Design Thinking or Design Theatre?
There is an element of Design Thinking that is simply cool.
Our users, who are frustrated with something get to participate in an immersive experience where they are in control of shaping their future solution.
It’s a playful, fun and rewarding experience for the participants.
However, how much did they contribute that fieldwork could’ve told you? Did you truly look to find the overlap of Feasibility, Viability & Desirability? Or have you come up with a cool concept poster that is likely out of reach, but it felt great whilst doing it?
Design Thinking can be theatrical. In a world of ineffective, and boring, traditional consulting, showing a new way that is the complete opposite to that does allow us to find better problems and better solutions.
But it can’t only be theatre. Have you spent the whole week exhausting your workshop participants to show off your cool innovative approach? Or are you focused on moving from the problem diamond to the solution diamond, diverging and converging.
It’s not about workshops. It’s about finding the right problem, and the right solution. Workshops are merely a tool to support this, don’t make the workshops the purpose of Design Thinking, or else you’re only putting on a show, and eventually it’ll end.
Having said all of this, sometimes doing it only for show is ok. If you’re wanting to show a client a new way of working, without necessarily coming to a good solution, it’s ok to spend an hour or two in a design workshop. Just be cautious as to label it “We did design thinking”, you actually showed an example of a design thinking activity. Spending the afternoon opening the boot of a car and listening to the sound system doesn’t mean you’ve driven it. Driving it is the purpose of the vehicle, but showing the boot and audio may have helped the sale.
