What is Design Thinking?
Thinking of a design includes making concepts of designs keeping the consumer’s needs and priorities in mind. It depends upon observation of a designer, how people interact with their environments, hands-on appearance to create innovative solutions.
Why is it called so?
Design thinking is created because on extreme cases big corporation might lack the ability to be creative. So there is a logical reason behind design planning.
What are the 5 stages of design thinking
The process of design thinking can be articulated in five simple steps. Here are they:
To emphathize
To define
To ideate
To prototype
To test
Let’s elaborately explore each of these phases in relation to a practical design process.
Phase 1- Emphasize
Empathy is a critical starting step to succeed as a valuable design thinking solution. It is the first stage of design thinking process that focuses on user-centric research. In order to gain an emphatic understanding to the matter you are trying to solve. Consults experts to know more about areas of concern and conduct observations to engage more users in a moment. To gain a deeper understanding of the matters you may also want to absorb yourself in your user’s physical environment.
It allows design thinkers to put their own assumptions of the world aside and understand the needs of the users. With time you will be able to accumulate adequate information to step into the next stage.
The main goal of this empathy stage is to develop the positive understanding of your users. Try to understand their requirements and solve the problems that underlie the development of the products, services you want to create.
Phase 2 -Define
In this stage you just have to organize the prior gathered information during the empathize stage. Analyze your observations to define the problems you and your team has identified, till time. In a human-centers manner, defining the problem and problem statement must be stated.
To establish features, functions and so on to solve the matter, this stage will help your design team to gather great ideas. It even allows users to resolve issues themselves with minimal difficulties. This phase, you will start to progress to the next level of ideation where you may ask questions to help you look for solutions.
Phase 3- Ideation
Ideation is the third phase of the design thinking process. During this time, designers are ready to generate ideas. As you have already known to understand your users, their needs in the Empathize stage, and you have analyzed your observations in the Define phase to create a user-centric-problem statement; you and your team members can start to look at the problem from various perspectives. This helps you to Ideate innovative solutions to your problems.
There are many hundreds of ideation techniques to be used like Brainstorm, Brainwrite, Worst Possible Idea and SCAMPER.
Brainstorm and Worst Possible Idea techniques are typically used at the beginning of the ideation phase to expand the problem areas. This allows you to incorporate as many ideas as possible at the start of ideation.
You may pick other ideation techniques towards the end of this phase to help you test your ideas because they seem to solve the problem or provide the elements required to avoid it.
Phase 4- Prototype
Prototype phase investigates the key solutions incorporated in the Ideation stage. This prototype can be shared and tested within the team itself with the help of other departments or with a small group of people apart from the design team. During this phase the team produces scaled down versions of the product or feature found within the product.
Being an experimental phase, the aim is to identify the best possible solution for each problem during the first three stages. Here the solutions are implemented within prototypes and they are investigated, accepted, improved or rejected respectively based on the user’s experience, one after the other.
The design team will have a better idea of the product’s limitations and the problems faced. It also clearly states how the users may behave, think and feel while interacting with the end product.
By the end of the Prototype stage, the design team will have a better idea of the product’s limitations and the problems it faces. They’ll also have a clearer view of how real users would behave, think and feel when they interact with the end product.
Phase 5- Test
Designers randomly test the entire product using the best solutions identified in the Prototype phase. This is the final stage of the five-stage model. However, in this process of design thinking, the results generated are used to redefine further problems.
This high level of understanding may help you to test the conditions of use and how people think, behave, and feel towards the product. It even leads you to loop back to the prior stage in the process. Then you may proceed with further iterations by making alterations and refinements to rule alternative solutions.
The ultimate achievement is to get a thorough understanding of the product and the users.
Why is Design Thinking Important?
There are several points to remember:
- It helps in enhancing collaborations
- It helps in Brainstorming
- It also helps in taking creative challenges
- It is user-focused
- It meets client needs
- Improves knowledge
- It helps in enhancing collaborations
Without collaboration no design could be complete. It requires effort and inspiration from all sources and needs participation of the entire team. With a design thinking strategy, you may approach all the challenges of a business.
The design strategy may encourage people to think out of the box and develop innovative techniques to improve.
- It helps in Brainstorming
Design thinking also involves designing products and services while re-thinking could be improved. Random testing of ideas and concepts could help companies to get big breakthroughs and implement better ways of doing things.
It prevents companies from investing both time and money into solutions that accelerate their efficiency.
- It also helps in taking creative challenges
It helps you to analyze creative challenges from various perspectives. Brainstorming lets your designers create output with fresh ideas that expands the visitor’s knowledge.
It also lets them work with collaboration and deliver enhanced designing to customers.
- It is user focused
Design thinking is beneficial as it is aimed at the user. Understanding the requirements of the target audience is a prime factor to develop new technologies or a new management solution. - It meets client needs
Initially, the understanding of the client’s requirements allows you to meet their needs in the process of design. Design thinking requires multiple rounds of testing and working on customer feedback, you will be able to deliver your products to your customers. - Improves knowledge
The process of design thinking involves evaluations and analyses. Apart from it, the process is constant and does not stop even after the complete delivery.
Companies measure the results based on the received feedback and assures the customers with the best experience using the product.
How can we help you?
Shirsendu.com, a professional website design company in Kolkata, tries to achieve success by a concrete set of design thinking. We follow the above rules and try to incorporate all possible information to meet the needs of our preferred customers.
We value the look and feel of the entire display of your business. If the design thinking is on the right track no business will be delayed to succeed.
Our number of freelance web designers and other co-workers join hand in hand to grow your business.
So, no need to be puzzled.