The theory and praxis behind Design Thinking
A two-day workshop at the Institute of Electronic Business in Berlin
Many definitions of Design Thinking can be found on the internet, for example:“Design thinking is a process for practical, creative resolution of problems or issues that looks for an improved future result.” Thus sounds the definition on Wikipedia while Tim Brown from Design and Innovation Company IDEO defines it as: “Design thinking can be described as a discipline that uses the designer’s sensibility and methods to match people’s needs with what is technologically feasible and what a viable business strategy can convert into customer value and market opportunity.” This gives us a hint of what Design Thinking means but what about the theory behind it, the practical methods and tools and how can you actively use it in your Businnes?
On Friday 25th and Saturday 26th Pia Betton will be co-facilitating a two day workshops at the Institute of Electronic Business in Berlin. Co-lecturers are Prof. Dr. Markus Peschl from Vienna University, DI Thomas Fundneider from theLivingCore (Vienna), Prof. Peter Friedrich Stephan who teaching Cognitive
Design at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne and Prof. Dr. Thomas Schildhauer and Sebastian Schmidt from the Institute of Electronic Business.
Besides Design Thinking Radical Innovation, Cognitive Design and Social Media and Crowdsourcing is on the agenda. Methods like Enabling Spaces, Scope and Drill-down, Cultural Probes, Re-framing, Attitude – Practise – Knowledge, Blue Print Maps and People Studies will be presented, explained and used through practical excercises.The overall focus is to teach how design theory and praxis can be implemented and successfully used in innovation and change processes in organisations.
It’s no longer possible to sign up for the workshop but a follow-up will be conducted in October. For update on the seminar, please send your e-mail address to p.betton@framework-identity.com
A brand building process
Building a brand identity that is real, attractive, unique and easily
Whether talking about private or business relations, the first encounter is the “make or break” moment. For companies it is crucial that they have a clear brand identity. Like a human voice or personality that authentically connects with their stakeholders. A brand identity that is real, attractive, unique and easily understood and communicated.
IFU is an independent, self-governing fund associated with the Ministry for Development Cooperation. IFU stands for The Danish Industrialisation Fund for Developing Countries. Together with Danish companies, they invest in commercial projects in developing countries.
IFU were looking to become more visible and well-known in Denmark. The main focus of this a process was to develop a strong and unique brand as a basis for IFU to reach their goals.
As a starting point for the strategic work, Pia Betton and business partner Flemming Andersen conducted eighteen interviews with IFU employees including people from the management team and members of the board. The objective was to identify the brand’s (the business’) core values.
A brand developing process for a self-governing fund.
The next step in the process was to analyse the situation in and around IFU. The values of an organisation are evident in every aspect of the organisations’ business routine even if not communicated directly to the public. Might this be client relations, direct marketing or treatment of its employees and strategic partners.
The results of the observations and interviews led to key conclusions concerning IFU’s future image and communication.
After presenting the results of the process framework identity facilitated two workshops with the management team and the employees where the new brand was refined. Our last contribution to the process was to develop a design briefing for a competition, where Denmark’s two best design agencies were invited to present their idea on how to visualise the new brand.
A one-day workshop: Designing Innovation - Design for Innovation
LEARNTEC is the leading international trade fair and convention for vocational education, learning and information technology. The fair in 2010 is the 18th of its kind and will take place at Karlsruhe Trade Fair Center from the 2. to 4. February 2010.
The workshop facilitators
Pia Betton, Founder and Managing Director of framework identity will conduct a one-day workshop on 4. February together with a team of great thinkers and practitioners from the fields of strategy, innovation and design:
Thomas Fundneider, Founder and Managing Director of tf consulting, a consultancy for Strategy and Innovation.
Thomas focuses on collaborative innovation processes (open innovation, crowd sourcing and creating and executing development/design competitions), radical innovation, design thinking, supporting start-ups and conceptualising and creating innovation hubs and enabling spaces.
