Design Thinking Process

“....throwing out what you think you know and starting from scratch opens up all kinds of possibilities.”

-MIT Sloan Business School

Where do good ideas originate? As a designer or creative, you may have noticed that not a whole lot is not new. Most ideas take influence from past forms, and as a result, we end up recycling ideas and solutions that are bits and pieces of our experience, ideas, and more.

When it comes to the process of design, there is a step-by-step process that assists in finding creative solutions. Enter design thinking.

Design thinking is a non-linear, iterative process that teams use to understand users, challenge assumptions, redefine problems and create innovative solutions to prototype and test. Design thinking has been found to be somewhat of a buzzword in the world of UX as well as in the world of, well, design.

But the process is golden and helps to solidify the Client-Designer relationship and address the issues of the client via the end resulting design.

Utilizing the overabundance of information in this process, we assimilated this information into an infographic:

The steps and results of the process vary, but the parts of the process and the result are similar. The process is also not linear, but more cyclical and fluctuates as a designer needs time to flesh out the ideas. As prototypes, or wireframes, are constructed, it may be helpful to go back to the drawing board prior to any presentation with the client.

Involving five phases—Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, and Test—it is most useful to tackle problems that are ill-defined or unknown, or have many layers, making it complicated.

Do you or your team use this process when working? We do at the VWC. This keeps us focused on where our projects are in the process as well as focused on where we are heading - while always keeping the client forward-facing.

We would love to hear from you about this process or another you utilize in your workflow.