Hey there, I'm Bairagi Sudhin Kumar!
hi, I am student of IST on diploma in computer science, also i am a web designer and electronic expert.
When It Comes to Drupal Website Design, Thinking Mobile First is an Ecommerce Must
Characteristics of a design-thinking leader
- Sees the world in terms of problems and products. Richard Buchanan adopts a broad view of products that includes information, artifacts, activities, services, systems, and environments. All of these can be designed in order to solve specific problems. All of these entities are within the scope of practice of leaders. [5, 6]
- Views self as product. A leader viewing themselves as a product means adopting a designerly approach to their own attitude, behavior, and outlook. Design-thinking leaders iterate on versions of themselves that will lead to exceptional team performance.
- Rigorously cultivates the abilities of a designer—especially empathy and optimism. Tim Brown did an excellent job of identifying the traits of a design thinker, many of which have direct correlations to the tenets outlined in the theory of transformational leadership. Once again, these include: empathy, integrative thinking, optimism, experimentalism and collaboration. [7]“Design-thinking leaders know how to act as a catalyst for creativity.”
- Deeply understands the process of creative problem solving and knows how to act as a catalyst for creativity. Within the creative process, leaders should seek to be conduits, provocateurs, shepherds, and motivators.
- Collaborates and communicates outside of PowerPoint. Design-thinking leaders think of new ways to engage groups, drawing upon methods from books like Gamestorming[8] and Thinkertoys. [9]
- Embraces ambiguity and seeks opportunity to use models and other forms of making to tame chaos and create order. It’s not a new concept that leaders should embrace ambiguity and chaos,[10] but doing this with a design attitude empowers leaders to tame this through designerly activities like modeling, sketching, and storytelling. This is echoed in Jon Kolko’s latest Harvard Business Review article, The Evolution of Design Thinking. [11]
- Prototypes visions, not just products. Prototypes are typically used to test out products in various stages of fidelity in order to get meaningful feedback from stakeholders. Design-thinking leaders should look for ways to prototype and test out different visions for their organization. This could include things like role-playing, or writing magazine articles about the future success of the company. There are always opportunities to “prototype” a more desirable future.
Design thinking is undoubtedly emerging as a hot topic, gaining wider awareness and adoption. These practical qualities of a design-thinking-focused leader will hopefully help you apply this approach in your discipline and practice of leadership.
References
- Richard Buchanan and Victor Margolin, Discovering Design, (University of Chicago Press, 1995); Buchanan, “Design Research and the New Learning”; J
A quick introduction to design thinking
Why design thinking matters
If you’re a designer yourself, you already know why design matters. Alas, we’re seeing such a massive transformation across the business world that it’s worth recapping on why design is such as crucial advantage for modern enterprises – and how companies can get on top of this new trend to deliver more valuable experiences to their customers.
We’ve written before about why business leaders should be investing in design. Today, we thought we’d expand a bit on that to try and understand how design can play a key role in modern corporate environments. Introducing the methodology known as ‘design thinking’.
So what is it? According to Tim Brown, CEO of global innovation and design firm IDEO:
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 other words, it’s a way to approach problems that up until now was perceived as being exclusive to designers – except it’s not. With a ‘designer hat’ on, businesses now can take full advantage of how they can deliver value through the right technology, in a way that propels them to new interesting grounds.
Seems simple in theory, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Nonetheless, there are three key principles that we believe will help businesses get on track with this and embrace design as a core practice. Here we go.
Principle #1. Think ‘how might we?’
These three words seem simple, almost obvious, but according to IDEO CEO Tim Brown they will get everyone aligned when it comes to creative problem solving. In Tim’s words:
‘How’ assumes that solutions exist and provides the creative confidence needed to identify and solve for unmet needs. ‘Might’ says that we can put ideas out there that might work or might not—either way, we’ll learn something useful. ‘We’ signals that we’re going to collaborate and build on each other’s ideas to find creative solutions together.
‘How might we?’ is the best way to start a discussion in a completely positive tone. Sure, there is a problem that needs solving and your team are tasked to solve it, but never forget that design thinking is first and foremost a collective learning exercise in which prototypes and iterations play a key role – but more on that in a minute.
Principle #2. Make it collaborative… to a point
According to PepsiCo’s Chief Design Officer, design is something that’s at the core of any meaningful brand experience. If we consider that successful brand experiences are the result of a company-wide effort, then why shouldn’t design be as well? As Zami Majuqwana, strategist at Wolff Olins,mentioned recently, “design and strategy are friends, not foes”. But there’s a twist.
There is a fantastic overview at The Next Web around why everyone in a company plays, one way or the other, the role of a designer. Among its most interesting conclusions is the idea that design is a collaborative effort… until it’s not. This doesn’t mean that we should continue feeding the ‘lone innovator’ or ‘creative genius’ myths, but rather that when it comes to company-wide creative problem solving it’s important to know at which stage each stakeholder should be involved.
