Design Thinking in Business

Design Thinking is a human-centered approach to problem-solving that uses empathy,
experimentation, collaboration, and iteration as its central practices. Used in a variety of
fields, including product design, healthcare, social innovation, and software development,
design thinking is most often viewed as an interdisciplinary process by which creative... read moreand
innovative solutions are discovered.

When practiced well, design thinking can bridge the gap between specific needs, context,
cultures, and locations. Design practice and methodologies provide the framework to its
creative problem-solving approach, but it’s important to note that design thinking is truly
interdisciplinary. Design thinkers look at the world from many different disciplinary
perspectives – they engage with problems differently, building creative insight from deep
knowledge drawn from empathic engagement with human problems. Solving problems with
design thinking enables a cross-disciplinary understanding of complex issues together with a
trained design approach.

In this series we will explore the range of processes, practices, and approaches that shape
design thinking today – within and beyond business and enterprise settings. Experts from a
range of disciplines will explain the core concepts of what it means to be a design thinker:
how to use empathy to understand customer audiences; how to approach and frame
problems creatively; ideation practices to support innovation; how to maximize learning
from rapid prototyping; what it means to use design thinking to approach social systems,
and more. Every talk will include real life examples from companies using design thinking in
their business practices.