Designing for Growth

What's "Designing for Growth" about?

• Design Thinking for Managers: "Designing for Growth" by Jeanne Liedtka and Tim Ogilvie is a guide for managers on how to apply design thinking to drive business growth.
• Toolkit Approach: The book provides a toolkit of ten design thinking tools that managers can use to innovate and solve complex business problems.
• Structured Process: It outlines a structured process involving four key questions: What is? What if? What wows? and What works? to guide managers through the design thinking journey.
• Practical Examples: The book includes real-world examples and case studies to illustrate how design thinking can be applied in various business contexts.

Why should I read "Designing for Growth"?

• Practical Application: It offers practical tools and methods that managers can directly apply to their work to foster innovation and growth.
• Structured Framework: The book provides a clear, structured framework for implementing design thinking, making it accessible even to those new to the concept.
• Real-World Success Stories: It includes success stories from companies like AARP and Kaiser Permanente, demonstrating the effectiveness of design thinking in real business scenarios.
• Enhance Problem-Solving Skills: Reading this book can enhance your problem-solving skills by teaching you how to approach challenges creatively and strategically.

What are the key takeaways of "Designing for Growth"?

• Four Key Questions: The design thinking process is structured around four questions: What is? What if? What wows? and What works? These guide the exploration, ideation, and implementation phases.
• Ten Essential Tools: The book introduces ten tools, such as journey mapping and rapid prototyping, that are essential for applying design thinking in business.
• Customer-Centric Approach: Emphasizes the importance of understanding customer needs and involving them in the design process to create value.
• Iterative Learning: Encourages an iterative approach to innovation, where assumptions are tested and refined through prototypes and customer feedback.

How does "Designing for Growth" define design thinking?

• Systematic Approach: Design thinking is defined as a systematic approach to problem-solving that starts with understanding customer needs and creating a better future for them.
• Empathy, Invention, Iteration: It involves empathy for the user, invention of new solutions, and iteration to refine those solutions.
• Beyond Aesthetics: The book differentiates design thinking from traditional design by focusing on business growth and problem-solving rather than just aesthetics.
• Accessible to Managers: It argues that design thinking can be taught to managers and applied in business contexts to drive innovation.

What are the four key questions in "Designing for Growth"?

• What is?: This question focuses on understanding the current reality and identifying the real problem or opportunity.
• What if?: This stage involves envisioning new possibilities and generating creative ideas for the future.
• What wows?: Here, the focus is on selecting the most promising ideas that have the potential to create significant value.
• What works?: This final stage involves testing the ideas in the marketplace to see which ones are viable and can be scaled.

What are the ten tools of design thinking in "Designing for Growth"?

• Visualization: Using imagery to envision possibilities and bring them to life.
• Journey Mapping: Assessing the existing experience through the customer's eyes.
• Value Chain Analysis: Evaluating the current value chain that supports the customer's journey.
• Mind Mapping: Generating insights from exploration activities and creating design criteria.
• Brainstorming: Generating new possibilities and alternative business models.
• Concept Development: Assembling innovative elements into a coherent solution.
• Assumption Testing: Isolating and testing key assumptions that will drive success.
• Rapid Prototyping: Expressing a new concept in a tangible form for exploration.
• Customer Co-Creation: Involving customers in creating the solution that best meets their needs.
• Learning Launch: Creating an affordable experiment to test key assumptions with market data.

How does "Designing for Growth" suggest using visualization?

• Mother of All Tools: Visualization is considered a fundamental tool used in every stage of the design thinking process.
• Reduces Misinterpretation: It helps reduce project risk by making ideas tangible and reducing the chances of misinterpretation.
• Engages Right Brain: Visualization engages the right brain, which is responsible for emotion and intuition, aiding in decision-making.
• Various Forms: It can take many forms, including storyboards, sketches, and personas, to help communicate ideas effectively.

What is journey mapping according to "Designing for Growth"?

• Customer Experience Focus: Journey mapping is about representing the customer's experience in a flowchart or graphic format.
• Identifies Pain Points: It helps identify emotional highs and lows in the customer's journey, revealing opportunities for improvement.
• Empathy Building: By walking in the customer's shoes, it builds empathy and a deeper understanding of their needs.
• Foundation for Innovation: It serves as a foundation for generating innovative ideas that enhance the customer experience.

How does "Designing for Growth" recommend conducting brainstorming?

• Structured Process: Brainstorming should be a structured process with clear ground rules to encourage creativity and prevent critiques.
• Diverse Group: Involves a small, diverse group of people to bring in different perspectives and ideas.
• Trigger Questions: Uses trigger questions to stimulate creative thinking and explore new possibilities.
• Follow-Up: Emphasizes the importance of follow-up to convert raw ideas into robust concepts through concept development.

What is assumption testing in "Designing for Growth"?

• Key Assumptions: Assumption testing involves identifying and testing the key assumptions underlying a new business concept.
• Thought Experiments: It uses thought experiments to test assumptions with existing data before moving to market tests.
• Reduces Risk: By focusing on critical assumptions, it reduces the risk of failure by ensuring that only viable concepts move forward.
• Iterative Process: It is an iterative process that helps refine concepts and improve their chances of success.

How does "Designing for Growth" define rapid prototyping?

• Express Concepts: Rapid prototyping is about creating visual or experiential manifestations of concepts to test and refine them.
• Iterative Learning: It is an iterative process that allows for quick learning and refinement of ideas.
• Low-Fidelity Start: Prototypes start as low-fidelity models to invite feedback and collaboration from stakeholders.
• Minimizes Investment: By testing concepts early, it minimizes investment and risk before full-scale development.

What are the best quotes from "Designing for Growth" and what do they mean?

• "Design thinking is actually a systematic approach to problem solving." This quote emphasizes that design thinking is not just about creativity but involves a structured process to address business challenges.
• "Empathy, invention, and iteration." These three words capture the essence of design thinking, highlighting the importance of understanding users, creating new solutions, and refining them through feedback.
• "Fail fast to succeed sooner." This quote underscores the value of rapid prototyping and learning from failures quickly to achieve success in innovation.
• "Visualization is the mother of all design tools." It highlights the critical role of visualization in making ideas tangible and facilitating communication and collaboration.