A Practical Guide To Design Thinking: A Collection of Methods To Re-Think Social Change

A practical
guide to
design
thinking
A collection
of methods to
re-think social
change
Moritz Gekeler
A practical
guide to
design
thinking
03
About the author
Moritz Gekeler, Ph.D., is a strategic facilitator and leadership coach for creative collaboration
and co-innovation.
© 2019 Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung India Office

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Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) is the oldest political foundation in Germany. The foundation is named after Frie-
drich Ebert, the first democratically elected president of Germany.
The views expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung.
Graphic Design: Myriam Rueda
04
Background 11
The concept of design thinking 13
What is design thinking? 15
The three core elements of design thinking 17
Deconstructing stereotypes through creative collaboration 25
Structure of the project 27
Focus: gender equality 27
Results of the creative collaboration 30
A step-by-step guide 35
A thousand and one methods 37
Facilitate your team 39
Be curious! 49
Be compassionate! 57
Be creative! 67
Be constructive! 73
Pitfalls: Where to be cautious 87
Outlook: How design thinking could help in other projects 91
Partner organizations involved in the project 95
Endnotes 97
Bibliography 103
05
06
07
08
The need for more
out-of-the-box
thinking
Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) has a long history of withstands any efforts to make substantial changes
working on social issues: on improving workers’ to its power structures. We have organized seminars,
and women’s rights, on social inclusion, and on trainings and campaigns, all working well for those
democratic accountability. With our large network already convinced of change. What we have failed to
of partner organizations we have been constantly do though, is to get on board those women and men
working on the reduction of gender inequality who resist a progressive understanding of the term
by capacity building, socio-economic analyses and “feminism” and gender . Civil society organizations
sensitization campaigns. Since 2015, however, we and government programmes are stuck in
have been wondering why, despite so much expertise technocratic solutions like gender mainstreaming
and good work, the situation of women has by-and- or over-emphatic political correctness. Largely
large not really improved. Within the context of dependent on donor funding, many organizations
Asian feminisms, we have realized that our work on with good intentions have become trapped in
gender equality has ended up going in circles. By now project cycles and application writing. But actual
we have understood the root causes of inequality alliances for change have seldom materialized.
(capitalism, patriarchy) and have the moral high
ground (social justice) on what needs to change. This was the point that started the FES India Office
Still, both men and women, and in fact all gender wanting to do things differently. We acknowledge
identities, are trapped in a patriarchal system that that patriarchy was the root cause of gender
09
inequity , but did we ever actually try understanding closer to understanding the enormous challenge
those in favour of the system? Did we—that ahead of us. We cannot change a running system
is, civil society—really put enough effort into overnight, but we can certainly try doing things
convincing the other side why gender equality differently. And finally, we should get out of our
matters? Did we reach out to the fence-sitters and comfort zone and interact with the Other. Our
rally them to our cause? And, most importantly, experience has shown that the world might not be
who are we genuinely targeting with our own that black-and-white after all.
work, and why does that seem not to function?
Design thinking is neither rocket science nor a
Gaining a fresh perspective on the alleged panacea. But it can surely help us re-image an
beneficiaries of patriarchy seemed equally alternative world, and to tell a different story
important as questioning our own lines of work and about life. We need to break out of our own work
conceptual approaches. With the help of the design habits and project cycles and just start doing things
thinking methodology we wanted to de-construct differently. This manual provides some guiding steps
not only patriarchy but also our own perceptions to that path. There is no executive summary as it
and assumptions, which frame our work. “Why are would consist of the two things only: You and Why?
we doing this?” has become the new guiding
question. Like the annoying child wanting to
know why, the continuous challenging of our own
mindset has led us closer to the truth and, yes, also
Patrick Ruether
Director, FES India Office
10
Background
The use of creative concepts and innovative This publication will give you an insight into the
methods—now often referred to as design process, the strengths and specific challenges of
thinking—was for a long time a niche practice the approach. It features experiences from the FES
for nerdy Californian innovators, creative German partner organizations and finally offers a practical
problem-solvers or arty Scandinavian designers. But guide to some of the methods that have been
since the turn of the 21st Century they have evolved used throughout the process. This guide has been
into an approach applied by professionals from designed on the basis of the process that the group
different fields and industries all over the world1. of partners and FES colleagues have gone through.
In the software industry the concept is widely It is not seeking to be a comprehensive collection
accepted, though design thinking is also becoming of design methods, but should act as a reminder
popular in other fields. In the social sector, big, for the project team of the methods they have
very often American organizations such as the Bill been using. Additionally, we publish these methods
& Melinda Gates Foundation2 , the Acumen Fund3 to help other organizations in the social sector to
and others4 have been playing around with design identify how design thinking might be useful for
methods. Smaller organizations or even local non- them and to provide some tools for thinking more
governmental organizations (NGOs) are only slowly creatively and collaboratively about their respective
gaining some exposure to it.5 topics. Most methods have not been developed
specifically for this project, and we will provide
The Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) India Office has links and resources for further engagement with
taken on the challenge of applying design thinking the concepts.
with their partner organizations in a context that is
less product- and business-oriented. The goal was
to enable experts from the partner organizations to
think differently about a topic that they have been
working on for years or even decades: improving
gender equality in India.
11
12
The
concept of
design thinking
13
14
What is
design
thinking?
“Design thinking is a way of finding human needs professionals. As the famous French-American
and creating new solutions using the tools and mind- designer Raymond Loewy is said to have remarked:
sets of design practitioners.”6 – David & Tom Kelley “Design is too important to be left to the
designers.”10 Instead, people from different
This quote from David and Tom Kelley very disciplines should come together, collaborate
broadly defines the concept of design thinking. creatively and thus create new solutions.
The simple way in which the two brothers from Palo
Alto, California, formulate it highlights the rather But why should the tools and mindsets of design
high aspiration behind the concept: design and practitioners be of any help in solving these
its methods can be used to solve challenges that challenges? In order to answer this question, let us
human beings face. Throughout the literature the take a look at the world as it appears today.
challenges that are best suited for design thinking
are described in more detail: Design thinking works A short history
best when the problem is ill-defined7, or “wicked”
as Richard Buchanan and others have called it8. It
of design thinking
should not have one single answer. Rather, several Over the last two decades the pace of change has
answers might be equally valid, although maybe increased dramatically. Even though statisticians
not equally desirable. In short: Design thinking is such as Hans Rossling have proven that this change
useful when the problem is complex.9 has usually been for the better11 , on a global scale
many new challenges have evolved without the old
Additionally, the aforementioned definition of problems being solved. New technologies such as
design thinking suggests that those tools and the computer and smartphone, and others yet to
mindsets can be used not only by the design come such as artificial intelligence or robots12, will
practitioners themselves, but also by other increase the speed at which humankind innovates
15
and adapts to a changing world. than just selling interchangeable products to
them13.
The capitalistic mindset of the 20th Century with
its methodologies and strategies—namely an Around 2003/2004 Hasso Plattner, one of the
industrial, profit-driven and top-down approach founders of the software company SAP, read
based on a patriarchal system—have managed to about David Kelley’s d.school, which is connected
bring much prosperity to some parts of the world, to Stanford University in Palo Alto. David used
while leaving others way behind. In the highly a process that he called design thinking to let
competitive business world of over-saturated students collaboratively work on problems that
markets, only those companies are to thrive that are not easily analysed. Similar approaches and
manage to distinguish themselves from others methods had been taught successfully around
and to create added value for the consumers. The the world before, but usually to students who
capitalistic race for higher margins and shareholder were aspiring to become designers themselves. At
value have contributed significantly to greater Stanford, David invited students from all kinds of
phenomena such as climate change, air and water disciplines into what he called the d.school14. He
pollution, or the emergence of new forms of wanted to teach his students to become innovators
bonded labour across the globe, to name a few. In rather than administrators in their respective fields
2018 these megatrends can no longer be considered and even across disciplines.
a somewhat distant sword of Damocles, but have
become reality in daily life, in the form of draughts, The following meeting between Hasso and David
heat waves, smog clouds, plastic islands in our accelerated the subsequent rise of design thinking.
oceans, etc. The sword is not somewhere above our Hasso generously funded the d.school at Stanford,
heads but has already begun falling. which since then has spread around the world from
Potsdam, Germany, to Cape Town, South Africa,
In recent years it has thus become more and more and then on to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and Beijing
obvious even to the wider public that the mindset in China.15 Other schools from various backgrounds
and strategies of the 20th Century will not be able to are also introducing a design-thinking approach.
produce solutions to problems that they themselves The company SAP, which touches the lives of millions
have created or at least accelerated. Based on this of employees in various sectors, also introduced
insight the search for alternative approaches had design thinking and it was only a matter of time
begun. Initially, companies were merely looking until design thinking also became popular in the
for better ways of differentiating themselves from board rooms of companies as diverse as PepsiCo,
their competitors. Design and its methods seemed Daimler, IBM or even traditional consultancies such
promising. Organizations like Apple were doing as McKinsey or Accenture.
increasingly well by focussing all their efforts on
creating experiences for their customers rather
16
Tackling the way of working teams to approach their challenges in a different,
more creative and more human-centred way.17 The
vs the workshop approach FES project on which this paper is based was
In the course of these developments design conceptualized as a series of workshops. However,
thinking has evolved from a profession (traditional the partner organizations of FES applied the
design) into a novel approach that helps people methods according to their needs in between the
solve their respective challenges in a more creative, meetings. The goal was to enable the partner
human-centred, collaborative, iterative and visual organizations to look at their respective fields of
way (design thinking)16. There often is a discussion work from a different perspective.
around how design thinking is to be done correctly.
Many employees of the companies mentioned
above say that design thinking is best done in a
workshop format. If you ask members of design
agencies or professional design teams within those
organizations they strongly disagree and say that
design thinking is rather embedded in their way
of working, and might but equally might not also
The three core

