Macromedia University for

Media and Communication

Research paper

“A Design Thinking Approach in Startups”

Examiner: Jürgen Faust

Handed in: Clarissa Amaral

Matr.-No.: M-28173

Degree program: Medien und Design (M.A.)

Munich, December 2011

Abstract

This research paper follows a discourse on design thinking and on the design thinking approach

described by Tim Brown, the president and CEO of IDEO, a major innovation and design

thinking firm. This design thinking approach consists of three main phases: the inspiration,

ideation, and implementation phase. Throughout this paper, the reader is guided through the

three phases of this design thinking approach with emphasis on the main steps and benefits of

each phase. Additionally, this essay also shows how such an approach could assist startup

businesses with their development process towards establishment. To exemplify this

methodology, the small startup company GoTeamers is discussed and suggestions is made in

order to improve the development process of the startup company via the design thinking

approach.

Table of Contents

1 Introduction to the Design Thinking Approach ................................................................... 1

2 Understanding Design and Thinking .................................................................................. 3

2.1 What is Design? .................................................................................................................. 3

2.1.1 Distinguishing Design from Science ................................................................................... 3

2.2 What is Thinking? ............................................................................................................... 5

3 Design Thinking .................................................................................................................. 7

3.1 Origins ................................................................................................................................. 7

3.2 Definitions ........................................................................................................................... 7

3.3 Design Thinkers and the Process of Design Thinking ...................................................... 8

3.4 Tim Brown’s Three Step Approach to Design Thinking...................................................11

3.4.1 Inspiration ........................................................................................................................ 12

3.4.2 Ideation ............................................................................................................................ 12

3.4.3 Implementation ................................................................................................................ 13

4 Introducing GoTeamers ................................................................................................... 14

5 Analyzing GoTeamers ..................................................................................................... 15

5.1 Inspiration ........................................................................................................................ 15

5.1.1 Improving the Inspiration Phase ...................................................................................... 15

5.2 Ideation ............................................................................................................................ 16

5.2.1 Improving the Ideation Phase .......................................................................................... 18

5.3 Implementation ................................................................................................................ 19

6 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................... 20

List of Illustrations and Tables

Table 1: Difference between Science and Design……….…...................................……………....4

Figure 1: Helping Designers Navigate Science………………………………….…………………....5

Figure 2: Desirability, Viability, and Feasibility……………………………………………………….10

Figure 3: The Three Phases of Design Thinking…………………………………………………….11

Figure 4: GoTeamer’s Vision...………………………………………………………………………...17

Figure 5: Storyboard....................................................................................................................18

1

1 Introduction to the Design Thinking Approach It can be said that every designer share one single trait or characteristic in this world.

Regardless if one is a prestigious designer or just a beginner in the field, designers will most

likely have experienced the unique difficulty of explicating their own field of studies, research,

and/or practice. This can sometimes be a frustrating experience because of preconceived

notions that a designer’s job is simply to design things to make them look pretty. For a countless

amount of time, different people from all over the world have made similar statements in regard

to designers: “designers decorate indoor and outdoor spaces,” or “designers are the ones

behind the desk creating websites,” or “designers are Photoshop geeks.” These erroneous

presumptions exist although designers acquire versatile skills in their studies and are often able

to work in various professional fields. A designer can be an architectural, graphic, fashion,

jewelry, game, product, engineering, landscape, urban, interior, furniture, industrial, interaction,

packaging, interface, and/or web designer. Although designers can work in different

professional fields, they all have one aim: work accordingly to fulfill customer needs. This is far

beyond making things look pretty. Designers create and shape the world to make the life of the

human being easier and more pleasant. Because designers work together with people and

customers in order to fulfill their needs, it is important that each designer follows certain

processes and methodologies to fulfill the customer’s requirements.

