‘Doing instead of Talking’: One main learning gained on the journey through the Design Thinking for Social Innovation course
“The signature behavior of people who routinely achieve innovative outcomes is that they constantly seek to experience the world instead of talking about experiencing the world.” — I copied this statement from one of the lecture readings, as for me it states very well some of my main learnings from the course.
The last 12 weeks have shown me that Design and Design thinking is about finding an innovative solution to complex problems by ‘getting the hands dirty’. It is not about reading research papers that many others already have read, but it is about going out and searching for diverse interviewees to get different opinions regarding the problem that is aimed to tackle. It is not about coming up with a perfect solution within a few weeks, but it is about understanding the involved people and communities by interviewing or observing them and using this information to generate suitable ideas. It is not about developing an excellent prototype, but it is about building something straightforward that can be tested to get feedback to refine the idea. So, as the statement, in the beginning, says: It is more about experiencing and doing and less about talking which was one of my key learnings during the course.
In this context, for me, the term experiencing also comprises the incorporation of different perspectives when searching for an innovative solution. During the group project of developing a community-based solution that tackles the issue of increasing sea level, different opinions and experiences regarding the topics have been highly valuable. For instance, in the research stage, our group interviewed numerous people with different backgrounds, ranging from local nova students to impact entrepreneurs and founders of social initiatives. Each of these interviews has been likewise useful to improve our understanding of the problem itself, the people involved, and approaches that have already been implemented. Also, when we were testing our prototypes various user feedback was valuable to enhance our solution. In terms of my general way of working it taught me the benefits of asking for feedback already in the early stages of a project. Hence, the advantage of diverse input in finding an innovative solution was another key learning. A closely related learning was the advantages of adopting different perspectives when developing an idea. Taking on negatively tainted roles in the guest lecture with Jess Majekodunmi forced us to look at our idea from entirely different angles. It allowed us to identify components that had to be reconsidered and previously have been unnoticed. Therefore, I will keep in mind the importance of adopting different perspectives and considering the unintended consequences when working on further projects. I think, it also underlines that co-creative approaches — involving the engagement of multiple stakeholders — can be beneficial in finding solutions with social impact
Another main learning to me was the value of keeping things simple. The various activities in class, such as simple drawing to visualize an idea or building a basic prototype with Lego, have shown me that it can yield surprisingly good results. When we as a group had to silently draw a solution for the unused space under a bridge in NYC, I was fascinated by the results particularly given the context of silence and time constrain. Also, in terms of the group project, we developed different very simple prototypes and I was impressed by the outcome of plentiful beneficial feedback. Therefore, about my general way of working, one great learning was not to overcomplicate things as at some points doing things in a very simple way is more than enough and can root great results.
Last, I want to explain why the constantly within the statement at the beginning also reflects a major learning to me. Particularly the prototyping stage of the project made me recognize the importance of constantly adapting and evolving an idea. As also mentioned in some lecture readings, finding a sustainable solution is a continuing process including backtracking and revising and that is what we also experimented during the group project. Based on various feedback, we had to adjust our idea several times and I think we are still not at the finish line. Finding solutions with social impact is an ongoing process that takes time. One cannot expect to have a final solution from the beginning — an important learning process for me, as I usually like to get things done quickly. Stepping back and recognizing the importance of keeping the process iterative, moving forward but also backward, incorporating insights gained from previous steps into following steps, and redefining the ideas was tricky for me at the beginning, but I think, an important learning for many other situations.
In short, there have been a lot of different learnings during the course. What I would like to emphasize is that the past 12 weeks have made it clear to me that developing innovative solutions with social impact is hard work that requires on-the-ground investigation. Above all, it is about understanding the people involved and their mutual relationships. I learned the value of systemic and open innovation approaches to merge different insights that combined can drive innovative ideas. What I enjoyed was the attitude of doing instead of talking as well as the mindset of doing it for something good. Therefore, I hope to be able to continue my journey in the design thinking for social innovation field.
