This is a well written article addressing the number one problem I face as I consult with nonprofits of every shape and size: the “this-is-the-way-we’ve-always-done-it syndrome”. Many nonprofits think that remaining true to their founding vision means static inspiration, ideation and implementation. Developing a design thinking culture makes perfect sense, but how do you do that? How can an organization shift it’s long-held operating culture to one of design thinking? As a consultant, I engage my clients in design thinking all the time (and they are thrilled because of it) but I need to teach them how to do it. Where can I find this “Toolkit for Design Thinking”?
Something I`ve developed based on my own need to try and get other people on-board with a design/systems thinking approach is to think of this approach as the development of thought processes or arts. Art is both intuitive and technique driven. We believe there is a solution, but we don’t know in advance what it is. We need ways of thinking and acting that help us understand where the solution lies and what form it might take. This is very different than pushing our existing systems harder to squeeze a bit more out of them.
I think that innovations like Kiva.org represent a convergence of needs, solution elements, and willing actors. Kiva wasn’t a case of someone trying to do fundraising for charity - they simply went at the age-old poverty issue from a very different and under-served angle. As the article suggests via IDEO and others, we can learn to prototype (even if we don’t build ‘thinks’), we can learn the habits of mind that deepen creativity (because creativity doesn’t just magically appear, it can be nurtured and learned). I’ve prototyped a short book that explores some of these things - what I call Ingenuity Arts - as a way of formalizing for myself the non-linear thinking that I need to keep working on. It is about rationality without rationalism - analysis without the reductionism that is so rampant.
We need to be rich in the ingredients that lead to solutions rather than being burdened by formulas that no longer work. I’d be interested in hearing what other people are doing in trying to build design thinking ideas into their work. Thanks for the article. Well worth a read. The IDEO toolkit is also very useful for getting past roadblocks personally and with teams.
As a change agent, I often bear witness to emotional blockages to change. I see this as a challenge at this time in design history as one to engage.
Our ability as affective communicators will be the pivot point to bring design thinking to the fore. I believe as designers we are now required to up our Emotional Intelligence as we never have before. In helping change the way the world thinks, we are at the very deepest level asking them to change a huge part of who they are. We are being required to develop trust at new levels. We are required to face fear, anger and despair at the deepest levels as we seek solutions to our greatest problems as a global community.
Being able to understand and respect the deep emotions that are associated with a problem, we will be able to bring teams of peole together to overcome them with a greater sense of connection to each other.
Facing emotion will help as as designers to lead individuals and groups to overcome issues and problems that are often embedded deeply into a community.
Daniel Goldman’s work in Emotional and Social Intelligence, I believe should be standards on our design book shelves. As we lead, we must be tuned to the emotional needs of not only the users we are solving for , but also the team that is working to solve the problem. As we understand the power of emotion in relationships, we will tap into ever deeper sources of creativity and clarity.
Design thinking can be applied to public policy infrastructure, too. See the work being done by Education|Evolving (http://www.educationevolving.org). This group’s entire approach is design-based. They are responsible for changes in policy frameworks that increase the possibility for innovation in K-12.
This is a great article that includes some references to other organizations that I look forward to exploring further. I would argue that increasing transparency in the design process can lead to even further ‘buy-in’ and hold all stakeholders in the design process to be accountable for any decisions that are made. Remember, there are some solid arguments out there AGAINST participation (for example, “Participation, The New Tyranny” which not only has the most hilariously titled book ever, but also outlines reasonable rationale for why participatory design processes are often as corrupt as any other, or more so). Innovative transparency within these innovative design processes will only make them stronger. I am on the board of a non-profit in Kalamazoo, MI that is utilizing many of the practices outlined above with the goal of local sustainable development that leads to local structural impacts. It’s called The I.D.E.A. Association (Interdisciplinary Development through Education and Art). We’d love any feedback from the professionals on this issue.
This is indeed a great article and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Working in an European context it is highly interesting and inspiring to read these experiences. The design thinking process is very similar to the process developed by Index: design to improve social living - I am interested in sharing experiences in how to ensure the educational system can support, facilitate and enhance the skills of the T-shaped person.
Enjoyed the article - thanks. I am from the world of education and am strong believer that we need to have far more design thinking in the curriculum. I have always felt that the dominance of Inquiry thinking is not a good reflection of the “real world” at all. Many educators seem to think that if we teach more Inquiry we will be somehow addressing everything about problem solving - NOT!
