30 октября 2026 г.: transcript

Hey guys, welcome to another class of disruptive technologies for innovation and change. This is session number 14 and today the topic is design thinking. So design thinking uh the definition from team brown okay the CEO of the CEO of IDO which is actually one company that I'm I would like to recommend you guys uh to check out. um says that design thinking is a human- centered approach to innovation that draws from the designer's toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology and the requirements for business success. So if you see it combines these three main aspects okay uh the needs of the people. So customer centric related with the end goal of actually solving the customer problem technology okay what can you do uh with the technological requirements needed to solve this problem and of course business success they also needs to take into account financial and business

outcomes in order to uh make it sustainable. Okay. Um it deres okay in a nutshell from um the product vision. Okay. In this case I present you here with an example of the Ein tomato uh ketchup bottle the classic one uh the classical one I think from the 50s. Uh together with a user centric approach. Okay. The one that we can find nowadays in most supermarkets and that maybe you guys have it in your fridge.

Okay. A bottle that pushes by a s a small um hole. Okay. The specific amount for you to put in your hamburgers or in your food or whatever. Okay, so this is transformation can be a little bit explained by using design thinking. Okay, design thinking is a um an agile an agile sorry methodology. Um we will see up ahead how it encompasses and how it includes some of the characteristics that an agile methodology has. Um and in a nutshell um it's um it's related with creating things that are easy to use that can solve problems um and that um not necessarily require um major breakthroughs in terms of technological revolutions. You can use simple technology that is accessible to everybody. Okay.

The first question is what is design? Okay. not only for beauty, the design also helps for efficiency. So sometimes the design asks for um yeah in this case that I present you here with the classical path okay a road for um uh walkers while in the end the user experience or what you really wanted um uh is not good enough. Okay, the the experience is uh all uh from the from in the terrain in the mud and not necessarily what is needed by um the end user. I have also another photo that I really like to show to my students. It's this one. Um and in the end, um the customer explained it how the project leader understood it. Okay, basically what they want is just a simple um as we can see here, my face is in the middle. Sorry guys, my ugly face is in the middle. But in the end, what I want to show you is

that in the in the last picture is that what they were client really wants is um a tree hop, okay? Using a simple tire uh glued next to to to a tree, okay, for [snorts] kids to to to have fun. Um the customer didn't know exactly how to frame it. He doesn't know the end goal. He just knows that he wants a bench on a tree. uh it explained it in this different way. The project leader understood okay he wants a bench on a tree. So it can be uh in any position of the tree. Okay. And in the end goal of the client maybe will not be able to swing it. [snorts] How the analyst designed it. Okay. Super aggressive, super complex. Um how the programmer wrote it. Okay. The simplest option possible. A bench on a tree. How the business consultant described it or sold it. Okay, you have this amazing bench on the tree. You're able to swing on it. It's super comfortable. You can sleep on it even. Okay, so bright shiny

thing. And how the project was documented, it was not. Okay, this is also something that that occurs in our professional lives unfortunately. What the operations installed? Unfortunately, nothing. They didn't install any operational support. How the customer was built, okay, up and down. And how it was supported, absolutely no support. And what they really wanted was of course uh the end goal of the bench using a simple tire that you're able to put yourself in it to swing and on the tree uh and have fun on it. Okay, this is a little bit of an analogy that I brought but actually describes the process of um uh fixing a problem, identifying a simple problem uh that the user has and proposing a solution. Okay, it might seem um in most of the times it might seem easy to fix it and to and to develop the solution but it's quite complex especially when you are in a highly um complex environment or a corporate environment with different stakeholders

inside the company. Okay. So let's analyze exactly what is design thinking. We will see uh that it has all of these different phases. Okay, design thinking is characterized particularly by one and interesting thing. You only define the exact problem of the customer after you observe it. Okay. So the the first step of design thinking is actually observation.

And this is different from other theories that uh are uh related with innovation and so on because uh here in design thinking you're it is characterized this specific methodology of you accepting and you being okay with not knowing fully what the customer needs. Okay guys, and it's a quite interesting approach because most uh most problems are uh really about u making um being aware of the of the problems of the of the customer and so on. And in this case, you observe them. You use this observation to um understand and to see um what is the need of the users.

