How design thinking helps founders build confidence

References to “design thinking” seem to be everywhere. But what does it mean, and how can it help you as a founder?

Design thinking is a term coined by the world-famous design firm IDEO to describe an approach to problem solving. It is employed by many teams to drive the creation and testing of innovative solutions. One of its foundational principles is that we learn best by doing, testing and iterating.

The following captures a high-level description of this iterative process:

1. Start by framing the idea as a question

The framing of an idea as a question-to-be-answered helps narrow the focus of the process. What problem are we trying to solve? And for whom are we trying to solve a problem? A classic illustration of framing is Henry Ford’s quote, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said ‘faster horses.’" The Model T was the result of asking how to get places faster, not how to improve on what already existed.

This video about framing a question includes a great description of what framing is, and why it matters in this process.

2. Gather inspiration

Gathering inspiration is about getting into the minds of those who’d be helped by your solution. It’s about talking to your prospective audience, observing them in their environment, and understanding their struggles more intimately.

Imagine spending a day working at the local food shelf in order to better understand the challenges of inventory management rather than merely being told about them. Imagine having to use a mouse with your non-dominant hand in order to approximate what it’s like for those with dexterity challenges to use an app. Firsthand experiences like these create genuine empathy and cause giant perspective shifts.

3. Generate ideas

With a real problem framed and detailed through inspiration gathering, the next step is generating ideas. Ideas can be simple, obvious ideas. They can also be wildly impractical ideas. As you may have heard, “there are no bad ideas in brainstorming!”

This article describes Crazy 8s, a brainstorming technique that is often used in software development. My personal favorite of the tools I’ve learned from IDEO is idea mash-ups, like those you see in this IDEO video. These are generative techniques to help get ideas flowing.

In this phase, ideas are captured, categorized, and voted on to be advanced in the process.

4. Make ideas tangible

Making an idea tangible is also sometimes referred to as creating a prototype. A prototype may be a workflow drawing on a whiteboard. It could be building a product using cardboard and tape. It could be a lot of things.

In any case, it should be something that helps people experience a solution. I recently wrote about software prototypes on the blog.

5. Test to learn

Once ideas are brought to life through prototyping, it’s time to let people experience it. This is your chance to gather feedback. Feedback allows you to learn more, and reconsider your solution in specific ways before investing in the real solution.

6. Share the story

This process equips the problem-solving team with insights and data that tell a story of a given solution for a given audience. Working iteratively through this process should also demonstrate the vetting of potential solutions, allowing the most viable, desirable and feasible solution to make itself known.

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How can design thinking help founders?

Now that you know a bit about how design thinking works, it’s worth thinking through how you can benefit from this process.

Wherever you are in the process of working on an idea, a design thinking approach can be used to test your idea.

There are 3 key ways in which you can benefit:

1. Determine if your idea is desirable

In other words, have you understood the problem? Have you created the right solution for the right problem? Does your audience want this solution for solving the problem you’ve defined? Would they use it?

2. Determine if your idea is viable

In other words, does this idea have a business model that will be profitable and sustainable?

3. Determine if your idea is feasible

In other words, can you actually produce and support this solution with the assets you have? If not, what do you need to do in order to operationally support this idea? Through that lens, is it still a good idea?

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At Cloudburst, we are all about helping founders build profitable businesses. Design thinking is a framework we draw direction and inspiration from in order to help founders feel confident in their idea’s desirability, viability and feasibility. Select founders can go through a 2-hour design thinking process with our team free of charge to complete something we call a Clarity Canvas. Click the link to download a blank one and book time with us if you’re interested.