When looking for the right innovation strategy, it’s best to do some research. Here are five articles from some of the most noteworthy news sites that explain why design thinking might be the right choice for your innovation team. Happy reading.

1. Why Design Thinking Works, Harvard Business Review.

   In this October 2018 article, Professor Jeanne Liedtka of the Darden School of Business discusses how design thinking leads to “extraordinary improvements” regardless of your industry. She shares data from a seven-year study in which she looked at 50 projects from a range of sectors, including business, health care and social services. Her conclusion: “Design thinking has the potential to do for innovation exactly what TQM did for manufacturing: unleash people’s full creative energies, win their commitment, and radically improve processes.”

2. How Great Design Could Fix the World’s ‘Wicked Problems’, Fortune Magazine.

   This 2019 article, written by IDEO’s Tim Brown with IDEO fellow Barry Katz, looks at the impact of design thinking, highlighting groundbreaking examples, such as its transformation of public education and getting voters to the polls. The two design thinking experts predict the method will be critical in supporting a circular economy where resources are reused and environmental crisis averted.

3. Design thinking: People first, The Economist.

    

   In 2018, everyone’s favorite weekly news magazine explored why design thinking is such a hot topic for businesses, sharing their favorite MBA programs for execs who want to learn more.

4. Design Thinking in Health Care, Preventing Chronic Disease.

   You can’t go wrong with a peer-reviewed journal. This article explores the results of 24 studies to determine whether design thinking is an effective tool in a healthcare setting. The authors found 11 of the studies showed design thinking was successful in achieving goals, and another 12 delivered mixed results. Their conclusion: Design Thinking can result in “more usable, acceptable, and effective interventions compared with traditional expert-driven methods.”

5. When Cognition Interferes with Innovation: Overcoming Cognitive Obstacles to Design Thinking, Research Technology Management.

   In another peer-reviewed journal, Bryant University professors Allison G. Butler and Michael A. Roberto share their research on how “cognitive traps” can be a detriment to the design thinking process and how to overcome them. “Attention to where cognitive efficiencies become cognitive traps and when and how to deploy countermeasures will increase the probability that the process will generate true breakthrough innovations,” they conclude.

Want a longer reading list on design thinking? Check out our post on the best innovation books from last year.

Learn how to enable innovation skill-building at scale or download our free ebook Design Thinking 101.