I once heard it said that “Over 90% of life’s real problems cannot be solved by logic alone.” (E. do Bono) so where in schools do we follow an approach to help students understand the 90%? Design thinking is a great way to do that. Not just appearing within the Arts but throughout the curriculum.
Inquiry feeds the need to know, the why and our curiosity; design thinking feeds the need to figure out how and our creative needs. They use the same the thinking tools but with a different focus, in a different order and with a different emphasis. I feel that if we focus more on the acceptability of the solutions we can see this more clearly.
There is a whole spectrum of problem solving processes (or as I prefer to think of them, solution seeking processes that include opportunity development - “positive problem solving”?) depending on the acceptable solution but there are two “families” as I view it - those closer to being dominated by Logic and those being dominated by Perception. I won’t dwell on that point but happy to explain more if anyone is interested.
In education there is a strong belief in Teacher as Researcher; surely there is a need for Teacher as Designer? They live the process every day as they design curriculum activities so why not teach student’s the same techniques? Having developed a framework a while ago to foster this concept and having had an opportunity to develop it with teachers, I know it can be done. It just seems that the world of academia is not the most conducive conduit for creativity of this kind!
Great work - as a former development worker in the NGO/UN community I have converted to design promotion and solution orientation. One should think that development worker looked for innovation all day to solve the problems but during the 90’s it was such a conservative bunch and there are still great resistance in using the peoples information and needs to create workable solutions.
We use industrial and service design to create solutions within sanitation. For the last 20 years in Sub Saharan Africa there has been no progress - after such results it should be time to look for new ways to solve the crisis killing millions of kids every year.
Keep ut and join the design thinking and remember you don’t have to be a designer yourself to be creative…
We have been working at the Taproot Foundation recently with a former IDEO consultant and the impact of design thinking has been really remarkable. Interestingly, it may be that this approach is more common in nonprofits who don’t have the funds to do large sample research and instead depend on working directly with a small number of users on program design. They also have lower capital costs for launching new efforts so there is more room for experimentation. It is lower cost and more aligned with the human-centric nature of nonprofit organizations and their programs.
It is also seems likely that nonprofits that embrace this thinking do it more holistically while many companies only do it in a silo or to check off their “innovation” activitity for the year. As a result, ten years from now we might actually look back and see that the nonprofit sector is the leader in this field and the one teaching corporations how to do it right.
Quite surprised by the absence of one word in particular that I would imagine sits in the top drawer of IDEO’s design thinking toolkit: analogy. Analogical thinking, or conceptual transfer, is essentially the core mechanism for innovation within diverse interdisciplinary groups, and is also an extremely effective way to re-conceptualize and translate ideas from one discipline to another, creating both empathy and creative breakthroughs at the same time. Design thinking not only lets social organizations approach problems in new ways, it also lets them enhance and unleash collaboration within their own ranks in new and exciting ways.
** Just realized my first comment may have sounded a tad arrogant - it really was a brilliant article, and is certainly making the rounds ‘round the interwebs. Does anyone know if/where this conversation is happening on other sites or boards? It definitely needs to continue…
Very interesting article, though the underlying concepts applicable to nonprofits aren’t really that novel. Essentially the authors are describing the process of conducting a formative evaluation, which is concerned with (among other things) how participants interact with the planned intervention to identify barriers to full dosing.
Interesting how Tim Brown is applying the design thinking approach to the nonprofit sector and social entrepreneurship. - I think that the real benefit of applying design thinking in social innovations is the up-scaling effect. By engaging people through design thinking process you will get a very powerful group of people for the implementation. Design thinking is at the same time about involvement, empowerment and engagement. All the driving forces we need for the change.
I am the founder of the Empathy Surplus Campaign, a non-profit organization in Ohio, dedicated to expanding freedom by promoting strong, empathetic grassroots participation in county party central / executive committees by encouraging responsibility for ourselves, and others. Elected precinct representatives are encouraged to facilitate civil discourse among constituents to identify strong, empathetic and responsible public policy directions, organizing grassroots support of those policy directions and electing public servants to implement those policy directions.
As I read through this article about “design thinking,” what strikes me is I suspect I am in the first stage, the inspiration stage.
This is not a surprise. What is great about this article and this game is I discovered there is a process for what I’m trying to do, which is to build on Thomas Jefferson’s idea of wards or precincts as those “little republics” where neighbors get together to govern themselves.
