Zhanna Liedtka, Tim Ogilvy; lane T. Mamedova Chapter from the book “Think like a designer. Design Thinking for Managers »
Publishing house "Mann, Ivanov and Ferber"

Design, this elegant definition tells us, - pure magic. A riddle of riddles, a mysterious realm of the unknown, where only the brave (and very smart) dare to enter. If this is so, then it is impossible to imagine that there is a formal process for mastering these sharp turns. Of course, we'd all like to invent an iPod equivalent for our business. But when it comes to such development and such innovation, mere mortals, ordinary business people, find themselves at a loss. We throw up our hands and continue to pore over spreadsheets and market research results, trying to find the next magic remedy- another catalyst for growth.

But don't be fooled by Apple's design views. This concept has many different meanings. It turns out that the design thinking process we'll talk about in the book is more like Dorothy's Silver Slippers than a magic wand. You already have magical powers. It remains to be seen how to use it. Find someone in any organization who is driving innovation, and you will likely see that person constantly practicing design thinking.

If you're a manager, be prepared to roll up your sleeves rather than throw up your hands in frustration. Because design thinking is a systematic approach to problem solving. It starts with your users and your ability to create a better future for them. And he takes into account that it may not work the first time. It does not require supernatural powers, and it is absolutely safe to try at home.

The time for design has come.

We believe that the recent explosion of interest in design thinking is due to much more than just the success and prestige of Apple. We need a new set of tools. Increasing productivity and reorganizing processes, we have exhausted our capabilities. Competition has raised the bar: with the advent of the Internet and networking, it is no longer possible to accumulate knowledge in secret from others. Our views on the sources of creativity are becoming broader every day: we are learning new things about the brain, studying new cognitive models and their functioning in different contexts. Finally, design tools—including sticky notes and dry erase boards—have become simple and common.

Design thinking can impact organic growth and innovation in the same way that Total Quality Management (TQM) has impacted quality: taking what we've always cared about and giving it to managers necessary tools and processes and get the result.

Is it possible and necessary to teach design thinking to managers? Designers are actively discussing this topic. But at the center of the debate remains the question of what is meant by design. The very idea of ​​teaching managers about design seems extremely dangerous to designers. After all, this requires years of special training, and if managers begin to consider themselves designers, the quality of work may suffer and respect for the profession will decrease. We believe that these concerns should be taken seriously and that the concepts of design and design thinking should first be distinguished.

Gifted designers combine an aesthetic sensibility with great abilities for visualization, ethnography, and pattern recognition. All this is far beyond our capabilities, and managers are no exception. But when it comes to stimulating growth in business, we are interested in abilities that are associated not with natural talent and artistic education, but with systematic approach to solving problems. For us, this is what distinguishes design thinking—and it can be taught to managers.

Like any process, design thinking is practiced at different levels by people with different talents and capabilities. Can a middle manager turn into Jonathan Ive, Apple's chief designer? You're just as likely to turn into Serena Williams under the tutelage of the district tennis champion. But is it possible to learn to play better? Certainly. And once you learn, you will appreciate the achievements of the Jonathan Quinces of this world even more. More importantly, you will have a new set of tools with which you can solve the complex problem of development.

The goal of this book is to demystify design thinking and transform the concept of design from an abstract idea into a practical, everyday tool that every manager can use. We will look at design from a business perspective, translating design vocabulary into business language, we'll uncover the mysterious connection between design thinking and profitable growth, describe systemic processes with simple templates for project management, and give you ten tools for combining design and traditional business approaches. With their help, you will expand the growth opportunities for your business and your profits. Along the way, we'll introduce you to other people like Dave Jarrett—none of whom were trained in design, but all of whom are using design thinking to drive innovation and growth in their organizations. Among them are Christy Zuber, a nurse with a passion for design, and Diane Tai, a political scientist by training with an MBA. On behalf of the American Association of Retired Persons, Diane helps young people manage their finances correctly, which allows baby boomers to refuse financial assistance to their adult children. All of these managers have mastered design thinking. So fasten your silver shoes and get going!

What if managers thought like designers?

But let's not get ahead of ourselves. What might change if managers thought more like designers? We have three words for you: empathy, invention, iteration.

Design begins with empathy - a deep understanding of the people it is intended for. Managers who think like designers will put themselves in the shoes of clients. Of course, we are already aware that we must be “customer-centric”, but now we are talking about deeper and more personal things. We're talking about understanding customers as people with real problems, rather than thinking of them as sales targets or as a set of demographics like age, income level, and marital status. To do this, you need to deeply understand their emotional and rational needs and desires. Actor Stephen Fry (the unrivaled Jeeves) writes about Apple's latest product after speaking with the company's chief designer Jonathan Ive (Time magazine, April 2010):

"(Think for a moment. We are human beings, and our first reaction is determined not by calculation, but by emotion. Ive and his team realized that if you carry an object in your pocket or in your hand for many hours every day, your relationship with that object will be deep , humane and emotional."

The best designs inspire - they engage us on an emotional level. Sadly, in business today we are often satisfied with mediocre. We don't even try to engage customers or employees emotionally - let alone inspire them. However, the difference between great and satisfactory design is precisely that the former evokes feelings in us.

Take the San Francisco-Oakland Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge. The first is a road over water. The second one too. But it also amazes, enchants and turns into a symbol. Like other architectural masterpieces such as the Sydney Opera House, it symbolizes the land on which it stands. Are all business inventions as attractive? Very few.

Because design is also a process of invention, managers who think like designers will consider themselves creators. In talking about the “science and art” of management, we have mainly focused on science. Taking design seriously means recognizing the difference between what scientists do and what designers and growth leaders do. While scientists conduct research to find explanations for what already exists today, designers invent tomorrow - create something that does not exist. To grow, you need to create something in the future that is missing in the present. But tomorrow's powerful tools are rarely discovered solely through analysis. As Walt Disney said, they are “first made in the mind, then in action.” This does not deny the important role of analysis, but it does relegate it to a secondary role compared to the process of invention - if growth is the goal.

Great design, as Richard Buchanan, former dean of the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University, said, occurs at the intersection of constraint, contingency, and opportunity—these are the essential elements for creating innovative, elegant, and functional design. But it is very important which one you start with. In the business world, conversations about growth usually start with constraints - in terms of budget, ease of implementation and focus on quarterly profits dictated by Wall Street. The result is a design for tomorrow that is not much different from the design of today. However, great design always starts with the question: “What if everything were possible?” After all, if growth depends on innovation, and our perceptions of limitations hinder our imagination, then the number one challenge is to learn to see what lies beyond them.

Take the design of one of America's most remarkable public spaces - Central Park in New York. In 1857, for the first time in the country, a competition was held landscape design- to select the park layout. Of the submitted works, only one, prepared by Frederick Olmsted and Calvert Vox, met all the requirements for the project. The park should not interfere with city traffic, which, in turn, should not spoil the pastoral atmosphere of the park. Execute so much difficult condition the rest of the participants considered it impossible. Olmsted and Vox succeeded by abandoning the idea of ​​the park as a two-dimensional space. They conceived it in three dimensions and laid four roads at a depth of two and a half meters underground.

Finally, design means that we must be prepared for an iterative process that will continue until we find a solution. Therefore, for managers who think like designers, the need to constantly learn is obvious. Most managers were taught a direct, linear solution method: define a problem, find different solutions, and choose the right one. Designers are not nearly as impatient and optimistic. They understand that successful inventions require experimentation and empathy is difficult to achieve. Therefore you need to study.

Let's take IKEA. When company founder Ingvar Kamprad first started, he only had general idea about what would become a revolutionary approach to the furniture business. Almost every element of IKEA's legendary business model—showrooms paired with catalogs, flat-packed furniture, delivery and assembly by customers themselves—has evolved over time through experimental answers to pressing questions. For example, self-pickup became a central part of IKEA's strategy almost by accident. One day, dissatisfied customers rushed to the warehouse because there weren’t enough employees to help them. The warehouse manager appreciated the benefits of the buyer initiative and proposed making this principle permanent. “Treat every problem as an opportunity” was Kamprad’s mantra, and so his design was less about control and trying to “get it right” right away, and more about learning, paying attention to and responding to opportunities.

A magnificent park, an iconic bridge, an innovative business model - they all share fundamental design principles: don't let imagined limitations get in the way of your imagination; try to understand as deeply as possible those for whom you work; look for possibilities, not perfection. But design is not just a collection of principles. It provides a methodology and a set of tools to help achieve these ambitious goals.

We wrote this book because we both fell in love with the idea of ​​design about ten years ago. We had very different backgrounds - Jeanne had been involved in business strategy almost all her life as a consultant and teacher, and her main topic was organic growth. Tim is a systems engineer turned entrepreneur and then co-founder of an innovation development firm. We have no design education. We like to say that President Thomas Jefferson introduced us to design.

Design and business: a match made in heaven - or in hell?

We believe there are profound differences between the 'traditional business' approach and the 'designer' approach, but they potentially complement each other so well that they could be a match made in heaven - or hell. As opposites that attract or repel each other, together they can create magic or lead to suffering.

Imagine that a large consumer goods manufacturer is faced with the difficult task of thinking about the likely changes in the retail market over the next ten years and deciding how to respond to them. Let's assume that two teams of students are taking on this question - one group is studying in the MBA program, and the other is specializing in design. How will each team approach the task?

MBA students will likely begin by studying market trends—social, technological, environmental, political. They'll read analyst reports, talk to industry experts, and look to leading retailers and competitors as benchmarks.

Design students will likely approach the project completely differently. They might start with a similar trend analysis, but use it to develop possible future scenarios rather than spreadsheets. They will go into stores and talk to customers and employees, learning about the shopping experience. Perhaps they will create buyer personas and, using various scenarios, try to simulate changes in their lives - and therefore their buying behavior - over a period of ten next years. Maybe they'll hold a brainstorming session on the theme "Shop of the Future" and invite their classmates (by offering them free pizza). They use these scenarios and images as a starting point and will build on this in group work. In the end, they will not present solutions, but a certain set of concepts, based on which you can create prototypes and with their help get feedback from real clients and colleagues.