Okay, it's called empathize uh in in in this phase. Empathize because I mean you're open to empathize with them with talking talking with them, asking them questions, um interviewing them, interview stakeholders that are in contact with the client and getting us an understanding of exactly uh what is the situation that the client is facing. Okay, only after this you can define the problem. Okay, this is the second phase of problem setting. You're only so you will only conclude what exactly your customer needs after you finish this initial part of observation of empathizing of uh gathering data uh related with the customer that will help you to define exactly what is the issue that is going on with them. Then afterwards we enter the ideation phase guys. Uh simple approach okay this is where your creativity comes in your brainstorming. Um you can use different methodology, you can concept score uh in them. You can prioritize your ideas,

ideate them in the best possible way and then you will reach a final concept or a final list of possible features. Okay, if we're talking about product development of features uh that you are going to install in your product or that we're going to that you are want to build in order to um see if you can actually uh put this on. And this part is called prototyping. Okay? When you are mocking up, when you are creating these different prototypes, this these different versions or what we call also the minimum viable product uh MVP and this is part of creating these mockups and these different possibilities that your solution in the end can become um that you put the ideas that you brainstorm into practice. Okay. Then the final part of this is testing is the testing phase because okay in in your opinion and in your humble opinion when you are developing these ideas you may think that okay this is the best idea in

the world this is makes total sense the client will love it but you can only make sure of this when you actually test them out with the end user. Okay. So, this is part of this part is super important as well. The testing part, the going out to the market, uh presenting the solutions to your client, testing them out in real practice. That will help you um uh to put them to put them into into practice and then you launch them, you develop them, you test them, you release them and so on. This, if you realize here in all of these sections um in all of these parts guys, it's a cyclical, okay? cyclical option because since this is an agile an agile methodology it is open to change and is open to okay I learned something new about my client or about the problem that I'm facing so I'm going back to the drawing board I'm going back to one step before and I will brainstorm again new possibilities I will test new prototypes I will uh even combine different ideas

into one last prototype uh uh to put it out into the market okay this is completely okay using design um design thinking methodology. So there is not one particular step one waterfall method. Okay, the classical project management using waterfall it's not applicable here because uh you are open to test new things go back uh test them again fail and incorporate the findings into the next possible version. Okay.

uh this uh um methodology is uh super focused and related with the divergent and conversion uh convergent method. Basically this means that you are open to swimming in underex um unexplored waters. Okay. Uh you are open to diverge your thinking and open up possibilities of a solution and you're not stuck inside two walls. Okay. The whole observation empath empathy uh and the ideation process are related with this because it allows you to open your mind and poss and propose and think about different solutions that can help uh to fix that specific problem. Okay? And it's all about this diversion and then conversion. Okay? Because in each of these phases if you realize you have to filter then the ideas or you will test them and some of them you will discard them and you will get a smaller amount of ideas or features or uh problems that your customer maybe is having. Okay guys, so it's all about these diversion

and conversion diversion and conversion um in terms of sense making of exactly what you are building for. Um yeah as as I said previously as well this is a collaborative work. Um this process is supposedly done with different peoples and of course it is in a 80s iterative process. Okay a cyclical pro uh process where it's no problem of going back one step and trying it again.

Okay we have the classical design jobs as well. So I just want to mention them uh with the UX strategic designer and then the U uh the UI okay the user experience part or the user interface designer. Yeah the user experience basically they support the product owner um by applying out the design thinking approach focusing on interactions inside the service and user satisfaction with within the customer journey. I think we will talk about this in the future a little bit as well. and the UI. The user interface supports the product owner in the UX designer to create different user interface. Okay. Uh maybe different design sections, different colors, palletes, whatever, [snorts] uh the interaction to be um smoother and for the client to to like it as well.

Okay. Um how to design think? Basically to design think you have uh all of these five different stages that I've also mentioned guys the empathize phase okay um where you are really getting into touch your with your client with your customer um with the person that you are designing for what is their situation surrounding them uh who am I solving this for what are different personas that are doing this what kind of interviews will I do uh and uh then after you gather all this information then you can really define the problem.

