1. DMI Transforming Design
Stepping up
Kevin McCullagh
Founder, Plan
08 September 2010

2. Design thinking
Wicked problems / user-driven / inter-disciplinary
iterative / prototyping / failing early

3. The opportunity

4. Stepping up
Why it leaves so many designers cold

5. Stepping up
Why it leaves so many designers cold
Why it’s such a hot topic with business

6. Stepping up
Why it leaves so many designers cold
Why it’s such a hot topic with business
How designers can step up to seize
the opportunity

7. Stepping up
Designers left cold

8. 2009

9. Milan
2009

10. ‘Even turkeys can fly in a tornado’

11. Designers drinking too much
of their own Kool Aid?

12. Milan
2009

13. Milan
2009

14. Fluffy concept

15. Design thinking
An ill-defined notion
Roger Martin
A way of thinking
Tim Brown
Designer’s sensibility and methods

16. Balanced left and right
brain thinking
Analytical
Intuitive

17. Martina Navratilova

18. Designers’ brain

19. Tim Brown
A false distinction
Design
doing
Design
thinking

20. Tim Brown
2008
Design
doing
Design
thinking

21. Tim Brown
2009
Design
Doing
Design
Thinking

22. Design thinking = Design process
tool for managers to tackle a wide range
of business problems
Source: Tim Brown, ‘Design Thinking’,
Harvard Business Review, June 2008

23. Bill Moggridge
New story, old idea
‘ esign thinking is
d
a new story, not
a new process.’
Bill Moggridge, Designerly Thinking:
In conversation with Bill Moggridge, NESTA,
12 June 2007

24. Design thinking
An ill-defined notion
Roger Martin
A way of thinking
Tim Brown
Designer’s sensibility and methods

25. Design thinking
Title
An ill-defined
Sub-heading notion
Roger Martin
A way of thinking
Thinking
Tim Brown
Designer’s sensibility and methods

26. Design thinking
Title
An ill-defined
Sub-heading notion
Roger Martin
A way of thinking
Tim Brown
Designer’s sensibility and methods
Thinking
Designing

27. Helen Walters
Former editor of Design and Innovation,
Bloomberg BusinessWeek
‘ we] need [a] better
[
definition of design thinking,
more widely understood.
[it’s a] Wild west of
interpretation right now.’
Helen Walters, Tweet, 9 March 2010

28. Don Norman
‘ esign thinking
D
is a nonsensical
phrase that
deserves to die’
Don Norman, ‘The Research-Practice Gulf’,
Design Research Conference, 11 May 2010

29. Don Norman
‘ esign thinking is
D
a public relations
term for good, oldfashioned creative
thinking.’
Don Norman, ‘Design Thinking: A useful myth’,
Core77, 25 June 2010

30. Stepping up
Hot topic with business

31. Redesign Business Summit
11-12 March 2010

32. The Big Re-Think
Redesigning business summit
11-12 March 2010
‘
Business leaders
are casting around
for new ideas...
...design thinking
is offering itself
up as one of the
new ideas’
Vijay V Vaitheeswaran, ‘The Big Re-Think:
redesigning business summit’, 11-12 March 2010
Vijay V Vaitheeswaran, Global Correspondent, The Economist

33. Crisis of trust and legitimacy
Richard Fuld, Ex-CEO Lehman Bros

34. Discredited ideas
Efficient markets
High pay = high talent
Shareholder value
Light-touch regulation
The wisdom of crowds

35. The rise of design
Leaders discredited,
designers legitimated
Leaders
Designers

36. Section heading
1987
1997
2007

37. 1987
Margaret Thatcher

38. 1987
Hair

39. 1987

40. 1987
Ford Escort

41. 1987
Newcastle Polytechnic
BA Design for Industry
Design
craftsman
Design
thinker

42. 1987
Design was a cult

43. Section heading
1987
1997
2007

44. 1997
The return of Steve Jobs

45. 1997
New Labour elected

46. 1997
Creative Britain
‘ e can say with
W
pride that Britain is the
“design workshop of
the world” – leading a
creative revolution’
Tony Blair, ‘Britain’s design industry,
Foreign and commonwealth office, 1998

47. 1997
The creative sector
40 million Americans !
Fine art auctions
Advertising
IT services
Music industry
Design
Gallery and museum
attendants

48. 1997
Death of Diana

49. 1997
Emoting

50. 1997
Culture of emotions
A shift from the head to the heart

51. Section heading
1987
1997
2007

52. 2007
Design on TV

53. 2007
Raised aesthetic expectations
‘ he rise of look and
T
feel – aesthetics are a
universal human desire
NOT a luxury’
Virginia Postrel, ‘The Substance of Style’, 2003

54. 2007
Creativity a mass
aspiration

55. 2007
Tim Brown is a big
hit at Davos

56. Stepping up
Stepping up – seizing
the opportunity

57. Cut down on the Kool Aid!

58. Not a magic process
Design Thinking ™
©®

59. New capabilities
Skills + Knowledge
Strategic skills
Facilitation / Corporate perspective / Technical Marketing knowledge
Craft skills
Specification
Prototyping
CAD/DTP
Detailing
Sketching
Creativity
Synthesis
Trends analysis
User research

60. New skills
Different problems require different
specialist knowledge and skills
Strategic skills
Facilitation / Corporate perspective / Technical Marketing knowledge
Craft skills
????
????
Specification
Prototyping
CAD/DTP
Detailing
Sketching
Creativity
Trends analysis
User research

