DESIGN IDEATION WORKSHOP
StartingBloc, New York, NY
In fall 2010 TYTHEdesign was invited by Startingbloc to run a workshop on practical design thinking and idea generation with business strategy firm Channelise, at the First Annual StartingBloc Fellows' Summit. Our workshop was focused on design ideation methods for social entrepreneurs, but the participants were a spectrum encompassing social ventures and mission-driven companies, non-profits and intrapreneurs (meaning people who are driving innovation from within large for-profit corporations). TYTHEdesign and Channelise taught participants a number of effective creative thinking and strategy tools that can be used to open up new avenues of action and problem-solving by bringing techniques for brainstorming and innovation to organizations in any field. It was a great opportunity to show the value of design thinking and design strategy in driving new solutions and ideation across sectors and in diverse organizations.
The workshop, of around 50 people, was divided up into teams and assigned global challenges, such as literacy and childhood obesity, as case studies to work through. The teams learned about user empathy maps, identifying assumptions and knowledge about users, and target empathy maps, identifying factors that can be changed, such as the design of a water pump that breaks frequently, and factors that can't be changed, such as traditional gender roles in a community.
We did rounds of massive brainstorming and ideation for solutions to the issues. Afterwards the teams categorized their solutions into a value matrix of inexpensive versus costly and inventive versus traditional. Participants learned how this matrix can be used in business strategy in their own organizations, for example to organize team members on projects or bring an organization's needs or mission into a decision-making process.
TYTHEdesign leads design strategy workshops to bring innovation and design thinking into organizations in order to energize internal strategy and creativity. If you are interested in bringing TYTHEdesign to your company to conduct a tailored workshop with your team you can contact us at info [at] tythe-design.com.
All pictures provided by StartingBloc
