What is Design Thinking?

Imagine that you have an idea for a product or service. As a start-up founder or product manager, you write the product specifications, you contact suppliers to understand the cost of delivering your idea (or you just go for it if you are lucky enough to have coding or maker skills). Before you know it, you are in business, but you have not asked the most important question. Is this product what customers really need? This question is key to avoid pitfalls and optimise both costs and time.

Design Thinking is a way of working that places users at its heart. It is a human-centred way to solve problems. The main advantage of this methodology is that it provides the possibility to test quickly if an idea, solution or enhancement can bring real benefits to our customers. It integrates different approaches, tools, and techniques from different fields (Marketing, Psychology, Design, Business, and even Ethnographic Research).

The most famous user of this type of methodology is Apple, -with Amazon as a close follower-, but design thinking is now ubiquitous in even the most inconspicuous industries, such as Financial Services. At Barclays Bank, Santander, as well as a number of Fintechs the methodology is widely used. Barclays Bank, for instance, has a Chief Design Officer, and it is under his umbrella or in collaboration with his teams that this type of work falls under.

By investing in design, prototyping the product, and collecting feedback, Barclays managed to focus on the customer experience for their mobile banking app. This led to higher net promoter scores. These higher scores, in turn, drove higher income and reduced complaints, thereby lowering costs. For example, the Barclays Mobile Banking App net promoter score climbed upwards for a number of months by using this type of approach.

In another field, GE is probably one of the most famous examples of a company that applies Design…

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