Industrial design has traditionally focused on late-stage product development and solutions, with designers trained to generate visual ideas and test products independently. In contrast, design thinking engages designers earlier in the process to frame problems through user research and concept development with an emphasis on teamwork, facilitation skills, and a user-centered approach using shared mindsets and language.

1. Industrial Design ≠ Design Thinking
Traditionally engage in late phases of
product development (after R&D and
strategic decision making)
focused on the solution
e.g product development, gestalt
professionally trained (8.000h +)
traditionally focused on expressing
themselves visually, idea generation,
product-user-testing
high ambiguity tolerance,
creative confidence, no process
needs to engage with diverse experts,
little formal team process, can work
autonomous
user, technology and/or meaning centered
Ingo Rauth, 2017, http://www.ingorauth.com
Engaged early on to do user search
and concepts development
focus on problem framing and rough
concept development
learning by doing
focus on user research, problem
framing and idea development, idea-
user-testing
process as guideline and fallback
team play is a must, some specialize
in facilitation
user-centered
shared mindsets & language

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