There are many different methods designers use to operate in their field, including qualitative,

quantitative methods, touchpoints matrix method, the research method of ethnography, among

others1. The one method that this paper will closely examine throughout the course of this paper

is the design thinking method. Design thinking is highly important in terms of starting successful

companies with innovative products. Emphasizing design thinking brings originality and

creativity to startups, increasing their chance to become market leaders and global competitors.

Examples of major market leader companies that continuously use design thinking in their

business strategy are: Proctor & Gamble, IDEO, Harley Davidson, Four Seasons Hotels, RIM,

GE, Apple (Trainor, 2011).

1 For more information on these different design research methods see references: Brugnoli, G. (2011), Creswell, J. (2003) and Ireland, C. (2003).

2

This paper will focus on the design thinking method and its fundamental tools that are applicable

to startup businesses. Before going into detail on the design thinking process, it is important to

have an in-depth understanding and formal definition of the word design to better guide the

reader in fully understanding design thinking. For this reason, the first part of this paper will

focus on understanding and defining the term design. In this chapter, there will also be a

separate explanation of the terminology behind the word thinking, which is a term that is often

used but hard to define. Then, putting the two words together, design and thinking, the next

chapter will attempt to explicate the term design thinking and how design thinking works, its

methodology and processes that help to fulfill customer needs and preferences. More

specifically, this third chapter will closely examine the design thinking approach of Tim Brown,

the president and CEO of IDEO, a major innovation and design thinking firm. Following the

design thinking discourse, the fourth chapter will provide an example of a small startup named

GoTeamers, a startup which could have benefited from Brown’s process of design thinking.

Furthermore, there will also be a detailed analysis of how the design thinking method could

have been integrated to ameliorate the GoTeamers startup. Finally, there will be a small

discussion in the conclusion about the main ideas presented and analyzed throughout the

paper.

3

2 Understanding Design and Thinking In order to better explicate the process of design thinking it is important to define the term

design and the term thinking separately.

2.1 What is Design? During the 2002 Design Council's Business Week, the designer Richard Seymour defined the

word design as the following: “design is making things better for people.” There, he emphasized

that design is the primary activity focused on human behavior, simply and thoroughly user-

driven and user-centered.

In addition to Seymour’s important contribution to defining the word ‘design,’ John Christopher

Jones also added to the meaning and terminology of design when he wrote his influential text,

Design Methods: seeds of human futures. In this text, he stated that design “initiate[s] change in

man-made things” (Jones, 1970).

Moreover, well-known designer Herbert Simon, defined the term design in his foremost

discourse The Sciences of the Artificial, as the following: “Design is changing an existing

situation into a preferred one” (Simon, 1969).

Focusing on these three main definitions of the word design, it is important to highlight the fact

that scientists, as well as designers, can also “make things better for people,” they can also

“initiate change in man-made things,” or they could also “change existing situations to preferred

ones.” As an example, when doctors discover new treatments for cancer, or when they improve

on certain medications that are already in the market, they are “changing existing situations into

a preferred one.” If doctors are creating less invasive and safer surgery methods, they are

“making things better for people.” So if scientists can act like a designer, how could we draw the

line and differentiate between scientists and designers? After all, medical school is completely

different than a school of design, right?

2.1.1 Distinguishing Design from Science Distinguishing design from science is an important task in this essay because acknowledged

design definitions from famous designers could also be used as a definition for science. If both

4

science and design can follow the same definition, both of them can be innovative, both operate

on the physical world, and both deals with the nature and the artificial, then what is the

difference?

Even though design and science do share certain traits, it is also possible to outline their main

differences. In order to highlight and clarify the main distinction between these two important

fields, tables and figures have been inserted in this paper to help better explicate the issue.

Table 1: Difference between Science and Design

Source: (Alexander, 1964), (Gregory,1966), (Simon, 1969).

Based on the differences presented on Table 1, it is now easier to separate scientists from

designers. One can summarize this table by affirming that scientists focus on existing matters

and behaviors while designers focus on new patters and new behaviors. Thus, it can be said

that scientists analyze existing matters and behaviors to solve existing problems and designers,

on the other hand, learn new patterns and methods in order to solve new problems.