Mr. Jefferson University

The University of Virginia, Tim's alma mater and Jeanne's teaching home for the last twenty years, introduced us both to design. And what a meeting it was! Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States and author of the Declaration of Independence, was a lifelong enthusiast of public education and devoted the last decade of his life to founding the University of Virginia.

He said it was “a hobby in my old age... and the last service I will render to my country.” Jefferson personally thought through every aspect of the project, from building architecture and landscaping to curriculum and teacher selection. Spend enough time in his beloved “academic village” and one cannot remain indifferent to his way of shaping the future through the power of design.

Like all great designs, the University of Virginia began with both challenge and faith. The challenge that most concerned Jefferson and all the American Founding Fathers was preserving a fragile democracy after the passing of the first generation of leaders. He believed that an educated electorate could choose wisely. Jefferson saw the connection between democracy and education as obvious - without an educated population there was no hope of defending democracy.

To a modern observer, Jefferson's genius may seem to lie in architectural beauty, but in fact he drew much of his inspiration from Palladio, the 16th-century Italian architect. His true genius lies in the power of the space he creates, both physical and intellectual, which vividly demonstrates its purpose. Jefferson University is designed to be a non-hierarchical community where faculty and students work as partners to develop the knowledge necessary for democracy.

The architecture of the university - a group of small buildings clustered around vacant plots - embodies his ambitious vision. The curriculum included scientific and practical fields of knowledge, such as botany and agriculture, suited to a democratic rather than an aristocratic structure of society. In addition, the new university was to have student government.

Jefferson not only designed a complex of buildings - he laid out a very specific educational process. Everything at the University of Virginia, from architecture to curriculum, faculty selection, and management practices, is structured according to Jefferson's vision of this process. Education for democracy. Like any example of great design, our campus inspires the work of both students and faculty.

There is a clear difference in organization, methods of collecting information and final results signals fundamental differences. These are differences in the underlying assumptions and factors on which decisions are made. Business thinking implies rationality and objectivity. Decisions are made based on cold, pure economic logic. Reality is precise and quantifiable. There is a “truth” and answers can be “right” or “wrong”. In turn, designers make decisions based on human feelings and impressions; there is always confusion and the perception of objectivity as an illusion. For them, reality is created by the people who live it. In this world, decisions are driven by emotion rather than logic, and desire is considered a more powerful motivator than common sense. In this world there is only our individual “truth”, and decisions can be “better” or “worse”. So MBA students analyzed trend data while designers observed the shopping experience.

But this asymmetry goes even deeper. Even the very values ​​on which each approach is based are radically divergent. And this is very closely related to the opposition between chaos and order. As one Procter & Gamble vice president explained to us, “P&G likes to communicate clearly and clearly, but we quickly learned that by adopting design, we would have to get used to the messy conversations.” Business leaders tend to value order and control above all else and structure their organizations to support them. “Our motto at Abbott is plan the work and work the plan,” one executive at pharmaceutical giant Abbott told us. Not surprising - this is exactly what you would expect from people who run large organizations and are responsible for achieving carefully forecasted quarterly targets. Ambiguity and uncertainty are like a drug for designers. So MBA students select benchmarks among competitors to determine what cutting-edge companies are doing today, and designers imagine multiple futuristic worlds to play with and prototype for.

Not surprisingly, different core values ​​and assumptions translate into different tools and techniques - and people - who often make each other nervous. Business thinking is based on an analytical approach. To make a decision we need “proof” that we have found the “correct” answer. So MBA students prove their case by calculating the economic impact and presenting PowerPoint presentations. In design, attempt is valued over careful planning and an almost exclusively experimental approach is practiced. Designers assume that through iteration they will increasingly “improve” their solution - so they create prototypes using paper, foam, or video.

Finally, in business we are almost always in the territory of either the abstract (putting hypotheticals on the balance sheet and describing the corporate vision from six kilometers above) or the very concrete (did you get the order?). In the practice of design, there is constant iteration - not only over time, but also between levels of abstraction, between the big picture and concrete elements - and the search for comfort in tangible things. Designers make models and prototypes that make ideas seem real, as opposed to tables and missions in the realm of abstraction. So, here's what we get:

So, to borrow a common expression, business comes from Mars and design comes from Venus. So why try to combine them? Then, like most opposites, they have a lot to offer each other.

You're no longer in Kansas

Today, when the pace is constantly increasing and there is less and less certainty, business needs design precisely because of the differences we have noted.

First, design is all about action, and businesses often get stuck in the talking stage. Let's face it: despite all the planning, analysis and control, a business's track record of turning words into action is underwhelming. Scientists estimate that companies typically receive between 10 and 60 percent of promised profits from new strategies. Poor results - even with maximum tolerance. Activities that require enormous amounts of time and attention, such as writing a company mission, produce discouraging results. A recent global study of three hundred companies found that 82 percent had mission statements. Unfortunately, less than half of the managers surveyed felt that these missions had nothing to do with their daily activities.

Jeremy Alexis, Designer and Educator
Illinois Institute of Technology

When people ask me what design thinking is, I always refer to the words of Gregory Treverton, an analyst at the Rand Corporation, who noted: “There are two types of problems. Mysteries and puzzles. Puzzles are problems where you have access to the necessary information. If there is a specific number, the problem can be solved." His example is about the search for Osama bin Laden - if we had GPS coordinates, we would know where he is.

There is another category of problems - mysteries for which there is no information at all to solve them. There is no access to data that would help solve the problem. Or there is too much data, and the difficulty lies in the need to interpret it. This is a more complex and multi-faceted problem that requires systems thinking, prototyping and pilot runs. And in this area, designers often succeed. Treverton's example was about rebuilding Iraq: we don't have a shred of information that would make the task easier. You will have to try different things, experiment and try to get closer to a solution... There will never be enough information. The information will never be what we need. All that remains is to interpret what is now and do it as best as possible. It is precisely such secrets that inspire designers.

In the corporate world, there is often a perception that just grab PowerPoint reports, spreadsheets and statistically significant studies and ideas will appear. This can help for gradual improvements, but if you need a breakthrough, you will have to go into the field, find something of your own and experience it yourself. There is an old joke: a lawyer will never ask a question to which he does not know the answer. For designers it's the other way around. We only ask questions if we have no idea about the answer - we want to be a sponge, we want to absorb ideas from the people we work with. Slowness and ambiguity are conditions inevitable in the design process. It takes time to think things through and express disagreement. And this is the key to great, new, big ideas. And this is what slows down the process. It's important to take the time to step back, look at what you've done, and think about whether there are connections you're missing. It also takes time to disagree, because good design thinking involves bringing together divergent opinions.

If you want efficiency, gather everyone who thinks along the same lines, and they will quickly come to a decision. This principle works in 80 percent of cases. But in the remaining 20 percent, when you need something explosive, innovative, creative, you have to accept some ambiguity.”

All this empty talk makes it difficult to implement change - especially in large organizations. We tell managers to be “customer-centric” and cut travel budgets. We ask them to take risks and then punish them for mistakes. We set ambitious growth goals for them and provide them only with Excel tables to achieve them. It won't work that way. New results require new tools - and design has real tools to help move from talk to life.

Secondly, design helps to perceive change as reality, and business rhetoric remains poorly connected with the people who are supposed to bring it to life. Leaders can buy and sell, hire employees, talk to Wall Street - but they can't change the organization without a ton of support. And only those for whom the strategy is real will truly help. As psychologist William James noted more than a century ago, things that are perceived as real are both interesting and personally meaningful to us. They are experienced, not just named. While managers show tables of data—abstraction at its most extreme—designers tell stories. From them you can learn to captivate the audience with history, connect the dimension of experiences and present the future so that it feels like reality. Look at any presentation prepared by anyone in a design firm and compare it to the crap you are forced to waste time on every day at work. That says it all.

Third, design is suited to uncertainty, and business's obsession with analysis is best suited to a stable and predictable world. But we no longer live in such a world. The world used to give us puzzles, but now it gives us mysteries. And no matter how much data we have about yesterday, they will not solve the mystery of tomorrow. Yes, as we have already noted, large organizations are created for stability and control, they are full of people with veto power, which they can impose on new ideas and initiatives. These are people “appointed to doubt.” The few who are allowed to try something new are expected to provide data to “validate” the chosen solution, and then - the first time - to implement it correctly.

Designers have no such expectations. Uncertainty for them is like mother's milk. Thanks to it, they thrive - hence the enthusiasm for experimentation and tolerance for failure. Design teaches us to relax and allow more chaos into our lives. Designers are drawn to uncertainty, while managers often deny it or struggle with it. True, not all managers. When we studied those who succeeded in organic growth, we found that they had a clear propensity for uncertainty and a focus on design thinking.

But what sets designers apart is not pure bravery, but rather having a process they believe in. One designer recently told us what he does when he doubts himself when faced with a difficult task: “I trust the process. He has surprised me many times already.” Acceptance far outweighs denial in an ever-changing world, but success requires courage, not just a positive attitude. Designers have developed tools such as mapping and prototyping to help actively manage expected uncertainty.

Fourth, the design recognizes that products and services are purchased by people, not by target markets segmented by demographic categories. In business, it's easy to lose sight of the real people behind the "demand." The reality of people and their needs fades when they are tabulated, averaged into categories, and reduced to preferences in conjoint analysis. And with reality, a deep understanding of the needs - often not even expressed - from which profitable growth begins is lost. This messy reality—behavior governed by more than just economic logic—is something designers understand well. They hone the skills of observation, understanding people and their needs, while managers mostly learn to evaluate, which rarely involves the very empathy that produces fresh ideas. Professional doubters perform much better when they judge rather than when they create. Dr. Alan Duncan of the Mayo Clinic, one of the largest private medical centers in the world, noted: “Until design thinking came to our clinic, we were better at destroying new concepts than implementing them.”

For these reasons, it is easy to be swayed by the allure of design and conclude that traditional business is evil. But let's not forget why a business looks and acts the way it does. Managers are stewards of others' resources, so there will always be a need for rigorous analytical processes that justify strategic investments, and for people whose natural inclinations lie in this direction. Designated doubters in an organization may sometimes slow down innovation, but they play an important role in good decision-making (it would be great if more people were involved in those discussions on Wall Street when they were so creative with innovative financial instruments , inclined to doubt and avoid risks!).