happen in a workshop format.
One reason for this discrepancy lies in the amount

of training both sides have put into learning the
methods and approaches of the designer. While
classical designers have studied the profession and
elements of
worked creatively more or less all through their
university life and professional career, employees design
thinking
with a background in a different field usually learn
about design thinking through highly engaging
training formats. Therefore, these workshop-like
trainings become what they think of as design How does design thinking enable this different
thinking, and it takes a long time and a lot of perspective? At its core, design thinking is a
practice for people to introduce the principles of collaborative and ideally multidisciplinary approach.
design thinking into their regular work routines, That is the biggest difference from classical design
as opposed to holding dedicated design-thinking as well as from other disciplines.
workshops.
Nevertheless, even short-term design-thinking While traditional projects in the corporate world,
work-shops have their value, since they enable the classical design world and also in the social
17
sector are usually based on cooperation, design Be mindful of people
thinking is based on collaboration. Cooperation in
this sense means that people work together as a Anything that a design thinker does is based on an
team but are not necessarily all involved in all steps attempt to better understand the human being. In
of the process. A design-thinking team on the other fact the term human-centred design can be used
hand ideally works together and decides together, almost synonymously with design thinking. This at-
therefore each team member is involved in all steps titude of being mindful of people has at least two
of the process (see Image 1). sides20 : the focus on the team on the one hand and
the focus on the target audience or user21 on the
In order to ensure that this collaboration works well other.
for the team members and also that it produces
results within an acceptable time frame18, design The team and their experience
thinkers make use of three core elements: people, As mentioned, the team in a design-thinking
place and process19. project should ideally be diverse in terms of gender,
Image 1: Projects based on cooperation vs. on collaboration
Beginning End
cooperative
collaborative
Source: Andrea Augsten and Moritz Gekeler, “Für einen Paradigmenwechsel in der Designlehre des 21. Jahrhunderts: Welche
Haltungen braucht kollaboratives Design?”, in: J. Parks, Design & Bildung – Schriften zur Designpädagogik, Band 2 (Munich:
Kopaed, 2018, pp. 32-33), translated by the author.
18
backgrounds and skills. For example, an engineer The audience and their context
could work with a social worker, a designer, a Whenever you read about design thinking, you will
philosopher and a business expert to solve whatever definitely find the user focus to be a very important
challenge they are working on. The concept of the element. A design-thinking project has at its core
“T-shaped person” describes how the people in the needs, wishes, aspirations and the context of
this team should be selected: the vertical line of the people it ultimately serves. Since it does not
the T describes the depth of any given expertise make sense to talk about users in the context of
(e.g. design22, social work, psychology or business), social activism or social work, terms like audience or
while the horizontal line symbolizes the ability and even just person or human being seem to be more
willingness to reach out to others and to bridge the suitable.
gap between the disciplines. This requires an open,
curious and empathetic attitude23 towards other Working with design thinking, the team ensure
people, and less of the imagined omniscience of to always keep the human being at the core
some domain experts. In general, design thinking of whatever they are doing: They take care to
requires the team members to take an innocent understand the situation and the context of that
perspective in order to be able to learn something human being—the challenges and opportunities,
new. the wishes and needs. They try to understand the
target audience of the final concept or solution (e.g.
In reality many organizations do not have the girls who should be empowered to go to school). But
diversity that would be ideal for this kind of a design thinker will also try to understand other
work, though. In this case it is useful to highlight stakeholders who are important in that situation
and embrace the diversity on other levels, such (e.g. fathers who think that too much education
as character or working style. Additionally, a true will make it difficult to find a good husband for
design thinker would always bring on other their daughters). Through thorough ethnographic
perspectives during a project, e.g. through research they try to get a good understanding
interaction or even co-creation with the target of the system in which they are operating. This
audience, experts or other people who can involves constant interaction with the people who
contribute their views and ideas to the project. are affected or even causing the problem, or who
have any other helpful information concerning the
Design-thinking teams also take responsibility for given challenge.24
maintaining a good team spirit by exchanging
constantly about their behaviour, their feelings and
emotions. Games and other fun team activities help
the team members to get to know each other in a
much richer way.
19
Be mindful solutions”. Usually the little word “new” carries a
lot of importance whenever design thinking is used.
of the (work) place
In order to support the team, it is helpful to The reason for many organizations to even look
work in a space that is flexible. Many traditional at an approach like design thinking is the need
offices have very heavy furniture, which cannot be for innovation. The problem here is that the team
removed from the room, or they have policies which (or even the sponsor, supervisor or president of an
do not allow for the employees to mess with the organization) cannot know at the outset of a project
interior design. If you are working in a traditional exactly what the outcome will be. That actually is
conference room or banquet hall of a hotel, the the whole point of the exercise. If you think you
staff usually obligingly bring enormous tables and know exactly what the outcome is, you do not
unwillingly destroy any flexibility that an empty need a design-thinking approach.27 But whenever
room would give you. you have no clue what solution could help solve the
challenge or which solution is the best one, design
In an ideal set-up on the other hand, the room thinking might help. Especially when the challenges
should inspire creativity and should be flexible are rather complex in nature and could be solved in
so that the team can move the furniture around many different ways.
whenever they need. Instead of being constrained
by the built environment, the team should be If you search the internet for images related to
able to decide what space they need at any given the term “design thinking”, you will find many
moment. Scott Whithofft and Scott Doorley have process visualizations. This is because being
written a very useful book that explains how spaces mindful of your process is very important to ensure
can be designed in a way that encourages people proper collaboration and avoid getting lost in the
to collaborate with each other and be creative.25 openness of the whole endeavour. The team should
be able to mutually understand where they are in
If you do not have the financial means to change the process and what has to be done in order to
the whole office set-up, some very simple tools such be comfortable with not knowing exactly what the
as rolls of brown or white paper, sticky notes and final outcome will be.
markers will take you a long way.26 Even changing
the setting for a day or two, working from a park The visualization that comes closest to the
or from a coffee shop, will help you in changing experienced reality of a design-thinking project
perspectives. is the “design squiggle” coined by Damien
Newman.28
Be mindful of process
David and Tom Kelley describe design thinking as At the beginning of the project a lot of research
“a way of finding human needs and creating new has to be done to understand the challenge better
20
Image 2: The design squiggle by Damien Newman
Uncertainty / patterns / insights Clarity / Focus
Research Concept Design

Source: Damien Newman, https://thedesignsquiggle.com/ (accessed: 13.12.2018)
and build empathy for the target audience. In this use a very simple trick. They pay attention to their
phase the team might feel a little lost sometimes, own thinking style and consciously adjust it. A very
but through broad research (ideally the attempt to open style that values every observation, every
get a 360° view) they will eventually find patterns insight and every idea, as small and irrelevant as it
and reach insights that then lead to initial ideas, might seem (divergent thinking), is differentiated
prototypes and, with increasing clarity and focus, from a more selective, critical and picky approach
finally to a very concrete design. The challenge for that enables the team to find patterns in the
teams that are new to a process like this is to make previously generated abundance of data, and to
them feel comfortable with not knowing where make choices (convergent thinking). These two
the process will lead them. An experienced design thinking styles are strictly separated from each
thinker will just simply trust the process, having other to enable the team to leave the area of the
seen it work so many times. known and consciously go forth into an area of
discovery.29
Divergent vs. convergent thinking
In order to structure this seemingly chaotic process,
design thinkers and other creative problem solvers
21
Separating the research styles of divergent and convergent thinking and the
from the search for a solution trick of separating “understanding the problem”
Additionally, design thinkers apply another simple from “solving the problem”. It also differentiates
trick: they separate the analysis and understanding four attitudes that are predominant in each phase
of a problem from the search for the solution. This of a project.
way they can ensure that the final solution is actually
based on needs and observations that are gathered During the initial research phase, the prevalent
in the research phase. Especially this second trick attitude is curiosity. The goal of this phase of a
sounds extremely simple, but it turns out that many design thinking project is to learn as much as you
people find it easier to directly jump to conclusions can about the given challenge and its context.
and to solutions rather than spending time on After that, while convergently finding patterns
analysing the problem from different perspectives and selecting insights, the team compassionately
first. describes the target audience and the situation in
which the challenge occurs. In this phase the team
The double diamond reformulates (“re-frames”) the initial challenge into
Image 2 shows an idealized version of the design more meaningful problem statements, which will
process, and visualizes the thinking styles and tricks. help them at the beginning of the next phase to be
This process visualization highlights the thinking creative and have better ideas. If the research has
Image 2: The double diamond shows the different thinking styles, tricks and attitudes
e
e
rg
rg
ve
ve
di
di
co
nv co
co
er n
nv
ge ve
er
ge
rg
UNDERSTAND SOLVE
e
THE PROBLEM THE PROBLEM
te
na
ive
io
ct
ss
be
be
tru
pa
cr
cu
ns
m
ea
rio
co
co
tiv
us
be
be
e
Source: Adapted from the ”Double Diamond“ by the British Design Council.
22
been done well the team builds not only an
intellectual but also an emotional understanding
of the problem they are working on. Being creative
in this context means developing as many ideas as
possible. No idea is too crazy or too challenging.
Again, this is part of the divergent way of thinking.
Only in the final phase the team select ideas. Now
it is time to be constructive in two ways:
§§ They build prototypes of their respective ideas.

§§ They test them with the target audience and
experts, and constructively collect feedback.
That feedback starts a loop that brings the team

back to being curious. Compassionately, they then
make sense of the collected feedback, find creative
solutions to the issues that have been raised in
that feedback, and build the next iteration of the
solution. Design thinking is never a linear process
—instead it involves constant exchange with the
target audience and other experts in order to
improve the solution well before implementing it.
23
24
Deconstructing
stereotypes
through creative
collaboration
25
26
design phases. Instead, each workshop consisted of
several design phases, where the different mindsets
and approaches had to be used. As early as the first
Structure of workshop, the teams came up with initial ideas and

then went back to their respective organizations to
the project
do more research or to develop them further. In the
second workshop several iterations were explored
to look at the concepts with a critical mind and to
Design-thinking methods were used in this project develop better prototypes.
as a catalyst for more creative, collaborative and
systemic thinking. During a series of workshops the The guiding principle behind the design of the
partner organizations were enabled to use design- workshop series was that whatever topic, method
thinking methods such as the ones featured in this or exercise has been started should be brought to
publication. a thought-out conclusion. Nevertheless, one core
Before and between the workshops the participants goal of the whole project was to bring new ways of
were directed to do homework such as field research, working to the partner organizations.
creating mood boards and personas, or developing
their prototypes further. Each homework task was
related to one or more design methods that were
applied and discussed during the workshops.
The workshop series culminated in a “train-the-

trainers” session, where the participants discussed Focus:
gender
and practised certain facilitation techniques in
order to be more confident in using the described
tools and exercises with their teams and their target
audiences.
Image 3 shows this approach visualized according

equality
to the “Learning Arches”, which the famous Since the topic of the project was gender equality,
creative leadership school Kaos Pilots in Aarhus, the obvious choice as a focal point for research and
Denmark30, uses for planning its learning future solution proposals were the women and
engagements. Each arch represents a phase in the girls who face unequal treatment. The gender unit
learning journey and the correlated goals. Since partners of FES India who went through the design-
design thinking is an iterative process, the thinking journey have been working with women
workshop series was not planned according to the and girls since many years. Still, they were open
27
Image 3: The design of the workshop series
START WORKING DIFFERENTLY

Use the methods with your team
and other stakeholders
DESCONSTRUCTING STEREOTYPES
THROUGH CREATIVE COLLABORATION Establish more
Enable FES partners to use design methods creative confidence
Give them an experience of design thinking
Try it out
Learn from it
Apply it
DEVELOP
A NEW CONCEPT
OR PROCESS,
ITERATE IT
AND IMPLEMENT IT
DEVELOP ITERATE
INITIAL THE
IDEAS IDEAS
WORKSHOP WORKSHOP WORKSHOP

HOME 1 HOME 2 HOME 3
WORK MUMBAI WORK DELHI WORK JAIPUR
Do initial Discuss the research Do more Iterate the ideas Iterate core Learn how to
research research concept facilitate others
Ideate first concepts Learn about design further using design
Persona Iterate your for behavioral change
Dig deeper in research methods
Moodboard & ideation methods concepts or Test it
develop new ones Prototype the ideas
Make a game plan Implement it
28
to trying out a different approach based on the
The FES Project: Political feminism insights they gained following the design-thinking
Damyanty Sridharan, Senior Advisor for Gender and Social Justice (FES India)
principles.
The vocabulary of feminism the world over today is, unfor-
tunately, more disengaging than engaging. In India as el- A thorough analysis of the stakeholders who
sewhere, the feminist space has a distinctive identity, but heavily influence the context in which these women
builds upon a diversity of women’s groups, individuals, ins-
and girls live made some partner organizations
titutions and movements. Despite this broad basis of expe-
rience, or perhaps because of it, this space remains disu- realize that there is a group of people about
nited. Alongside the traditional women’s movement, new whom they know very little, even though they
groups have arisen, and not all of them are or even want to have an important role to play. We called them the
be called feminist. It is imperative to recognize the diversity
of their ideas and reasoning. For the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung withholders.
(FES), with its commitment to the values of freedom, equa-
lity, democracy and social justice, it is important to build bri- This big group of people might include the
dges between the established feminist activists and new-ge-
neration feminists, between staunch advocates of feminism husbands, fathers and brothers of the women who
and the non-converts, from elite feminists to grassroots ac- are opposed to them going to school, executing
tivists. their rights in political committees or just earning
In this context we noted the decline of the political nature of
their own livelihood. But men are sometimes not
feminism and a growing technicality of the same. Political in the only ones standing in the way of positive
this sense refers to feminism representing one of the many change. Even the mothers, grandmothers or
groups and movements in the political discourse that consti-
mothers-in-law, who may not have been fortunate
tute our democracies. Reducing feminism to gender mains-
treaming or linguistic gender-washing neglects the broader enough to experience equal rights themselves, can
context in which the recognition and dignity of the margi- act in a way that hinders or even oppresses other
nalized has to find its place. The NGO-ization of gender, as women. Religious leaders and opinion leaders in
some have put it, falls short of explaining why the structural
imbalances still prevail. And it is a global phenomenon in the local communities might use their dominant
which not only women but also men and other genders feel status to influence the community against change
more and more on the losing side of a system that is no for gender equality.
longer or has never even been theirs. Thus, FES initiated the
Project on Political Feminism to revive the debate on “the
Political”—that is, a debate about visions and ideas on how Since the topic of gender inequality is so
we want to build an inclusive, gender-just society. emotionally and politically charged, the participants
in our project had never thought of including
In India, it is with this approach that we thought of enga-
ging with new methods such as design thinking, together those people who are opposed to the concepts of
with our partner organizations, to deal with the ever-perva- women’s rights, political and social equality into
sive, complex, and challenging task of dealing with the pa- their approaches. Even though this might seem
triarchal mindset. Thus, learning from each other, accepting
the differences, embracing the common goals and reaching like an obvious thing to do in hindsight, it has not
out to new allies, FES hopes to contribute to creating a new been attempted because many obstacles seemed
narrative for social justice in India. to stand in the way of approaching someone from
29
the opposing end of the political spectrum. They A more human-centred
seemed unreachable.
and optimistic mindset
The participants thought they could be certain that All partner organizations mentioned the human-
there would only be a negative reaction. -centredness of design thinking as one of the
core benefits. Even though they are all working
The different tools and methods that were applied in the social sector which, of course requires them
helped the partner organizations in re-organizing to know much about their target audience, the
their thoughts, in taking a new approach to their methods and tools helped them to get an even
research and in developing fresher ideas. By making better understanding of their context and to find
those ideas more tangible and conveying their new opportunities for intervention. This influenced
discussions more easily to other stakeholders and their way of working even when they did not
the target audience, these partner organizations officially apply design thinking in a structured,
ultimately managed to make some impact in their methodological way.
respective field of work. Gayatri Sharma and Parul Sethi from Women
Power Connect in New Delhi mentioned that the
workshops and the inputs on human-centred
methods changed the way they organize their
work. Based on the processes and methods that
were discussed and used during the design thinking
workshops they now asked students to identify
their most pressing issues and designed a new
Results of format based on that input. The result was so