61. Section heading
Foundations
Recent steps
Next steps

62. Foundations
More than stylists
5 levels of design
5
Problem framing
4
Problem solving
3
Functionality
usability
2
Aesthetics
1
Accidental design
Source: adapted from www.bplusd.org

63. Foundations
More than stylists
5
Problem framing
4
Problem solving
3
Functionality
usability
2
Aesthetics
1
Accidental design
Source: adapted from www.bplusd.org
Design

64. Foundations
More than stylists
5
Problem framing
Design thinking
4
Problem solving
3
Functionality
usability
2
Aesthetics
1
Accidental design
Source: adapted from www.bplusd.org
Design

65. Foundations
Cross-silo facilitators
Taking a holistic view as interdisciplinary
translators and bridges between silos
Customer support
Channel
Packaging design
Finance
UX
Product design
Marketing
RD
Designers

66. Foundations
Cross-silo facilitators
Christopher Lorenz envisaged
a bigger role for designers in 1980s
‘ designers good]
[
translators, bridges
and catalysts [between
corporate silos]...
[playing the role of]
facilitator, coordinator,
evaluator and completer.’
Christopher Lorenz, ‘The Design Dimension’, 1986

67. Foundations
Resolving and completing
‘ esign is the best
D
you can do by next
Wednesday!’
Charles Eames

68. Foundations
Basic skills
Creativity
Visualising
Prototyping

69. Foundations
Synthesisers
Christopher Lorenz envisaged
a bigger role for designers in 1980s
‘t is not the mundane skills of
I
sketching, shaping and colouring
which make the industrial
designer such a valuable
resource, but the multi-faceted
ability to contribute to the work of
other disciplines, and to stimulate,
interpret and synthesise it.’
Christopher Lorenz, ‘The Design Dimension’, 1986

70. Foundations
Synthesisers
‘ aser intelligence probes
L
deeply into a topic, but ignores
opportunities to cross-pollinate...
Searchlight intelligence may not
probe as deeply but is always
scanning the environment and
[spotting] connections across
spheres.’
Howard Gardner, ‘Five Minds for the Future’, 2007

71. Foundations
Ambiguity
Tackling fuzzy and multi-dimensional
‘wicked problems’

72. Foundations
Scope
Title
Sub-heading

73. Foundations
Frame
Title
Sub-heading

74. Foundations
Analyse
Title
Sub-heading

75. Foundations
Synthesis
Title
Knitting together disparate information
Sub-heading
into a new and coherent whole

76. Foundations
Editors
Disciplined focus
‘t was about being very focused
I
and not trying to do too much…
the key was getting rid of stuff’
Jonathan Ive quoted in ‘The guts of a new machine’, New York Times,
30 November 2003

77. Foundations
Cultural interpreters
No need to be defensive
about aesthetics
‘ Design is] ‘problem solving
[
in a cultural context’
Ron Arad

78. Foundations
Recent steps
Next steps

79. Recent steps
Better at communicating process

80. Recent steps
User research methods
have been formalised

81. Recent steps
Experience design
A genuinely new and powerful approach

82. Recent steps
Service design
A genuinely new and powerful approach
Trip planning
At airport
In aircraft
Destination

83. Social design

84. Recent steps
Engagement facilitators
‘
those looking for a prescribed
way to implement design
thinking are destined to be
disappointed. It’s a messy,
opaque process that depends
as much on group dynamics as
intellect or insight....the process
was more important than the
product.... the idea is that
people need a way to engage
in multiple places within their
community.’
Helen Walters, ‘Inside the Design Thinking Process’,
Businessweek.com,14 December 2009

85. Foundations
Recent steps
Next steps

86. Next steps
Design needs to raise its game
‘ reativity is not
C
in short supply...
Design no longer
delivers competitive
advantage’
Roberto Verganti, Design-Driven Innovation, 2009

87. Next steps
Design needs take more
of its own medicine
We need to innovate
how we innovate
There is no one size
fits all approach to
innovation
Roberto Verganti

88. Next steps
High quality design is hard
We’re all designers, it’s what
separates us from the apes
‘ esign is not
D
important.
Good design
is important.’
Jonathan Ive, ‘Lessons from America’,
Design Council / HEFCE, September 2006

89. Next steps
More analytical rigour
Balanced left and right
brain thinking
Analytical
Intuitive

90. Next steps
More analytical rigour
Precision over woolliness

91. Next steps
Too much focus on consumers

92. Next steps
Vision
Over insight and empathy
‘ adical innovation
R
does not come
from users...
Designers have
become less visionary.
They have spent the
last 10 years getting
close to consumers
and trying to become
businessmen, and
have lost their visions.’
Roberto Verganti
The Big Re-Think: redesigning business summit
11-12 March 2010

93. Next steps
Consumer needs last
‘ echnology first,
T
invention second,
needs last.’
Don Norman, ‘Technology First, Needs Last’,
interactions.acm.org, March/April 2010

94. Next steps
Foresight
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
‘
Strategy must be created from
the future backwards’
Gary Hamel

95. Next steps
Foresight of interpreters
Consumers
Rear-view mirror outlook
Experts
Professional interpreters of the future

96. Next steps
Design leadership challenge
Balancing Process, Context and Talent
Process
Context
Talent

97. Design thinking
Overly focuses on process
Design thinking
Process
Context
Talent

98. Setting the context is key the
design leadership challenge
Process
Knowledge
Analysis
Foresight
Vision
Context
Talent

99. Underplays the importance
of finding, nurturing and
motivating talent
Design thinking
Process
Context
Talent

100. A new generation of talent
Rachel

101. Thank you
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