What are the Key Elements of Design Thinking?

Introduction

Design language continues to be a critical part of every aspect of social, economic, historical setup made for and around mankind. Even today, in the day and age where technology rules the world, complex problems related to the same require solutions that can be found only through structure and design-centric solutions. As we grow as a species, our ideas and ventures related to tech need to become more humane than mechanical over time. 

We are aware of the impact that technology has had on our day-to-day lives. The tech world has grown exponentially in 2021 and is yet to flourish with the onset of 2022. With this thought in mind, we look to become more and more efficient and effective in design thinking and approach. This implies that instead of leaving the way of design and the art of designing to the intuitive thought patterns and flow of an individual, giving the same process a structure. Designing can thus lead to skill development among those who wish to learn and become better designers. This means that we democratize these skills of making and producing designs for solving actual real-life problems as well.

This article examines the essence of design thinking from its conception, execution, progression, and its prospects. Let’s get cracking!

History

Firstly, let’s learn a bit about how the idea of design thinking came about. The concept of design thinking is relatively recent. The brutal and strict emphasis on critical and logical thinking during the 20th century led to an entire generation being kept in the dark when it came to, let alone the importance of, the very idea of designing and art. This might have worked accordingly for that time, but that same knowledge and pattern of thinking couldn’t work well when Apple was looking to disrupt the market with its revolutionary products.

Industry pioneers like Tim Brown worked on developing ways to introduce design thinking in the mainstream by presenting it in the world of business and tech back in the 1970s. The success of design thinking later led to the establishment of the world-renowned designing and consultation firm IDEO. The firm helped create the world's first usable computer mouse. And also, through the same concept of design thinking, IDEO helped nations in Africa design waste out the food systems and much more. Today, IDEO finds answers to the challenges through their solution in education, food, mobility, and aging. 

What is Design Thinking?

Design thinking. Image source: UX Planet

In the words of Tim Brown, “Design thinking is a human-centered approach to innovation that draws from the designer’s toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology, and the requirements for business success.”

In simple words, design thinking refers to an effective, practical, and solution-driven approach to producing design solutions. As we’ve discussed earlier, design thinking works around building design solutions to real-life practical challenges. It doesn’t always have to be a complex solution. Sometimes the most viable and effective solution lies in the simplest of solutions that get unseen by most people.

Moving forward, we are going to discuss in detail the steps involved in the process of building a design solution. The following are some of the essential key elements of the design thinking process that you need to know about.

Key elements of Design Thinking

           Design thinking illustration. Image source: firstchoicebc.de

1. Process

The process of design thinking encompasses a structured procedure directed by IDEO back when Tim Brown, in the 1970s, coined the term “design thinking.” The process includes 3 phases, namely - Inspiration, Ideation, and Implementation.

• Inspiration 

This phase is all about understanding the problem and framing it appropriately. When we say inspiration, we’re talking about understanding the core issue a community is facing, which may be justifiably addressed. This can be done through surveying people, interviewing individuals, and collecting relevant data with legible consent.

• Ideation

 This phase is all about generating new creative ideas which are solution-oriented. In this phase, a group of people working together on the problem brainstorms on all the ideas everyone has to present. There’s nothing right or wrong when it comes to presenting an idea. Once some of the ideas are shortlisted, the next phase is about working on viable prototypes and testing them with actual users. It is imperative to understand and address the user/community pain points when these prototypes are tested. 

• Implementation 

The final phase in the process includes implementing the final solution and launching it all together. It shall be advantageous to document the story of the complete process and present it to users who are going to use the product. Once the product is launched, it becomes the duty of the team/individual working on the product to gather useful feedback after some time. So an iterative process cycle can be established.

2. Collaboration

A design thinking process is required to have a team/collaborative effort. People from multidisciplinary backgrounds bring forward ideas that are generally a blind spot for someone not from the same background. At the end of the day, the user can be from different ethnic, professional, cultural backgrounds. It can be challenging or even impossible for one person to understand such great diversity. One key element to the collaborative team effort is brainstorming. As discussed before, brainstorming is a crucial part of the ideation phase and thus cannot be ignored. Therefore it becomes foremost to work in a team when designing solutions for a large number of people.

3. Empathy

Design thinking is a human-centered process. When we focus on designing any solution, we target at fixing an issue that is intuitively worked around to please and heal the pain points that the consumer/user is facing in their day-to-day usage of the product/service. When we talk about empathy, it means understanding human emotions, psychology and inducing and feeling the same sentiment. Many successful companies and brands worldwide have become popular and profitable because they invest heavily in marketing research; what people like, what they don’t like, what pleases them the most and so on.  

So whenever we design a product, we remove everyone from the picture and only keep the user at the very core of our process and research, from beginning till the end.

4. Breaking Biases

Now when we talk about biases and breaking biases, it means learning new concepts while at the same time unlearning the old ones. Going through life, knowingly or unknowingly, we develop biases towards people, things, and everything surrounding our world. When one works in a team to develop a solution for people we have never met, it becomes a challenge to collectively assume what they might need. Therefore, it becomes the responsibility of a designer at a personal level to be ready to break old biases about things and try, adapt and learn new concepts that are crucial in producing design solutions. 

5. Iterative process

Each time we create a product service centered around humans or made for people to use in their day-to-day life, it is natural to assume that the solution that works today might not work in the coming times. This time frame can vary from days, months, or years. This is the same reason why we get app updates on our devices. Irrespective of how evolutionary or revolutionary a product is at its first appearance, it tends to change with time in a good way.

Every product that comes as a collaborative effort of design and technology goes through a natural iterative cycle. This simply means that going through the cycle:

DESIGN -> IMPLEMENTATION -> TESTING -> FEEDBACK -> REQUIREMENT ANALYSIS …

This cycle repeats itself over and over again. This complete process typically brings about incremental changes with each cycle. Tweaking things here and there, adding features if the user asks for it, or some changes that become an industry norm, for example, the dark mode features across all applications and system UI, are inevitable.

So these are some of the key elements when we deal with design thinking. As the world evolves and technology advances with time, the requirement for more and more design-centered solutions will soar.

Final thoughts:

As the industry looks for more and more people with aesthetically sound minds, there’s never been a time in the history of humanity where knowledge related to skill development has been more readily available to everyone. As the internet becomes cheap and accessible, the concept of self-education becomes widely popular. Out of innumerable opportunities in the field of design, 3D designing has become a leading industry need. If you are passionate about learning 3D designing with the most creative and easy-to-learn tools, SelfCAD should be the platform for you.

You can learn to design, sketch, model, and render  in just a matter of weeks. Whether you are a beginner or a professional, SelfCAD’s intuitive tools can help you bring your designs to life! You can start your design journey today for no cost on a SelfCAD browser-based designing platform. If you wish to advance and become a professional in 3D designing, selfCAD also provides affordable subscriptions starting at just $11.99 billed annually or go for $14.99/month with no hidden charges. 

---

Enjoy powerful modeling, rendering, and 3D printing tools without the steep learning curve.

Need to learn 3D modeling? Get started with interactive tutorials.