Catalysts

For the past four years, a group that includes Zhanna has been studying managers who have achieved organic growth for mature businesses. By contacting some of the most important companies in America, the researchers looked in detail at how fifty of their employees achieved success. These managers were called "catalysts" - like chemical catalysts, they quickly achieved something that would not have happened at all without their participation. In most cases, they succeeded solely due to their ability to skillfully maneuver in an environment of uncertainty and limited resources. We learned several growth lessons from them.

You don't have to look for opportunities somewhere far away. The tools to add value to your users and thereby strengthen your relationships are right under your nose. You just need to know the users very well to see them.

You don't have to bet big to be successful. On the contrary, it often leads to failure. Make small bets quickly and learn, learn, learn.

Speed ​​is exciting. An obsession with speed opens up a surprising number of possibilities to powerful effect. If you overcome the lethargy of “traditional business,” the returns will be great.

There's bound to be tension between creating something new and preserving what's best—but it's a healthy tension. As a manager, you must learn to control it and not throw away old techniques as soon as you have a set of new ones. The problem with many traditional organizations today is not that the analytical approach is bad, but that we have no other, and therefore everything around us seems alike - like a little boy with a hammer, everything looks like heads of nails.

The future will require a manager to have a range of different tools at his disposal. Equipped to start and grow a business in a world of uncertainty, design tools and analysis tools designed to run a smooth business in a more stable world. But these are not two sets of conflicting groups of people who cannot interact with each other. For some managers, a design approach comes naturally. But most of us think differently—in part because managers have literally been taught to do the wrong thing when faced with the uncertainty inherent in growth.

They were told that they had to “think bigger” and not waste time on small details, that they had to “prove” the value of new ideas by projecting data taken from the past onto them, that they had to sit in meeting rooms and show PowerPoint presentations instead of finding a real user and organize a small experiment with his participation. Why? Again, because we have acquired attitudes and skills adapted to working in conditions of predictability and control. It's not surprising that this way of thinking and behaving gets in the way when the environment becomes unpredictable and uncertain—where growth and innovation are possible. Unfortunately, managers who rely entirely on what they have learned will not be able to achieve the innovation that will drive their career success.

What these managers need is not a right-brain transplant to help them forget about left-brain thinking. These managers need to be taught new approaches so they can add them to their toolbox. So before we throw the baby out with the bathwater, let's acknowledge that the traditional business approach helps managers do things that designers have trouble doing. Designers need a business mindset for the following good reasons:

First, novelty does not always create value. The flip side of protecting the familiar old is the race for the new, just because it is new. Profitable growth requires ideas that are not only new, but also create value through their newness.

Second, even creating value is not enough. To survive, companies must care about more than just creating value for the customer. This is an important first step. But it alone is not enough. To survive in the long term, companies need to capture value from the value they create and translate it into profit. Therefore, we need to think about such aspects as the ability to protect a new idea from the invasion of competitors, about its scalability: is it possible to transfer the idea from a small experiment to a large-scale business without spoiling the recipe? The part about translating value into profit is often difficult for designers to understand, but it is necessary to create new growth scenarios for organizations.

And thirdly, it’s unlikely that we need so many stylish toasters and corkscrews. Cool things are great, but design can do so much more. Design can change the world - not just make it look nice. And business is one of the most influential institutions of today. We will only make the planet a better place if we combine these two ways of working.

So, can business and design create the future together? Let me tell you why we are optimistic. Organizations like yours are already doing this and achieving compelling results. And despite the differences we've discussed, they also share common values. “Why are we here? What is our goal? - the most important issues, promoting the movement towards unification. Designers realized that cool gadgets and $200 trash cans aren't what's important. And business people have learned a painful lesson: messing around with numbers and chasing quarterly earnings per share growth as if it were the Holy Grail is dangerous. negative consequences. We increasingly recognize that the main measure of success - both in design and in business - is creating value for someone. Is anyone's life better (by any measure from their perspective) because of our efforts? Without this, sustainable growth in economic feasibility is simply a mirage.

There is one more common point - data. Naturally, managers love them, but there is a common myth that designers don’t like data, that design is synonymous with “acting on a whim.” This may be true for star architects and fashion designers, but here at the forefront, design is based on data analysis no less than traditional management. It's just a different approach: good designers spend a lot of time putting ideas into concrete form, going out into the field and getting refined data from the real world, rather than using information from the past. This refutes another popular misconception: that the design approach is riskier than the traditional business approach. The reverse is also true: managers need to accept it as a fact that their basic assumption that analysis reduces risk is wrong in the face of uncertainty. Hiding in the office and taking dubious numbers from the past to predict the future is precisely the riskiest behavior.

If your goal is growth, uncertainty will be par for the course. By avoiding or denying it, you cannot get the desired growth results. But this does not mean that you are powerless to do something about it. You can't get rid of it, but you can control it instead of letting it control you.

Let's take a closer look at how the design process and tools help minimize risk and maximize opportunity in our crazy world.

Four questions, ten tools

Remember how the design process was illustrated? Here is our illustration:

We start and end where Apple's Tim Brennan did, but the tangled tangle becomes a manageable process. Despite the abundance of fancy expressions like “idea generation” and “co-design,” design thinking is used to work with four basic questions: what is there? what if? what catches you? what works? At the “What is?” stage we are exploring existing reality. "What if?" - introducing a new future. “What catches you?” - we make a certain choice. "What works?" - we find ourselves on the market. Each of the questions covers more or less wide range reality. Designers call this divergent and convergent thinking. At the beginning of each stage of the process, we progressively increase our field of vision to look at the world around us as broadly as possible and avoid falling into the trap of conventional approaches to problems and a pre-existing set of solutions. When we formulate a new set of concepts, we will begin the reverse process - convergence, that is, we will gradually reduce the number of options to the most promising.

There are ten basic tools that design thinking uses to answer these four questions and move through the stages of divergent and convergent thinking. You need these tools to create new opportunities and (equally important) reduce risk while managing the inevitable uncertainty of growth and innovation. We will describe in detail all the stages and tools, and also help you apply them to your development tasks. First, we want to show how the process unfolds as we answer the four questions and as we use each of the tools, keeping in mind that this model imparts an artificial linearity to a highly variable process.

First, we'd like to draw your attention to one particular design tool: visualization (tool 1). This is a real “meta-tool”, a basic one - it is necessary at literally every stage of using design for growth. Often visualization is included in other tools that we talk about. It is an approach to searching, organizing, and communicating that engages right-brain thinking while reducing our reliance on left-brain tools such as calculations. Visualization is the conscious enrichment of work processes with visual images. Its purpose is to bring ideas to life, facilitate team collaboration, and (ultimately) create stories through which designers cultivate empathy at every stage of their work and use it to generate enthusiasm for new ideas.

All successful innovation begins with an accurate assessment of the present—the current reality. Let's leave the crystal ball of the soothsayers for later. Sounds paradoxical, right? When we think about new things, we usually think about the future, not the present. Why not start there?

There are many reasons for this. First, to identify the real problem or opportunity we want to tackle, we need to take a close look at what is happening now. Managers often lose development opportunities by defining a problem too narrowly. For years, product developers at P&G have been trying to improve floor cleaners. One day they realized (using design thinking) that users wanted cleaner floors, and they could achieve cleanness through other means - for example, improving the mop with a floor cloth. This idea was embodied in the Swifter brand - that is, opportunities for growth appeared thanks to an object invented in the Middle Ages (if not earlier). A fruitful approach comes down to a basic question: What is the work to be done?

If we take a closer look at user behavior, a funny thing happens - we see that the key to a new future lies in dissatisfaction with the present. And not only when we need a little improvement. Growth is always associated with solving someone's problems - even if these people have not yet realized them. However, take a closer look at how they live, what reasons for disappointment and dissatisfaction they have, and you will see what they themselves are missing. To get users where you want to go, you need to meet them where they are now. Therefore, the best starting point for finding prospects for growth is to find out what users do not like today, what concessions they would not like to make.

Ten instruments

1. Visualization: Using visual images to imagine possibilities and bring them to life.
2. Empathy map: assessing sensations and impressions from the user’s point of view
3. Value chain analysis: assessing the current value chain surrounding the user experience
4. Mind mapping: generating ideas based on research and using them to create design criteria
5. Brainstorming: generating new opportunities and new alternative business models
6. Concept development: gathering innovative elements into a coherent alternative solution that can be explored and evaluated
7. Hypothesis testing: identifying and testing key hypotheses that will lead to the success or failure of a concept
8. Hot prototyping: bringing it to life new concept in a tangible form for research, testing and improvement
9. Co-design with users: involving users in creating a solution that best suits their needs
10. Test run: preparing an accessible experiment that allows users to use the new solution over an extended period; thus, key hypotheses are tested by market data

That's exactly the approach executives at Pfizer's over-the-counter drug business took when sales of Nicorette, the company's leading smoking-cessation product, were struggling. What was even more discouraging was that it did not seem to have the expected effect. Pfizer estimates that smokers had seven unsuccessful attempts before they were able to kick the habit. The company's managers were not satisfied with this. They set a goal to significantly develop the brand - both in terms of sales and in terms of effect. It was decided to use design thinking instead of the “traditional business approach” and use it to find opportunities for growth.

First, the Nicorette team identified a group of clients that were worth getting to know better. Pfizer executives have focused on those who are more open to change: young smokers. The largest market for this target group was in Europe, so they set up a team in London. Taking a design approach as a basis, Pfizer invested a lot of effort into exploring the motivations that drive these smokers - beyond their chemical dependence on nicotine. They observed these people's daily lives at home and at work, trying to understand how smoking habits and attempts to quit fit into the larger picture of their lives and what meaning they had for them. The study revealed a surprising fact: smokers who wanted to quit didn't count their habit medical problem. They didn't want to take pills to "get better." Smoking seemed to them to be a consciously chosen element of their lifestyle. They believed that one day they would make a different choice and eventually quit. By understanding how their customers defined smoking cessation, Pfizer managers realized they could develop more effective offerings.