positive that a partnering university decided to
the creative
frame a whole campus festival around the topic
they had identified. The topic was self-esteem.
collaboration Besides this approach of involving their target

audience more, Parul Sethi also pointed out that
design thinking helped them to get rid of a very
During the last workshop of the series in Jaipur, negative way of thinking, which sometimes hinders
Rajasthan, we interviewed the partners and asked them from doing good work. Instead of being
them for their feedback on the process. The “bogged down by a lot of problems” such as
variety of ideas, new approaches and unexpected resource limitations or bureaucratic issues they
applications of the things the group did during the now feel “a spirit of opportunities”.
workshops was overwhelming.
30
Improving team spirit they are facing every day. Besides that, his team
iterated a simple questionnaire several times
As one participant put it during a collaborative while applying visual elements in order to make it
feedback session: “Just like all rivers meet in the easier to use by semi-literate women in the local
ocean, in design thinking different ideas come communities.
together.” This flow of different ideas from within
the team and from the outside often has an Krupa Haresh Balan from the Vacha Trust, an
encouraging and motivating effect. advocacy group for women’s and girls’ issues,
described creative projects they started doing with
Renuka Bala and V. Balakrishnan from the Centre the girls from their community in order to create
for Women’s Development and Research (CWDR) in awareness about boys lingering in front of girls’
Chennai emphasized that the approach of design toilets. They encouraged the girls to take pictures
thinking helped them rethink their relationship and create a photo exhibition. The exhibition
with their own staff and their entire strategy. worked as a conversation starter between the girls
Inspired by the concept of design thinking they and some of the boys and the situation improved
now let their staff “talk about their dreams and considerably.
visions,” he said. This reportedly led to a much more
engaged and happy work force.
Immediate intervention
They were so engaged in the concepts that they
and co-creation
decided to take an additional online class on design
thinking offered through Plus Acumen.31 The design methods that the participants learned
and applied during the workshops were originally
intended to be used by dedicated design teams to
Visual and creative approach gain more empathy, synthesize insights or build
prototypes. However, many organizations told
Many participants emphasized the usefulness of us how they also used them directly as a tool for
the visual tools and of the basic concept of working intervention. Gururaja Budhya from Urban Research
visually. They said it helped them in their work to Center (URC) took the workshop design that the
make concepts and ideas clearer, but also to enable participants had experienced and copied it with a
others to share their views. group of urban women councillors. In this way he
enabled the women in his area to come up with
V. Balakrishnan from CWDR had community ideas of their own and to test them immediately.
members in the area where his organization works
draw visual maps of their village or slum in order to
get a better understanding of the challenges that
31
The NGOs Social Action for Human Resource and 2018 this tiny change enabled SCRIA and
Development (SOHARD) in Rajasthan and Social SOHARD to understand the needs and wishes of
Centre for Rural Initiative & Advancement (SCRIA) male surpanches (local elected leaders) better.
in Haryana organized a design-thinking workshop Only by inviting a group of traditionally sceptical
where they invited elected female leaders. They surpanches were they able to convince two of them
simplified some of the tools (which you will also to commit to the participative way of creating
find in the method section of this publication) the next village plan for which they had been
in order to think about how to approach the advocating for a long time. In the years before they
withholders in their communities better. One of had used this participative way of planning only
the results of these workshops was that their staff with the women of the villages. Now this planning
engaged with the Khap Panchayat, a traditional, method benefits all citizens and is transparent at
non-elected community organization representing the same time. Based on this new plan they were
a certain clan or several clans in rural communities. able to unlock a significant allocation of funds, so
By finding the right words and the right timing, a that now other surpanches want their help in doing
woman was allowed for the first time ever to even a participative village plan.
speak in front of this group of very traditional and
influential local leaders. SCRIA also went into ideation sessions with
schoolboys. Based on the insight that the mother
in a household often eats last in the family and
Be compassionate – even sometimes does not get enough food, they asked
towards withholders the boys to think about what could be done to
decrease inequality at home. Beautifully simple
The biggest impact of the project was achieved for ideas came. One of the boys said: “Let’s eat all
those partners who had the idea to focus more on together, so that everyone gets an equal share.”
people who are not their usual target audience. After the session the boys pledged to propose this
Through the analysis of the stakeholders they had new dinner set-up to their families.
understood that the withholders play an important
role and therefore decided to learn more about Gururaja Budhya also highlighted this specific
them. aspect: “We always see the opposite person from
one perspective and don’t understand that they
Sunder Lal from SCRIA said that with design thinking have another point of view.” Based on this insight
you should “unlearn what you already know”, in it was also important for them to learn more about
order to apply this different mindset. He admitted the stakeholders in the context of their community
that they have been “involving women for so many of urban female leaders.
years”. To start working with men seemed to be
just a small idea in the beginning. During 2017
32
33
34
A step-by-step
guide
35
36
A thousand Additional resources
and one Dave Gray, Sunni Brown and James Macanufo.

Gamestorming: A playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers
and Changemakers. Sebastopol: O’Reilly, 2010.
methods Vijay Kumar. 101 design methods: A structured approach

for driving innovation in your organization. Hoboken:
Wiley, 2013.
Within each of the phases many different methods Florian Rustler. Thinking tools for creativity and innovation:
can be applied. Many books and online resources The little handbook of innovation methods. Zürich: Midas,
describe these methods. Have a look at the resources 2018.
section in the box. Each design thinking team will Dan Saffer. Designing for interaction: Creating innovative
applications and devices. San Francisco: New Riders, 2010.
create their own set of methods, theory hacks and
approaches. Marc Stickdorn, Markus Hormess, Adam Lawrence, and
Jakob Schneider. This is service design doing: Applying
Service Design Thinking in the real world. Sebastopol:
An experienced team will have someone from O’Reilly, 2018.
within the team to facilitate the process, while a The design kit, online.32
less experienced team might have someone from Design research techniques 33
the outside guiding them.
Google design sprint methods 34
Stanford d.school resources 35
Gamestorming repository 36
Luma Institute workplace 37
Service design tools 38
The method repository of ”This is service design
doing“ 39
37
Image 4: The double diamond with a selection of the most important methods in each phase
Diaries 6-3-5
Collage Collages
Desk research Sketching
Personas Role plays
User interviews Brainstorming
Mood boards Sketches
Expert Brainwritting
HMW questions Story boards
Knowledge mapping Inspirational cards
Direct quotes Wireframes
Research planning Creative matrix
Point of view statements All kind of prototyping
Participatory observation Play with constraints
Customer journey maps Click dummies
Fly on the wall Six thinking hats
2 by 2 matrix Simulations
Cultural probes Clustering
Venn diagram Feedback grid
Video recording Brainstomp
Story board Interviews
Photos Voting
Photos Photos
UNDERSTAND SOLVE
THE PROBLEM THE PROBLEM
Source: Adapted from the ”Double Diamond“ by the British Design Council.
38
Facilitate
your team
Design thinking is very much based on the self- thinking or another context, knows the process
organization of teams and thus does not entail a thoroughly and constantly develops their
belief in the usefulness of a hierarchical decision- knowledge about methods and tools. Such a
making process. Since the team works together facilitator will be able to decide whether a certain
in all phases of the process, it usually builds much part of the process should be done as a workshop
more knowledge than a manager or a team leader or whether some parts need individual work as
could possibly have. By iterating and testing ideas well. In our project, Moritz Gekeler acted as both
and concepts, the team ensures that the ideas they facilitator and trainer. He guided the participants
are taking forward actually work. Therefore, the through the process, choosing the methods that he
team should be enabled to take decisions as quickly considered helpful to deal with the specific issues
and as un-bureaucratically as possible. A leader in of each phase. By giving the teams homework he
this context will make use of a facilitative style of ensured that they would prepare specific content
leadership. before each meeting.
The concept of facilitation Methods for facilitation

“Facilitators are like midwives,” writes Roberta The following methods are just a small introduction
Tassi. “Facilitators help groups of people by into the broad toolbox of a great facilitator.41
identifying and using a variety of processes that help
participants to bring ideas to the surface, and enable
them to reach their goals.”40 A facilitator, in design
39
Warm-ups
Time requirement
5 - 90 minutes
Required material
§§ Depends on the chosen warm-up
Additional literature
Grace Hawthorne et al., “Impact and Sustainability of
Creative Capacity Building: The Cognitive, Behavioral,
and Neural Correlates of Increasing Creative Capaci-
ty”, in: Design thinking research. Building innovation
eco-systems, (Zürich: Springer, 2014, pp. 65-74).
Improv Encyclopedia, an online collection of improv
theatre games42
Session lab, an online workshop planner and library of
methods and tools, see the energizers43
Service Design Doing, official website to the namesake
book, see the section on Warm-Ups44
How to use the method

A warm-up (or energizer) is a short playful activity. team to have fun, while others might help them
Usually warm-ups are used during work-shops, but in achieving a specific goal in one of the design
even in a longer project they can help teams to phases: For example, you could do a quick round
loosen up and change the perspective. As studies of interviews between the team members in the
have shown, regular creative activities also help curiosity phase or do a handicraft exercise as a
in building the creative capacity of a person. Any warm-up, in order to get the team on board for
game can be used as a warm-up. You can take prototyping, feeling constructive or trying out an
inspiration from fields as varied as improvisational idea that might seem crazy.
theatre, children’s games, meditation and sport.
Some warm-ups have as their goal simply for the
40
When to use it Pitfalls & challenges
Warm-ups should be used regularly to help the Since warm-ups are playful activities there might
team to get to know each other and be com- be people in the team who think that games are
fortable with each other, and to get rid of tensions. for children only. In order to bring them on board
Ideally the facilitator should have a goal in mind it makes sense to explain why it is a good idea to
when proposing a warm-up (e.g. relate it to a do a warm-up. Also, while choosing a warm-up for
design phase). sceptical people you should ideally relate it to the
activity or phase you are working on at the moment.
Step-by-step guide
There are millions of warm-ups to be found in
books and online. The general process for choosing
one is the following:
1/ Identify the occasion for which you need a

warm-up. Does the team already know each
other or do they have to introduce themselves
first? Are you in a specific phase of the design
process that could need some introduction or
kick-start?
2/ Decide on the amount of time you want to

spend with the warm-up.
3/ Have a look at the online method repositories in

our additional literature section.
4/ Choose one or design your own playful exercise.
5/ Play it with your team.
6/ If the warm-up was not only a fun activity but

had a certain goal, do a short reflection with
your team. This will over time also increase the
willingness of sceptics to participate in such
activities.
41
I like, I wish
Time requirement
5 - 30 minutes
Required material
§§ A computer and/or sticky notes.
Method “I like, I wish, what if”, Stanford d.school.45
Method “I like, I wish, what if”, Interaction Design
Foundation.46

