Design Thinking as a Learning Process
The article summarizes my view on design thinking as an embedded learning process in organizations. The insights are part of my doctoral research from 2011–2017, supported by the HPI-Stanford Design Thinking Research Program. During my research, I observed how SAP and other organizations started to apply design thinking as a framework for multidisciplinary teamwork. Most teams that I observed cultivated a sort of learning culture by going through distinct learning phases in their projects. The observation has shown to be coherent with Beckman and Barry’s ideas in one of their influential papers.
Beckman and Barry applied David Kolb’s learning theory as a lense to explain design thinking as an experiential learning process. In Kolb’s theory individuals and teams are learning when they continuously adapt their worldviews through experiences they make. Beckman and Barry argue that design thinking offers a methodoloical framework for teams to systematically run through this learning process. The process is actually a recurring cycle (see illustration below).
The learning process is defined by two continua:
- The first continuum is represented through the horizontal line in the illustration below. It is the continuum from observation to imagination (Beckman and Barry use the words analysis and synthesis, though). Observation means that teams are observing a world that is inhabited by people with emotions, needs and problems. We can make these peoples’ life easier with new great designs, at least this every teams’ assumption to start with. Any person out there could eventually become a user of a design yet to be created. However, before we can start working on the design, we need to have an idea of who these people are and what they actually need in a given context that matters to them. A focus on imagination becomes possible when a team seems to grasp who their targeted users are and what needs they have. At this point they start to imagine and creating new designs.
- The second continuum that defines the learning process is represented through the vertical line. This continuum goes from abstract to concrete. Teams that are learning through experiences are either learning through concrete observation and concrete imagination or through abstracting what they have previously observed.
The two continua divide the learning process into four different corners. Each corner represents a phase that a team will eventually experience. In most projects they will eventually experience all phases multiple times.
1. Observing users
When teams are observing users they act in the area of concrete observation. In this phase, high-performing learning teams are able to soak up observations like a sponge. It is a very intuitive, very immediate learning experience. Individuals that are really good observers are also called divergent learners. They open up for each and every detail in a person’s behavior and attitude without categorizing them immediately.
2. Synthesis of data
Teams that have collected real world observations will eventually find themselves in a phase where they try to make sense out of the data. In this phase of synthesis, they are still dealing with observations but now they are abstracting them. They combine, re-arrange, divide and further interpret their observations until patterns about needs and problems emerge. People that are performing well in this phase have a so-called strength in assimiliating. It is a very conceptual work that is deeply connected to observations. High performing teams in this phase can fight the urge to jump to solutions before they have figured out what the observation really mean to them. They do not only find useful frameworks for their data but also come up with new frameworks (more about my thoughts on frameworks here).
3. Finding ideas
At some point teams will eventually focus their attention on one meaningful pattern or even just one detail from the observation. This is the starting point to imagine a future design that will change a persons’ life for the better. They will generate concepts that serve as opportunities for future designs. High performing teams take their time to elaborate the overall concept and idea before loosing themselves in the very details. Details can matter but those conversations will eventually lead back to the discussion about the overall concept. Finding conceptual ideas is a generative act. In learning theory, individuals who are doing well in this phase are also called acccomodating learners. Their strength lies in the ability to connect with other indivduals and stay open for feedback and new inputs.
4. Building prototypes
In order to translate abstract concepts into the real world, teams will imagine concrete solutions, by building prototypes. Protoypes are manifestations of inner ideas that teams and users can react to. They trigger feedback to learn from. Prototypes are great way to reenter the learning cycle by reconnecting with users and observing their reactions. Individuals that perform well in this phase are called accomodating learners.
Lessons from learning theory
- Research has shown that most learners are not equally well performing in all phases but are rather specialists in one or the other phase (Kolb 2015). It is therefore useful for team managers and coaches to identifiy which kind of learners the team consists of. These team members may take lead roles in “their” phases. Of course, the other team members will still actively participate in all phases.
- Design thinking itself is not providing a uniquely new learning experience. Learning theory has shown that teams have applied the learning styles before design thinking became a known concept. However, design thinking offers a structural methodology to enable a wide range of teams to go through all phases and therefore learn in different ways as they normally would do.
- The learning experience is rather a cycle that teams go through in multiple iterations. However, teams hardly seem to go through these phases in a non-linear fashion. Most teams follow sequences from observing to synthesizing to finding ideas to prototyping. We know from design theory (Schön 1983, Rowe 1987, Owen 2007) that experienced designers can switch from abstract to concrete work in a matter of seconds. But these are individuals that act without verbally expressing most of their thoughts. Design thinking teams on the other side rely on verbal expressions, otherwise teamwork would become impossible. The switches between phases that we observe in teams are therefore much fewer than in the work of individual designers.