From this discussion, the difference between science and design can then be illustrated in a

two-way process (Figure 1), with the theoretical statement that both scientists and designers are

interested in solving problems and acquiring knowledge, nevertheless, both scientists and

designers go by opposing means and opposing goals. Additionally, it has to be mentioned that

Science Design

Focus on existing structures

Focus on new structures

Problem-solving behavior

Inventive behavior

Analytic

Constructive

Concern how things are Concern how things ought to be

5

the term science in this chart focuses on the scientific discipline of fundamental research.

Certain exceptions, e.g. applied research, where the goal in science can be as well to solve a

problem and not to learn, for example developing more efficient engines for an automotive

company, are excluded from this definition of science.

Figure 1: Helping Designers Navigate Science

Source: (Hastrich, 2011)

If the difference between science and design can be clearly outlined, then designers do not

have to “turn design into an imitation of science” (Cross, 2001). Scientists and designers can

continue to be innovative and original in their findings in their own field of study and/or practice.

Now that the difference between scientists and designers has been clarified, we can follow to

the next section of this paper which will focus on the word thinking.

2.2 What is Thinking? The clarification of the term design thinking requires a definition of the second term thinking.

However, thinking is a problematic term to comprehend and define. After all, what is thinking?

Cognitive scientists are trying to answer this question. Every rational being thinks, logically or

illogically, processing stored information, with knowledge or with language. Yet, how can the

word thinking be fully defined? Merriam Webster defines the term as “the action of using one’s

mind to produce thoughts” (2011). However, this definition is still very generic.

6

A more detailed definition is given by Andrei S. Monin. He starts with the definition of a complex

system as basis for the ability to think: “A complex system (CS) is defined as a set of elements,

with connections between them, singled out of the environment, capable of getting information

from the environment, capable of making decisions (i.e., of choosing between alternatives), and

having purposefulness (i.e., an urge towards preferable states or other goals)” (Monin, 1992).

These three elements – getting information from the environment, being capable of making

decisions and having purposefulness in them together with the ability to connect all three

dimensions are requirements for being able to think.

Monin also defines the process of thinking in more detail: “Thinking is a process that takes place

(or which can take place) in some of the CS and consists of (i) receiving information from the

environment (and from itself), (it) memorizing the information, (iii) the subconscious, and (iv)

consciousness” (Monin, 1992). The ability to store information is another central element of

thinking to take advantage of past information and in case of humans, experience. However, the

fact that subconscious and consciousness are both involved in thinking, demonstrates that it is

difficult to give a narrow definition of thinking.

From a medical perspective, thinking always involves the two hemispheres of the brain and

uses the connection between them (Glatzeder, Goel, & Mueller, 2010). This emphasizes again

the fact, that thinking includes using given information which can be logical, but also including

experienced feelings and emotions.

To conclude, the term thinking involves a conscious or subconscious process that consists of

getting information from the environment and making purposeful decisions based on stored

information that can include facts or feelings.

7

3 Design Thinking 3.1 Origins Before analyzing the term design thinking and describing the design thinking process, it is

important to give a brief background on the history of the term. It was Herbert Simon that first

introduced the term design thinking as a way of thinking in his major book The Sciences of the

Artificial, 1969. Later in 1973 and in 1993, respectively, Robert McKim and Rolf Faste expanded

on the term, defining and commercializing the idea of design thinking and its original benefits on

creation. Peter Rowe's 1986 systematic approach in his book Design Thinking became one of

the primary literatures on design that explained the design thinking term with problem solving

procedures in urban planning and architecture. In these past years, design thinking has been a

highly discussed term in the realm of design but also in the realm of business (Davy, 2012).