One of the core elements of design thinking is the status of the team, rather use short and concise
to be mindful of the people who are involved in methods. “I like, I wish” is one of these methods.
the process. In order to do this it is important to It helps the team to quickly share what works well
constantly check how the team is doing. Design in the collaboration experience and what could be
thinkers, instead of holding long meetings to discuss done better.
42
This should be used regularly at the end of a day Make sure that the team feels comfortable in sharing
their views. If there is a strong hierarchy or cultural
or a meeting. In these cases it can be a very short
environment in which some team members might
activity of 5-15 minutes. After bigger achievements
not feel comfortable in speaking up, have them write
or project milestones the team should take a little
bit more time and reflect in more detail. the likes and wishes individually on sticky notes and
shuffle them before reading them out loud. Do not
Step-by-step guide go into long answers for each item, in particular the
wishes. Use the session with the team as a time for
1/ Bring the whole team together.
collection (divergent) and decide on a specific time
2/ Ask everyone to share one thing they like and for solving the raised wishes (convergent).
one thing they would wish to be different
about their experience. Some versions of this
method make use of a third category of “How
to” or “What if”, where the team members can
already propose solutions on how to meet the
wishes.
3/ Document the likes and wishes either by having

the team write them on sticky notes or by typing
them on your computer.
4/ Regularly have a look at the wishes in order to
think about how to improve the collaboration.
43
Visual thinking
Time requirement
No specific time requirement.
Required material
§§ A lot of whiteboard space or brown paper
§§ A good amount of diverse stationery close to hand
§§ Cameras or mobile phones with cameras
§§ Access to online images
Rudolf Arnheim, Visual thinking (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 2004).
Robert H McKim, Thinking Visually. A strategy manual
for problem solving (Dale Seymour Publications, 1980).
Method “Draw it“, Design Kit, an online collection of
design methods.48
The Noun Project, an online resource of icons created by
designers around the world.49

This is a core approach throughout the design research instead of just writing it down. They can
thinking process and one of the justifications of apply visual frameworks (such as 2-by-2 matrices or
even calling it design thinking. In any phase of the Venn diagrams47) to their research data in order to
process the team should visualize the results and be more compassionate with the target audience,
ideas they are working on. or they can make their ideas and concepts tangible
They can sketch simple stick-figures on a piece of by prototyping them in a visual and experiential
paper. They can take pictures and videos of their way.
44
When to use it
Visual thinking should be applied in all phases of
the process.
Step-by-step guide
1/ Encourage the team to use visual tools during
the entire process.
2/ Even if the team members do not feel very

comfortable in their sketching or other artistic
abilities, reassure them that you are not looking
for art, but only for a way to convey a concept
or a meaning.
3/ Encourage them to take pictures and videos.
4/ Help them in providing material (stationery,

whiteboards, flip charts, brown paper, etc.) that
is inspiring and fun.
Pitfalls & challenges

Some people do not feel confident in their own
drawing skills. Let those team members who sketch
well work together with the ones who do not in
order to create an exchange. Also enable the team
by reminding them of tools where they can find
images that express the specific concept that they
are thinking about. This can include providing old
magazines to cut out images, or showing them on-
line resources for visualizations and icons such as
the noun project (see additional literature).
45
Make use of the walls
Time requirement
No specific time requirement.
Required material
§§ Some kind of wall-mounted canvas (e.g. whiteboards,
chalk boards, brown paper or flip charts)
§§ Markers in diverse colours and sizes
§§ Tape
§§ Pins
Scott Witthoft and Scott Doorley, Make Space. Set the
stage for creative collaboration (Hoboken: Wiley, 2012).

In today’s world most of our work happens within a stick to the wall. This has several benefits:
frame of 12 to around 30 inches. Those are the sizes §§You have all your work visible at once when it is
of the most commonly used computer monitors. stuck to the wall.
Creativity and especially collaborative creative work §§The team will be forced to stand up in order to
does not really fit into those dimensions. Therefore, stick things, which stops them from being stuck
design thinkers try to go beyond the boundaries of in their comfortable office chairs. Working in a
the computer as often as possible. To do this, they standing position increases the energy level
make use of the space and especially the walls in and will force the team members to look at
their work space. You can use whiteboards, chalk each each other more often and interact more
boards, pin boards or just regular paper, which you physically.
46
This should be used throughout the process. Ideally Unexperienced design thinkers sometimes need
the team should have a dedicated space where to be reminded of taking notes and visualizing
they can leave the posters and visualizations over everything. Some people also regularly fall back
the whole time of the project. This way they will be into the habit of sitting down and relaxing instead
able to even physically remember where a specific of standing in front of the wall they are working
information is after a longer project involvement. on. Avoid this by taking regular breaks and by
deliberately deciding when the team should be
Step-by-step guide working in an upright position and when it makes
There are millions of warm-ups to be found in sense to sit down.
books and online. The general process for choosing
one is the following:
1/ Make sure you have empty walls in your work
space.
2/ Put as many boards or brown paper around
you as possible, to encourage the team to stick
everything there.
3/ Sometimes unexperienced design thinkers will
fall back into the mode of just discussing without
taking any notes or visualizing anything.
Reinforce the concept of visualizing and docu-
menting everything while the team is working.
4/ Take pictures of everything you have done, but
also keep the posters for future reference.
5/ If you are working with a remote team, there
are online resources such as the Realtime
Board50 realtimeboard.com or Mural51 mural.ly
which help teams to work as if they were in the
same room. But be aware that online collabo-
ration needs even more moderation from the
facilitator.
47
48
Be curious!
As explained above, the whole point of the initial challenge. This involves looking at blind spots, and
phase of the design thinking process is to be curious. taking another look at things that had supposedly
Instead of expecting the team to know everything been understood earlier.
already, a design thinker expects the team not to
know anything – but in a positive way. In our project, this meant not only looking at our
direct target audience, but also trying to understand
The concept and build empathy, maybe even compassion with
the other side – that is, in our case, people who are
of being curious opposed to the concept of gender equality.
Based on the attitude of not knowing, the team can
start gathering as many observations and develop Methods
as many insights as possible. Design thinking is
based on a constructivist world view, in which each
for nurturing curiosity
individual has an own, very unique experience of The following methods are just a small introduction
the world. From that standpoint it is always valuable into the broad toolbox to stimulate curiosity.
to interact with other individuals and be surprised
by the stories they tell about their lives.
A design thinker will usually learn something new

in every project they do, even if it is a project in
their very specific field of expertise. The goal of the
design thinker is to gather a 360° view of the given
49
Stakeholder mapping
Time requirement
30-90 minutes
Required material
§§ Template (printed or drawn on a board)
§§ A lot of sticky notes
§§ Markers for each team member
Marc Stickdorn and Jacob Schneider, “Stakeholder
Maps”, in: This is service design thinking. Basics - Tools
- Cases (Amsterdam: BIS Publishers, 2012, pp. 150-153).
Tool “Actors Map”, Service Design Tools.52
Method “Stakeholder Map”, Interaction Design Founda-
tion, online.53

To understand the whole system of stakeholders
who are directly or indirectly part of the context
of the project, it is very helpful to map them all
out. Especially when done with a diverse group of
experts from different fields, this is a very fruitful
exercise, which enables the team to quickly see any
blind spots.
50
When to use it 4/ Have them stick their ideas on the template is
A stakeholder map can be done quite early in the inspiring and fun.
project, but it should be revisited over the course 5/ Let the team take a closer look at the map and
of the project, and expanded or amended if identify missing stakeholders and blind spots.
necessary. During the research more stakeholders
might become apparent and the interconnections
6/ If you have more time, you can also have the
team draw connections between the stake-
between the stakeholders might become clearer.
holders.
Step-by-step guide Pitfalls & challenges

1/ Prepare a template on the wall. The template The more diverse the group is the more complete
should show the topic you are working on in the stakeholder mapping will be. There should
the middle, and can show potential categories be some experts on the topic, but it always helps
around that, which will help to think about to have people with a completely different
specific stakeholders. The template given perspective, since they will more easily identify
in this publication suggests the following unconventional stakeholders. To avoid missing out
categories: direct vs. in-direct stakeholders as on anything you can also test your stakeholder map
well as enablers vs. withholders. These were with other experts.
specific to the project on gender equality, while
other templates propose other categories (e.g.
internal vs. external stakeholders). You can
decide which category makes most sense in your
specific project situation.
2/ Hand sticky notes and markers to each team

member.
3/ Let the team members think of stakeholders

who are part of the context of the project. Let
them keep their thoughts to themselves at first,
and only later share the ideas with the rest of
the team.
51
Interviews
Time requirement
30-120 minutes per interview
Required material
§§ Collection of questions
§§ Notebook and pen
§§ Device for audio and/or video recording
Dan Saffer, Designing for interaction. Creating innova-
tive applications and devices (San Francisco: New riders,
2010, pp. 87 f.)
Vijay Kumar, 101 Design Methods. A structured approach
for driving innovation in your organization (Hoboken:
Wiley, 2013, pp. 88 ff. and 110 f.)
Method “Semi Structured Interviews”, Design Research
Techniques.54
The video introduction “Getting people to talk” by IIT
Institute of Design.55

Interviews are the most popular method for is different from a structured survey. While the
getting to know another person in design latter relies on a heavily structured questionnaire,
thinking. They can be applied when speaking to the former keeps things more open to give space
the target audience as well as to other stakeholders to the interviewee to express their thoughts and
such as experts or donors. In the process of getting views.
a 360° view of any given challenge it is very helpful
to use interviews across the stakeholder map and When to use it
speak to selected people from different areas and Interviews usually are used at the beginning of the
contexts. Depending on the challenge you are wor- process to get an overview and an understanding
king on it some-times helps even to just go out on of the situation. Depending on the interviewee an
the street and speak to random people. interview can be hours-long or very short. To really
get new insights, interviews that last between 30
An interview in the context of design thinking and 120 minutes usually help the most.
52
The second phase where interviews are really open questions and avoid leading ones. The
helpful is the “be constructive” phase, where the 80/20 rule applies: the interviewer only speaks
team collects feedback on the concept(s) they have for 20 percent of the time, while giving 80
created. percent of space to the interviewee. Remember
you are not judging the answers and you are
Step-by-step guide not there to defend or prove anything.
1/ Have at least a basic understanding of what 6/ It is key to take notes. Direct quotes in particular
you are working on and who is related to that should be noted down, but observations can
specific challenge (e.g. through a stakeholder also be helpful later. If possible, record the
map). Make use of the collective brain of the interview, but be aware that you will not have
team to first understand everything that you the time to listen to everything again. If you
already know or think you know about the think something is very interesting, you can
challenge at hand. make a note of the time-stamp in your recording
in order to jump to that specific topic later when
2/ Identify what broad areas you would like to
you listen to it again.
talk about with your interviewees. Instead of a
linear questionnaire, a mind map with questions 7/ After the interview thank your interviewee and
gives you more flexibility during the interview. ask them if you could come back at a later stage
Since we are not trying to prove anything, this with more questions or even a prototype for
questionnaire can also change over the course testing.
of the interview. If one interviewee asks an
interesting question that you had not thought
8/ After the interview, review your notes and
highlight any extraordinarily interesting quotes.
of, add it to your questionnaire.
3/ Set up the interviews. If at all possible it is
always advisable to do the interview in the
Since the rapport between interviewer and
interviewee’s usual surroundings, as opposed
interviewee is crucial, it is best to go as a team
to a meeting room or any other artificial place.
of two to an interview. This way, one person can
This way the interview will also link to another
take notes while the other concentrates more on
method in design thinking, which is observation.
conducting the interview. You definitely should
4/ Build a rapport with the interviewee. It is avoid judging or contradicting the interviewee,
important that they do not feel judged or tested even if they express views that do not correspond
during your interview. Tell them that you are with your own. You are only collecting data
here to learn, and ask very openly and naively (divergent thinking). Try to understand why they
in order to really understand the meaning of think in this specific way. You should also not try
what the interviewee is telling you. to sell the interviewee anything. To avoid that, ask
open questions that give space for the stories of the
5/ During the interviews it is crucial that you let
the interviewee speak most of the time. Ask interviewee.
53
Observation
Time requirement
30 minutes to one or more full days depending on the
situation
Required material
§§ Recording device for pictures, and audio and/or video
recording
tive applications and devices (San Francisco: New Riders,
2010, pp. 86 f.).
Vijay Kumar, 101 design methods. A structured approach
Wiley, 2013, pp. 88 f.).
Florian Rustler, Thinking tools for creativity and innova-
tion. The little handbook of innovation methods (Zürich:
Midas, 2018, pp. 122 f.).
Design Research Techniques, online.56
The explanation on “How to conduct user observation”,
Interaction Design, online.57

