An interesting piece from Yale Insights: “The one constant in capitalism is that things will always be changing. Industries rise and fall, while the darlings of the business world for one generation are often afterthoughts, or worse, dinosaurs, to the next. Along with the churning comes new ideas for how businesses can best remain competitive. One of the concepts with the most momentum now is design thinking, which to the uninitiated may look like a group of people scribbling on Post-It notes.”
“Design thinking is more than that. At its essence, it is using how designers tackle problems in their realm to come up with solutions for businesses. Proponents of design thinking argue that it allows organizations to become more creative and innovative, while addressing issues from new product design to how to clean up garbage in the oceans.”
In a sign of just how mainstream design thinking has become, Bloomberg Businessweek now devotes an entire issue to it, calling design thinking “the core to any successful business.”
And the New York Times reports the D.school — formally known as the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design — is the hottest school at Stanford.
A related Harvard Business School case on innovation at Apple argues that a dedication to design thinking is at the core of what’s known as the “Apple Way,” fueling the company’s ability to understand and anticipate the needs of consumers.