Okay, what is the exact problem? What are the challenges and the pain points that are related with this problem? Then again, we go to the next step, the ideation part. What kind of solutions can solve this problem in what in what specific use cases? What is the current priority? And and lastly, of course, you will prototype and test out these different uh solutions and the difference ideas. Okay, you take the ideas, you put you execute them, you put them into practice in building different prototypes and testing them out with the customer. Okay, which one do you prefer?

You can we will see different kind of strategies that you can apply. I will just briefly introduce them because this is a huge topic especially related with the product development guys. Um but uh but yeah uh mockups, storyboards, wireframes, how can I test it now and what will also what is the feedback that I will receive and what is the criteria that I will take in order to analyze uh the findings that I that I uh had with with the end customer and then go or iterate. Okay, then if this makes sense for the client, the client likes it.

Okay, push it forward. This is my solution. or if not, if they are not happy or it didn't work out when you try to test them out, no problem. Let's go back to the drawing board. Let's go back in having new ideas and create new prototypes um and test them out again. Uh it's a as part of the innovation process guys, we've also mentioned this it gathers um it's between innovation as you know is in between these three different things. Okay. Desiraability, viability and feasibility. Desiraability is okay. Is the customer um uh expectations validated with this? Do they really want this? Is this important? They will uh this product will benefit them or not. The feasibility is actually can we build this? Okay. Technical and it's focused on logical thinking. Do I have the tools in order to create this to make uh this product or is this going to cost me

1,00,000, okay, or 1 million euros to to do? Okay, so this is where you actually create a business case and you actually put it into practice. So that's why prototyping is super important important especially in this phase. And then viability. Okay. Um is it viable that I push this into market? Uh is this business-wise viable to me as well? Can I make uh returns on on this specific product or not? Uh what is my differentiation with um considering also other um um other uh players in the market? Okay, there is do I have a a monetization and a revenue uh strategy for this product?

So these are things that go into this viability part and into the critical thinking. Now when to use design thinking? Um in my previous company where when I worked in consultancy guys we you we used to rely on design thinking. Okay I'm going to talk a little bit about my specific experience. We used to really think use design thinking when we didn't have a lot of idea on the customer. Okay. when we were a little bit lost uh with a specific project or with a bid um in an area that we didn't know or we didn't have any background for example we would use design thinking just um as a standard methodology because it's perfect for it okay it allows us to preframe the problem and to define specifically okay uh is this a go or no go project can we actually do this or not okay because uh having this initial idea of understanding the because the

the the client uh providing um uh the initial or the definition of the problem. Okay, especially the initial two phases guys. Um it helps a lot to um to see if we can actually propose something valuable that will uh result in the adoption of the of the project or of the product depending on um the circumstances. Okay. Um and then you have the framing option. You go or no go with the development stage. Um and that's when you actually propose then the MVP the minimum viable product uh that is expected of course at the end of the project.

Um approaches to the definition part and the ideation part. Okay guys uh remember definition is the second phase of design thinking. The first one empathize, the second def define and the third ideiate. Okay. So definition and ideate you start with in-depth revenues okay interviews with have direct contact with the participants you collect firsthand accounts of experiences opinions attitudes and perceptions you shadow you can also shadow and you find uh insights to the participants uh watching them closely in for example an example that we did in my previous company we went to a factory floor and we went there for three three different days and our job only was to take notes and see how the employees would interact with a specific software program. Okay, that was the project that we had back then. Um, so it was kind of shadowing. Okay, seeing what were the actions that the customers did because sometimes people can lie. Okay, you have you have to take this into account as well. People in interviews can say one thing but in real life they

do a different thing. So this is a quite particular um sensitive project uh uh uh problem that you are facing in this in this part of empathizing. Okay guys, you uh shadowing and is shadowing is a really good thing for this because you will actually see people in their day-to-day uh doing things even if they don't tell you face to face that they that they're having a specific problem or not. Uh fly on the wall observation. Okay. by gathering information, looking, listening without direct participation or interference what we did in the factory and of course mystery relying role playing mystery shopper of expering a service or product firsthand to understand the the experience of its customers in this case for example if you're doing a project to a a commerce uh you can just pretend that you are a client uh and gather the experience that you are having u firsthand approach to prototypes. Okay guys, I'm

