Category: Design Thinking
“Two heads are better than one.” — John Heywood The organizations that Thomas Lockwood and I researched were not bound by the limitations of their structure or the defined roles people find themselves in. Rather, they invite inclusion, and bring together diverse groups and parties to collaboratively produce mutually benefitting and jointly valued outcomes.…
In our book, Innovation by Design, Thomas Lockwood and I identified 10 attributes that give remarkable power to the human-centered aspects of design thinking organizations. Curious confrontation, that is, facing differing ideas and mindsets with the desire to investigate and learn, is one of these aspects. Throughout our research we found this attribute to be…
One of the culture keys, and a cornerstone to how people interpret culture, is how disagreement and team conflict are managed. It has a great deal to do with how people feel safe in a culture, including their experience of what is acceptable and safe behavior, and what is considered unacceptable and unsafe. More than…
Part Four: Awareness Design, The Fifth Order Over the past two decades, and with the furthering of social media, our business environment has evolved into one in which the relationships between companies and their customers are becoming more open and interlinked. With the acceleration of changes in technology that advance our capability to communicate and…
Part Three: Designing Loyalty to Brands A goal of any product or service is for the customer to emotionally identify with its brand and, as a result, for the customer to trust enough in their experience that they are willing to continue to buy and use it into the future. Furthermore, the aim is that…
Part Two: Designing Customer Happiness What makes for a happy customer experience? How can you better design a user experience that evokes happiness? What are the key elements you need to consider? There’s a broad set of influences and circumstances that are part of every customer experience. At face value, these elements fall into two…
Part One: Perspectives of Empathy In this week’s blog, whether you’re a novice or experienced user of design thinking, I invite you to begin exploring how you can better understand the human experience and use design thinking to design and deliver great customer experiences, as well as apply it to solve the most complex of…
As we unfold the new calendar year, I’d like to begin by focusing on how leaders and their organizations and teams can be more innovative in taking on the challenges that lie ahead. Design guru Thomas Lockwood and I dedicated a great deal of the last two years to researching and defining the makeup…
Culture informs people how to individually and collectively achieve success, and to understand what is acceptable and unacceptable behavior. As a result, it is at the core of how people come together to innovate. That being said, how does a leader assess and understand the culture of their organization enough to know what its sources…
One of the essential characteristics of creative and highly innovative cultures is their ability to recognize and leverage conflict. Granted, for any organization or team, one of the greatest challenges it faces is how to effectively manage competing interests, differing views, disagreement, and multiple mindsets, all of which are natural sources of conflict. However, when…
