The focus is on making design thinking work in large organisations. What is design thinking? The author describes it as, “…an integrated and disciplined innovation process that builds creative insight from deep knowledge.” “The idea is to think carefully about the problem before jumping to solutions, to ‘sit with the question.’ This can create tension as organisations like to move things forward quickly. Design thinking can take up significant resources and yet not guarantee a result, or even a timeline, and that can create a significant amount of discomfort. The adoption of design thinking,and inviting others to do the same, (as opposed to mandating it) by leadership is essential but in order to succeed it also needs to have support at ‘grassroots level’. The need to balance the product user perspective with the many other stakeholders, both within the organisation and outside of it, eg: social environmental concerns is also explored in detail. The adoption of systems alongside design thinking also comes across as a dimension that can improve the odds of success.
It becomes evident that “its complicated’, that adopting design thinking in large organisations is challenging. With so many variables and agendas, success is not likely to be easy, yet the author is optimistic, provides significant guidance and believes the effort is worthwhile.
With many thanks to the author, the publishers, University of Toronto Press, and NetGalley for my free copy to review.