I need more people involved, but not just warm bodies. I need the kind of social innovators Urgent Evoke is also seeking.
A challenge and a strength is that I am living into this process by hosting weekly and monthly meetings. Our weekly meetings are places to get to know people better. Our monthly meeting is a place to hear speakers and encourage people to come.
I work for a not for profit organisation in education and am keen to hear more about your views on applying design thinking to teaching. Would you be able to contact me on zahmoh @ gmail.com ?
On the mosquito net in Africa, we think the numbers from WHO are wrong. There is no major evidence that shows that it works. The problem in this design process is focusing on effects, instead of cause. We have people living in Africa that suffer the worst of malaria, yet the WHO increasingly publishes very deceptive numbers.
The aids model in Africa is flawed and there is nothing that will save it until the aid agencies stop manipulating African markets with dumping of nets and likes. More than 80% of mosquito net companies collapsed in Africa because of the WHO program. Now, we cannot see the nets as the WHO has run short of funds. Immediately, the cycle is back and people are dying because the evolving small sector of making nets has been carefully destroyed by WHO.
We are tired of this aids program in Africa and it is time it stops. WHO is not helping because our effort to create a sustainable and not begging solution is destroyed by free things that work for a few seasons. Imagine people that invested in making nets; now there is no business. Even the distributors cannot make money because governments give them free. But the worst, there is no net.
I have been involved with the Stanford Design for Extreme Affordability Program lead by David Kelly and Jim Patell for almost 10 years now. A wonderful part of the program for me is being involved in the students process of learning how to apply their design idea to the market they are serving. Your article mentions an excellent example of this with Kara Pecknold, who took an internship with a women’s cooperative in Rwanda. Her task was to develop a Web site to connect rural Rwandan weavers with the world. Pecknold soon discovered that the weavers had little or no access to computers and the Internet….
The single biggest reason that most technologies for developing countries never reach scale is that nobody seems to know how to design for the market. Over the past 30 years, I’ve looked at hundreds of technologies for developing countries. Some provided elegant solutions for challenging technical problems. Some were big and clumsy. Some were far too expensive. Some of were beautifully simple and radically affordable. But only a handful were capable of reaching a million or more customers who live on less than two dollars a day.
If you succeed, against all odds, in designing a transformative radically affordable technology, you still have addressed only 25 % of the problem. The other 75% is marketing it effectively, which requires designing and implementing an effective branding, mass marketing and last mile distribution strategy.
I have been blogging about this for the last couple of weeks. This week I look at more advanced ideas for Design for the Market which may be of interest to you.
Fantastic arguments throughout. This is exactly what I try to explain to my own web viewers. That needs should ultimately inform design. Affordability is also a major factor obviously, but it all boils down to same basic issues.
Interesting how Tim Brown is applying the design thinking approach to the nonprofit sector and social entrepreneurship. - I think that the real benefit of applying design thinking in social innovations is the up-scaling effect. By engaging people through design thinking process you will get a very powerful group of people for the implementation. Design thinking is at the same time about involvement, empowerment and engagement. All the driving forces we need for the change.
I am really enjoying seeing “design” having a more central role in how people go about their lives and work. It seems indicative of a larger shift from form and tradition, beyond goals and excellence, to process and meaning. As the world becomes more complex, our ability to handle complexity necessitates the development of new tools and ways of seeing the world. Social technologies (the real software, not the hardware!) are developing, and a design perspective and approach can only help make them better.
IDEO,
Putting a bunch of designers on a project, designers who are not working closely with the recipients of the system/technology and not making an indepth effort to understand the process they had to manage just isn’t going to work. Or it could work as part of a very iterative, ergo expensive, process.
I’m thinking of IDEO’s work on a particular project.
Maybe it’s “People/Places/Processes Thinking” not “Design Thinking.”
I am going to try and make myself visible through the obvious spam on this page and provide some relative commentary. I found this article at a pristine time as I have just begun to look in to a project that started at Burning Man called The Flutter Tunnel. Artist Bland Hoke was commissioned for the project and created a solar powered art display with contributions going towards social change in third world countries. I know that the New School at Parsons recently created a program for these kind of ‘artists’ and I am looking forward to seeing the developments. Here is a link to the flutter tunnel project: http://www.fluttertunnel.com/riley/flutter-blog.html
Working with the team of IDEO was an amazing experience during my stint as Sales Innovations Manager at VisionSpring. In fact, IDEO took team VisionSpring through a systematic process of ideation and implementation to achieve our objectve of exploring various means to cater to the young customers in need of eye-glasses.The Human Centred Design was a great tool which helped us follow a specific process in actually translating innovation into a system, process or strategy.