As described in the context of interviewing, ideally where you do not interact at all with the objects
your curiosity should lead you to not only hear of your observation. You can even observe yourself
what people are saying, but also to observe what trying out something related to the challenge
they are actually doing. Very often the two do not you are working on. The important thing is to be
fit together. mindful that you are observing. Ideally you should
take pictures or notes while observing and again
Observation can be done in many different not judge if you see someone make a mistake or
ways. While doing an interview, you can ask the use a certain tool in the wrong way. In fact those
interviewee to show you the things they are talking are the observations we can learn the most from.
about. You can conduct fly-on-the-wall observation
54
Observation is especially helpful at the beginning For people who are not used to consciously
of the process, when you still need to understand observing it might be difficult to know what to
the problem, and again in the later stage when you look for. Keep a curious mind and pay attention
have a prototype of your solution and you want to to the details. Take note of everything, even if it
see how people are using it. might initially seem irrelevant. Take pictures or
video footage to have something to remind you of
Step-by-step guide the things you saw.
1/ Identify the things or activities you want to

observe.
2/ Make an appointment with the target

stakeholder who can give you access. Again
make sure that you can go as a team in order to
have one person to take notes.
3/ Go to the place where you can observe. Interact

with the people (participatory observation),
immerse yourself consciously in the situation
you would like to observe (self-observation) or
observe from a distance without any interaction
(fly-on-the-wall).
4/ Take notes, take pictures, take video footage!
Additionally you can even take artefacts (things
that have meaning to the challenge you are
working on) from the scene with you. Of course
you will have to ask if it is OK to take them.
5/ After the observation is complete, take a look at

your notes. Highlight the surprising things and
reflect on what you have learned from them.
55
56
Be compassionate!
During the initial, “be curious stage”, the team process should produce some lightbulb moments,
applies divergent thinking techniques. This means where the team realizes that they have uncovered
they collect data without selecting or prioritizing things they did not know before.
any of it.
The concept of synthesis Methods

and how to develop for being compassionate
compassion The following methods are just a small introduction
In the synthesis phase the team now brings that into the broad toolbox to stimulate curiosity.
data back home and analyses it. To do this it is im-
portant to have good notes, pictures and artefacts
from the previous activities. Back in their studio
the team compiles this data, ideally by writing ob-
servations and quotes from the research on sticky
notes. The team then re-arranges the sticky notes
and applies a variety of frameworks to the data to
find patterns and create insights. If done right this
57
Storytelling and clustering
Time requirement
Two hours to a day or more, depending on the amount
of data.
Required material
§§ Boards and board markers
§§ Sticky notes and markers
§§ Print-outs of the pictures
2010, pp. 94 f.).
tion. The little handbook of innovation methods
(Zürich: Midas, 2018, pp. 132 f.).
Tool “Affinity Diagram”, Service Design Tools.58

During the curiosity phase all observations, quotes each team member shares the stories from their
etc. have been collected in a notebook. Now it is interviews and observations while the rest of the
time to share the data with the rest of the team. team notes the stories on sticky notes. Colour
Since not everyone was present in each interview or coding helps identify where each information came
each observation, the team has to collaboratively from afterwards. After collecting all the data on
understand what they have learned. A simple way the wall, the team sorts the sticky notes to find
of doing this is the method of storytelling, where common themes, trends and clusters.
58
When to use it 5/ The cluster headlines should give you an
Storytelling can be used right after a set of overview of the world you have found in your
activities such as interviews or observations, when research. They will describe problems you have
the memories of the activity are still fresh. The seen and observations you have made, and
clustering should be done in a dedicated session in condense your raw data into insights and key
order to ensure that the whole team is present and learnings that will help you later in the process
focused. to design a better solution.
Step-by-step guide Pitfalls & challenges

1/ Choose a body of data (e.g. your interviews, The biggest challenge here is to be too picky about
observations etc.) what information you share from your research.
Since you do not know before what each data
2/ One team member or small research team
point might mean, you should make sure to collect
recounts each activity one by one and highlights
as much as possible. Clustering poses another huge
the information that stood out. The rest of the
danger. Instead of making things clearer it might
team notes everything down on sticky notes. Only
actually obscure things. This usually happens when
write one observation or quote per sticky note.
the clusters are too big and the headlines of the
3/ Once all research activities have been shared clusters are comprised only of single words or half
the team re-sorts the sticky notes to find clusters sentences. Be careful to create clusters that actually
of observations, pictures and quotes that have only allow one conclusion and write that conclusion
something in common. down as the headline of the cluster. This might
4/ Once they have found the clusters, the team mean that there are only very few sticky notes in
identifies headlines that describe the common a cluster. Here it is not about quantity, but quality.
element in each cluster. Ideally these headlines
should not be single words but full sentences.
By finding a full sentence for each cluster the
team actually processes the data. This is where
the magic happens.
59
Mood board
Time requirement
30-90 minutes
Required material
§§ Big sheets of paper, Glue, Scissors, Photos, Old
magazines and newspapers
§§ Diverse artefacts that you found during research
§§ Other inspiring material such as textiles,
differently coloured paper etc.
2010, pp. 149f.).
Tool “Moodboard”, Service Design Tools.59
Method “Mood Board“, Game Storming, official website

of the namesake book.60
Method “Mood Boards”, This is Service Design Doing,
online.61

A mood board is a collage of images, texts, that the design team wants to create (to-be mood
artefacts, newspaper cut-outs and other found board). Due to its abstract nature the mood board
objects. It either represents a set of feelings that works well as a creative activity to build empathy
the target audience finds themselves in as observed with the target audience. It can even be created in
in the research (as-is mood board), or it visualizes collaboration with the target audience or by the
an emotional vision for the final product or service target audience.
60
Traditionally, mood boards are used in design Since it is a rather intuitive and not a very structured
fields such as interior, graphic or fashion design to method, some people might not feel comfortable
explore the aesthetic style that the designer with it. In order to take away the seriousness you
wants to achieve in the final product. In this can use the creation of a mood board also as a
sense they are part of the creative phase of warm-up game at the beginning of the compassion
a design process. But during the research or creativity phase.
phase as well, mood boards can help visualize
the emotional level of a situation or the context.
Step-by-step guide
1/ Prepare material from which to create the
mood board. You can use whatever comes
to your mind, for example pictures from the
research or from magazines, discarded product
wrappers that you found during research or that
represent the community you are working with,
print-outs, movie stills, colours, textiles, natural
things (e.g. leaves) etc.
2/ The process of creating a mood board is rather
intuitive, so start with whatever material you
want and explore where it leads you.
3/ Use words or sentences from magazines or
newspapers to make the things you want to
express more explicit.
4/ The mood board is a great way to convey
a message on an emotional level. Use it for
presenting your target audience to others in
order to explain the problems they are facing.
61
Personas
Time requirement
30-90 minutes
Required material
§§ Print-outs of the template
§§ Pictures from the research or from the internet
Wiley, 2013, pp. 210 f.).
tion. The little handbook of innovation methods (Zürich:
Midas, 2018, pp. 140 f.).
Method “Personas”, Interaction Design.62
Method “Personas”, Service Design Tools.63

Personas are fictional characters. They represent Even though it might feel unfamiliar to focus just on
individuals who could live in the world that has one individual instead of a target group the tool of
been observed during research. They help design the persona can be very powerful. Think of a persona
teams to identify the goals and limitations of a as the character of a theatre play or a movie. The
specific stakeholder group for their project and at collection of qualitative fragments of this character
the same time to relate to someone with a different makes it easier to tell a story about him or her. An
perspective on the world. In a design project the audience who listens to a presentation that is based
persona is very often used as a starting point. It can on personas can relate much better to the content.
inspire ideas that otherwise would not be possible.
62
When to use it
Personas are used during the compassion phase
in order to synthesize the research into one or
more specific points of view. In the creative phase
they function as starting points for ideation. In the
constructive phase they can work as basis for testing
the prototype in a role play. The design team then
asks: “How would this persona feel when our solution
was implemented?”
Step-by-step guide
1/ Choose a body of data to inform your work. The
better your research the easier it will be for the
team to create the persona.
2/ Prepare a template that provides some guiding
questions that make sense in the context of your
project such as the one provided here.
3/ Fill out the template.
4/ Use the persona throughout the project.

There are two main risks when using personas:
not enough research or too much research. When
you do not have enough data to ground your
persona in, it becomes over-stereotypical and
usually teams drift into making fun of it. If you
have too much data, teams sometimes tend to
take one specific person from the research who
was representative of a specific group during the
research. This is generally fine, but remember to
modify the persona a little bit, otherwise the team
might feel uncomfortable designing something for
one specific person, especially if the topic you are
working with is delicate.
63
Journey mapping
Time requirement
30 to 120 minutes depending on the number of personas
Wiley, 2013, pp. 182 f.).
Marc Stickdorn and Jacob Schneider, “Stakeholder
Maps”, in: This is service design thinking. Basics - Tools -
Cases (Amsterdam: BIS Publishers, 2012, pp. 158 f.)
Method “Customer Journey Map”, Service Design
Tools.64
Required material Method “Journey Map”, Design Kit.65

§§ Space on the wall Method “Mapping Journeys”, This is Service Design
§§ Sticky notes and markers Doing , online.66
§§ Maybe pictures and other artefacts from the research
to make it more specific
64
How to use the method 3/ First map out the quotes, observations and
insights from your research on that time frame.
Based on your persona you can create a journey
Usually the template for a journey map has some
map. This is a visual representation of the experience
kind of scale on which the team rates emotional
a person has over time. The journey map shows the
aspects of the journey. This scale can be for
different steps the person takes and should link
example based on the happiness, excitement or
them to some emotional evaluation. How does this
stress level of the persona.
person feel at any given point of time during the
process? Depending on the topic of your project 4/ You can add detail by adding information about
you can add additional information: Where in the technology use, interaction with other people,
process does the person interact with others or or by highlighting crucial points in the journey,
with technology? It is best practice to use actual where important decisions take place.
quotes from the interviews to create a journey map.
5/ If you have the time and the data available it
is very helpful to map several personas in order
When to use it to see differences in their experience. Based on
Journey maps can be used in two ways: for describing that the team can find patterns and usually find
a status quo and for describing a future vision. a structure that is similar across all journeys, as
well as the differentiating elements.
Step-by-step guide
1/ Have a body of data to inform your journey Pitfalls & challenges
map. You can map the journey of your Journey maps, as well as personas, should always be
interviewees, or have personas in place who will grounded in research. To be able to create a journey
be the protagonist of your journey. map, the research has to be done in a certain way.
The team has to delve into processes, experiences
2/ Decide on a time frame that you would like to
etc. Otherwise it will be difficult to identify the
depict. This can be a 10-minute process where
journey.
your personas experience one specific problem
in their lives, a day in the life of your persona, or
even a period of several weeks, months or years,
depending on the project.
65
66
Be creative!
The myths that surround artists and other creative vs. the convergent thinking styles. The goal in
people often suggest that creativity is an activity this divergent phase is to create as many ideas as
for the lone genius. We imagine artists sitting in possible. To achieve this it is necessary for the team
their studios finding inspiration in themselves and to follow some basic rules:
their individual context. While this might be true
for some, design thinkers experience a different • Defer judgement, any idea counts
kind of creativity. • Go for quantity first, select later
• Encourage wild ideas, don’t limit your thinking
• Get inspired and build upon the ideas of others.
The concept
of collaborative creativity
Design thinkers work in a team and get inspired by
the ideas that the other team members contribute.
Collaborative creativity
This can be a very empowering and inspiring The following methods are just a small introduction
process. into the broad toolbox to incite collaborative
creativity.
To be able to create something together in this way
it is important to remind yourself of the divergent
67
How might we...?
Time requirement
30-90 minutes
Required material
§§ Paper and markers
Florian Rustler, Thinking tools for creativity and inno-
vation. The little handbook of innovation methods
(Zürich: Midas, 2018, pp. 144 f.).
Method ”Design and frame your design challenge“
Interaction Design.67
Method ”How might we“, Design Kit.68