Markus F. Peschl is professor for Cognitive Science and Philosophy of Science at the Dept. of Philosophy at the University of Vienna, Austria.
Markus’ focus of research is on the question of knowledge (knowledge creation/innovation, construction, and representation of knowledge) in various contexts e.g: in natural cognitive systems, in science, in organisations and in educational settings. Markus follows a radically interdisciplinary approach integrating concepts from the natural sciences, philosophy of science, from the humanities, as well as from knowledge technology.
Peter Friedrich Stephan is a designer and writer focusing on Design Thinking: He works on various projects within Knowledge Design and Creative Business Design helping organisations develop clear concepts for internal and external communication. Concepts that meet user needs and promote tangible business results. Furthermore Peter is a professor in Theory and Design at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne and a tutor at the Masterprogramm Leadership in digitaler Kommunikation at Berlin University of the Arts.
The workshop…
At the Leading Edge Workshop, “New Methods and Tools for the innovation and knowledge generation”, participants will gain insight in what new tools and approaches are used when working with innovation and generating knowledge.
The workshop will be conducted as an open space workshop, where the different tools will be introduced in short group sessions. The participants will get a hands-on experience with how to use the tools and be able to discuss, in which situations what tool will be appropriate to us.
*About LEARNTEC *
LEARNTEC is a top notch source for information about different approaches to learning, using online and traditional media, which are both effective and free of time constraints.
During the three days more than 170 providers will be showcasing their solutions for vocational education, e-learning and knowledge management. International experts from both practical and theoretical fields will bring together business, science and academia and present the future of learning at Germany’s largest congress, complete with best practice examples.
If you wish to know more go to LEARNTEC’s website
Innovation and education in Roskilde
For months now we have worked on an innovation process with with Roskilde, a Danish municipality, together with our partners Per Løkken and Build Identity. The aim of this process is to develop a strategy that guides Roskilde in the direction of becoming Europe’s leading, educational city in the year 2030.
As an important part of the process, we wanted “the silent voice” (the users) that are often overruled or ignored by “the known voice” (the professionals) to be heard. In this case, we defined the “silent voice” as being students from Roskilde’s different educational institutions. In many cases, the future work force and citizens of Roskilde. The userdriven innovation process is divided into three stages:
Stage one, Involvement
We invite the students (the users) to become co-developers and share thoughts, wishes and dreams and contribute ideas on the project.
Stage two, Idea- and concept development
The material we are left with form the basis for stage two where the people that normally work with strategy development in the municipality (“the known voice”) take part in transforming all the thoughts and inputs into concrete ideas and concepts. Again, students are invited into this process
Stage three, realisation
Development and realization of innovative concepts for the municipality.
The grand opening
Last Tuesday (November 24) was the highlight of stage one. A one day innovation work shop were we had invited seventy students from various schools and universities to participate in six different work shops. Furthermore employees from the municipality (the educational institutions, politicians etc.) were working together in a seventh workshop. The workshops were designed as an experience for many senses where the participants through play and creativity explored future lifestyles within 6 areas of everyday life and education.
For you Danish speaking readers you can follow this link to watch a small video. A feature by a regional tv station that stopped by on the innovation day.
Innovative summer plans
Sunbathing at one of the many lakes in and around Berlin or gaining new knowledge and meeting innovative people for refreshing input and inspiration? If you feel more attracted to the second option, we suggest you join us at the summer camp at Berlin University of the Arts*
Many organisations are challenged by the rapid changes of today’s market and the increasingly high expactations of their stakeholders. To continiously generate and implement new ideas and market opportunities gives you a head start to your competitiors. Most managers are aware of this fact but are challenged in their everyday lifes because of structural and cultural boundaries.
For the Berlin University of the Arts Pia Betton and Prof. Peter Friedrich Stephan facilitate a three day seminar where Radical Innovation – design of concepts, processes and systems, ethnographic field work and cognitive design are on the agenda. Through talks, workshops and coaching you will gain new insight in how to embrace change. You will be introduced to methods and tools that can help you overcome organisational obstacles and actively and efficiently work with innovation in your organisation.