The Human Centred Design and the various concepts of IDEO has much wider scope extending beyond the realms of innovative social enterprises!
This is a great read! Really appreciate the work and philosophy of IDEO. We can definitely use the points raised in the article for future endeavors with non profits here in Africa.
I’m truly enjoying the design and layout of your blog. It’s a very easy on the eyes which makes it
much more enjoyable for me to come here and visit more often.
Did you hire out a designer to create your theme? Superb work!
Hi there! Someone in my Facebook group shared this site with us so I came to check it out.
I’m definitely enjoying the information. I’m bookmarking
and will be tweeting this to my followers! Outstanding blog and wonderful
style and design.
The “Design Thinking” is truly an innovative approach that can be applied to any task by leveraging on the variety of culture, background and expertise of the people you work with. This requires emotional, social and cultural intelligence. It takes an open-mind and a collaborative attitude to build on the ideas of others instead of sticking to the traditional ways of doing things. The academe will benefit a lot with this approach. It is time for us to tailor fit our curricula and make it more empathetic to the learning needs of the students to substantially equip them to the ever changing and competitive industries that they will be working for.
Amazing justifications throughout. This is exactly what I try to describe to my own web audiences. That needs should eventually notify style. Budget is also a significant component obviously, but it all depends upon same primary problems.
We need to be loaded with the components that cause to alternatives rather than being overwhelmed by treatments that not perform. I’d be enthusiastic about listening to what other people are doing in trying to develop style considering concepts into their perform. Thanks for the content. Well value a study. The IDEO tool set is also very useful for getting previous hurdles individually and with groups. source: http://www.finacialmagazine.org
My name is Irak López and I am the Director of the mexican e-Government Magazine PUNTOGOB (http://www.puntogob.mx).
Our next number is about Innovation and we liked very much your article “Design Thinking for Social Innovation”
So, we want to ask you if we can publish the article in PUNTOGOB (with corresponding credits).
this is a well -knitted discussion on the three perspectives of ‘Design Thinking’. Inspiration aims at getting more interest on that venture and ideation maps the plan how to reach the solution and Implementation relies on the practical activities relating to the outcomes of the social ventures.
I have enjoyed reading the article even though it has been written almost a decade ago.
I have just started a course Introduction to human centered design and this has been the first eye opening article.
this content subject help to learn more about this approach concerning design thinking ,in addition to that ,it can help someone to find out the solution to the problem in society especially for young entrepreneurs in Rwanda
I am very new to design thinking process. Can someone kindly explain what design thinking tools are? how and where to use them? I would really appreciate. Thanks.
COMMENTS
BY Tom Moucka
ON November 19, 2009 07:36 PM
This is a well written article addressing the number one problem I face as I consult with nonprofits of every shape and size: the “this-is-the-way-we’ve-always-done-it syndrome”. Many nonprofits think that remaining true to their founding vision means static inspiration, ideation and implementation. Developing a design thinking culture makes perfect sense, but how do you do that? How can an organization shift it’s long-held operating culture to one of design thinking? As a consultant, I engage my clients in design thinking all the time (and they are thrilled because of it) but I need to teach them how to do it. Where can I find this “Toolkit for Design Thinking”?
BY Jo
ON November 19, 2009 08:11 PM
I found it at http://www.ideo.com/work/item/human-centered-design-toolkit/
BY IngenuityArts
ON November 20, 2009 03:14 PM
Something I`ve developed based on my own need to try and get other people on-board with a design/systems thinking approach is to think of this approach as the development of thought processes or arts. Art is both intuitive and technique driven. We believe there is a solution, but we don’t know in advance what it is. We need ways of thinking and acting that help us understand where the solution lies and what form it might take. This is very different than pushing our existing systems harder to squeeze a bit more out of them.