The first step is to focus on the users we hope to serve. Design has a set of ethnographic tools, such as user scenario analysis (tool 2), which helps assess the potential of an idea to create value. This tool teaches us how to “follow users into their homes” to delve deeper into their lives and find out what is stopping them. This way we will be able to use the capabilities of our organization to offer solutions to problems that are in the middle ground area of ​​interest to us.

It is also important during research to determine the potential for added value (i.e. profitability). To do this, we need to study in detail the value chain where our idea probably lies.

Who are the strong players here? What motivates them? Will they want to help us? And can they? Accurate information about the capabilities and resources of your own organization(and key competitors) is also very important. Required for early stages identify what opportunities we lack and find suitable partner who can provide them. All this requires value chain analysis (Tool 3).

In our Pfizer example, research has led to important conclusions - not only about how smokers define their problem, but also about what it takes to quit. bad habit generally. The Pfizer team realized that the Nicorette patch was generally ineffective when used alone. Success requires a comprehensive program that includes counseling, hypnosis, or a support group of some kind. None of these options allowed for optimal use strengths companies. Pfizer needed to position itself in a new value chain - together with partners who could provide complementary offerings.

How do you know if enough research has been done? It's always subjective. There is an avalanche of low-quality information available from sources such as the Internet. High-quality information usually requires field research, which is expensive and time-consuming, and there is no point in chasing information we don't need, although it is not always easy to figure out what exactly is needed. The main goal at this stage of research is not to create a business case for a specific idea. This will come later. Our goal now is to prepare to generate ideas, not to evaluate them.

Designers have come up with several tools that help find trends and extract meaning from the wealth of data obtained during the research stage. One of them is what we call mind mapping (tool 4). It helps organize the mass of collected information and draw conclusions from it about what kind of innovation we need. We then use the resulting criteria to evaluate the design to generate ideas for the next stage.

What if? We are considering possibilities

Once we have synthesized the data and identified noticeable trends, ideas begin to come to us. We consider new opportunities, trends and moments of uncertainty, while still unconsciously we begin to develop hypotheses about what the desired future might look like. This means it’s time to move from the “What is?” research stage, where we worked with data, to the “What if?” stage, where it’s time to connect creativity. We will do this in Section III.

At this stage we are looking the future in the face. And we are tempted to ask: “Where did I put the crystal ball?” We ask (as historians Richard Neustadt and Ernest May put it) where the future might deviate from the familiar flows of the past and how our observations might evolve into new possibilities. Designers call this stage idea generation.

To get truly creative ideas, it's important to start with possibilities. In the business world, when we try to be practical, we often start with limitations. This is deadly to innovative thinking. If you initially accept all the points that prevent something from being improved, developments for tomorrow will inevitably look the same as today's. There is only one hope to enable true creativity - to ignore basic limitations in order to identify a new set of possibilities. Then creative ideas will arise - how to get rid of these restrictions. A serious impetus is needed, and it can be obtained by properly discussing the possibilities. This will provide energy for the hard work of overcoming limitations. In many of the business innovations we've been involved with, the true creativity was in how the future was implemented, not in what it looked like. Poet Eric Hoffer has aptly observed that few things promote creativity more than hearing others tell you they can't do things your way.

At the “What is?” stage We looked at how clients now define their problems, and we also looked at the mental models and limitations that we ourselves place on them. We now use this information to formulate hypotheses about new opportunities.

Pfizer executives hypothesized a new approach to reaching customers. What if, instead of doctors in white coats helping smokers with the medical problem of chemical dependency, the company offered trainers in tracksuits? And they would encourage smokers to adopt a new exercise regimen? In addition, Pfizer now knew that Nicorette needed to be included in a multifaceted smoking cessation program that addressed not only tobacco addiction, but also lifestyle. The company hoped to find a way to do this without investing in physical facilities like fitness clubs and clinics. In the end, we settled on a small Scandinavian company that had developed a program for changing behavior using individual messages sent to a mobile phone.

We'll approach the task of generating ideas using a familiar tool, brainstorming (tool 5), but using a defined structure instead of a free-form one. A disciplined approach to brainstorming is absolutely necessary to overcome its inevitable drawbacks. Main reason The reason it doesn't bring satisfaction is the lack of a formal process to translate its results into something of value. We present here another design thinking tool - concept development (tool 6). With its help, we take the results of brainstorming, organize them into coherent groups and process the most convincing ones into a rough “concept”. In the first stage, we moved from data to an analytical picture. Now let's move from the analytical picture to ideas and concepts. For ideas, a sticker is often enough, but a concept requires a whole poster.

So, we have developed hypotheses (in the form of concepts) regarding new, promising profitable growth opportunities for creating value for our users. Now let’s start thinking systematically about arranging concepts in order of priority and looking for something that will hook users.

What catches you? Finding the golden mean

If everything went well in the previous stages, we probably have too many new concepts to move forward with right away. The company we recently worked with came up with more than three hundred interesting ideas, which were boiled down to twenty-three concepts. In the end, only five were selected for market testing during the “What Works?” phase. We will have to make a choice. Therefore, in Section IV we move from the “What if?” mode of generating hypotheses. into the “What sticks?” phase to reduce the number of concepts to a workable number. These must be concepts that hook the user and find a sweet spot where the chance to significantly increase user value coincides with attractive potential for revenue growth. The very zone that we need.

Therefore, it is necessary to start with some kind of assessment of the information that we have - information about today. Again, remember: we are not proving the value of an idea - we are simply preparing to conduct thought experiments to estimate what our “business case” would look like. Since assessing the long-term potential of a new concept can be difficult, one must tread carefully so as not to accidentally favor too moderate ideas and dismiss more radical ones.

Good news: we have a method at our disposal that has rarely been used in business. It is much more useful for evaluating early-stage innovation than the less-proven but still commonly used metrics such as economic impact and payback. Good old scientific method, which engages both creative and analytical thinking. It's good if we want to be creative, looking for opportunities, or tough, figuring out which ones are usable. Unlike brainstorming, this method does not require leaving analytical thinking at the door. It involves both the left and right hemisphere and is specifically designed for situations with many unknowns. If we treat our new concept as a hypothesis and then test it, using this method we can do everything listed above.

First, hypotheses are taken that arose as answers to the question “What if?” New possibilities (essentially educated guesses about ideas that seem to be good) are then taken and tested by asking, “Under what conditions would this hypothesis be a good business opportunity?” In other words: “What must happen in reality for my concept to be good?” That is, the premises behind each hypothesis need to be brought to the surface and tested. Hypotheses that pass the first test are suitable candidates for real experiments in the market. Thus, hypothesis testing (tool 7) is one of the most powerful arrows in the designer and manager's quiver. Remember, our goal is not to discover the “truth,” but to make better choices in the face of uncertainty.

Design is always driven by hypothesis, which is the design world's shorthand for how decisions tend to be the result of an iterative process rather than a linear one. That is, the design begins with a timid, uncertain solution, expecting that it will improve during experiments. Imagine an architect moving forward through a series of different visions of a single project. These could be sketches, cardboard mockups, wooden mockups, and these days perhaps 3D models. And all of them are created before they hit the ground with a shovel for the first time at the construction site.

So, having tested the hypotheses as thoroughly as possible with the available information, we move on to reality - experiments in the market, which will allow us to collect data on the new concept in real time. To do this, you need to take the concepts that have successfully passed the filtering phase and translate them into something you can work with - a prototype. Hot prototyping (tool 8) of a new business idea seems like a daunting task. But we just want to say that we need to take the concepts formed at the “What if?” stage. and selected through testing, and presented in a form specific enough to be discussed with important stakeholders (eg, users and partners). Our goal here is to create visual artifacts - mockups of the selected concepts. By giving ideas a concrete physical form, we will ensure the effectiveness of their discussion and will be able to make constructive improvements to the layout.

Prototyping should be rough and fast. Designers call such prototypes “primary” - they must be good enough to be understood by people whose opinion is important to us. We don’t need more, because we want to evaluate a number of important functional aspects, and not test a theoretically finished product. This way we can more quickly make mistakes that show room for improvement, and reach agreement on what is already working well. If the prototyping phase is successful, we will identify and correct potential problems to ensure a successful project. As Frank Wright noted, it's easier to use an eraser on a drawing board than a demolition ball on a construction site. Regardless of the form prototypes take, you need to focus on the details of how the model will work and how it will be experienced by users.

The Pfizer team created a prototype for a new behavior change program by combining the Scandinavian firm's computer platform, tailored for smoking cessation, with other parts of the business model, such as increased interactivity and networking elements such as family support. Prototypes were created for all components using tools such as screenshots and storyboards. Users were asked to test the interfaces and report their reactions to the design team.

What works? Time to face reality

Finally! We are ready to launch and get feedback from the real world. First, let's try out a rough prototype on a group of users and see how things go. If successful, we will create a more accurate prototype for our idea and check whether users are willing to pay money for it.

A particularly effective way to determine what works is to invite users into the conversation in an active and practical way. Here we will use co-design with the user (tool 9). Involving buyers in a growth project is the most powerful way to reduce risk.

Having improved the prototype, we are ready to enter the market. To do this, we offer a tool that we call a test run (tool 10). With its help, we will transfer the developed concepts to field conditions. When planning a launch, you need to be open about searching for information that disproves your hypothesis. It is the most valuable and the easiest to miss. To increase your chances of finding this information, you need to imagine in advance what it will look like.

During a test launch, you need to pay attention to one more important task - how to reach users. How can you present a new offer to quickly convince buyers to give it a chance? Otherwise, the potential for creating value remains just potential. Therefore, you need to think about how to attract attention to your new offer and present it for testing.

As you do this, follow some principles of learning by doing: get feedback quickly; minimize the cost of experiments. It is better to fail early in order to succeed sooner.

Test key premises and alternatives faster. And most importantly, play with prototypes in the field instead of defending them from criticism.

The Pfizer team tested three options for reaching customers: offering its product in retail, selling it through intermediaries, such as employers or insurance companies, and distributing it directly via the Internet. To the surprise of the managers, the goods remained stale on the shelves. Sales through intermediaries were too slow and did not allow the expected results to be achieved. The third option, the Internet, won the test run by a wide margin, even though Pfizer had never used this sales channel before.