3.2 Definitions It remains true that there is not one single definition that every single design researcher will

agree on when it comes down to defining the term design thinking. It can be said that further

academic literature on design thinking has to be published in order to have a full consensus of

the genuine meaning of the term. For some design researchers, the term has become such a

broad concept that design thinking could be possibly applied for anything or everything. Nigel

Cross, one of the most well-known design researchers, echoes this idea when he states that

design thinking has become a “common-place concept that it is in danger of losing its meaning”

(Cross, 2008).

Although the term design thinking can be broad for some and difficult to define, this section of

the paper is an attempt at formally defining the term. Thomas Lockwood, the president of the

Design Management Institute (DMI), tries to describe design thinking as “essentially a human-

centered innovation process that emphasizes observation, collaboration, fast learning,

visualization of ideas, rapid concept prototyping, and concurrent business analysis, which

ultimately influences innovation and business strategy” (Lockwood 2010). Furthermore, the

acclaimed design researcher, Jürgen Faust, also tries to define the term as a “directive

cultivation of intuition, imagination, and inspiration to solve a problem” (Faust, 2011). In addition,

Tim Brown, the president and CEO of IDEO, defines design thinking as “a methodology that

imbues the full spectrum of innovation activities with a human centered design ethos” (Brown,

8

2008). Moreover, Cross also tries to summarize the definition when he presents design thinking

as “comprising abilities of resolving ill-defined problems, adopting solution-focused cognitive

strategies, employing abductive or appositional thinking and using non-verbal modeling media.”

(Cross, 2008)

Summarizing all this definitions mentioned above, design thinking can be further defined as a

human centered design approach that seeks to solve problems through a creative visual

communication strategy. This is the final author’s definition based on the compiled knowledge

from the statements above.

Because defining the term design thinking can be a fussy subject due to the lack of written work

on the topic, and to some extent, due to the unclear definition of the word thinking, this paper

will switch focus to the design thinking process to show how its methodology can help improve

fulfilling customer needs and preferences when it comes to starting up a business.

3.3 Design Thinkers and the Process of Design Thinking When discussing the process of design thinking, it is important to mention Nigel Cross’s paper,

Design thinking as a form of Intelligence. In his paper, he presents an interesting study of the

brain activity that is relevant to design thinking. In Cross’s essay, it shows that brain activities

differ between the right and left hemisphere. After conducting several experiments, the study

concludes that specific areas of the right hemisphere of the brain are consistently activated

when one undertakes design thinking processes. Accordingly, the study also shows that

damage to the left hemisphere of the brain often results in loss of speech capability, while

damage to the right hemisphere of the brain often results in in the loss of design and artistic

abilities.

Cross reviews brain imaging studies to analyze design thinking because his fundamental beliefs

are centered on design thinking as a different form of intelligence. Cross states in his text:

“Design thinking does not necessarily mean that some people ‘have it’ and some people

do not. Design ability is something that everyone has, to some extent, because it is

embedded in our brains as a natural cognitive function. Like other forms of intelligence

and ability it may be possessed, or may be manifested in performance, at higher levels

by some people than by others. And like other forms of intelligence and ability, design

9

intelligence is not simply a given ‘talent’ or ‘gift’, but can be trained and developed”

(Cross, 2008).

This statement from Cross is significant because it demonstrates that everyone and anyone has

the ability to be a design thinker. He confirms that design thinking is a way of thinking that can

be developed and trained; it is a form of intelligence, not an aptitude, nor an inborn talent. Thus,

it can be concluded that design thinking methods utilize strategies that can be applied by

professionals of all disciplines, not only by designers. This is important information to know

when starting up a business, since most of the time small startup businesses do not have

designers in the management and often not at all on their team. Here, it can be concluded that

creative startup ideas, do not come from creative design genius, creative and innovative ideas

come from a human centered and an interactive approach done through an extensive process

of design thinking. Such a process tends to involve long hours of prototyping and user testing

(Brown, 2008).

As previously mentioned, design thinking has become an attractive subject to the designers and

also to many managers and leaders of several market leading companies, including Proctor &

Gamble, IDEO, Harley Davidson, Four Seasons Hotels, RIM, GE, and Apple. Because it is such

an important tool that has been helping business around the world, great thinkers such as Tim

Brown, have been constantly working on dispersing the term design thinking among society.

