image from: www.interaction-design.org
what is Design Thinking ?
Design thinking is a user-centered approach to problem-solving that involves five key steps. Here’s a brief description of each step:
- Empathize:
- Understand the needs, experiences, and motivations of the users through research and observation. This step involves gathering insights about the users and their challenges.
- Define:
- Clearly articulate the problem you want to solve. This involves synthesizing the information gathered during the Empathize phase to define a clear problem statement or point of view.
- Ideate:
- Generate a wide range of ideas and potential solutions. This step encourages brainstorming and thinking outside the box to explore various possibilities without judgment.
- Prototype:
- Create simple, tangible representations of your ideas. Prototypes can be anything from sketches and models to interactive digital mockups. The goal is to quickly and cheaply test different aspects of your ideas.
- Test:
- Evaluate the prototypes with real users to gather feedback. This step involves observing how users interact with the prototypes and iterating based on their feedback to refine the solutions.
By following these steps, design thinking helps teams develop innovative solutions that are deeply rooted in user needs and experiences.