Before we go into more detail about the ten tools, let's talk about one more ingredient you'll need to successfully use design thinking.

Project Management Tools

To succeed in using design thinking to grow your business, you need to do more than just try out the ten tools we discussed—you need to manage the growth project itself. It's not as easy as it might seem. You're gathering a ton of information, dealing with high levels of uncertainty and ambiguity, and working with new internal and external partners—all under the pressure of looming deadlines and limited resources. With new tools and new types of information, your innovation train can easily get derailed.

To prevent this from happening, we present you with four Project Management Aids (PMAs). These are not design tools - they are not about creating and testing ideas. Instead, they are protocols for communication that integrate the design thinking process with established structures for managing projects in your organization. They will help you control the process by helping you learn and increase certainty at each stage of the process, reinforcing decisions, moving from one stage to another, and integrating results into successful project growth. The diagram shows what the purpose of each tool is and how they fit together.

The bottom row in the following design thinking model illustration shows at what point in the process each pattern is used.

These are the components of the design thinking process: four questions, ten tools, and project management tools. Everything we need.

Attention!

Using design thinking to find opportunities for growth will require some patience. Most companies, no matter how well intentioned or enthusiastic they are about innovation, are not P&G or Google: they don't get it right. It is possible that your company is among them. While you're asked to look for new opportunities to grow and improve profitability, expect to be constantly challenged. The last chapter is devoted to the ambitious task of promoting a design project in an organization.

Managers who are trying to innovate and develop new business models in large, bureaucratic companies need a lot of help. And design thinking can really help. So let's first show how it's done.

Hugh Dubberly. "How Do You Design? A Compendium of Models". March 2005, p. 10.

Dorothy is the heroine of Lyman Frank Baum's fairy tales about the land of Oz. Dorothy's silver slippers could take her anywhere. Here and below are translator's notes.

Baby boomers - born in the late 1940s - early 1950s, in the wake of the rise in birth rates that took place after the end of World War II.

Stephen Fry. "The iPad Launch: Can Steve Jobs Do It Again?" Time, April 1, 2010.

See: Owen Edwards. Elegant Solutions (Three Rivers Press, 1989), pp. 1–8.

Richard Buchanan and Victor Margolin (eds.). Discovering Design: Explorations in Design Studies (University of Chicago Press, 1995).

In the film “The Wizard of Oz” (USA, 1939), Dorothy says to her dog: “Toto, I have a feeling that we are no longer in Kansas.”

See, for example: Kaplan R., Norton D. Strategy-oriented organization. How organizations using the balanced scorecard succeed in the new business environment. M.: Olimp-Business, 2009; Michael C. Mankins and Richard Steele. "Turning Great Strategy into Great Performance". Harvard Business Review, July-August 2005.

J.N. Wright. "Mission and reality and why not?" Journal of Change Management, 3(1): 30–45 (2002).

From Duncan's remarks at the Institute for Design Strategy Conference, Chicago, May 2005.

See: Jeanne Liedtka, Robert Rosen, and Robert Wiltbank. Th e Catalyst: How You Can Become an Extraordinary Growth Leader. (Crown Business, 2009).

FedEx Corporation is an American company specializing in postal and courier delivery, also provides logistics services worldwide.

Neustadt R., May E. Contemporary reflections on the benefits of history for decision makers. M.: Library of the Moscow School of Political Research, Ad Marginem, 1999.

Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959) - innovative American architect who had a huge influence on the development of modern architecture, author of the project for the Guggenheim Museum in New York.

“Everything should be by design.”
Total design slogan

“Design can be everything.”
Andrea Branzi, designer, Italy

Ideas about the company are formed on the basis of visual sensations that record information about the interior and exterior of the office, sales and showrooms, appearance personnel, corporate symbols, elements of corporate style. What can we say about the design of the product itself! In short, design determines the visual image of an organization.

However, the visual impact on consumer behavior is not the only and not the main function of design. Design develops examples of rational construction of the subject environment, corresponding to the variety of functions modern society. He solves serious socio-technical problems of human existence in an objective environment, designing things and space according to the principles of combining convenience, economy and beauty. Italian designer Ettore Sottsass says that when developing a design, you need to get as close as possible to the current anthropological state, which, in turn, should be as close as possible to the image of the entire society as it sees itself (www.sreda.boom.ru).

Today, many of our manufacturers, when working on the design of their products, pay great attention to the convenience factor. A striking example is packaging. One cannot help but notice how conveniently domestically produced food products have become presented. But, unfortunately, this is still based on the developments of foreign designers, whose skills are in demand by business there. Domestic industrial design is only at the beginning of its journey.

What we are is the design

In the global design market, industrial design accounts for 82% of all design services, graphic design - 60%, environmental and interior design - 48%. Recently, multimedia design has also appeared - 16% and design research - 20% (Vinokurtseva, 2002).

Nowadays, Ukrainian design looks like seedlings in a wild field and one can only assume its potential and future value. Which, by the way, is closely monitored by Western business sharks. Their attention, on the one hand, provokes a brain drain. On the other hand, sensing the maturation of strong creative competition from the post-Soviet “fresh”, developed countries will do everything to prevent a new competitor from developing.

There is a design crisis in the world right now. According to Design Week magazine, the combined turnover of Britain's 100 largest brand companies fell in 2001 from £888.5 million to £795.5 million, with 500 of its 3,000 designers being made redundant during the year. It is quite possible that the released mass of creative resources, in particular human ones, will turn their attention to countries where the design market is just emerging. And it is unknown how the situation will turn out. After all, as they say, there is no prophet in his own country...

Nothing can develop on its own, and in order to cultivate a domestic tribe of designers - creators of a comfortable and beautiful life, we need to give them the opportunity to “merge” with production and business as much as possible. And not snatching yesterday's achievements of the West (who will give us today's ones!) is often not of the best quality. Domestic design is quite competitive, but passive, since we have too few forces involved to activate it.

Active entrepreneurs from developed countries are already seriously “grazing” in our creative fields and collecting unique ideas bit by bit, often together with the creators. And then these same ideas return to the country, but in the form of goods under an imported brand.

The world highly values ​​the individual achievements of Ukrainian designers, but, unfortunately, we do not have that massive “middle wave” in design that would form the basis of the Ukrainian design market and ensure its presence at all levels national economy. Design is essentially a utilitarian phenomenon, but here it is still perceived as high art and is not recognized as an ordinary tool for creating quality and profit. That's why it's stagnant.

Prospects for domestic industrial design will appear only when Ukrainian goods begin to be actively exported. But this is only possible if they meet the high ergonomic and aesthetic requirements of a developed society. It turns out to be a vicious circle, which the current generation will have to break. Otherwise it may be too late.

According to D. Peryshkov, art director of the Moscow studio “Direct Design”, design is a litmus test that clearly responds to the economic state of the country (cited from: Vinokurtseva, 2002). Leaders in industrial design are Japan, Holland, France. Large companies These countries have long understood the benefits of cooperation with designers. And the state’s attitude to this topic is special: the government is pursuing a targeted policy to introduce design at enterprises so that they can thoughtfully update and improve their products and successfully compete with foreign manufacturers.

Design and business: who wins?

So, the time has come to start seriously “feeding” the field of design with financial fertilizers. It is necessary to invest in design, if only because it is now impossible to compete otherwise - neither in international markets nor in the domestic one. But it takes a certain amount of entrepreneurial maturity to include such costs as fixed costs. After all, to many this still seems like philanthropy

You can dismiss the problem of investing in design - they say it’s pampering, an expensive pleasure. In fact, creating aesthetics and comfort around your business is not that expensive. You just need to think about it, strain your imagination and intellect, use existing and new knowledge. If you pay attention to yourself, design becomes a fertile investment object, because over time it begins to bring in money.

In our country, as a rule, orders to designers come down to the phrase - make me beautiful. And the problems of the design market are mainly tied to the questions: how much and for what should designers be paid? how to organize them so that they do what is required of them? etc. They pay designers for creating new additional value for the product.

Here you need to remember about the responsibility of the designer, because it is precisely this that underlies the payment for his work. Everything depends on what and to what extent depends on the solution proposed by the designer. Well, the second question is related to the first: a professional designer who is aware of his responsibility should not be forced to do what you (from your point of view) need. He knows this better than you and will offer the most correct solution. You are required to clearly set a task for the designer: why are you doing this or that thing and what do you want to achieve.

Design complex in the marketing mix

Once, at some event dedicated to fashionable clothing, I looked at the presented collections of Ukrainian designers and was so inspired by wonderful things that I confidently decided to leave a significant amount in the budgets of the creators. To do this the very next day, I asked one of the managers for the coordinates of the salon, expecting to receive a business card. And I received a handwritten address and telephone number on a piece of paper torn from a notebook... In terms of content, they gave me what I wanted, but in terms of form?

At first, indignation stirred in me (as a business person, I was accustomed to certain manners), which, however, quickly faded away. However, subsequently, since my desire to make a purchase was based on inspiration, impression and other arch-subjective motives, I cooled down in my intentions.

Having discovered this piece of paper the next day, which didn’t even have the name of the boutique, I postponed the visit altogether - not feeling the support of the initial aesthetic delight, my excitement went away, and the rational levers of consciousness turned on. Although, if my fleeting desire to splurge on a rarity had been reminded of my fleeting desire to splurge on a rarity, I had been reminded by an elegant business card, as impeccable in terms of design as my favorite things, I swear, I would have splurged immediately! And so the tattered piece of paper instantly brought me down to the ground. Conclusion: you cannot replace one value with another. Although the product design is great, the communication design is not working. But we are talking about business, not about an art museum.

Today, a client is not satisfied with just a thing that is good from a design point of view; he is interested in comprehensive comfort and aesthetic support. Industrial design, that is, the product itself, and design as an element of business are different things, but very closely interrelated.

In addition to the fact that the use of design should be subject to the principles of practicality, pleasingness and meet market objectives (for example, relevance, economic feasibility, stylishness, reflection of consumer needs and expectations), design should be carried out as a whole, and not as separate, time-separated activities. Only in this case will he gain his weight in business. By bringing together all the design capabilities, you can achieve your business goals with great effect.