Back in September 2009, Brown gave a remarkable speech in the global TED (Technology

Entertainment and Design) conference about design thinkers. He stressed that designers

should be thinking less on the final product but more on the design thinking process and

approach. Brown also affirmed that design thinking begins with integrative thinking: balancing

desirability with viability and feasibility (see Figure 2).

10

Figure 2: Desirability, Viability, and Feasibility

Source: www.ideo.com

Desirability accounts for the human seek, viability accounts for scalability in business ideas, and

feasibility meaning achievable, no technical impediments. Interpreting this image, it can be said

that innovation through the design thinking process can happen only if desirability, viability, and

feasibility are involved, not otherwise.

Following the discussion on the design thinking process, Brown also commented that design

thinking is always human centered, it may integrate technology and economics, but the ideas

always start with what humans need or might need in the future. He also mentioned that it is

vital to understand culture before starting with the design thinking process. In addition, learning

by making while fast prototyping, was also a way he commented about to develop leading and

creative ideas. He concluded his speech by affirming that design thinking should thoroughly

explore the active engagement of the consumers, not just as consumers, but as developers as

well.

According to Brown, a clear example of design thinking has occurred in 1879, when Thomas

Alva Edison created the first version of what we now know as the light bulb. Edison envisioned

how people would want to use what he made and he engineered the light bulb towards this

11

insight. Because of that, Edison’s invention is seen as one of the earliest approaches to design

thinking (Brown, 2008).

3.4 Tim Brown’s Three Step Approach to Design Thinking Now that the reader had an understanding of design thinking and who are the design thinkers, it

will be important to focus on one design thinking process instead of a broader view. Thus, the

following sections of this paper are dedicated to Tim Brown’s approach to the design thinking

process and how his approach can aid startups, e.g. GoTeamers. In order to have a more clear

understanding of his design thinking process, a clear visual aid was added to this paper to

illustrate this approach. This concept (Figure 3) of the design thinking process has been

developed by Tim Brown to help his audience better visualize the design thinking model. In this

approach, design thinking is portrayed as a continuous three step process: the first being

“Inspiration”, the second “Ideation”, and the third “Implementation” (Brown, 2008).

.

Figure 3: The Three Phases of Design Thinking

Source: Brown (2008)

I.

Inspiration

II.

Ideation

III.

Implementation

12

3.4.1 Inspiration Brown affirms that a major part of design thinking is the inspiration phase. At the inspiration

phase, design thinkers look for opportunities in the market, what has changed and what should

change. They observe the world to find what people are doing out there, how they are thinking,

what they desire and what they wish for. They collect insights by looking at the major problems

in society and try to solve it. They talk to the end-users for collecting even richer and more

provocative ideas. They capture a research based analysis of the target customer to precisely

lay out what the customer wants. In this inspiration phase, design thinkers are often able to

identify opportunities by paying very close attention to the “extreme” users in society, those

being children and elderly people, because designers often do not tend to incorporate the

specials needs of these users in their products and services. By focusing on these polarities and

making a good use of it, new businesses can be highly innovative and successful.

In addition, during the inspiration phase, there should be one appropriate working environment,

one single working room that is comfortable and accessible to all team members. Lastly, in this

phase the recruiting process should occur, it is important here to recruit people from

interdisciplinary programs—people with different backgrounds, to have a diversified team

(Brown, 2008).

3.4.2 Ideation At the ideation phase, design thinkers brainstorm. During the brainstorm phase, they collect

relevant information, sketch, and produce creative formworks. At this stage, design thinkers

work strongly with visual aids. They often work with colorful sticky notes that can be rearranged

as necessary in any type of wall or board. In this phase, it is extremely relevant to place the

customer, the end user, in a visual journey through the business idea (Brown, 2008).

