Design thinking, which can separate average companies from excellent ones, is made up of empathy for the end user, creativity when looking for solutions and a rational approach to making choices and trade-offs, says Anne-Marie le Roux, faculty and business consultant for innovation and design thinking at USB Executive Development.
She has the following advice:
• Harness the power of empathy; the best way to solve a customer's problem, for example, is to find a way to experience their pain. "Empathy goes beyond the physical design of something to the emotional experience of it. Companies must go through what their customers experience to understand this."
• Innovation has become the buzz word, but there needs to be a focus on the how of innovation. "It means representing customers' experience in a way that's diverse and collaborative."
• View customers as partners. "We usually design our organisations in silos, so our focus becomes all about our struggle to collaborate internally. The people who really deal with customers should be empowered to make decisions to create amazing customer experience," says Le Roux.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.