The marketing mix is ​​used everywhere, but why is no one talking about the design mix? After all, the very definition of design contains its unifying essence - beautiful, convenient, profitable. And in business, the signs of design complexity are obvious.

For example, the fact that design, on the one hand, is part of the product, which is reflected in the price, and on the other, it is an element of marketing communications, with the help of which the manufacturer silently declares: “I am modern, fashionable and comfortable. I’m exactly what you need, buy my products!” In addition, design is the collective creativity of a group of designers, the customer and the surrounding life, that is, a complex of efforts, and therefore a complex of initial resources to create a common result.

So, design is a complex concept and we should not underestimate its role in everything we do, particularly in business. You cannot fully satisfy the consumer by selling him an item of exceptional design in an inconvenient store from the hands of an ugly seller.

The commercial essence of design lies in the complex of all its elements and the goal of getting as close as possible to the consumer and influencing him. Design is harmony, consonance of all elements. It is closely intertwined with style and image, being a very responsible tool in dialogue with the target audience. If you had one thing in mind and created another, then you yourself understand what can come of it.

In conclusion, hoping that you will now reconsider the place of design in your business and actively begin to use all its possibilities, I will give

10 maxims of good design

by Dieter Rams, designer at Braun

Quality design -
. innovative;
. makes the product useful;
. aesthetic;
. invisible;
. makes the product easy to understand;
. honest;
. durable;
. consistent down to the smallest detail;
. environmentally friendly;
. and finally, good design is, if possible, a minimum of...design.

“MANAGEMENT and MANAGER” No. 1 2003

“Damn,” my colleague, the owner, complains about the client small design studio, - today they couldn’t start the project again, their director doesn’t sign the budget - he says “expensive,” they say, there’s no reason for designers to pay that kind of money for pictures. And the owner says that I should give him a financial justification - why he should pay me so much. Where will I get the financial justification for him? I'm a designer!"

Indeed, it is stupid to pay for benefits that cannot be measured. Then this is not useful at all, but some kind of quackery, a “scam,” as a famous Russian businessman described design, marketing, branding, and the entire creative industry like them. “No, you know, when I hire a marketing director - I buy him for an expensive price, then for the first six months he tells me that he’s getting into it, and for the second six months he says that so far the effect of his actions has not come. And then he writes a statement and goes to competitors. And it’s not clear why we need such marketing...” - he complains.

The stumbling block in these stories, familiar to industry insiders, is the system of assessment, measurement of financial and other results that make the work of creative specialists necessary and important for business. No one, not a single soul, can help a designer justify the cost of his work, or a marketer the value of this budget for the company, if they do not learn to speak a new language. A language that unites interprofessional competencies. A language that connects “business branding-production-sales-finance-design” into one strong, steel chain of iron arguments. If such a language really exists, then, in this case, the creative industry will still stand, and perhaps even survive.

1951 Post-war Chicago. In America there is an economic recovery, production is increasing by leaps and bounds. Walter Papke, an ordinary American manufacturer, organizes a conference in a small suburb of Chicago - the town of Aspen. The topic of the conference is quite strange - even somewhat ill-conceived, non-academic, or something. It’s as if they mixed two completely different objects that have nothing in common with each other. On the one hand - money, time, hardware, production, sales. On the other hand, art, aesthetics, style, trend... The Aspen conference raised the topic “Design as a function of business,” where for the first time representatives of “business” and “design” discussed the prospects for fruitful cooperation. This was probably one of the first public events on “design management”.

The term "design management" was first introduced at a meeting of the Royal Society of Arts in London in 1965. From this moment the official history of the development of the new discipline begins.

What is modern design management? First of all, a translator from “designer” to “business” - and vice versa. Design management takes creativity apart and gives answers to questions about how much you need to invest in design to get effective product. Design management develops an index of return on investment in design, the same ROI (Return-On-Investment), which in one formula gives the answer to the question “If I invested 1 ruble in design, how much will I get?...” It also breaks down the dusty and the well-worn cloak of mystery from the “creative kitchen”, packaging it in a cutting-edge transparent shell of design strategy that can be counted, measured and evaluated. It also helps manage the design team at the enterprise and organize the work of its own design studio.

The main functions of design management are organizing the design process, developing a design strategy and bringing design to life, or more precisely, to business and the market. In general, design management makes life a lot easier.

Although, maybe everything is different in Russia? And you don’t need any overseas design management? We ourselves, somehow, the old-fashioned way, will manage the design... The latest Russian research, however, sweeps away all doubts. In 2006, on the initiative of ORGANICA design consultancy and with the support of the Department of Communication Design of St. Petersburg State Academy of Art and Industry, an expert survey of top managers of 150 enterprises was conducted on the topic “The role of design in business. Effective design.” It turned out that 61.1% of them consider the creation of a system for assessing the quality of design projects to be the most important, and 20.8% consider standardization of the agency-client relationship a priority. And that they would “pay dearly for a professional to explain to them what design needs to be done so as not to lose an investment in, for example, a production line worth 5 million euros” (quote from an expert interview, “The Role of Design in Business. Effective Design” , St. Petersburg, 2006).

Issues of assessing the effectiveness of design, as well as organizing a design management system at an enterprise, are precisely within the purview of design management. If we rely on the research data, it turns out that most enterprises need design management services, but either do not yet realize this need or do not have the opportunity to take advantage of them - services in this area are not yet represented in Russia.

In the words of the first Russian entrepreneur who implemented a design audit project at his furniture enterprise, " Previously, I could not even imagine that there were design evaluation systems, such as those used by financiers or in commerce. The consulting companies that I contacted to develop a company strategy could only evaluate finances, work with personnel, and, well, marketing too. But what should I do with the design? I work in furniture, with us design is everything." - Vadim Trubin, general director of the Sid-Sofas company, vice-president of the Association of Furniture Enterprises and Trade of the Chelyabinsk Region, talks about the project. We implemented the project for this company in 2008 together with students from the British Higher School of Design. There is different methods enterprise audit from the point of view of design strategy analysis is both the DTI Innovation Audit, developed by the London Business School, and the DTI Successful Product Development Audit - a more complete assessment model proposed by the British Design Council. We took a foreign methodology and refined it taking into account the needs of a real Russian enterprise, made such a working tool for a furniture company, with the specifics of organizing an experimental workshop, understanding trends, setting design tasks, and of course, recommended prototyping and modeling technologies."

A new profession could not be more in demand now in the business world, where every careless step makes the consequences of the crisis even more painful, and every ruble spent is worth as much as two. And enterprises are in a hurry to get rid of the ballast of the old guard - they need not those who know how to spend budgets, but those who can save them and invest them wisely. The strategy of the strong is not to hold on to straws, but to swim to new shores, read - to acquire new competencies while no one else has them, and by 2010 to become the leader of the advanced expert community. Why by the 10th? Well, it’s simple, then the crisis will end, and those who survived will be worth their weight in gold. Companies will need people with the ability to manage design strategy because the future of the 21st century is called “Design,” as Bruce Nussbaum said at the end of Innovation, Creativity and Design Strategy Day at the 2006 World Economic Forum in Davos.

Let's try to say “innovation”, quietly, to ourselves, not necessarily out loud. And then present something innovative, something like, “wow.” Introduced? What happened? Apple iPod or Apple iPhone? It doesn't matter, the main thing is Apple. 90% of the world's business elite surveyed in 2006 by the Boston Consulting Group also named Apple when asked "Which company do you consider innovative?" But here's the thing - Apple invests in innovation and development (R&D) less than the industry average - only 5.9% compared to the industry 7.9%! Apple doesn't innovate technology - "we package technology in a very simple and attractive form," says Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. And his colleagues add: “we are engaged in design innovation.”

While design management in Russia is taking its first steps, abroad it is latest trend- include a “design management” course in MBA programs. And even open separate programs - as, for example, at the University of the Arts in London. I’ll tell you a secret that soon it will be possible to learn design management in Russia - however, only in Moscow, in the British Higher School Design. First educational program in design management will open in 2009.

Specialists who are just starting to work in this field can count on a wide client base and a complete lack of competition, and there are no restrictions on the optimal form of work. And indeed, if there is no established market, then you just need to take a truly innovative topic into your own hands and develop your own consulting business based on it. You can work in design management either independently or within your own studio or mini-consulting bureau. An important condition, however, remains professionalism - without specialized education in this area, it is hardly possible to understand the specifics of high-quality design management for enterprises.

Abroad, professional services in the field of design management are provided by both specialized consulting companies and general-purpose design studios. However, in conditions of fierce competition, an effective model in the West is also private practice, freelancer in the field of design management. Experts, authors of books and articles on this topic, choose their niches - they specialize in any industry (electronics, household appliances, furniture or industrial design in general), and also work in the field of organizational consulting. A striking example is the company Park Advanced Design Management with offices in Germany and the Netherlands, which helps create a design department at an enterprise, develop a design strategy for the company, and also manage design personnel.

As Claudia Kotchka, vice president of design innovation and strategy at Procter & Gamble, wrote in an article for Design Management Review, “To make something a brand, you must first design something for it.” And to do design well, you need to include it as a variable in your business strategy and, most importantly, understand the importance of design for business. “After all, design is only 2% creativity, and 98% calculation and common sense” (Terence Conran, famous British designer and entrepreneur).

Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation

Federal State Budgetary Educational Institution

Higher professional education

Ufa State University of Economics and Service

Faculty of Design and National Cultures

Department of Technology and Clothing Design

COURSE WORK

by discipline: “Organization of production, service to the population and the basics of a business plan”

TOPIC: “Business plan for the fashion forum project Top Fashion designed for participation in the youth forum i Volga"

Completed: art. gr. BKID-4

Khanbekova N.D.

Checked by: professor

Polatynskaya N.P.

Ufa 2015

Introduction 3

1 Summary and main indicators of the business plan 5

2 Analysis of the demand and sales market 7

3 Project implementation plan 10

4 Project estimate 11

5 Project effectiveness 12

Conclusions 13

References 14

Introduction

The twentieth century radically changed humanity's understanding of the world around us. All aspects of life, including art, were subjected to a radical revision. In art, the desire for innovation was determined by changes in society and the scientific revolution. The implementation of scientific discoveries has expanded the boundaries of existence, setting art the task of finding new artistic means capable of conveying all the diversity of the newly discovered world.