At the ideation phase, it is important to start prototyping at the early stage of the project, start

experimenting with sketches and with new technologies. This is the phase to generate, develop

and test the idea. While prototyping, it is important to constantly seek feedback from your end-

users. In terms of budgeting, design thinkers don’t limit themselves with the calculated costs

and funding for the project, they think big and innovative (Brown, 2008). If the project is

innovative and creative, there will be the funding for it regardless of the costs.

13

3.4.3 Implementation The implementation phase is the time to execute the vision, to market the business, to spread

the word around. To continue the process of design thinking, the implementation phase loops

back to another inspiration phase. After running through all the phases and steps involved in

starting up a business, it is very likely that design thinkers will have other innovative ideas to

work again through the inspiration, ideation and implementation (Brown, 2008). By analyzing

this never ending cycle illustration, one can say that design thinkers never stop generating

innovative ideas.

14

4 Introducing GoTeamers In this chapter, the reader will be familiarized with the business model and concept of the

startup GoTeamers, which will be further analyzed in terms of Brown’s design thinking process.

It will be important to give some general information about the company before analyzing the

benefit this three phase design thinking approach has on the development and processes of

such a startup company:

GoTeamers is a mobile application platform that combines the successful business model of a

well-known social media company such as Facebook with the additional benefit of creating

groups and organizing activities with interesting people one might not know of. Having its main

focus on sports activities, this application allows the user to connect with all the people in the

community and not only people one is friends with, like on Facebook.

The application is configured with a user-friendly interface which automatically eases the

process of organizing activities, e.g. users that want to play soccer at two o’clock on a Sunday

in a certain sports facility can see free vacancies at nearby facilities and can also see other

users who are interested in playing at the same time and place.

GoTeamers target active people looking to participate in indoor and outdoor activities. It

involves males and females, located in the city of Munich or in the suburbs of Munich.

The start-up is run by seven Master students with a strong international background that

experienced the need to be active and meet new people in a foreign country. The project is now

on the ramp up phase, ready for implementation. A click dummy prototype is already developed

and the founding team is looking for potential investors to financially assist in launching the

product.

15

5 Analyzing GoTeamers 5.1 Inspiration Before GoTeamers came together, a group of more than twenty Master students from the

Macromedia Hochschule für Medien und Kommunikation (MHMK) researched ideas that could

be innovative in today’s modern society. All students had different ideas and the ideas were

focused on the problems they had in their daily life. The students focused on searching for ideas

online and they forgot to engage in thorough market research so as to outline the market’s

needs and desires. The students did not observe people in the streets, they did not talk to

people individually, as randomly about their current problems and things they would like to have

it changed in today’s society. At the beginning, the students thought about addressing the

children and elderly demographic as one of their first ideas, e.g. creating an Ipad application for

elderly people. At the end, however, all of the students decided to focus on the target group

between 18-60 years old. They ended up not focusing on the extreme users of society.

5.1.1 Improving the Inspiration Phase In this case, there are a few major key points that should be addressed in order to improve the

inspiration phase in the process of generating business ideas. The MHMK group of students

should have been focused less on the final product and more on the end user, they should have

gone out in the streets after the lecture period and they should have talked to the end-users at

this inspiration phase for collecting even richer and more provocative ideas. They should have

created a questionnaire containing questions such as the following:

1. What problems do you encounter in your daily life?

2. What products/services do you seek?

3. What products/services would better your life?

4. What changes do you want to see in the future in regards to media and technology?

Besides asking questions to people outside of the class, the students should have observed the

world outside, how people shop, how people communicate, how people socialize, etc. The

students should have focused less on researching online and more on researching outside.

They should have continued to work with the extreme users, develop more ideas around these

users, maybe have continued with the elderly idea, or have the idea adapted for children.

