3 1/2 Keys to Design Thinking

Posted on | February 17, 2009 | View Comments

I ran across this excellent video yesterday while checking out some post designthinking.ideo.com IDEO’s blog. The video is of Tim Brown, CEO IDEO answering 5 Questions at BusinessWeek. He talks a bit about IDEO and then shifts to talk about design thinking. He breaks design thinking down into 3 1/2 keys which I’ve listed below.

Check out the video and then I challenge you to think of 3 1/2 ways to change what you do.

3 1/2 Keys to design thinking

1. Think of everything as a project. It gives finite boundaries.

2. Go look at the world for insights instead of imaging imagining that you already know all the choices.

3. Make Ideas tangible. aka prototyping as quickly as possible and test it in the real world.
3 1/2. Be able to tell stories about your ideas. Ideas fail inside organizations because people don’t understand it, and if they don’t understand it, they won’t get behind the idea.

3 Ways to change

1.think about my work in project form. In the past I’ve looked at the whole picture instead of just focusing on a 2 week or specific section.

2. I’m going to try to walk into situations assuming I don’t know all the pieces. By nature I tend to look at the cards dealt and figure out the best scenario with what I’ve got – that’s more of the MacGyver mentality. Instead I’m going to try to see solutions to problems by asking “what if?”

3. I’m going to learn how to tell stories better. Some people are naturally great at it, as you can guess by my last post about speaking in public – I’ve got a lot to learn.

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