The deliverable once you understand the problem formulation encourages finding solutions (“how”),
better is a set of reformulated or re-framed opens up the mind to unexpected possibilities
questions. These questions should be informed by (“might”), and creates a sense of ownership within
your research and should describe the problem you the team (“we”). Once this simple formulation
are working on in a clearer, more empathetic and becomes natural to you, most of the problems that
more insightful way than before. Design thinkers you find in the world will become opportunities for
often use a certain structure to formulate these improvement.
questions. They ask “how might we…?” This
68
In order to create good questions it is necessary to Beginners often underestimate the power of this
have a good body of research. Ideally you should use formulation. Instead of “how might we…” they
this method after being curious and compassionate might ask questions that start differently, for
about the context of your challenge. Nevertheless, example with “why…” or “who…” These questions
this way of formulating questions in order to will not produce solutions. Sometimes beginners
inspire better ideas is valid in any case. So even if also change the word “might” to “can” or “should”.
you have not done your research, you can use this Experience shows that this is simply less inspiring
formulation before a brainstorming session. and can hinder the team from allowing themselves
to have their own wild ideas.
Step-by-step guide
1/ Make use of the insights you obtained through
your research.
2/ Reformulate those insights into questions by

putting the phrase “how might we…” at the
beginning.
3/ Especially for beginners, it makes sense to also

put the target audience in the formulation in
order to make sure that the ideas will be human-
centred:
“How might we enable/help/empower ___
[who]_____ to _[do what]____?”
4/ If you have a lot of questions you might want
to let the team vote on the ones that seem
more pressing, or more inspiring to work on, to
choose the right ones.
5/ Use the questions for any creative technique,
such as brainstorming or the creative matrix.
69
Ideation technique:
Creative matrix
HMW HMW HMW HMW Time requirement
1 2 3 4 30-60 minutes (not longer). If necessary, take a break and
repeat the exercise at a later stage.
Enabler
Required material
1
§§ Board with the matrix

§§ Good questions and enablers
§§ Sticky notes and markers for each team member
Enabler
2
Vijay Kumar, 101 design methods. A structured
approach for driving innovation in your organization
Enabler
(Hoboken: Wiley, 2013, pp. 216 f.)

LUMA Institute, Innovating for people. Handbook of
3
Human-Centered Design ≠Methods (Pittsburgh: LUMA

Institute, 2012, p. 62)
Method “Creative Matrix”, Business Models Inc., a
Enabler
collection of the best design tools.69

4
Worksheet “Creative Matrix”, Bressler Group, insight

driven product innovation.70

There are countless ideation methods such as five rows including the headline for each row and
brainstorming, silent brain-writing or others. In column. The columns either represent different
our project we used the creative matrix and it is “how might we…?” questions, or they stand for
a method that always delivers what it should: a different personas or different phases in a process
lot of ideas! The creative matrix may seem a little (e.g. based on a journey map). The rows on the
bit counter-intuitive to beginners. It is highly other hand represent different enablers that might
structured and thus people might think that it help solve the problem. Enablers could be anything.
hinders creativity. But the opposite is the case: the Usually the following enablers are very useful:
structure of the creative matrix makes it easier for technology, social media, events, programmes,
the team to develop a lot of ideas. processes, policies or facilities. Depending on the
challenge at hand other enablers can be used.
The matrix usually consists of five columns and In order to inspire more creative ideas, even
70
unusual or fictional enablers such as gods, public 6/ While they apply their ideas to the matrix others
figures, superheroes or very successful leaders can can add more ideas (brainstorming). Now they
be used. Sometimes it is also helpful to reframe a can also start explaining ideas, but without
constraint as an enabler in this phase. For this it is criticizing or judging them.
necessary to exaggerate the constraint in order for
it to be inspiring. For example: Every project in every
7/ Once the time is up let the team discuss the
ideas and add more.
sector always struggles with budget. Mentioning
the exact budget as an enabler would not be very 8/ After the board is full of ideas it usually
inspiring. Instead design thinkers would use “zero makes sense to do a clustering similar to the
budget” or “unlimited budget” as an enabler here. clustering the team did during synthesis, to find
redundancies and clusters of related ideas.

The whole reason of doing the research before The questions are crucial. If it is not informed by
going into solving the problem is inspiration. During good research or well formulated, even a creative
the curiosity phase and the compassion phase the matrix can fail to help the team to come up with
team seeks a better understanding of the problem ideas. Besides, it is important that the team follow
and inspiration on how to solve it. Therefore it is the rules for brainstorming. Every idea that is
better to use the creative matrix after a thorough added to the board counts! It is also important to
research and synthesis. Nevertheless, it can be used emphasize the necessity of doing a silent brain-
right away if you have formulated good questions. writing first, before moving on to a brainstorming
mode. Research has shown that this increases the
Step-by-step guide likelihood of better ideas.
1/ Draw the matrix on a board or big sheet of
paper.
2/ Choose four “How might we…?” questions.
3/ Choose four enablers based on the challenge

you are working on.
4/ Set a time frame for the ideation (not too long!).
5/ First let the team members silently write down
and sketch ideas (brain-writing). At each
intersection of the matrix the team should ask
themselves, how might we solve that question
using that specific enabler?
71
72
Be constructive!
Design thinking is an iterative process. This cannot convey your concept to testers. The testers might
be mentioned often enough. Instead of creating be your future audience or customers, they might
one concept and then implementing it, design thin- be subject-matter experts or even potential do-
king calls for prototyping and testing your ideas. nors and supporters. Based on these tests the team
should iterate the concept. Some ideas might be
The concept dropped while others might be added. Once you
of constructive have tested and iterated your concept well, you will
have more confidence in its future success. Based on
prototyping and testing this confidence it then will be much easier to take
While prototyping sounds rather technical, it actua- the final steps to actually implement the concept.
lly only describes the process of making your con-
cept tangible and ideally even experienceable. This
can be done with a product, a campaign idea, a ser-
Methods for constructing solutions
vice concept or even with a policy proposal. There The following methods are just a small introduction
are several ways of making an idea tangible: You into the broad toolbox to test towards finding a
can visualize it in sketches or images, you can phy- solution.
sically build it, or you can create a role play around
it. The goal of any of those activities is to be able to
73
Voting visually
Time requirement
5-15 minutes
Required material
§§ Sticky dots in different colours
§§ Markers in different colours
Method “Visualize the vote”, Design Thinking Toolkit,
Atomic Spin, the blog of the software design agency
Atomic Object.71
Method “Visualize the vote”, Google Design Sprint
Kit.72
Method “Quick voting methods”, This is Service Design
Doing.73

In the creative matrix, you have come up with a lot §§Blue–most relevant = biggest impact for the
of ideas, and you might have clustered them based persona
on their affinity to other ideas. Now it is time to
select which ideas you would like to take forward. This way the voting will not be based solely on the
One simple way of doing this is by voting with sticky personal preferences of the team members, but
dots. Instead of giving each team member only one focussed on specific aspects that will be helpful for
vote, you may give them three different votes. Each choosing. If you work in a bigger organization it also
vote should be showing a different category of makes sense to involve others in the voting process.
ideas. For example: This way you get a clearer picture. The results of
§§Red–most radical = wildest idea this voting should be used as a heat map that
§§Green–most resonant = quick win for a huge informs the team decision, not a strict mechanism.
target audience The ultimate decision lies with the team.
74
It is usually applied after ideation, but you can apply It is usually helpful to document the categories
the same method also to identify which “how might and colours somewhere on the board. This way
we…?” question you would like to work with, or each team member remembers them and does
which insights from your research you might want not get confused. Additionally you will be able to
to focus on. remember them looking at your board in the future.
You can also use a different set of voting criteria
Step-by-step guide such as technical feasibility, economic viability and
human desirability. But the technical and economic
1/ Select body of data (e.g. a bunch of ideas,
criteria might be limiting at an early stage. You
questions or insights)
might be able to iterate an idea that now seems
2/ Define the categories you want to vote on (e.g. technically challenging and come up with a better
radical, resonant, relevant) and allocate a colour way of making it real later in the process. Do not
to each category. limit yourselves only to the simple ideas.
3/ Give each team member some time to decide
where to put their votes.
4/ Have them stick their votes all at the same time
to avoid too much influencing.
5/ Take a look at the heat map of votes on the
board and together decide what to do with it.
75
Idea napkin
Time requirement
30-45 minutes per idea
Required material
§§ Print-outs of the template
§§ Markers in different colours for sketching
§§ Additionally you can use other visual material
(similar to the ones you used in the mood board).
Method “Idea napkin“, The Straight Up Toolkit
– a resource for entrepreneurs.74
Method “Concept poster”, Mindlab Methods
– a collection of methods for iterative design processes,
online.75

In the creative matrix, you have come up with a lot that. It provides the team with a set of questions
of ideas. By clustering and voting you were able to that help in thinking a concept through. Fill out the
identify the ones that seem more promising, but template for each of the ideas that you would like
your ideas are still very raw. Now it is time to define to proceed with. At the end you should be able to
them further. The idea napkin helps you in doing explain each idea much more easily.
76
When to use it
This method is best used when you have selected a
set of ideas and would like to develop them further.
It helps a team to make up their minds about an
idea on a more detailed level. Based on an idea
napkin, the team will be able to share their concept
with others.
Step-by-step guide
1/ Select a set of ideas.
2/ Fill out the template and sketch out each idea

in more detail.
3/ Share the idea with others to get early feedback.