16

5.2 Ideation During the ideation processes, the group of MHMK students participated in three different

brainstorming sections which finally led to four major ideas. One idea was to create a mobile

application that would assist Munich residents to find parking spaces around the city. A second

idea was to also create a mobile application that would scan pieces of clothes and suggest

similar items in different stores around Munich. A third idea was to develop a website that would

indicate bio shops situated near to the user’s location. The fourth idea was GoTeamers, which is

the startup company that this paper has been using as an example.

The seven students that grouped together to form GoTeamers were coming from a similar

background. All seven students were coming from a different city than Munich and they

experienced the need to be active and meet new people in the city.

In this phase, the team started to brainstorm name for the company. Names included All4one,

Group You, Grouped by You, Join Us, Team Me, Teamme, Teamed Up, Teamed, Gather Up,

Form Up, among others. The GoTeamers name came about when the team found out that all

the other domains with .com were taken.

Most of the time, the group sketched and brainstormed in different white boards, they rarely

used sticky notes that could have been rearranged, if necessary, in any type of wall or board.

An example of a GoTeamers sketch can be seen on the following page:

17

Figure 4: GoTeamer’s vision

Source: Compiled by GoTeamers members

At this ideation phase, GoTeamers prototyped but rarely did user testing. They did not

constantly seek feedback from the end-users. Throughout the ideation phase GoTeamers did

not have one appropriate working environment, one single working room that was comfortable

and accessible to all team members.

18

5.2.1 Improving the Ideation Phase When founding GoTeamers, major parts of the Ideation process were missed. On this phase, it

was extremely important to have a visualization of business idea, paying close attention to the

customer and to the main service of the business. Instead or in addition to just creating a

drawing of the business plan in the board (Figure 4), GoTeamers should have used design

thinking in design service, for example, they could have created a storyboard to visually narrate

the business model and its process. A storyboard is a professional way to explain the business

model to customers, investors, or other major stakeholders, see Figure 5.

Figure 5: Storyboard

Source: http://www.servicedesigntools.org

By just looking at the drawing GoTeamers created, it would be difficult to interpret the business

model and the service the business wants to provide. In the drawing (Figure 4) there was no

starting point and no ending point for the audience to follow. The storyboard (Figure 5), on the

other hand, narrates and illustrates every single step of the business process from beginning to

end. Here there would be no need for further information to be added verbally to explain the

business process.

19

In regards to prototyping, GoTeamers should have finished the clickdummy quicker and should

have performed several user testing. Lastly, GoTeamers should have worked in one single

room, which would contain all the sketches, prototypes, sitemaps, wireframe, persona, and UI

design that the group had been working on.

5.3 Implementation The GoTeamers startup business is now on its ramp up phase. A click dummy prototype was

developed and the founding team is looking for potential investors to financially assist in

launching the product. The required investment to develop and launch the GoTeamers app on

IOS mobile devices is estimated to be €36.339,00. Before GoTeamers enter the marketplace,

they should start promoting their business and spread the word about what they have been

working on.

Independent from the question if the company is established or not, it is very likely that the team

members will loop back to another inspiration phase. After running through all the phases and

steps involved on starting up a business, and after learning from their mistakes, it is very likely

that GoTeamers team members will have other innovative ideas and use the valuable

framework of the design thinking phases explained in this paper. If they will be working together

in the same group is uncertain, but if they want to succeed, they should closely follow the three

design thinking steps approach described in this paper.

20

6 Conclusion In this paper, the reader was familiarized with design thinking and the fundamental tools that are

applicable for startup businesses. In order to understand design thinking and how design

thinking works, this paper first presented to the reader formal definitions of design and thinking.

Then, putting the two words together, design thinking was described—its methodology and

processes that could help improve fulfilling customer needs and preferences. More specifically,

this paper closely emphasized and examined the three step design thinking approach of Tim

Brown, inspiration being the problem and opportunity that urges the seek for new solutions;

ideation as following the process of brainstorming, development, and user testing; and

implementation as the final execution of the product/service into the market.