I think that innovations like Kiva.org represent a convergence of needs, solution elements, and willing actors. Kiva wasn’t a case of someone trying to do fundraising for charity - they simply went at the age-old poverty issue from a very different and under-served angle. As the article suggests via IDEO and others, we can learn to prototype (even if we don’t build ‘thinks’), we can learn the habits of mind that deepen creativity (because creativity doesn’t just magically appear, it can be nurtured and learned). I’ve prototyped a short book that explores some of these things - what I call Ingenuity Arts - as a way of formalizing for myself the non-linear thinking that I need to keep working on. It is about rationality without rationalism - analysis without the reductionism that is so rampant.
We need to be rich in the ingredients that lead to solutions rather than being burdened by formulas that no longer work. I’d be interested in hearing what other people are doing in trying to build design thinking ideas into their work. Thanks for the article. Well worth a read. The IDEO toolkit is also very useful for getting past roadblocks personally and with teams.
BY Florence Haridan
ON November 23, 2009 01:53 PM
As a change agent, I often bear witness to emotional blockages to change. I see this as a challenge at this time in design history as one to engage.
Our ability as affective communicators will be the pivot point to bring design thinking to the fore. I believe as designers we are now required to up our Emotional Intelligence as we never have before. In helping change the way the world thinks, we are at the very deepest level asking them to change a huge part of who they are. We are being required to develop trust at new levels. We are required to face fear, anger and despair at the deepest levels as we seek solutions to our greatest problems as a global community.
Being able to understand and respect the deep emotions that are associated with a problem, we will be able to bring teams of peole together to overcome them with a greater sense of connection to each other.
Facing emotion will help as as designers to lead individuals and groups to overcome issues and problems that are often embedded deeply into a community.
Daniel Goldman’s work in Emotional and Social Intelligence, I believe should be standards on our design book shelves. As we lead, we must be tuned to the emotional needs of not only the users we are solving for , but also the team that is working to solve the problem. As we understand the power of emotion in relationships, we will tap into ever deeper sources of creativity and clarity.
BY Kim Farris-Berg
ON November 23, 2009 10:37 PM
Design thinking can be applied to public policy infrastructure, too. See the work being done by Education|Evolving (http://www.educationevolving.org). This group’s entire approach is design-based. They are responsible for changes in policy frameworks that increase the possibility for innovation in K-12.
BY Matthew Lechel
ON November 24, 2009 07:21 AM
This is a great article that includes some references to other organizations that I look forward to exploring further. I would argue that increasing transparency in the design process can lead to even further ‘buy-in’ and hold all stakeholders in the design process to be accountable for any decisions that are made. Remember, there are some solid arguments out there AGAINST participation (for example, “Participation, The New Tyranny” which not only has the most hilariously titled book ever, but also outlines reasonable rationale for why participatory design processes are often as corrupt as any other, or more so). Innovative transparency within these innovative design processes will only make them stronger. I am on the board of a non-profit in Kalamazoo, MI that is utilizing many of the practices outlined above with the goal of local sustainable development that leads to local structural impacts. It’s called The I.D.E.A. Association (Interdisciplinary Development through Education and Art). We’d love any feedback from the professionals on this issue.
BY pernille berg
ON November 24, 2009 04:26 PM
This is indeed a great article and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Working in an European context it is highly interesting and inspiring to read these experiences. The design thinking process is very similar to the process developed by Index: design to improve social living - I am interested in sharing experiences in how to ensure the educational system can support, facilitate and enhance the skills of the T-shaped person.
BY Abhijit Shirsath
ON November 24, 2009 11:33 PM
really great idea! this will help society and people to make life simple
BY Geoff Day
ON November 26, 2009 07:26 AM
Enjoyed the article - thanks. I am from the world of education and am strong believer that we need to have far more design thinking in the curriculum. I have always felt that the dominance of Inquiry thinking is not a good reflection of the “real world” at all. Many educators seem to think that if we teach more Inquiry we will be somehow addressing everything about problem solving - NOT!
I once heard it said that “Over 90% of life’s real problems cannot be solved by logic alone.” (E. do Bono) so where in schools do we follow an approach to help students understand the 90%? Design thinking is a great way to do that. Not just appearing within the Arts but throughout the curriculum.
Inquiry feeds the need to know, the why and our curiosity; design thinking feeds the need to figure out how and our creative needs. They use the same the thinking tools but with a different focus, in a different order and with a different emphasis. I feel that if we focus more on the acceptability of the solutions we can see this more clearly.
There is a whole spectrum of problem solving processes (or as I prefer to think of them, solution seeking processes that include opportunity development - “positive problem solving”?) depending on the acceptable solution but there are two “families” as I view it - those closer to being dominated by Logic and those being dominated by Perception. I won’t dwell on that point but happy to explain more if anyone is interested.