Sometimes teams find it difficult to envision their
idea in all relevant details. Encourage them to
play around again with divergent and convergent
thinking. If you are not clear about one specific
question of the template, have the team brainstorm
about it and then select the answers that best apply
to that specific idea.
77
Six thinking hats
Time requirement
10-30 minutes per hat
Required material
§§ Space on a board
§§ Optional: it’s fun to have actual hats to put on
Edward de Bono, Six Thinking Hats, (London: Penguin
Books, 1990).
Method “Six thinking hats”, Tools Hero, a knowledge
platform for skills and career development.76

There is a huge amount of literature on the six • White–this hat calls for the facts and just the
thinking hats. It is a concept that Edward de Bono facts.
published as early as1986. The basic idea behind the • Yellow–this hat enables the wearer to feel
six thinking hats is again based on the observation optimistic. It makes you look for value and benefit.
that we can consciously adopt different thinking • Red–symbolizes feelings, emotions and intuitions.
styles. De Bono differentiates six of them and You can also share fears wearing this hat.
attributes colours to them. He encourages people • Black–stands for judgment, and for when you
to mentally put on a hat of a certain colour and look for everything that can go wrong.
switch them when necessary. He speaks about the • Green–encourages you to have new ideas. It
following colours and meanings: stands for opportunities, alternatives and new
• Blue–the hat of the facilitator who keeps the solutions.
overview of the process.
78
Traditionally the method calls for a certain degree Depending on the local culture you are working
of self-organization by the team. In our process we in, it might be difficult for people to adopt certain
used it in a rather structured process, where the thinking styles (e.g. the black hat, which is focused
facilitator announced each hat and gave the teams on critique). The facilitator should encourage the
a certain amount of time to discuss their concepts team to really stick to the prescribed thinking style
in the form of an idea napkin from the perspective for each respective hat. If people are uncomfortable
of that specific hat. uttering negative comments in front of their team
members because they fear offending them, have
The concept can be used in different parts of the them write down their comments silently and then
process. During research it can help to look at the shuffle the comments before discussing them.
findings from a different perspective. We used it
as a way of iterating the concepts that came out
of the creative process. It enabled the members
of different teams to give each other more critical
feedback.
Step-by-step guide
1/ Decide on a topic to discuss (e.g. in our case an
idea a team came up with).
2/ Have someone facilitate the session (blue hat).
3/ Announce each hat in turn and give the

team some time to discuss the topic from the
perspective of that specific hat.
4/ Encourage them to collect the discussion

on a board in order to be able to build on it
afterwards.
79
Behavioural change world café
Time requirement
90 to 120 minutes
Required material
§§ Stations prepared with boards
§§ One moderator per station
Dan Ariely, “Are we in control of our own decisions?”,
talk on ted.com.77
Dan Ariely, Changing Customer Behaviour, course on
plusacumen.org.78
Method “World Café”, Game Storming.79

This is not necessarily a classical design method, the next group that comes to that station. They build
but for the purpose of our project we developed on whatever has been said. This process repeats
this method based on the publications of the until all teams have been at all stations. In our case
behavioural economist Dan Ariely. We discussed we provided four stations with one question each
his principles in a world café approach for each from Dan Ariely’s concept of behavioural change.
concept. He describes six different principles that you can
use to influence behaviour:
A world café is a structured discussion where
different teams discuss different topics. While they • Simplicity and defaults–simple choices make it
are talking, they document their thoughts on a easier to change your behaviour.
board. After a set amount of time one person stays • Concreteness–it should be very clear what the
back and the rest go to the next station where desired behaviour should be.
another topic is discussed. The person who stayed • Pre-commitment and loss aversion–the pain of
back introduces the thoughts of the first group to losing something is greater than the joy of gaining
80
something. Pitfalls & challenges
• Choice architecture–design choices for the Since this is not a simple method, it requires a
desired behaviour in a way that they come easy. more thorough understanding of the principles of
• Incentives–use rewards to incentivize the behavioural change. This publication does not have
desired behaviour. the space to go into more detail, but we encourage
• Social proof – show people that others are acting you to attend the online course that Dan Ariely
in the desired way. has developed for Plus Acumen (see additional
Our stations were based on the concepts of literature). For the world café approach it is
simplicity and defaults, loss aversion, incentives, necessary to have one facilitator at each station to
and social proof. We left out concreteness and encourage the teams to document their discussion
choice architecture because we felt that the partner and to transfer the results to the team that comes
organizations were not in a position to do much on next.
those particular principles.
When to use it
In general this is a concept that you, as a member of
an NGO or social organization, should know more
about. Since you are often working on changing
behaviour it is crucial to think about your own
offerings and check whether the principles of
behavioural economics can be of help in refining
them.
Step-by-step guide
1/ Explain the principles of behavioural change
to the team and watch Dan Ariely’s TED talk
together.
2/ Conduct a world café with stations that reflect

those principles.
3/ Discuss your concepts based on those principles.
4/ Iterate your concepts in a way that they comply

more with the principles.
81
Storyboard
Time requirement
60 minutes to several hours per story depending on the
detail level
Required material
§§ Space on a board
§§ Some material to make the story more visual such as
old newspapers, magazines, coloured paper or printed
figures e.g. from SAP SCENES (see additional literature)
§§ Scissors
§§ Glue
§§ Tape
Jonah Sachs, Using the hero’s journey to build better
brands, online.
Method “Storyboard”, Game Storming, online.80
Method “Storyboard”, Service Design Tools.81
Method ”Scenes“, SAP Design Services, a visual toolset
for collaborative storytelling, online.82

The partner organizations are working in the order to tell a story.
social sector. Therefore, many ideas are not The benefit of telling your concept in a story format
product-oriented, but they might be campaigns, is that many people relate to stories. We are able to
policy proposals or other interventions. In order identify with the characters and thus can imagine
to prototype such a concept, we made use of what the specific concept adds to the world. A
storyboards. Storyboards are familiar in the context storyboard usually consists of several pictures and
of script writers or playwrights, but most people some text. Together each picture and text represent
will also remember them from primary school, one scene in the storyboard.
where children have to add images to a cartoon in
82
The plot of the story can be freely developed. Step-by-step guide
In our project we gave the teams some input on 1/ Identify what idea you want to tell in a story
standard storytelling formats, such as the hero’s format.
journey, and encouraged them to use that format
2/ Let the team brainstorm on the different scenes
in order to come up with their story. The hero’s
that the story should consist of. A standard for-
journey is a format that has been identified by
mat like the hero’s journey might help to create
literature theorists by looking at huge numbers of
a more vivid story.
fairy tales and folk stories. They found out that most
of these stories are based on a similar structure: 3/ Visualize each scene and tell the story in words.
A hero or heroine receives a call to go out on an 4/ Share your story with others in order to get their
adventure, and after some struggle and with the feedback.
help of a supernatural mentor crosses the threshold
of an unknown world. She fights several obstacles Pitfalls & challenges
(such as dragons) and finally reaches a remote place Developing a storyboard might not feel easy for
(such as the underworld or some magical cave) people who have not done it before. A standardized
where she acquires a secret that she then brings framework such as the hero’s journey can help.
back to her own world. Through undergoing this
In our project the teams struggled a little bit with
journey, the heroine has grown into a stronger
that format, though, because of the nature of
and more knowledgeable character. She now can
the project. Instead of making the women or girls
solve a problem in her own world based on her
the heroines of the story, we encouraged them
learnings.
to take the withholders. The thinking behind this
decision was based on the idea that they should be
When to use it the ones who go through a change and thus will
Use it whenever you have to convey a concept that grow by means of the intervention that is part of
is time-based such as a service, a process, or a policy the concept. Most teams did not agree with this
change. approach and thus created female heroines.
83
Testing the concepts
Time requirement
30 -120 minutes per test
Required material
§§ Prototype to test
§§ Clear idea of what you want to learn
§§ Photo and/or video camera
2010, pp. 181 ff.)
Method Design Kit.83
Method “Measure and evaluate”, Design Kit.84

Design thinking is an iterative approach to solving ting their concepts with the same attitude as they
problems. It is iterative because instead of spending start into any new project: with curiosity. The goal
a lot of time and money on developing the solution of testing your concept is to learn from the people
first and then rolling it out, it encourages teams to you are testing it with. This might mean that you
check, test and adapt their concepts right from the learn that your concept is not as great as you have
start of a project. The concept might be still very thought. It might mean that you have to accept
rough, but design thinkers should feel comfortable ideas from others that are better than yours. But
in testing it with experts and especially with the it will ensure that you do not develop the wrong
target audience. A design thinker will approach tes- thing and then fail after a lot of effort.
84
Once you have an idea for a solution you should There are two main challenges to overcome: the fear
test it. It can be as small as a sticky note or it can be of embarrassing yourself and the pride of having
a full-fledged prototype. Go back in the process of developed something amazing. Both will hinder
design thinking to a mindset of curiosity and collect the team from really learning what works and what
as much feedback as you can. does not. To get rid of the fear, make them go out
with their concept as early as possible. In order to
Step-by-step guide avoid the pride of the new concept, force them
not to answer any questions that have not been
1/ Choose the concept you want to get feedback
on. solved yet. Instead of answering those questions,
the team should ask back “What do you think?”.
2/ Identify what exactly you need to learn about This will prevent them from selling anything that is
it. Ask yourself, “what don’t I know about my not even there in the prototype, and force them to
concept?” really learn about the ideas of the tester.
3/ Go out, meet people and engage them with your
concept. Ideally you will have an experiential
prototype. So let the testers experience that for
themselves. If you have a more visual prototype,
such as a storyboard, show it to them, but do as
little explanation as possible.
4/ Let them express their thoughts. Use the

interviewing techniques such as the 80/20 rule.
Listen carefully and take notes. Observe how
the testers are dealing with your prototype. Ask
open questions that leave space for the tester to
really tell their opinion.
5/ Don’t sell your idea. You are not here to convince
anyone. You want to learn from them.
6/ Go back to your team space. Collect the data
and go through synthesis just as you would have
done after research.
85
86
Pitfalls:
Where to be
cautious
87
88
While the benefits of design thinking have already the danger of getting lost in the process and not
been discussed in previous chapters, it is also finding your way out towards actually implementing
necessary to describe the weaknesses and challenges the ideas. This is a problem that can be observed in
that this approach poses to any organization, but many design-thinking teams. They get overly excited
especially to those in the social sector working about having ideas and building prototypes, but
directly with local communities. then nothing really happens afterwards. Therefore
the expectation towards design thinking should be
In general it is important to state that design kept to a realistic level. It can inspire teams to have
thinking is not a magic wand that will immediately creative ideas. It can help teams to create innovative
solve all problems of the entire humankind. This solutions to their respective problems, but it is not
might seem obvious, but nevertheless a lot of a guarantee for success. Again, you need discipline
people who hear about design thinking for the within the team to walk the walk and actually
first time seem to think that. The expectation that implement the ideas and concepts. Since design
is put towards design thinking as a one-size-fits-all thinking (especially in the social sector) is highly
wonder-tool can be found in the corporate as well self-driven with few resources, the team must take
as the social sector. the lead and step out of their comfort zone in order
to really take advantage of the methods and tools.
Besides, the objective of the design-thinking
approach is not necessarily to be more time- During the workshop in Jaipur the participants also
efficient. Even with design thinking, things take asked themselves whether design thinking could be
their time. Due to its creative and structured applied without a team. Since design thinking as
approach it might help teams in starting small and it is described here is seen as a way of thinking, it
circumventing obstacles and thus getting quicker to can also be applied alone. Concepts like divergent
their goal. But for that to happen you need a high and convergent thinking, for example, can be very
level of self-discipline within the team. helpful even if someone is working alone, but it is
more fun and more effective when several people
Of course a facilitator can help with that, but from diverse backgrounds come together.
that was another fear of the participants: Do you
always need a facilitator? As mentioned before, Another issue that was raised was the fact that
the facilitator’s role is especially needed in teams donor organizations often do not give space for
working with design thinking for the first time. human-centred and iterative proposals. In this case
More experienced teams will manage themselves the team can try to find creative ways how to apply
or have rotating members take the role of the the mindset even during a seemingly closed request
facilitator. for proposals and secretly sneak some collaborative
and creative methods into their project.
Participants in this process additionally described
89
90
Outlook:
How design thinking
could help
in other projects
91
92
Design thinking has many applications and it can perspective of other people will they be able to
successfully be applied in the social sector. As des- include and involve them. For this the team needs
cribed in the introduction, design thinking works empathy. But only if they also have a wish to help
best when the challenge to be solved is rather com- these other people improve their situation will they
plex and allows for several answers. Through the ultimately get into the mode of finding new solu-
process of design thinking a multidisciplinary team tions. Therefore a team using design thinking in the
is empowered to work collaboratively, visually and social sector ultimately needs more than empathy.
to be compassionate with their target audience It needs compassion.
and their context.
… creative,
If that future team has the right mindset, it will and believe in their own creativity! Sometimes this
be able to develop solutions for the problems they creativity is hidden behind fears and traditional
are working on, which might be different from the structures, hierarchies and processes. Design thin-
ones they have had so many times before. In the king can help to break those up.
social sector in particular, these solutions do not
necessarily have to be big innovations. Sometimes … constructive!
even small changes or a new angle for applying de- In order to work on huge and complex problems
cades-old knowledge can be just as effective. such as gender inequality it is necessary to start
small, and permanently evaluate and re-think the
In order for this to happen, that future team must solution proposals. Applying a constructive mind-
be… set and prototyping their way to new interventions
and campaigns that future team will be likely more
… curious! successful than following the traditional approach.
This means they have to leave their office and go
out in the field. It also means leaving the comfort By not only accepting the “existing situation”, but
zone of working only with the stakeholders whom constructively turning it “into a preferred one”86
they know and like. Peter Coleman has shown that that future team truly designs, as Herbert Simon
knowing those you consider your enemy is the best has defined it.
strategy to solve a conflict. “Listen carefully. Work
hard to listen to the other side in a conflict. […] Hopefully this publication will help other teams in
This alone can move the conflict in a more friendly doing just that, and inspire them to go on an ad-
and constructive direction.”85 True curiosity helps in venturous journey that leads them to new ways of
doing that first step. solving their old problems.
… compassionate!
Only if that future team can understand the
93
94
Partner
organizations
involved in
the project
Center for Women’s Development and Research (CWDR), www.cwdr.org
CWDR works on issues of education, violence against women, social security, income generation and
human rights in Tamil Nadu. It also serves as a support service organization for capacity building and
networking for other NGOs. CWDR has organized women domestic workers in Tamil Nadu under a Trade
Union called “Manushi”.
Social Centre for Rural Initiative and Advancement (SCRIA), www.scria.org