Following Tim Brown’s methodology on design thinking, the reader was then introduced to the

small startup company GoTeamers. From there, the chapters guided the reader to Tim Brown’s

design thinking process that could have benefited such a startup company. These last chapters

demonstrated flaws in the GoTeamer’s business structure and process and indicated better

human centered design approach solutions, with a stronger creative visual communication

strategy.

To finalize, it has been shown that companies that incorporate the design thinking in their

innovation processes have become market leaders. If startups could follow Brown’s three steps

of design thinking processes phases: Inspiration, Ideation and Implementation, it could increase

their chances to beat the saturated market. Startups that use the design thinking approach are

driven by a search for customer needs that are not yet fulfilled by existing products and services

in a structured way (Inspiration). The likelihood to identify undiscovered customer needs is

increased and new markets are more often identified. Furthermore, design thinking also helps to

further a customer-oriented development of the product design (Ideation) and to make sure that

the final products meet the customer requirements in an optimal way (Implementation).

Consequently, the phases of Inspiration, Ideation and Implementation are essential steps that

teams should follow when starting up a business. Design thinking can transform the way

products and services are developed in businesses, adding more customer benefits and

business value. Innovation means differentiation, therefore design thinking should be

incorporated into all phases of the process.

21

References

Alexander, C. (1964). Notes on the Synthesis of Form. (Vol. 57, p. 216). Harvard University

Press.

Brown, T. (2008). Design thinking. Harvard Business Review.

Brugnoli, G. (2011). Touchpoints Matrix. Retrieved December 28, 2011 from

http://www.servicedesigntools.org/tools/108.

Creswell, J. (2003). Research design: qualitative, quantitative, and mixed method approaches.

Cross, N. (2008). Design Thinking as a Form of Intelligence. 102-103.

Cross, N. (1999). Design Research : A Disciplined Conversation. Design Issues, 15(2), 5-10.

Cross, N. (2001). Designerly Ways of Knowing : Design Discipline Versus Design Science.

Design Issues, 17(3), 49-55.

Cross, N. (2008). Design thinking as a form of Intelligence. Business Week. The Open

University.

Davy, M. (2012). A Brief History of Design Thinking: The Theory. Retrieved January 19, 2012,

from http://ithinkidesign.wordpress.com/2012/01/18/a-brief-history-of-design-thinking-the-

theory-p1

Faste, R. Roth, B. & Wilde, D. (1993). Integrating Creativity into the Mechanical Engineering

Curriculum.

Faust, J. Ascott, R. (2009). Design Discourse and Discourse Design: Reflections on

Conveyance Matter.

Glatzeder, Goel, & Mueller. (2010). Towards a Theory of Thinking. Springer.

22

Hastrich, C. (2011). Helping Designers Navigate Science. Retrieved December 18, 2011, from

http://bouncingideas.wordpress.com/2011/09/23/helping-designers-navigate-science.

Ireland, C. (2003). The Changing Role of Research. Design Research Methods and

Perspectives, 183(1), 22. The MIT Press.

Jones, J. C. (1970). Design Methods: seeds of human futures. New York (Vol. 32, p. 1158).

Wiley-Interscience.

Lockwood, T. (2010). Design Thinking, Allworth Press NY.

McKim, R. (1973). Experiences in Visual Thinking. Brooks/Cole Publishing Co.

Monin, A. (1992). On the definition of the concepts of thinking consciousness and conscience.

Moscow: Russian Academy of Sciences.

Ralph, P. and Wand, Y. (2009). A proposal for a formal definition of the design concept. 110.

Rowe, P (1986). Design Thinking. Cambridge: The MIT Press.

S. Gregory. (1966). A Design Science. Design Method. London: Butterworth.

Simon, H. A. (1969). The sciences of the artificial, MIT Press Cambridge.

Seymour, R. (2002). What is design. Design Council, 1-3.

Trainor, G. (2011). Potentials and limits of design thinking. Design Business Conference.

Servicedesigntools. (2011). System Map. Retrieved December 20, 2011, from

http://www.servicedesigntools.org/tools/28.