this is I mean this could be a class for itself. So I'm just giving you some examples of um of different prototype phases. Okay, in the customer journey in terms of observability, okay, people shadowing experience, the wizard of Oz uh sorry the in the brainstorming part in the ideation part you have the six hats methodology the brainstorming world cafe uh mind mapping um analogical exploration mood boards are a list of tools that you guys can use I really guys so these are just the tools that I'm proposing you to use in your formative assignments but there are thousand mores But uh I really guys if you want to give a uh dedicate some time on this because this is the interesting part okay these are the methodologies and the tools that you can use in your day-to-day in your companies are some of them some of these are the examples okay so take a a deep uh a deeper look on

them uh to uh to do lastly uh for the prototype part part the last part of the project uh these are some methodology as well that I find interesting that you guys can use. User-driven prototypes, physical models, okay, roleplaying, uh, storyboards are also an excellent ways of doing this and of testing out the the the different prototypes with your customer. And Wizard of Oz, of course, are prototypes with fake functions, okay, in activity that comes from a human rather than an algorithm or software code. A really good example of this is I think a couple of an entrepreneur from Austria. He wanted to um [snorts] to test out if vending if creating a vending machine that made hot pizzas made sense or not. Okay, so freshlymade pizzas at night. Um, and instead of just wasting thousands of euros in uh in

machinery and in ovens automatized for vending machines, he actually went inside the box or the machine and he was the one cooking it himself. So, uh interesting also strategy for testing a specific function or product without actually building it. Okay. Without having the financial investment to to build it. Um yeah, when prototyping, pay attention to four major considerations. People, objects, locations, and interactions because these factors will of course affect how the prototypes will uh work. Um and what what are the things that you need to observe when you are uh testing them out face to face with your customers um yeah to understand your customer.

Okay, for example, uh this is the the classic uh for uh a type of application for uh dating app. Okay, um this is the general overview that I've also brainstormed myself in order to present you guys. Okay, we have here the personal number one. Uh they are looking for romantic partner. They Google a dating site. Uh then what what is the next action that they will do? They will try the first links the first three links sorry in the Google page. uh they will land on the website or the mobile app first page. Uh they will scroll on the list of profiles. They will filter it. Click the details for profile number one. Go back if they don't like it. Um message try to pro to message the profile if they like it. Of course, request to fill in the uh personal information. Request to choose a subscription formula, pay the formula, and so on. And then you can play around with these different actions. Does it make sense to actually allow people to see first who is dating and then only

ask them for paying or no? Or you want to keep your platform private and are you putting the the the personal information or the payment options first before they can actually see the private information of other people. So in this balancing these are the type of things that you need to balance in the user um story as well guys. Okay. And that I really want you guys to to focus on.

And lastly, also so presenting just some examples of um uh digital tools that can also help you enhance communication collaboration. We got Jira, we got Trello, Asana, Slack are all digital platforms that allow for um practical design thinking implementation. We do them day-to-day in my company and most companies in the world. Okay. using Jira for example or Trello and Slack are I think are the three most popular. Um and all of these platforms make the process really easy uh because it's collaborative, it's digital, all of the team members in your uh in your teams have access to them and uh it's quite uh it's quite simple to to put into practice. Okay guys, uh lastly uh uh just going back a little bit to my initial slide if you want to explore further design thinking became a really world known uh methodology. It was already being used in IDO. Okay. The company that I mentioned of Tim Brown in the beginning

but uh it be it really became um a a major scene uh after nightife's ABC okay program a program from ABC when they presented the IDO solving problem for the for the shopping cart. Okay. It's in it's on YouTube guys and I highly recommend you guys to go search for the shopping cart case study um of IDEO there because there you will be able to see also the design thinking process in in action. Okay, unfortunately we don't have time to cover all of these aspects in super detail. Uh but guys I'm giving you some hints and some tips for you to also explore it in your own. Okay. Um from my side this is it. Thank you very much and I will see you on the next class. Bye guys. Thank you.