In education there is a strong belief in Teacher as Researcher; surely there is a need for Teacher as Designer? They live the process every day as they design curriculum activities so why not teach student’s the same techniques? Having developed a framework a while ago to foster this concept and having had an opportunity to develop it with teachers, I know it can be done. It just seems that the world of academia is not the most conducive conduit for creativity of this kind!
BY Karsten Gjefle
ON November 28, 2009 01:34 PM
Great work - as a former development worker in the NGO/UN community I have converted to design promotion and solution orientation. One should think that development worker looked for innovation all day to solve the problems but during the 90’s it was such a conservative bunch and there are still great resistance in using the peoples information and needs to create workable solutions.
We use industrial and service design to create solutions within sanitation. For the last 20 years in Sub Saharan Africa there has been no progress - after such results it should be time to look for new ways to solve the crisis killing millions of kids every year.
Keep ut and join the design thinking and remember you don’t have to be a designer yourself to be creative…
BY Aaron Hurst
ON November 30, 2009 07:59 AM
We have been working at the Taproot Foundation recently with a former IDEO consultant and the impact of design thinking has been really remarkable. Interestingly, it may be that this approach is more common in nonprofits who don’t have the funds to do large sample research and instead depend on working directly with a small number of users on program design. They also have lower capital costs for launching new efforts so there is more room for experimentation. It is lower cost and more aligned with the human-centric nature of nonprofit organizations and their programs.
It is also seems likely that nonprofits that embrace this thinking do it more holistically while many companies only do it in a silo or to check off their “innovation” activitity for the year. As a result, ten years from now we might actually look back and see that the nonprofit sector is the leader in this field and the one teaching corporations how to do it right.
BY Dustin Larimer
ON December 7, 2009 06:05 PM
Quite surprised by the absence of one word in particular that I would imagine sits in the top drawer of IDEO’s design thinking toolkit: analogy. Analogical thinking, or conceptual transfer, is essentially the core mechanism for innovation within diverse interdisciplinary groups, and is also an extremely effective way to re-conceptualize and translate ideas from one discipline to another, creating both empathy and creative breakthroughs at the same time. Design thinking not only lets social organizations approach problems in new ways, it also lets them enhance and unleash collaboration within their own ranks in new and exciting ways.
BY Dustin Larimer
ON December 7, 2009 06:28 PM
** Just realized my first comment may have sounded a tad arrogant - it really was a brilliant article, and is certainly making the rounds ‘round the interwebs. Does anyone know if/where this conversation is happening on other sites or boards? It definitely needs to continue…
BY Mat Despard
ON February 18, 2010 11:36 AM
Very interesting article, though the underlying concepts applicable to nonprofits aren’t really that novel. Essentially the authors are describing the process of conducting a formative evaluation, which is concerned with (among other things) how participants interact with the planned intervention to identify barriers to full dosing.
BY AnneS
ON February 22, 2010 06:28 AM
Interesting how Tim Brown is applying the design thinking approach to the nonprofit sector and social entrepreneurship. - I think that the real benefit of applying design thinking in social innovations is the up-scaling effect. By engaging people through design thinking process you will get a very powerful group of people for the implementation. Design thinking is at the same time about involvement, empowerment and engagement. All the driving forces we need for the change.
BY Chuck Watts
ON March 22, 2010 04:39 AM
I am the founder of the Empathy Surplus Campaign, a non-profit organization in Ohio, dedicated to expanding freedom by promoting strong, empathetic grassroots participation in county party central / executive committees by encouraging responsibility for ourselves, and others. Elected precinct representatives are encouraged to facilitate civil discourse among constituents to identify strong, empathetic and responsible public policy directions, organizing grassroots support of those policy directions and electing public servants to implement those policy directions.
As I read through this article about “design thinking,” what strikes me is I suspect I am in the first stage, the inspiration stage.
This is not a surprise. What is great about this article and this game is I discovered there is a process for what I’m trying to do, which is to build on Thomas Jefferson’s idea of wards or precincts as those “little republics” where neighbors get together to govern themselves.
I need more people involved, but not just warm bodies. I need the kind of social innovators Urgent Evoke is also seeking.
A challenge and a strength is that I am living into this process by hosting weekly and monthly meetings. Our weekly meetings are places to get to know people better. Our monthly meeting is a place to hear speakers and encourage people to come.
