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January 25, 2018

Design Thinking

Oftentimes when I introduce myself as an Art Director, I’m met with “Oh I could never do that, I’m not creative at all.” In fact, most people associate creativity with art of some kind, believing creativity is a skillset like drawing or graphic design. But this couldn’t be further from the truth.

Creativity is not a skill set. It’s a mindset.

Just about everyone speaking on the subject of creativity explains it that way. Once you subscribe to creativity as a mindset versus a skill, you’ll discover you (and maybe even your colleagues!) are capable of creativity…and Design Thinking.

Tom Kelly, a lead educator with IDEO, challenges our thinking with, “It turns out that creativity isn’t some rare gift to be enjoyed by the lucky few – it’s a natural part of human thinking and behavior.”

In no way is ‘drawing’ or ‘graphic design’ or ‘knowing how to use Photoshop’ part of the creativity/design definition.

What’s the point?

Bill Burnett, Executive Director of the Design Program at Stanford, said it best, “Design Thinking is innovation, creativity with a purpose.”

When you approach a problem the same as always, how can you expect different (and better) results?

Leveraging Design Thinking allows you to tackle even the most overwhelming of problems with measurable business minded results, do so quickly through rapid prototyping (hey we mentioned this nugget last year!) and with less risk even when the stakes are high.

At its core, it is about humans.

Design Thinking is empathy and patient journey mapping on steroids. Humans are at the center of the process. They are your reason for trying to get to a better solution. At the end of the day, when you understand your end users better, you’ll have the power and clarity to make the right decisions that provide answers to the problems you are trying to solve.

Want to learn more? Be sure to check out our 2018 Health Care Trends Report Webinar on March 6th at 2:00 p.m.!