How yoga disrupted my well designed summer holiday.
It suddenly hit me: How can I justify that our clients should disrupt their business process — when I privately am stuck in conformity? This is the personal story of how I went about using Design Thinking activities to disrupt my own summer holiday…
My business model
I work as Head of Studio in Idean, one of the top renowned Design Thinking (DT) companies of the world. Coming from a design background my career path have shifted drastically over the last years. What I find my self doing is not designing cool stuff, but talking to clients, cracking numbers and performing leadership tasks for my Studio in Bergen. I don’t complain, this is what I was aiming for. I get feedback that this is going well, so my Business model works.

“Who am I to tell CEOs to jump up and change their game?”
Questioning my own KPI’s
But along with this career change I found myself also narrowing my set of values. I have always been very experimental and innovative, but found myself questioning this. Have I in incremental steps floated away from this mindset and replaced my values with more comfortable ones? I also raised the question if I have started to associate myself with a less diverse mass of people. The typically person I talk to is generally 37 years old, have a Master degree, a successful career, a house, 1,7 kids and a nice car. He or she is always looking for the next career step and smart investment.
“Success is a funny thing. You can grow into a lazy, judgemental and predictive person. I was about to becoming this guy.”
A new value proporsition
It was an average day. I argued fiercely that our client (CEO)should not build her digital solution based on her own tech brief and understanding of the problem. Instead she should let Idean do a 3 weeks design sprint. I argued with conviction, that doing insight work into real user needs, would secure a leaner product. It would not only be understood — but would be loved by the user. I also argued that we must explore alternative features in a parallel prototype, test and evaluate, to find even more effective work processes. A Design Sprint, I argued, would save her development work (and money) and secure a great experience for end users and secure profit for the client. Then I went home and started planning my long sought after holiday. I was tired and was looking forward to a really relaxing time away from it all. Then a paradox suddenly occurred to me. I was about to book a variation of the same holiday as my last 8 ones. I needed a new value proposition. Who am I to tell CEOs or business owners that know what their doing, to jump up and change their game?

User research to the rescue!
Normally I travel to exotic places like Patagonia, South Africa, Caribia or Australia and book myself in at a 4/5 star retreat. I drink good wine, eat well and experience the local culture from a safe distance. I suddenly saw the narrow pattern I had created for myself and started using Design Thinking to self evaluate:
- Is my holiday “user needs” met and correctly prioritized ?
- Can it be designed in a less expensive way?
- Is the holiday an giant bold itterating or incrementally improvement of the last one?
- Does it have the desired effect?
My answers was:
- Not any more. I don’t experience something new, exciting and feel relaxed when coming home.
- Oh, yes!
- No, they are all the variation of the same holiday. Incremental improvement and safe.
- No, I do not always come back relaxed and refreshed.
Yoga-disrupting my own business model
Then I did something I never have dreamed of doing. I researched something so far of my radar as possible, namely Yoga and meditation retreats held in private homes. I picked one in Ibiza (No, not a clubbing excuse, far off on the country side) and flew down.
“I can tolerate Vegan food for a while — but must admit I ran off buying a bloody steak the third night in.”
Framing my field Hypothesis’
For some this might seem like a normal thing to do. For me this was a challenge. I never done yoga and barely any meditation. But it was time for me to test and evaluate a my own perceptions, directly in “the field”:
I think Yoga is a lazy sport for old ladies.
I’m allergic to people talking about their religious views
I can’t stand smelly lights, purple scarfs and dinglebels in curtains.
I don’t want to share a house with people I don’t know.
I hate getting up early and follow a prepared schedual.
I can’t eat only Vegan food.

Marked reception — There is a business guy in the house!
I arrived in the Yoga and mediation retreat and took all the required activities for a week. I was definatly the odd guy out in the house. Early comments and discussions positioned the other participants as sceptical to any sort of material or 9–5 lifestyle. I had to adapt to the crowd. But then I experience that when you show empathy towards other peoples believes, most will respond with curiosity. And even openness to your own point of view.
In short, we found common ground on more areas then I would have imagined.
User testing report
Yoga can be physically relaxing, but there are also very challenging exercises.
I experienced a broader variation of activities than expected. I will hold on to the ones I liked and discard for example the deeply uncomfortable ones like “Laugh for 20 minutes while looking into each others eyes”.
There were a lot of older ladies. But also a fair amount of the total opposite.
I’m still allergic to religious people trying to “save me”. But I can understand and respect why they think differently than me.
I can live with smelly lights. I even bought a scent candel on the airport!
I still don’t like dingle-bells in curtains. Or curtains.
It’s ok to get up early and follow a schedule — if I choose to be motivated for it.
I can tolerate Vegan food for a while — but must admit I ran off buying a bloody steak the third night in.

Measuring the effect
I came back more relaxed and calm than I have been in years. Strickly scientifically it’s hard to say if this was due only to the yoga and meditation exercises. The effect would probably have been lower if I did not have a high level of motivation for testing it.
The wow moment
I really enjoyed sharing a house with totally different personalities than mine. It broadened my understanding of what values I accept. Openness to the “uncomfortable change“ is the most important take away for me. I’ll try to become better both in business and personal life to apply this to my thinking.
The Conclution, namaste!
Generally speaking I was overdue in challenging my own perception of people, habits, food, and experiences. I won’t become a yoga fanatic or do meditation every day. But I have picked a few activities I felt I could benefit from. My acid test was if they made me calmer and not uncomfortable, let’s explore more.
“Openness to the uncomfortable change was the most valuable take away”
I’m taking away with me an understanding that I need to test my perceptions on most topics from time to time. This is the only way I will feel comfortable to challenge other peoples point of view in an effective and empathic manner. So the next time I talk to someone struggling with their user experience I will better understand how hard it is for them to change it.
It takes a toll for everyone to challenge themselves, but if you are motivated, you can do it — one pixel at the time.