*Read more about the seminar here or contact Berlin University of the Arts for more information!
Designing a sustainable society
3rd International Future Center Summit
In May we are participating in a summit in Stockholm, together with our network partners from Strandgaard & Co and The International Center for Innovation.
The participants will be an inspiring, international group of practitioners and thinkers – people from existing and up-coming so called future and innovation centers. Future Centers are open innovation environments where concepts are developed to support organisations in becoming more systematic in their process of user involvement.
At the summit professionals with shared interests and visions will have the opportunity to exchange knowledge and experience and participate in workshops on social entrepreneurship, intercultural collaboration and society design. The summit is highly relevant for us and our work with both the International Center for Innovation, Future Strategy and 180° Academy where user-driven innovation plays a big role. We hope to extend our network and gain new knowledge that we can integrate in our work with our network partners.
More information about the summit can be found here
Summit Leaders
Prof. Leif Edvinsson – UNIC & University of Lund & The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Per Östling – Dalenum Development
Henrik Danckwardt – IC Community
A new dining experience
- What will the future service concepts look like?
On a friends recommendation I went to a restaurant called Inamo on a recent visit to London, a “pioneering Oriental fusion restaurant and bar” as they call themselves . The reason is their unusual service concept with the intention of leaving the control of the dining experience to the customer.
We were seated as in every other restaurant but quickly noticed that the table top wasn’t a normal wooden or metal one but an interactive screen. A waiter introduced us to the concept: You place your order yourself, whether food or drinks. When clicking through the menu you se a picture of every dish (on your “plate”) along with a short description. By clicking on a dish or drink the system saves it in an order folder until you activate it, since all meals are served within 15 minutes from when the order is placed. This means you plan yourself what you want to eat when and hardly have any contact with the waiters.
When introduced to the interface I first connected it with Surface, an advanced touch-screen product from Microsoft, that I saw a demonstration of in Dubai when visiting the Microsoft Office with 180° Academy. Of course Surface is a totally different product but the version at Inamo offers a service similar to some of those intended for the Microsoft Surface. Since having experienced a close-up live demonstration of Surface, I can tell that it is amazing what you can do with the product and the possibilities/business ideas are endless! With a thought through concept a lot of services can become more user friendly and efficient which will surely make a lot of people happy, offering self-service in a new dimension. At the same time it might lead to a discussion about how products like Surface influence the level of social interaction in every-day life boosting the development of society becoming slowly more individual. Still, I’m excited to se which products will be introduced in the future as a result of the development in this product range!
Create with your audience
This week around 70 representatives from leading cultural organisations in Denmark met in the theatre Camp X in Copenhagen to discuss and share their experiences around people-centred innovation. The Danish Ministry of Culture have recently published a report about involvement of the audience in creating or improving cultural offers. Johannes and I participated in the conference and got the chance to meet the people behind 5 of the 29 cases presented in the report – very inspiring.
A student from The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, School of Architecture told about a project, where she was given the assignment to develop something for homeless people. She decided to do observations and went to live with the homeless people for 24 hours. She found that they are not interested in material things. She also found that in the public space the homeless see the bench as their couch, the public rest rooms as their bathrooms, the phone booth as their office etc. At the end, she decided to improve their couch and created a cover for the bench that made it into a comfortable couch. The homeless people loved it.
A developer at the Danish Radio (public broardcaster) develops a number of online products to create traffic on their website. Among others he described an online game/virtual world, which was hacked by lead users. They hacked their way to optimize the game. He turned the hackers into important co-creators of the game.
I’m convinced, that there are many more success stories to come, when more cultural institutions invite their audience to challenge them and give their input. It works very well in the business world. Some people raised the question: Who is to decide which cultural offers the population should be exposed for? Who are the experts? I believe the questions to raise is: How do we re-new ourselves and make excisting or new offers even more relevant and attractive for the audience?