Scientific progress gave impetus to the rapid development of industry. So, the invention was in 1831. Bartholomew Timmonier's sewing machine turned tailoring into an industry. As a result, it became possible to produce mass products, and society was faced with the question of the aesthetic value of this kind of product. The answer was the creation of a new type of culture - design, which designated a style of thinking in the industrial creation of the aesthetics of the objective world. The concept of “design” covers the creative sphere of visual culture. Distinctive feature design is its dependence on success in the market, and, consequently, on the introduction of new scientific and technological achievements and on the requirements of changing fashion. Other characteristic feature design is that, as it developed, it began to have a significant influence on all types of art, including decorative and applied arts, as well as the art of creating costumes.

Today, the field of design takes a leading position in all areas of our lives. A large number of young people enroll in specialties in this field, but each of them faces the problem of finding a job. Because there are a lot of specialists graduating, but there is little work, and even if there is work, you won’t get there. Young people graduating from educational institutions, do not risk opening their own enterprises.

IN course work business plan presentedfashion forum project Top Fashion , designed for participation in the youth forum i Volga. This project is a kind of platform where young people can present their works to a competent jury, and this project is also for businessmen or people who are ready to invest their money for the development of this industry.

1 Summary and main indicators of the business plan

The business plan serves to justify technical and organizational decisions taken for the development of the fashion forum. The purpose of the proposed business is to make a profit by offering the market competitive types of products and services.

This forum was created with the aim of creating a platform where young people can present their work to a competent jury, which includes light industry workers, designers, leading fashion industry specialists, businessmen, employers, buyers and many others.

This forum was created primarily to help young professionals develop their abilities, as well as to help them find employment or develop their own brand. Therefore, the goal of the project isDevelopment of the fashion industry and all its areas at the level of the Volga Federal District. Project objectives: - formation of cultural norms and attitudes among young people;

Creating conditions for the realization of the creative potential of young people in the field of design; - attracting promising investors, attracting interested Russian and foreign specialists in the field of design and fashion to replicate collections.

Problem - Lack of conditions for presenting yourself to potential customers.

TOP FASHION project involves holding an annual fashion forum at the Volga Federal District level; schoolchildren, college and university students, professional designers and fashion designers, and people with disabilities will be able to take part in the forum.

The competition will be held in the following categories:

The best model

Fashion photo shooting,

Fashion video shooting,

Art object,

Fashion design competition, which is held in the following categories:

Art design,

Ethno-vintage,

Predoporte,

One costume competition

Clothing competition for people with disabilities.

At the end of the forum, all participants have the opportunity to place their work for sale on the official website of the fashion forum. This will give young people the opportunity to develop further.

2 Analysis of the demand and sales market

Without the competitiveness of the designed forum, its successful implementation is impossible. To assess competitiveness, it is important to determine who the competitors are, what is the effectiveness of participation and what are the features of competitors, the cost of participation. Competitors are the only and best source of information.

Participation of a young designer in Fashion Weeks (Mercedez-Benz Fashion Week Russia, Volvo-Fashion Week in Moscow, Cycles & Seasons by MasterCard, Aurora fashion week, Fashion Show on the Neva) requires large financial investments, and is therefore available only to those who have a sponsor. Organizing your own fashion show without established contacts with the press and buyers risks falling into oblivion. Therefore, young professionals rip out competitions and fashion forums for their promotion to the masses.

This is the situation in the city of Ufa; there are competitions for designers and models such as “Zaitsev Fashion Week”, “ StatusFashionDaY ", "Miss Bashkortostan", "Miss Fashion Model" and many others. etc.

Competitions or forums that can give a good result are held only in the cities of Moscow and St. Petersburg. Not all young professionals can afford to participate in these events.

If we consider these events at the Volga Federal District level, we can find a large number of competitions and fashion events, for exampleAll-Russian Fashion Theater Competition “Step towards” (Saratov), fashion week in Udmurtia,II All-Russian fashion show - “KREMLIN FASHION SHOW” April 17, 2015 (Kazan).

None of the ones listed earlier can give that result, and are not aimed at anything more than a fashionable event.

Having conducted marketing research of the market (questioning and interviewing consumers, studying verbal and material facts of consumer behavior, testing), it was revealed that there is a limited number of forums or competitions that are held in the Volga Federal District, which can really give a boost to a young specialist. If we predict the market capacity for the identified segment, then there is a constant effective demand for the area under study.

The fashion forum I propose is different in that the main goal of the organizers is not to earn as much money as possible, but to create a platform for young professionals for their further development, hence the focus on a specific circle of consumers.

The territory in which the implementation will take place is the city of Ufa, which is characterized by a large population and more advanced views on fashion, compared to other cities of the Republic of Bashkortostan (advanced city).

According to data for 2014, the population of the urban district of the city of Ufa is 1,096,702 people. The number of women (54.5%) prevails over the number of men (45.5%) (498,999 people).The share of persons under working age accounts for 15.6%; working age 65.8%; over working age 18.6%.

Working age population

65.8x25x5/ 100 = 19.8 percent (206,817 people). My target audience is young people from 14 to 30 years old.

Conducted marketing research revealed the following marketing brands that mass produce similar products (Table 1).

Table 1

Mod Forum Comparison Chart

Brand	Host city		Participants from Ufa
Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Russia	Moscow
1. Efficiency	high
2. The exclusivity of the forum	Opportunity to reach more high level sales
3. Average price, rub.	500 000
Fashion Week in Udmurtia	Izhevsk
1. Efficiency	low
2. The exclusivity of the forum	Opportunity to undergo internship at one of the leading enterprises in Russia
3. Average price, rub.	30 000
Zaitsev Fashion Week	Ufa	More than 50
1. Efficiency	average
2. The exclusivity of the forum	Opportunity to undergo internship at the Zaitsev fashion house
3. Average price, rub.	5 000

3 Project implementation plan

	Event	Date
	Preparing the fashion forum for the fall-winter season	February May
	Holding a fashion forum for the fall-winter season
	Preparation of the fashion forum for the spring-summer season	July-December
	Holding a fashion forum for the spring-summer season

4 Project estimate

	Name	Qty pcs.	Cost per unit in rub.	Price Rub.
	Frames for certificates, letters of gratitude.			6 600
	Certificates of winners
	Letters of gratitude
	Certificates of participants			3 750
	Flowers			3 000
	Engraving			15 500
	Award "Nika"			23 250
	Gift certificates		grand prix = 8000 rub. 1 pc. 1st place=3,000 10 pcs. 2nd place=2,000 10 pcs. 3rd place = 1,000 10 pcs.	65 000
	Ribbon for the winners of the modeling competition		1,000 rub.	3 000
	Diadem			1 500
	Gifts for forum participants			25 000
	Banner 2*4 m			2 000
	Banner 10*15			8 000
	Invitations to the gala show			4 500
	Booklet			4 500
	Decoration of the halls			20 000
	Printed product design development			2 000
	Dancers		1 000	4 000
	Presenters		7 000	14 000
	Singers			2 000
	Actors			5 000
	Models			20 000
	Hairdresser		1 000	6 000
	Visagiste		1 000	6 000
	Stage rental		4 000	20 000
	Light rental		3 000	24 000
	Audio Equipment Rental			30 000
	Renting premises			50 000
	Arrival and accommodation of experts		10 000	60 000
	Photo and video shooting of the forum			40 000
Total: 472,665 rubles

5 Project efficiency

For the first time, the competition was held from December 2 to 6, 2013 within the walls of UGUES. The winners were selected in the following categories:

Best model of 2013;

Fashion photo shooting;

Fashion video shooting;

Art object;

A total of 14 winners of the forum were determined.

67 participants from the city of Ufa took part.

The second time the forum was held from December 1 to 6, 2014 within the walls of the UGUES, and the halo show of the forum took place in the Auchan-Ufa hypermarket. The winners were selected in the following categories:

Best model of 2014;

Fashion photo shooting;

Fashion video shooting;

Art object;

Fashion designer competition

Grand Prix of the Top Fashion Fashion Forum

A total of 30 forum winners were identified.

Over 200 participants from various cities of Russia took part.

Also, 3 participants received certificates for qualifying for the finals of the Moscow Competition of Young Fashion Designers.

Conclusions

Young professionals in the fashion industry of the Volga Federal District need a quality platform. In order to demonstrate your work, not just to get a place in the competition, but also in order to subsequently find a job or create your own brand.

To solve this problem, a fashion forum has been proposed, which can become a launching pad. The opportunity to exchange experiences between people.

I would like and hope that a star will light up on this forum, which will be able to achieve a lot and thereby become a confirmation of this project.

References

1. Polatynskaya N.P. Development of business plans in the production of garments: Textbook / N.P. Polatynskaya, A.A. Bikbulatova. Ufa: UGIS, 2005. 96 p.
2. Barinov, V.A. Business planning: Textbook / V.A. Barinov. - M.: Forum, 2013. - 256 p.
3. Losev, V. How to draw up a business plan. How to write a business plan: Practical guide with examples of ready-made business plans for different industries: Per. from English / V. Losev. - M.: Williams, 2013. - 208 p.
4. Workbook for the youth forum “Seliger 2014”

UGUES, BKID-4

Sheets

BKID-4 262200.62

A4 format

Sheet

Stage

Business plan for a fashion forum project Top Fashion developed for participation in the youth forum i Volga

Polatynskaya

Khanbekova

Prov.

Date

Subp.

Doc. no.

Sheet

Developed

Change

Head of the design and interface design department of Mail.ru Group Yuri Vetrov on how designers can influence the company’s key indicators.

Bookmarks

Common language of business and design

Designers defend the rights of the user, but appeal to things that are incomprehensible to managers - best practices, guidelines, other people's experience, or simply “first of all, it’s beautiful.” They can't always transfer them to their product.

Product designer at Apple Laura Martini makes the right analogy: accountants don’t say that they make money by filling out tables of arrivals and departures, and HR people don’t say that they get paid for calling and writing to candidates; they talk about business value - healthy finances and stronger teams accordingly. It’s better to translate users’ pain into business language rather than continue to argue - then everyone will be happy.