I think I will invite others to this game.
BY mohammed.zaheer@teachforallnetwork.org
ON August 6, 2010 03:22 AM
Hi Geoff,
I work for a not for profit organisation in education and am keen to hear more about your views on applying design thinking to teaching. Would you be able to contact me on zahmoh @ gmail.com ?
Many thanks,
Mohammed
p.s. I’m based in London
BY Sam John
ON August 9, 2010 08:06 AM
On the mosquito net in Africa, we think the numbers from WHO are wrong. There is no major evidence that shows that it works. The problem in this design process is focusing on effects, instead of cause. We have people living in Africa that suffer the worst of malaria, yet the WHO increasingly publishes very deceptive numbers.
The aids model in Africa is flawed and there is nothing that will save it until the aid agencies stop manipulating African markets with dumping of nets and likes. More than 80% of mosquito net companies collapsed in Africa because of the WHO program. Now, we cannot see the nets as the WHO has run short of funds. Immediately, the cycle is back and people are dying because the evolving small sector of making nets has been carefully destroyed by WHO.
We are tired of this aids program in Africa and it is time it stops. WHO is not helping because our effort to create a sustainable and not begging solution is destroyed by free things that work for a few seasons. Imagine people that invested in making nets; now there is no business. Even the distributors cannot make money because governments give them free. But the worst, there is no net.
BY Paul Polak
ON September 20, 2010 09:26 AM
Great to read this article.
I have been involved with the Stanford Design for Extreme Affordability Program lead by David Kelly and Jim Patell for almost 10 years now. A wonderful part of the program for me is being involved in the students process of learning how to apply their design idea to the market they are serving. Your article mentions an excellent example of this with Kara Pecknold, who took an internship with a women’s cooperative in Rwanda. Her task was to develop a Web site to connect rural Rwandan weavers with the world. Pecknold soon discovered that the weavers had little or no access to computers and the Internet….
The single biggest reason that most technologies for developing countries never reach scale is that nobody seems to know how to design for the market. Over the past 30 years, I’ve looked at hundreds of technologies for developing countries. Some provided elegant solutions for challenging technical problems. Some were big and clumsy. Some were far too expensive. Some of were beautifully simple and radically affordable. But only a handful were capable of reaching a million or more customers who live on less than two dollars a day.
If you succeed, against all odds, in designing a transformative radically affordable technology, you still have addressed only 25 % of the problem. The other 75% is marketing it effectively, which requires designing and implementing an effective branding, mass marketing and last mile distribution strategy.
I have been blogging about this for the last couple of weeks. This week I look at more advanced ideas for Design for the Market which may be of interest to you.
Thanks.
Paul Polak
BY Alice Johnson
ON January 17, 2011 04:00 PM
Fantastic arguments throughout. This is exactly what I try to explain to my own web viewers. That needs should ultimately inform design. Affordability is also a major factor obviously, but it all boils down to same basic issues.
Interesting how Tim Brown is applying the design thinking approach to the nonprofit sector and social entrepreneurship. - I think that the real benefit of applying design thinking in social innovations is the up-scaling effect. By engaging people through design thinking process you will get a very powerful group of people for the implementation. Design thinking is at the same time about involvement, empowerment and engagement. All the driving forces we need for the change.
Thanks Again,
Alice Johnson
BY Eric Storm
ON February 1, 2011 02:04 PM
I am really enjoying seeing “design” having a more central role in how people go about their lives and work. It seems indicative of a larger shift from form and tradition, beyond goals and excellence, to process and meaning. As the world becomes more complex, our ability to handle complexity necessitates the development of new tools and ways of seeing the world. Social technologies (the real software, not the hardware!) are developing, and a design perspective and approach can only help make them better.
BY Joao Vasconcellos
ON March 3, 2011 09:57 PM
IDEO,
Putting a bunch of designers on a project, designers who are not working closely with the recipients of the system/technology and not making an indepth effort to understand the process they had to manage just isn’t going to work. Or it could work as part of a very iterative, ergo expensive, process.
I’m thinking of IDEO’s work on a particular project.
Maybe it’s “People/Places/Processes Thinking” not “Design Thinking.”