By starting with a broad mindset with many stakeholders but then knowing when to trim both the volume of possible solutions and people involved in actually executing them, companies will be in a much better position to make the best possible use of design to change a real problem. This of course doesn’t mean that design acts in silo – it is, after all, a two-way street – but both from a leadership and ownership point of view it’s indispensable to develop truly innovative solutions. (Ever heard of ‘designs by committee’? Precisely.)
Principle #3. Make prototyping your best friend
Beyond the purely academic definitions of what a prototype is, one of the best we saw came from PepsiCo’s Chief Design Officer profile on Harvard Business Review. In a nutshell, prototypes are tools to better align collective vision around the potential outcomes of a project.
Remember the ‘learning exercise’ point above? That’s where prototypes come in. By starting with a broad scope of possibilities which are trimmed down as the team progresses, prototypes demonstrate in a very tangible way what the current solutions would look like, allowing everyone to discuss around its specifications instead of abstract notions and ideas.
It’s also important to understand that the design thinking methodology requires a lot of trial and error, with iterations along the way. The point is not to get it right at the very first try by magically thinking like a designer, but rather making use of design principles to understand which options are or not viable, and proceeding with the ones that truly add value to the business, the brand and its customers.
Design is everywhere, let’s start thinking like designers
The goal of prototyping isn’t to finish. It is to learn about the strengths and weaknesses of the idea and to identify new directions that further prototypes might take.
We see the same as being true for the goal of design thinking for businesses. It’s particularly hard to nail down the perfect solution by a stroke of brilliance, which leaves the second best option: to rally a group of inter-disciplinary people from your company, empathising with and discussing the problems that need solving, exploring multiple routes on a practical level, learning from them and implementing the solutions that will make the bigger difference.
This is something we’re aiming to help solve with Creative Cloud for Enterprise. Above all, it represents the exciting times we live in – let’s step into the next level of business by thinking like designers.
Rut-Roh! I’m in a Design Rut
How did I know this was a rut? I hadn’t had a monumental, “I can’t design anymore” breakdown. This was subtle. A seemingly small detail showed me that even though I was still happily working, my wheels had stopped turning. I’d found a cozy, reliable solution that didn’t need questioning. Sure, this was just an arrow, but I wondered—how many of my best practices are outdated?
Relying on old, reliable ideas stops us from thinking critically and being deliberate in our work. It prevents our best ideas from ever surfacing. These ruts are dangerous.
Identify Your Ruts
“More often than not, I’ve found a rut is the consequence of sticking to tried and tested methods that don’t take into account how you or the world has changed.” —Twyla Tharp
Imagine the first time you heard a song you love. Maybe the beat was infectious or the dramatic buildup really blew your mind. If you listened to that song 52 times a day for a month, the impact would be lost. The same goes for recycled ideas. The first time I used the DIN arrow was on a website for a museum. The arrow looked like the wayfinding signs in the museum. Hey, that made perfect sense! Once.
To identify ruts, we need to challenge our instincts.
Take a moment to analyze your work and your work habits. Notice any patterns? Perhaps you’re a slave to Proxima Nova, love pointy ribbons, or have been using the same grunge brushes since 2008. Maybe you’ve found a process that’s worked for you through the years, and you’ve found no reason to switch it up. In the past, my unquestioned devotion to the 960 grid led to many redundant, subpar layouts. When our best practices lose potency, it’s time to rethink them.
Generate Lots of Ideas
Once we’re identified these ruts, we need to act on them. We need to create and test new ideas.
My belated New Year’s Resolution is to get into the habit of generating ideas. I won’t belabor the importance of sketching. We all know this is a valuable tool. That being said, I know when I’m under a time crunch, I sometimes forget about the value of producing lots of ideas.
Keep your brainstorming focused. Assign yourself a time restriction, required quantity, and very deliberate task. “I’m going to spend half an hour, sketching 60 arrows.” Don’t scrutinize until you’re done. Usually my ruts result from choosing the most practical solution first. The benefit of setting a time limit and quantity is I don’t have time to censor my ridiculous ideas. That’s where the good stuff is hiding.
Use tools that are malleable and help you generate ideas quickly. When choosing fonts for a project, I used to rely on whichever font I had on my machine because of the taxing task of surveying web font sites and purchasing fonts that ended up being less than ideal. Might as well just stick to the basics, right? TypeCast is a tool that lets designers try out font pairings rapidly. It gives me the freedom to change my mind if a font isn’t working, and has made that task way easier (and more fun).
Collaborate with Others
Of course, the best ideas aren’t produced in a vacuum. Even if I sketch for 24 hours straight, my head can’t come up with ALLTHE IDEAS EVER or even the best idea. This is why I work with other people.
Ask other people to challenge your ideas. This is a great way to edit the results of your brainstorming session. Maybe someone else will find potential in a sketch and push you further.
Some of the best perspectives I get are from people outside my discipline. If I have an early sketch of a design, I run it by a developer to see if they know of any interactions that can improve my idea. Recently, I was working on making a home page carousel that was feeling flat, more playful. When Allison, on my team, suggested incorporating using Sequence, a jQuery plug in, the carousel got the joy it was missing.
How do you work on generating better, more deliberate ideas? How do you battle through a design rut?
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