Comparison of the American Customer Satisfaction Index and the market dynamics of 190 leading companies

In fact, both indexes are correct. In a competitive B2C market, quality of product and service are very important for success. But if sales depend little on the opinion of the end user (monopoly industries, government services, corporate software with centralized procurement), other laws apply. In addition, investments in product quality are aimed at the long term; they will not show immediate results.

Therefore, it is not enough to refer to the success of other companies - their business may operate on different principles. You need to soberly assess the current situation and understand where design can benefit your business. Otherwise, you will remain pixel engines or a toy in the hands of management.

Solving business problems is the main task of designers after the most basic - helping to develop products. The company, of course, cares about how well we do our job - the design should not delay the launch of products and their updates to the market, and its quality should be decent. But this is only a small piece. Even better, designers can help businesses make better product decisions. Or even find new opportunities for growth.

This is what will allow the design team to become more than just a performer and move along the maturity model from the operational (how well a specialist does his job) and tactical levels (how well the product production process is structured) to the strategic (where and how successfully the company is developing). As a result, to influence what the company does and why.

Design must solve business problems

Designers often complain that they are not involved in defining the product. Requirements come from managers and they just draw pictures. In some places this is due to the immaturity of the company and management, in others it is due to the weakness and short-sightedness of the designers themselves.

It is important to show and prove the value of design - we know a lot about users, and this is important for product managers to make decisions. Then you will be invited not only to produce mock-ups and prototypes. Bobby Ghoshal of WeWork says that 80% of design decisions are made outside the pixel - in discussions, presentations, reporting meetings and other events, so it is important to be able to argue your ideas.

Designers Melissa Perry and Scott Schellhorst show that there is a lot of overlap between product management and design. Some of this concerns quite familiar design artifacts that designers have been making successfully for a long time. But the most important thing is user problems.

Being able to find them, assess their importance for customers (goals, context, motivation and opportunities) and the business itself (product strategy, competition, organizational potential, etc.), and ultimately the ability to propose and visualize a future in which the problem is solved - that’s where key growth points for a design team striving for a mature UX.

Common language and problems

In a mature company with cross-functional teams, designers help product managers make decisions. Where and what? Let's imagine an idealized process of working on a product:

1. Product hypothesis. Finding unsolved user problems that our product could solve to increase business performance.
2. Pre-validation. Analytical assessment of how popular and commercially justifiable such a product may be.
3. Design and development. Production of a product or functionality in the required time frame and quality.
4. Testing the solution. Preliminary assessment of how suitable the product is for the target audience.
5. Product distribution. Attracting users through different channels and markets, possibly with different messages and values. Plus the organization of seamless user transition between channels.
6. Feedback from the market and users. Really assessing the product and making changes to it, be it implementation details, features or the concept and target audience as a whole.
7. User support. Solving problems that arise when using the product, with which users contact support, social media and other channels of communication with the company.​

An idealized process for working on a product or functionality

The model for developing products and their new functions has become increasingly dynamic over the past 10-15 years, so this scheme is quite arbitrary - full of both more iterative and more conservative examples. In addition, in real world the first stages are often reduced to a finished product plan. But this does not change the essence.

Lean model of working on a product or functionality

If, along the way, designers remain mindful of why the company is solving specific problems and how those solutions impact the business, the focus will shift from design artifacts and methods to product work.

We will finally not just solve development problems, but influence key business indicators and, perhaps, even introduce innovative ideas. This transformation of the role of designers consists of three stages:

1. Help in finding and solving business and user problems.
2. Estimation of maximum output when solving problems.
3. Moving from problem solving to innovation​.

Step 1. Help in finding and solving problems

If we take product development out of the equation, the product team and its manager face three main tasks:

1. Find unsolved user problems (problem space).
2. Understand what and how to do to solve a problem (solution space).
3. Assess how well the problem is solved (how to develop the product).

They can be represented as a chain “problem → solution → validation”. The product team will navigate it more efficiently with the help of the tools that UX specialists have.

Many companies begin the integration of designers from the last stage, organizing the process of usability testing - it is relatively simple, and the outcome is immediately clear. But if you engage in all three, you can radically increase the value of designers' work.

Find unresolved user issues

One of the ways to launch new products and develop existing ones is to start from yet unsolved user problems. If the potential audience is large enough and there are prospects for monetization, the company can offer them a suitable product. What does the product manager do in this case:

• Market assessment (capacity in money and audience, main competing products, typical business models, growth prospects, map of the subject area).
• Competitor research (market shares, business models, product functionality, marketing).
• Functional matrix (comparison of functions found in competing products).
• Assessment of the target audience (segmentation, preferences, expectations, problems, solvency).
• Building a business model.​

The advantage does not always come from the product itself (in some places the competition is won by a cheaper price or new distribution channels; in others it starts with technology). But if the problem is still in himself, then the design team can greatly help the product manager:

1. Research of users and their needs. Ethnographic research, interviews, surveys, diaries, focus groups, and work with analytics will provide a lot of useful information about the importance of problems and characteristics of the target audience (segments, behavior, motivation, context, mental and consumption models, expectations, fears and prejudices).
2. Analysis of competing products. Comparative usability testing, expert and heuristic assessment and user research methods from the previous paragraph. They will show how well other companies in the market are solving problems, and what users find particularly important.​

To formalize user problems, the Jobs to Be Done methodology is increasingly being used. In relation to digital products, Intercom and designer James Kalback are now writing a lot about it. Job stories show what life situations cause users problems (functional, emotional, social) for which they are willing to pay. HubSpot describes a similar approach to finding and describing potential problems.

Job story

Jobs to Be Done Model: Four Forces

Jobs to Be Done Model: Life Cycle

Jobs to Be Done Model

Jobs to be Done is also a way to segment users by needs. Designers used to use personas for this, but this tool has recently lost its former glory - few people effectively use them throughout the entire work on a product, and not just at the beginning.

In addition, JTBD has a clear focus on problems, while characters often spend a lot of time describing personal characteristics, moreover, taken from their heads rather than user research.

It is problems that are easier to use as a filter for subsequent product decisions. Although the characters are still great at pumping up the product team’s empathy for its users. And if the segmentation of the product’s audience is clear enough, personas in conjunction with JTBD will be an excellent tool.

A similar task of linking a description of a user’s portrait and his problems is facilitated by Value Proposition Canvas. This approach shows how a business plans to solve user problems by delivering value to them.

The Value Proposition Canvas framework

A good tool for a more detailed analysis of user problems is a customer journey map (a map of interaction with a product) and an experience map (a more abstract process of solving a life problem).

This is a design language that is useful to teach to managers (and the most advanced of them have already tried it). Although in addition to these two formats there are also service blueprints (how a company provides a service), many experts advise not to worry about semantic accuracy and compliance with templates - the main thing is that the map helps in the work.

Customer Journey Map © Macadamian

Experience Map

Such maps show how the user solves his problem now (in a specific product and outside of connection with it), noting the key stages of this scenario, as well as positive and problematic areas in them.

They may include the full cycle of acquisition by a client company from his awareness of the product to active use and recommendations to friends, or interaction with a separate large piece of the service. If we are talking about a new product of the company, the map will help to present its main functions; if about an existing one, it will show bottlenecks, the solution of which will allow it to be developed.

The card covers both the digital product and accompanying services in other channels of user interaction (including offline). And this is a deep look at the problem, providing even more useful information for decision-making.

The interaction map does not have to be complex and spectacular, as in the examples above. The main thing is that it helps visualize user problems.

Customer Journey Map simplified © Shopify

True, the exhaust depends on the complexity of the use cases. It is better to include a one-page promotional site in the general map of interaction with the product it sells - interaction with the landing page itself is too primitive.

If the product processes many scenarios, but still atomic (for example, Internet search), complex analytics and behavioral segmentation of users will help.

In reality, companies often start from a market opportunity by launching a product quickly and iteratively developing it, with user insights added later.

In this case, many corners are cut and user research is not carried out. But for successful product growth, the need to understand your customers is important, so the product manager will return to these questions sooner or later. Moreover, the focus of mature companies is increasingly shifting from solving problems to finding them, and without understanding users, these opportunities are limited.

Understand what and how to do to solve the problem

When the problem is well understood and its importance and value to users is high enough, the product manager needs to propose a product solution for the target audience. What does the product manager do in this case:

• Product vision (how we will solve user problems so that the company has commercial success or achieves other goals).
• Product capabilities (feature set ranked by value for users and business).
• Concept or prototype of a solution (or several alternatives).
• Plan for production, launch and distribution (is it possible to immediately make the first version or first you need to test the main hypotheses; what team and resources are needed for this).​

Here the participation of the design team is more active and we can help the product manager even more.

• Assessing user attitudes towards a product idea. Although in the very early stages, when there is not even a prototype, it is difficult for users to gauge their interest in the product, there are survey and interview formats to test them out.​
• Testing hypotheses using a prototype solution. Creating static and interactive prototypes, pseudo-automated services with manual order processing and a lot more - there is a wide range of cheap solutions. After this - testing: qualitative (interviews, usability testing) or quantitative (analytics after launch to a small audience, comparison of several solution options) and iterative refinement of the prototype.

Testing hypotheses is a key place for designers to add value. Moreover, thanks to the popularization of design thinking practices, companies are increasingly “thinking with their hands”, creating prototypes of solutions. And with the spread of lean approaches, the importance of fast, iterative work in the early stages has increased.

Although hypotheses are tested at the next stage, they need to be formulated at the stage of proposing solutions (and the statement of the problem itself is, in fact, a hypothesis). It is important to understand how we will ensure that the proposed concept actually solves the chosen user problem.

To do this, you need to decide on an experiment: a testing method (how and which users will see the concept), success metrics (what statistically significant data from analytics or user research will confirm the hypothesis) and a minimum set of functions (MVP (minimum viable product): what scenarios should the concept work out? ).

This is largely the task of the product manager, but the design team knows many methods for testing hypotheses and, in a mature company, is actively involved in the process.

Interaction map showing problems in the interface

Write