My Top 3 Design Thinking Frameworks to Keep in Mind, Every (Work) Day!

When it Comes to Design Thinking, The World of Business Seems to Have Two Approaches of Looking At Things.

1.

People who see Design Thinking just as a fluffy bullshiting around putting already know frameworks in a fancy coat, which I honestly understand to a certain point. Nowadays, Design Thinking is a huge buzzword. And a lot of consultants and agencies are hiding behind Design Thinking or Human Centered Desingn just to go with the trend and try to make money out of it.

2.

People who actually experienced well facilitated Design Thinking workshop / project or those who are not limiting the scope of Design Thinking as a set of frameworks but see its overlaps and understand the mindset. Only then you are actually able to imagine the potencial of this human centered metodology used in many business industries.

The Innovation Potencial of Design Thinking

Therefore understanding Design Thinking as an ultimate mindset methodology to ideate, prototype, test and build innovative products and services will open you a new way to think about your business desicions - according to the real insights, from your clients and customers - reacting to the fresh feedbacks and build your future.

We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them. (Albert Einstein, btw)

From The Bigger Picture to Useful Pieces of The Puzzle

It's not easy to start using complicated canvases if you are completely new to the topic. That's why I'm listing here for you 3 of my most favorite Design Thinking frameworks that are able to refresh your current business understanding on a daily basis. They are powerful, yet easy to start with:

1. Customer Journey Mapping

There is always "a journey" that a customer has to undertake to buy or use a product/service. Customer Journey maps and all its parts into perspective. Having a full understanding of your process, gives you a possibility to give even better overall experience. Also, having this drawn or written down is always a great help for team decisions, and to make everybody aware of the importance of the flow of the whole user experience.

2. Landing Page Rapid Prototyping

There is always a new idea, product/service or way of communication that you would like try out on the market. It is always better to rapid test and get relevant feedback to adjust the concept on the go and deliver a perfect product/service.

Creating web landing pages with tools like @unbouce allows us to test anything, in a matter of days. After that, through Google Adwords and Facebook Ads we drag relevant users to the website and let them react to our landing page. After that, through website analytics we understand how successful our prototype was. From there we continue with new and consistent business strategy. That is the perfect way to make thoughtful business decisions based on real users feedbacks.

3. Five Whys

This framework is for everybody whos curiosity is not satisfied enough or struggles to find the real cause of problems to be solved. Five Whys is useful when it comes to know the real core of a problem. Simply ask yourself or people around "why" five times, after every answer. You end up with a chain of explanations that gives you bigger picture of the situation.

Find Your Frameworks and Start With "Design Thinking" today!

To use Design Thinking frameworks is good for every company. At @spacepace and @advertiadigital we take the best of design thinking frameworks and apply it to find ways how to rock business innovation and digital marketing. Find your frameworks and start with your "Design Thinking" today!

My Favorite Sources:

• This is Service Design Thinking (design thinking bible)
• Service Design: From Insight to Implementation (amazing case studies)
• The Design Sprint by Google (kick-ass set of framework used by GV)