical thinking, but the best way to incorporate this keyword on your resume is by using the CAR (challenge, action, result) technique.

You could say something like, "Used strategic thinking skills by analyzing user engagement data and running an A/B test that resulted in increased engagement of 20 percent."

For more resume advice, check out "How to Make Your Resume Shine."

Samskara’s Atelier: Crafting Timeless Stories Through Design

Within the realm of interior design, where each angle, curve, and hue has the capacity to tell a tale, Samskara’s Atelier is a shining example of ingenuity, commitment, and a deep appreciation for design. Namrita has been leading this path for more than 28 years, transforming areas into dynamic works of art that exude personality and meaning.

Samskara’s Atelier is a story told via the language of design, not just an interior design company. The heart of Samskara’s design philosophy is encapsulated in the quote “A room should start a conversation before people start exchanging words,” as articulated by Barry Dixon. The goal is to create environments that are more than just practical; settings that evoke strong feelings and grow to become extensions of the souls of those who inhabit them.

The Atelier of Samskara is renowned for its capacity to balance the interaction of form and function. Every design is painstakingly created to achieve a harmony between functionality and visual appeal. It involves more than just choosing paint colours or furniture placement ; rather, it involves creating an experience in which each component works together to tell a story.

Crafting Experiences

Consider the Cocoba initiative, which reinvents urban eating on Delhi’s busy streets. Cocoba is an engaging experience where modern refinement blends with seaside attractiveness. It’s more than simply a restaurant. With its rich vegetation, touches of bamboo, and gentle, ambient lighting, the design carries visitors away to a world of tropical beauty. One is immediately surrounded by a mood of luxury and relaxation as soon as they enter.

With one of the earliest Tiki bar designs in Delhi, Cocoba brings an exotic flavour to the city’s culinary scene. The area is intended to inspire a feeling of escape—a little solace from the rush of metropolitan life. It’s evidence of Samskara’s dedication to pushing limits and redefining what’s possible in the interior design industry.

Creating Timeless Luxury

On the other hand, Ananda is a magnificent residential masterpiece that is tucked away inside Ludlow Castle’s ancient walls. Here, modern sophistication and classical grace blend together to create spaces that radiate tasteful luxury. Every room in Ananda, with its custom furniture, elaborate details, and painstaking attention to craftsmanship, conveys a tale of everlasting elegance.

Every area of Ananda is intended to exude grandeur and comfort, from the intimate private suites to the opulent entryway. It’s a haven where people may enjoy the finer things in life and withdraw from the outer world. Ananda serves as evidence of Samskara’s dedication to designing timeless settings that are beautiful beyond fads.

Inspiring Innovation

A look into the dynamic world of contemporary workplace design is provided by Studio Mosaic . Here, whimsical details blend in well with elegant architecture to create a stimulating space that encourages innovation and teamwork . The room’s creative use of materials, clean lines, and splashes of colour all serve to highlight the dynamic nature of the work that takes place within.

The smooth incorporation of nature into Studio Mosaic’s workstation, however, may be its most remarkable aspect. A sensation of energy and renewal permeates the room as lush flora pours from the walls, connecting the interior and outdoor spaces. It is evidence of Samskara’s faith in the potential of biophilic design , which combines creativity and nature to create spaces that uplift the spirit, mind, and body.

Mission and Vision

The fundamental goal of Samskara’s Atelier is to create environments that uplift people’s spirits, spur their creativity, and improve their quality of life. It involves more than simply room design; it involves crafting deeper-than-surface experiences.

Samskara’s Atelier looks forward to a time where every area is a work of art and every design has a captivating backstory. It wants to be the standard in the field of interior design, where rooms are used to reflect a person’s individuality and way of life.

In a world where design trends change frequently, Samskara’s Atelier is a monument to the strength and endurance of excellent design. Namrita and her team are driven by a love for creativity and a dedication to perfection, always pushing the envelope to create environments that evoke deep emotions and spark the imagination. Design is more than simply a job at Samskara’s Atelier; it’s a journey where passion and design collide to create environments that are alive.

To sum up, Samskara’s Atelier is proof of the transformational potential of design. Every project tells a different narrative, fusing form, function, and emotion into a tapestry of eternal beauty. Examples of these projects include the distinguished elegance of Ananda, the compelling combination of seaside attractiveness and modern refinement in Cocoba, and the bright creativity of Studio Mosaic. Under the steadfast commitment and enthusiasm of Namrita, Samskara’s Atelier persistently pushes the frontiers of interior design possibilities. Looking ahead, we are steadfast in our dedication to our goal of creating environments that uplift, provoke, and endure—a journey where design turns into an art form and every place becomes a blank canvas waiting to be filled with imagination and individuality. Welcome to Samskara’s Atelier, where creativity and passion collide.

List of Images:

Image 1 Studio Mosaic: Office, New Delhi _© https://www.samskarasatelier.com/projects-8

Image 2 Ananda: Residence, Ludlow Castle, Delhi _© https://www.samskarasatelier.com/projects-8

Image 3 Cocoba:Modern Coastal Bistro & Bar _© https://www.samskarasatelier.com/projects-8

As a Student Architect who blends traditional architecture with technology, Arnav’s artistic vision is inspired by a deep love for music which helps in transforming architecture into a storytelling medium. Committed to integrating technology, art, and design, his work elevates architectural experiences, marrying functionality with aesthetic appeal.

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School warns of phone call scaring parents into thinking their child was kidnapped

NEW CUMBERLAND, Pa. (Gray News) – A school district in Pennsylvania is warning parents everywhere to be aware of a fake phone call scheme that aims to trick families.

Todd B. Stoltz, the superintendent of West Shore School District, made an announcement Wednesday on Facebook about the incident that happened to parents in the district.

“Recently, one of our families experienced a scam that took advantage of their worst fear, that their child may be in danger,” Stoltz said.

During the school day, a parent received a phone call from a number similar to the school’s phone number.

Stoltz said the call began with what sounded like their child on the phone. Then, an adult spoke and claimed the child had been kidnapped from school property.

The caller even used a child’s voice crying in background to make the claim seem more realistic.

Stoltz praised the family for thinking quickly. While one parent stayed on the phone with the caller, the other parent called the school, who confirmed their child was safe in class.

“We are grateful that when faced with a very stressful situation, the parents were able to remain calm and contacted school staff and law enforcement for assistance,” Stoltz said.

Police say if you receive a phone call like this one, hang up immediately, and do not provide the caller with any personal information.

Then, contact your child directly to confirm their location and safety.

Of course, if you cannot confirm your child is safe, or you suspect foul play, call 911.

Copyright 2024 Gray Media Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

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