Crafting the design-driven growth mindset: why business design is needed for sustained innovation
This is the first of two posts on Business Design.
Business Design is broadly defined as a human-centred design approach to business innovation. Human-centred design puts the intended user/consumer at the centre of the innovation process. The concept was first introduced by Stanford psychologist-engineer John Arnold in the late 1950s, then further contextualized by management strategist Roger Martin in 2009 at the Rotman School of Management. It has evolved into a critical approach for sustained corporate innovation and a curriculum for innovative leadership.
An effective innovation process resolves a need, problem or desire by offering something new that is perceived to improve the meaning or increase value to the user/consumer. Business Design as a practice aims to transform business leaders into empathic, strategic and creative problem solvers — essentially developing a ‘design-driven growth mindset’. This new type of designer combines financial management with design literacy. The business designer crafts strategies, processes, customer experiences and business models. They are measured on impact, value (meaning) and profits.
Business Design is both an ideology and philosophy.
As an ideology, it is a mode of thinking, a system and set of values we bring to a situation. As a philosophy, it is a mode of action or the behavioural logic we apply to observe and interpret a situation.
Business Design is currently exclusively taught at Rotman and is practiced through three thinking and acting modes necessary to navigate innovation’s uncertain path: (1) finding>sensing, (2) framing>sensemaking and (3) solving>changemaking. Through active and reflective practice, it aims to impact the mindset of business leaders, and ultimately the culture of organizations. (Note — the next post will unpack each mode).
Learning the why, what and how of design in business. Below is a learning ladder that explains the levels of knowledge required to understand, learn and apply design methods and techniques for business innovation.
Business Design embeds Design Thinking in business management.
Design Thinking is commonly understood as a creative problem-solving method. It involves multidisciplinary teams using a variety of tools to generate a lot of ideas and prototype concepts with end-users. Business Design embeds Design Thinking and more aptly Design Strategies into its end-to-end business innovation management stages. It involves deeper (user research) and broader (systems thinking) contextual understanding before idea generation, and operational integration and after prototyping (user feedback) and implementation (market evaluation).
Business Design involves four critical steps to understand, learn and then apply design methods effectively to a business context. These steps ladder up from foundational knowledge to building competence with sensing (finding), sensemaking (framing) and changemaking (solving). See the next post on modes and associated competencies.
Design-led innovation development (and management) process
After 25 years as a business innovation designer, and reviewing thousands of innovation processes and hundreds of models for my PhD research, the evidence suggests the innovation process involves four general phases: (1) initiation, (2) investigation, (3) integration and (4) implementation. Although not typically a linear process, all innovation development involves a beginning (initiation) and an end (implementation or not). How one company moves from initiation to investigation, through integration and then implementation (or not) is a unique journey.
Successful innovation (adoption of a new product, service or experience) is designed. It begins with a shared intent to align stakeholders and teams on what the problem is believed to be, rather than focusing on the solution to the wrong problem.
