How to uncover your next million-dollar idea By Stephanie Oley

Need to rethink an app, redesign an insurance system or solve a once-in-a-generation infrastructure challenge? Chances are that design thinking could set your team on the right path.

The name may suggest product design, and to be fair, many proponents of the discipline worked at IDEO – the Silicon Valley-based design and innovation consultancy that takes its name from 'idéo', French for 'idea'. Since founding in 1991, IDEO has been a leading advocate of design thinking. Products to have sprung from its principles include the first Apple mouse, P&G's standing toothpaste tubes, and Infarm's vertical farms.

However, to cite a TED talk by Tim Brown, former CEO of IDEO, focusing too much on design can see practitioners become blindsided to the actual need. He cites one of his own humbling early-career experiences of designing the perfect fax machine, only for the technology itself to become obsolete soon afterwards. This is why the discipline is particularly relevant in the fast-moving modern world of professional services.

Which businesses benefit from design thinking?

Design thinking is in essence a 'human-centred approach to problem-solving and innovation' (to paraphrase from our design thinking course description).

'Design thinking means adopting a process centred on empathy and understanding humans. It's not just for physical products; it applies to any business challenge,' says design thinking CCE facilitator, Kristine Bell.

Bell's own background is in advertising, and she attributes design thinking as critical to some of her team's most successful campaigns. While working for global advertising agency Ogilvy & Mather in post-apartheid South Africa, Bell and her team had opportunities to improve lifestyles in the vibrant township of Soweto.

Our best cultural insights came from just sitting and speaking with people - women who were supporting each other to start businesses, mothers looking for affordable ways to feed their families. Those insights led to the strategies that created our award-winning campaigns for frozen vegetables, banking products and more.

- Kristine Bell

These days, professionals learning design thinking range from natural resources companies to government agencies and travel organisations. One exclusive leisure club in Sydney sends a mix of team members to the CCE course each year, from senior managers to kitchen staff and fitness centre managers, Bell says. They are given a brief that they later have to present to the CEO. 'It's a great opportunity to help every part of the business innovate,' she says.

Where did design thinking originate?

The principles of design thinking long predate IDEO, which is why Bell and her colleagues incorporate a range of case studies, frameworks and exercises into their training.

Bell names visionary British civil engineer, Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806 – 1859), as a likely early pioneer of design thinking. By wondering, 'Why can't I travel uninterrupted from the English midlands via London and then on to New York?' he made advancements ranging from suspension bridges to viaducts, tunnels and steamships.

Practitioners are also introduced to work such as Maslow's hierarchy of needs (as a compass for product development), Daniel Kahnemann's System 1 and System 2 thinking (to better understand users' decision-making processes), Brené Brown (to underscore the value of empathy), and Lean and Canvas frameworks (to turn ideas into structured plans).

So, can anyone become an effective design thinker? Yes, Bell says – but you need a mindset of curiosity.

'A lot of people come to the workshops thinking they can't do it – that design thinking is something special that only others can do,' she explains. 'However, this course gives people permission to come back to childhood and play with ideas. It helps you get outside conventional thinking, and encourages originality.'

She also stresses that the aim here is not perfection. 'There will be loops: pathways opening and pathways closing. And your work will never be completely done! This is really important to remember,' she says.

If human-centred design is new to your team, consider attending the Critical and Creative Thinking Course first. It introduces various ways to explore a problem, from Sohail Inayatullah's Causal Layered Analysis to Edward de Bono's Six Thinking Hats, helping counteract blocks such as one's own biases.

Alternatively, after attending the Design Thinking Course you may be ready to apply your ideas at a more hands-on workshop such as our Product Management Course: Foundations.

In either case, Bell suggests that the best thing participants can do is to actually implement their idea, while ensuring it will add value to others. After all, design thinking is really human-centred thinking – a principle to live by.