BY Findlay Robertson
ON March 6, 2011 02:18 PM
I am going to try and make myself visible through the obvious spam on this page and provide some relative commentary. I found this article at a pristine time as I have just begun to look in to a project that started at Burning Man called The Flutter Tunnel. Artist Bland Hoke was commissioned for the project and created a solar powered art display with contributions going towards social change in third world countries. I know that the New School at Parsons recently created a program for these kind of ‘artists’ and I am looking forward to seeing the developments. Here is a link to the flutter tunnel project: http://www.fluttertunnel.com/riley/flutter-blog.html
BY Anitha Gopalan
ON March 21, 2011 12:02 PM
Working with the team of IDEO was an amazing experience during my stint as Sales Innovations Manager at VisionSpring. In fact, IDEO took team VisionSpring through a systematic process of ideation and implementation to achieve our objectve of exploring various means to cater to the young customers in need of eye-glasses.The Human Centred Design was a great tool which helped us follow a specific process in actually translating innovation into a system, process or strategy.
The Human Centred Design and the various concepts of IDEO has much wider scope extending beyond the realms of innovative social enterprises!
BY Kirsten Sims
ON January 5, 2012 01:01 PM
I hope that everyone everywhere reads this article.
BY Thomas
ON August 28, 2012 04:39 AM
This is a great read! Really appreciate the work and philosophy of IDEO. We can definitely use the points raised in the article for future endeavors with non profits here in Africa.
BY Elisabeth
ON October 5, 2012 07:22 AM
I’m truly enjoying the design and layout of your blog. It’s a very easy on the eyes which makes it
much more enjoyable for me to come here and visit more often.
Did you hire out a designer to create your theme? Superb work!
BY Mohammed
ON July 18, 2013 11:58 AM
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I’m definitely enjoying the information. I’m bookmarking
and will be tweeting this to my followers! Outstanding blog and wonderful
style and design.
BY Judelaine Ramirez Catalano
ON July 30, 2014 08:04 AM
The “Design Thinking” is truly an innovative approach that can be applied to any task by leveraging on the variety of culture, background and expertise of the people you work with. This requires emotional, social and cultural intelligence. It takes an open-mind and a collaborative attitude to build on the ideas of others instead of sticking to the traditional ways of doing things. The academe will benefit a lot with this approach. It is time for us to tailor fit our curricula and make it more empathetic to the learning needs of the students to substantially equip them to the ever changing and competitive industries that they will be working for.
BY Radu
ON September 29, 2014 12:56 PM
I wish that everyone everywhere flows this content.
BY Emi
ON September 29, 2014 12:58 PM
Amazing justifications throughout. This is exactly what I try to describe to my own web audiences. That needs should eventually notify style. Budget is also a significant component obviously, but it all depends upon same primary problems.
BY Lauren
ON September 29, 2014 12:59 PM
We need to be loaded with the components that cause to alternatives rather than being overwhelmed by treatments that not perform. I’d be enthusiastic about listening to what other people are doing in trying to develop style considering concepts into their perform. Thanks for the content. Well value a study. The IDEO tool set is also very useful for getting previous hurdles individually and with groups. source: http://www.finacialmagazine.org
BY IRAK LOPEZ DAVILA
ON March 16, 2015 11:07 PM
Hello!
My name is Irak López and I am the Director of the mexican e-Government Magazine PUNTOGOB (http://www.puntogob.mx).
Our next number is about Innovation and we liked very much your article “Design Thinking for Social Innovation”
So, we want to ask you if we can publish the article in PUNTOGOB (with corresponding credits).
Thank you very much.
Best regards.
Irak
BY Deb Proshad Halder
ON November 22, 2018 12:47 AM
this is a well -knitted discussion on the three perspectives of ‘Design Thinking’. Inspiration aims at getting more interest on that venture and ideation maps the plan how to reach the solution and Implementation relies on the practical activities relating to the outcomes of the social ventures.
BY Lameck Luwanda
ON May 13, 2019 02:15 PM
I have enjoyed reading the article even though it has been written almost a decade ago.
I have just started a course Introduction to human centered design and this has been the first eye opening article.
BY JEROMEUMUHIRE
ON November 21, 2019 07:45 AM
this content subject help to learn more about this approach concerning design thinking ,in addition to that ,it can help someone to find out the solution to the problem in society especially for young entrepreneurs in Rwanda
BY Manikanta
ON June 11, 2020 05:38 AM
I am very new to design thinking process. Can someone kindly explain what design thinking tools are? how and where to use them? I would really appreciate. Thanks.