CAN DESIGN THINKING MAKE YOU A MORE

INNOVATIVE AND EFFECTIVE FUTURIST?

APF ProDev Day

Washington, DC
July 22, 2016

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Futures

Innovation

Design

AGENDA
What do you want and why are you here?

My futures framework
Design thinking (DT)validity vs. reliability
Biases

DT steps
Touchpoints between DT and futures framework
moments of truth
Focus on empathy as a way to get a clients needs
Framing questions and needs

Personas, prototyping and testing

Wrap-up
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WHAT DO YOU WANT TO TAKE WITH

YOU AT THE END OF THIS SESSION?

Why?

SEVEN STEPS TO THE FUTURE

4.

Tell Stories

5.

Live and Work in the

Future

6.

Walk Back to Today

7.

Shape the Future

1.

Lay the Foundation

2.

Change the Frame

3.

Challenge the Experts

RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY

Reliability means predictable and consistent
Validity means outcomes meet an objective
Appropriate for investigating mysteries

Especially where there is no proof [which includes the

future]
Integrative thinkingquestioning assumptions to get
opportunities
The Design Of Business, Roger Martin
The Opposable Mind, Roger Martin

BIASES
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CHIP AT THOSE BIASES AND THINGS WE

KNOW WE JUST KNOW

DESIGN THINKING STEPS

Craft initial solutionsquickly
created, tested, refined and
produced

Detect insights into human-centered problems

Diving deep to really understand and meet client needs

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TOUCH POINTS
Seven Fundamentals
1.

Lay the Foundation

2.

Change the Frame

3.

Challenge the Experts

4.

Tell Stories

5.

Live and Work in the

Future

6.

Walk Back to Today

7.

Shape the Future

Empathize

Define

Ideate

Prototype

Test

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FORESIGHT AND DT
DT answers three fundamental questionsWhat is:

human
perspective

desirable?

feasible?

technical viewpoint

viable?

business reality

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FORESIGHT AND DT
Foresight answers three fundamental questions
What could be:
social trends

technical trends

desirable?

feasible?

viable?

business trends

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NON-LINEAR, MESSY, BUT DISCIPLINED

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GO WIDE, GO NARROW
Be inclusive

Be inclusive

Lets spend some time here

Be exclusive
Be exclusive
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INNOVATION WITHOUT EMOTION IS

UNINTERESTING
The Designful Company, Marty Neumeier

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EMPATHY VS. SYMPATHY

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EMPATHY
Attempt to understand the way and the whys of
your users

Physical and emotional needs

. . .what is meaningful to
them is the foundation to
create useful and meaningful
design solutions
Hasso Plattner Institute of
Design at Stanford)

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BE AN EMPATHETIC INTERVIEWER
You are interviewing for understanding

Not for sales, marketing, or compliance

human
perspective

desirable?

Start here
Go under the casual
statements

feasible?

technical viewpoint

viable?

business reality

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SOME APPROACHES
Why questions
Weather conditions questions
And:
Short questions (no yes/no),
Attentive listening

No arguing
Acceptance of silence while the interviewee thinks
Capturing everything (interviewer and a recorder)

Ensuring anonymity

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WHY DO YOU WANT TO KNOW ABOUT

THE FUTURE? THE 5-WHYS FRAMEWORK
Why?
Why?
Why?
Why?
Why?
Use the why questions as a foundation to dive
deeper; use framing questions, such as
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SOME POTENTIAL FRAMING

QUESTIONS
Why is the future important to you?
How do you plan for the future?
When you think about the future, what kinds of
information do you need?
How have you used information like this?
Tell me a story about a time you were surprised by
something important that happened and affected you.
How could you have known this surprise was coming?
How did this surprise make you feel?
So, in looking at the future, what sorts of things do you
think you need to know?
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MINE THE ANSWERS

What jobs need to be done?
What does client want to do with insights of the
future?
What are some key unknowns?
What are some recurring patterns in the answers?

What stories of the future would benefit the client?

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CREATE A DEFINE NEEDS STATEMENT

For example:
Trans-plains Delivery is a carrier creating a strategic
plan for the next 15 years. What is a good story
(scenario) to understand the future of insurance and
autonomous vehicles?
Or

Urban-Eco is a successful development company

and wants to look at urban development in 2025 and
is curious about housing trends. What is a story that
could help awareness and action points for the future
of tiny homes in high-value urban areas?

Note: we massaged the needs statement to focus on scenarios; the needs statement generally is
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much broader and the use of scenarios could come out of (or not) an ideation session

FOR WHOM ARE WE DESIGNING AND

FORESEEING?

Personas help
focus on the
individual
Creating a story for
the story
Generally have
multiple personas
for a project

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Moved to San Francisco from Belo Horizonte, Brazil

in 2004

Inez Carvalho
Director of Analytics for Customer
Services

Aspirations:
Wants to move up in business
management, beyond analysis
Enjoys travel
Would like to live in NYC or London
Roles
Analyst
Researcher
Daughter
Student

Pain Points
Torn between MBA, design, and analytics masters
Trying to get ahead of business directions to
shape better analytic tools
Convincing her leadership to look beyond the next
quarter
Creating better ways to share business insights
Protecting proprietary insights, yet sharing with
her professional network
Networks:
Member of professional analytics organizations
Foodie who enjoys group cook-ins
Has close, small group of friends who enjoy music
and art

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PROTOTYPE
Make something tangible that clients can interact with
or use to understand how the future might unfold.

Low cost, easy to makedemonstrates ideas

Rudimentary storyboards with cartoons

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PROTOTYPE
Could be as simple as grouping
post-it notes to capture ideas
into scenario themes
Group them by:
STEEPED category
Major drivers, like energy
costs or conflicts
Details can be specific or
metaphorical

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PROTOTYPE

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PROTOTYPE

Take a page from improvisation

Choose favorite trends and act out
the trends in the future
Lets participants feel the trends
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STRESS TEST
To prevent infatuationwe often fall in love
with our products

To make sure we are addressing the real

needswe often let our biases get in the way
To save resourcesfail early, fail cheaply

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STRESS TEST QUESTIONS

Does the prototype address the why questions? And include:
Plausibility
Differentiation

Does it have a different factor/quality/item that will cause

provocative thinking? Does it provoke?
Consistency:
The logical reasoning must not have any in-built
inconsistency that would undermine its credibility.
Decision-making utility:
Should contribute sufficient insights into the future to bear
on the decision focus selected.
Challenge: The prototype should challenge the organizations
conventional wisdom about the future.
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Why

Challenge

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1
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Decision Making

Plausible

Differentiaton

Consistent

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Why

Challenge

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1
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Decision Making

Plausible

Differentiaton

Consistent

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Why

Add 3-6 Labels

from Define Needs
Challenge

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Decision Making

Plausible

Differentiaton

Consistent

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DESIGN THINKING AIDS FORESIGHT

By helping to better understand client needs

through empathetic interviewing and
listeninghuman-centered
Helps overcome foresight practitioner biases
Refines client needs
Offers low-cost, quick ways to get feedback
and align solutions with needs

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WRAP-UP & EVALUATION

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SUMMARY
Combining traditional futures techniques with
complementary, creative DT:
Provides tools for more fidelity in understanding
client desires and needs
Enables futurists to craft more feasible solutions and
designing more viable business models at reduced
costs
Allows fast feedback from clients

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CONTACT INFORMATION

Jim Burke
burkeje@verizon.net
@burkejames
703-585-9328

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