The goal of SCRIA is to organize rural communities for sustainable rural development. In order to fulfil this
goal, SCRIA has been building capacities of rural communities for their meaningful participation in self-
governance processes for inclusive governance. SCRIA has been engaging with women and youth groups
for initiatives on local self-governance since 1995 in Haryana and Rajasthan.
Social Action for Human Resource Development (SOHARD)

SOHARD, an NGO based in Rajasthan, has been working on the issue of local governance with women
since 1997. Through its activities with self- help groups and elected members, SOHARD has been training
women in Panchayati Raj. It tries to bring the concept of local self-governance within the reach of the
people and to build confidence amongst women including elected women representatives to participate
effectively in Panchayati Raj Institutions.
95
Urban Research Centre (URC)
Urban Research Centre (URC) is a non-profit organization working on action research projects on
urbanization in Karnataka. URC is working on ward based participatory planning and brings together
citizens, local groups, councillors and municipal councils.
Vacha Trust, www.vacha.org.in

Vacha is a women’s group that was formed in 1987. It was first established as a women’s library, together
with a cultural centre that created and collected oral and visual resources. Vacha organizes gender
training for teachers and social activists, youth groups and others. The organization is based in Mumbai
and its outreach programmes are mainly in Maharashtra and Gujarat. It is an active part of the network of
autonomous women’s groups in India.
WomenPowerConnect (WPC), www.womenpowerconnect.org

Women Power Connect (WPC) is a national level organization of women’s groups and individuals working
together for formalizing the process of legislative coordination. Their activities are aimed at influencing
legislators and policy makers to frame gender-friendly policies that impact women positively. WPC has
1,400 individual and institutional members across the country. WPC works actively with members of
Parliament to protect the interests of women in India.
96
Endnotes
1
Tim Brown, “When Everyone Is Doing Design Thinking, Is It Still a Competitive Advantage?”, Harvard Business Review: Ideas and
advice for leaders, https://hbr.org/2015/08/when-everyone-is-doing-design-thinking-is-it-still-a-competitive-advantage.
2
Catherine Cheney, “Gates Foundation and USAID team up to bring design to health”, Devex International Development, acces-
sed: 20.10.2018, https://www.devex.com/news/gates-foundation-and-usaid-team-up-to-bring-design-to-health-92084.
3
Emily Smith, “Putting the People First: Human-Centered Poverty Alleviation”, Acumen Blog (blog), accessed: 20.10.2018, https://
acumen.org/blog/events/putting-the-people-first-human-centered-poverty-alleviation/.
4
Jeanne Liedtke, Randy Salman, and Daisy Azer, Design thinking for the greater good. Innovation in the Social Sector (New York:
Columbia University Press, 2017).
5
Thanks to the world of massive open online courses the basics of design thinking can now be learned remotely, e.g. from the HPI
D-School: Mana Taheri, Karen von Schmieden, and Lena Mayer, “Inspirations for Design: A Course on Human-Centered Research”,
Open HPI (online course), accessed: 20.10.2018, https://open.hpi.de/courses/insights-2017. Especially for the social sector there are
some incredibly useful courses by the Acumen fund and IDEO: ideo.org, “Introduction to human-centered design”, +A (online
course), accessed: 20.10.2018, https://www.plusacumen.org/courses/introduction-human-centered-design.
6
Kelley, David; Kelley, Tom, Creative Confidence: Unleashing the Creative Potential Within Us All (New York: HarperCollins Publi-
shers. 2013, E-Book: Kindle-Position 386).
7
Manzini, Ezio, Coad, Rachel, Design, When Everybody Designs: An Introduction to Design for Social Innovation. (Cambridge: The
MIT Press. E-Book: Kindle-Position 893, 2015).
8
See for example: Richard Buchanan, “Wicked problems in ‚Design Thinking‘“, in: Design Issues. 8/2 (Cambridge: The MIT Press,
1992, pp. 5-21).
9
See also: Tim Brown, Change by design. How design thinking transforms organizations and inspires innovation (New York: Har-
per Business, 2009).
10
The quote is attributed to Raymond Loewy by: Adam Richardson, Innovation X. Why a company’s toughest problems are its
greatest advantage (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2010, p. 184).
11
Hans Rosling, Ola Rosling and Anna Rosling Rönnlund, Factfulness. Ten reasons we’re wrong about the world – and why things
are better than you think (London: Sceptre, 2018).
12
Yuval Noah Harari, Homo Deus. A brief history of tomorrow (New York: Vintage, 2017, pp. 356 ff).
13
See Jeneanne Rae, “Design Value Index Results and Commentary”, dmi. Design Management Institute, accessed: 14.10.2018,
https://www.dmi.org/page/2015DVIandOTW.
14
David Kelley uses the name d.school in opposition to all the b.schools (business schools), which in his view had way too much
influence on the world.
15
See the map of d.schools and cooperation partners here: Hasso-Plattner-Institut, “Kooperationen”, HPI, accessed: 14.10.2018,
https://hpi.de/school-of-design-thinking/hpi-d-school/kooperationen.html.
16
John Meada speaks of three kinds of design, which exist today: classical design, design thinking and of increasing importance
computational design. John Maeda, “Design in Tech Report 2016”, Design in Tech Report, accessed: 14.10.2018, https://designin-
tech.report/2016/03/13/design-in-tech-report-2016/.
17
Jan Schmiedgen, Holger Rhinow, Eva Köppen and Christoph Meinel, Parts without a whole. The current state of design thinking
practice in organizations, Technische Berichte des Hasso-Plattner-Instituts für Softwaresystemtechnik an der Universität Potsdam
; 97, Potsdam: Universitätsverlag Potsdam, 2015 (on the internet: http://publishup.uni-potsdam.de/opus4-ubp/frontdoor/index/
index/docId/7996, accessed: 20.10.2018).
97
18
Note that design thinking is not necessarily a tool to make projects more (time) efficient. Even in a design thinking project you
will not be able to solve every challenge in a two-day workshop.
19
This dictum was presumably coined by George Kembel, the former head of the d.school at Stanford university.
20
You could argue that design thinking even implies a third side: In addition to focussing on team and target audience, also fo-
cussing on yourself. One of the founding professors of the Stanford d.school has written a book about this: Bernhard Roth, The
achievement habit. Stop wishing, start doing and take command of your life (New York: HarperBusiness, 2015).
21
This is an unfortunate use of words, which originates in the field of product and especially software design, where the design
team usually thinks about the user of the product or software.
22
Karel Vredenburg describes beautifully how also designers fit into such a diverse design thinking team and how the basic
concept of collaboration actually constitutes the difference between design and design thinking: Karel Vredenburg, “Design vs.
design thinking explained”, Karel Vredenburg
On design, technology, and optimizing the human experience (blog), last modified: 30.08.2016, accessed: 14.10.2018, https://
www.karelvredenburg.com/home/2016/8/29/design-vs-design-thinking-explained.
23
James W. Tamm, Ronald J. Luyet, Radical Collaboration: Five Essential Skills to Overcome Defensiveness and build successful
relationships (Sebastopol: O’Reilly, 2004).
24
Natasha Iskander has written a very critical piece on design thinking describing it as “fundamentally conservative” and “pre-
serving the status-quo”. Especially one element of this critique is worth noting in this context: design thinking can reaffirm “the
privileged role of the designer, positioning her as the vessel through which all the implicit understandings that make it into the
final design must first pass.” It is therefore very important to be conscious of this danger, for example through co-creation with
the target audience. As the examples of the FES partners show in our project the design thinking approach of understanding the
context as well as the traget audience has actually provided the teams with a new perspective which helped them apply their
participatory methods of planning and budgeting more effectively. See. Natasha Iskander, “Design Thinking Is Fundamentally
Conservative and Preserves the Status Quo”, Harvard Business Review, last modified: 05.09.2018, accessed: 02.12.2018, https://hbr.
org/2018/09/design-thinking-is-fundamentally-conservative-and-preserves-the-status-quo.
25
That book also incorporates DIY examples of furniture which can be easily built at low cost. Scott Witthoft and Scott Doorley,
Make Space (Hoboken: Wiley, 2012).
26
Take a look at this list of material, which the d.school at Stanford university suggests for a design thinking studio: Adam Royalty,
“Materials List at the d.school”, The K-12 Lab Wiki, last modified: 02.08.2011, accessed: 02.12.2018, https://dschool-old.stanford.
edu/groups/k12/wiki/56b69/Materials_List.html.
27
This is only true, if you really know the answer. A math problem of 2+2=4 does not need a design thinking approach. Don’t get
stuck in your expert’s mind, though. “We did that last year and it didn’t work” is not a good reason not to apply design thinking,
in fact it’s the opposite.
28
The design squiggle was published by Damien Newman under creative commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United
States License, on the internet: https://thedesignsquiggle.com/, (last visited: 15.06.2016)
29
Florian Rustler, Thinking tools for creativity and innovation. The little handbook of innovation methods (Zurich: Midas Verlag,
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30
To the knowledge of the author there is no official publication of the learning arches, but it is used by the Simon Kavanaugh
throughout the Kaos Pilot master class on “Facilitating Learning Spaces”, which the author attended.
31
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A practical

© 2019 Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung India Office

Graphic Design: Myriam Rueda

The three core

One reason for this discrepancy lies in the amount

Image 1: Projects based on cooperation vs. on collaboration

Uncertainty / patterns / insights Clarity / Focus

Research Concept Design

§§ They build prototypes of their respective ideas.

That feedback starts a loop that brings the team

Structure of workshop, the teams came up with initial ideas and

The workshop series culminated in a “train-the-

Image 3 shows this approach visualized according

START WORKING DIFFERENTLY

WORKSHOP WORKSHOP WORKSHOP

Results of format based on that input. The result was so

collaboration Besides this approach of involving their target

and one Dave Gray, Sunni Brown and James Macanufo.

methods Vijay Kumar. 101 design methods: A structured approach

The concept of facilitation Methods for facilitation

How to use the method

1/ Identify the occasion for which you need a

2/ Decide on the amount of time you want to

3/ Have a look at the online method repositories in

4/ Choose one or design your own playful exercise.

5/ Play it with your team.

6/ If the warm-up was not only a fun activity but

How to use the method

3/ Document the likes and wishes either by having

How to use the method

2/ Even if the team members do not feel very

3/ Encourage them to take pictures and videos.

4/ Help them in providing material (stationery,

Pitfalls & challenges

How to use the method

A design thinker will usually learn something new

How to use the method

Step-by-step guide Pitfalls & challenges

2/ Hand sticky notes and markers to each team

3/ Let the team members think of stakeholders

How to use the method

How to use the method

1/ Identify the things or activities you want to

2/ Make an appointment with the target

3/ Go to the place where you can observe. Interact

5/ After the observation is complete, take a look at

The concept of synthesis Methods

How to use the method

Step-by-step guide Pitfalls & challenges

Method “Mood Board“, Game Storming, official website

How to use the method

Method “Personas”, Service Design Tools.63

How to use the method

Pitfalls & challenges

Required material Method “Journey Map”, Design Kit.65

Method ”How might we“, Design Kit.68

How to use the method

2/ Reformulate those insights into questions by

3/ Especially for beginners, it makes sense to also