Design Thinking is a human-centered and solution-oriented problem-solving approach. Understanding the human requirements involved, re-framing the problem in a more human-centric manner, generating alternative concepts, and adopting a hands-on approach to prototyping is immensely effective in handling ill-defined challenges.

Many design teams at some of the world’s most successful technology businesses use it. Apple, Disney, Microsoft, and IBM are few Fortune 500 firms that have proven the value of “design thinking” as a competitive edge that boosts profits and fosters growth. Design Thinking is taught at some of the world’s most prestigious universities, including Stanford, Harvard, and others.

Stages of Design Thinking

According to school ( Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford), the five stages of Design Thinking are as follows: empathize, define (the problem), ideate, prototype, and test. It is important to note that the five steps are not always sequential — they need not occur in any particular order. They can occur concurrently and be repeated iteratively. Let’s take a closer look at each of the five stages of Design Thinking.

Empathize: Research your user’s requirement

In this step, the designers get a sympathetic grasp of the problem you’re trying to solve by researching the user’s needs. A human-centered design method like design thinking relies heavily on empathy because it allows designers to put their own assumptions aside and gain a deeper understanding of their customers and their requirements.

Define: Describe the problems/needs of the user

In this phase, the design team will analyze and synthesize their findings to define the core difficulties they have identified so far. Here they try to define a problem statement from the user’s point of view and not what the organization wants.

Ideate: Generate new ideas

The design team is now ready to start brainstorming. As they have a strong foundation of information from the prior two phases, they can begin to “think outside the box,” look for new perspectives on the problem, and develop creative solutions to the problem statement you’ve constructed. To stimulate free-thinking, brainstorming and Worst-Case-Scenario’s sessions are widely employed. In the Ideation phase, it’s vital to produce as many ideas or problem solutions as possible.

Prototype: Create Solutions

This is the experimental phase, where the goal is to find the best solution for each problem encountered. To put the concepts developed thus far to the test, the team creates many low-cost, scaled-down product duplicates (or specific functionality present within the product). This might be as simple as prototyping on paper.

As the prototypes are built, the solutions are tested and evaluated one at a time, either approved, improved, and re-examined, or rejected. By the end of this stage, the design team will have a deeper understanding of the product’s limitations and a clearer picture of how real users behave, feel and think when interacting with the end product.

Test: Try Out The Solutions

Throughout this phase, designers rigorously test and evaluate the efficiency product utilizing the best solutions identified during the prototyping phase. As a consequence of this stage, it is possible to make changes and refinements and re-define problems or improve the user’s understanding.

Final Words

Designers and consumers work together to bring ideas to life using the Design Thinking technique, which is iterative and flexible.

A certification in design thinking might help you stand out and advance in your career. In addition to improving your working abilities, you’ll also get a competitive advantage as design thinking becomes more prevalent in the business world. For a deeper understanding of the concept, enroll in a design thinking course. You can accelerate your learning and professional advancement by taking the Stanford Design Thinking Course from Great Learning.