A question might come to your mind - "Why Should I think like a Designer?"
A good designer has a problem-solving mindset, who uses his creative & analytical reasoning to design a product that meets user-needs, while complying to the business constraints. Also, designing a product is an iterative-process (design-build-test-design), which makes a designer empirical (experimental) in his approach. These are the essential qualities to solve complex problems in dynamic environment. "Design Thinking" extends these attributes of a good designer to the entire cycle of product management or problem-solving.
Before, we get to the detailed definition and meaning of "Design Thinking", it is important for us to understand a few concepts of 'a good designer' and 'creative and analytical reasoning'.
A 'good designer' is the one who creates 'the most valuable design' of the product. The value of a design is measured in three aspects:
Desirability (Value Proposition to the Customer): The product design must be in line with what is desired by our target Customer/User. Desirability is not same as Need, however, it starts from Need. A Need is for something that can solve customer's pain point. Need gets converted into 'Want' or 'Desire' when the customer associates unique value beyond just fulfilling the need, towards the product and wishes to possess it. (A want is same as Desire, but a less strong feeling). A Want or Desire when backed by willingness and ability to pay, becomes Demand. Desirability is the first criterion to be evaluated for a design, however it may not be explicitly articulated by the customers/users in all the scenarios. Most of the technologically innovative companies e.g. Apple, Intel etc. have created their best products based on their understanding of unarticulated need or desire of the customers/users.
Feasibility (Technical/Operational feasibility and effort): The product design must be feasible to be built, based on existing technological and operational capabilities. If the new capabilities are to be built or acquired, is that feasible in the required timeframe? For example, a Formula Racer might desire a car to able to run at 500 km/h, but it is not technically feasible to build it; for a transmission company with facilities only to build manual transmission, an automatic transmission design is of no value; for a company of no digital capabilities, design of a digital product is of no value. Feasibility needs to be evaluated after Desirability is confirmed. History is full of the examples of failed products (means, design was feasible) that we now call as "they were quite ahead of the time" (not desirable at that time). https://informi.co.uk/blog/10-failed-inventions-were-ahead-their-time.
Viability (Value Proposition to the Company): The product design must be commercially viable. It must meet the cost requirement of the product, so that the product can be offered to the target customer at desired price, profitably (for the organization). Viability also means whether the product is in line with the organization's overall strategic objective and vision. For example, it is technically feasible for a budget-phone company to build high-powered camera lenses (which is a desirable feature, as well) in its product, but then it will not meet the cost requirement based on the price positioning of its product; it is desirable and technically feasible for a small-sized or a start-up company to buy sophisticated systems and technology, but may not be commercially viable; It is technically feasible to build a spaceship that can take us to Mars (and it is desired by many people, as well), but the designs are not commercially viable to be rolled out as a market product. There are many examples where the product failed due to high pricing (e.g. Google Glass) or the company pulled back the product as they were losing money on it (cost more than the price).
The most valuable design is that sweet spot in the middle, which meets the criteria of all the three - Desirability, Feasibility, and Viability. If any of these criterion is not met, it is not 'the most valuable design' as expected from a good designer. The reason 'Design thinking' framework is highly effective in product management and problem-solving, is because it focusses on all these three aspects to evaluate the proposed products/solution.
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