Design thinking: Critical analysis and future evolution

Abstract

The importance of design as a source of value creation has been studied for decades. In the late 90s, however, a specific approach in the practice of design achieved a rapid diffusion across organizations: Design Thinking. This is a formal method for creative problem solving characterized by user‐centeredness, ideation, and iterative prototyping. The rapid diffusion of Design Thinking in practice has not been coupled with similarly rapid and robust development of its theoretical underpinnings. Most contributions have been inward‐oriented toward a confined community of scholars; therefore, the scientific discourse on Design Thinking has unfolded in a vacuum—often independently from other innovation management theories. The consequence has been that Design Thinking is often confused (especially among those new to the field) with the entire practice of design. Subsequently, we still lack an understanding on whether, why, and when Design Thinking contributes to innovation. In this editorial, we discuss the journey to the Special Issue “Design Thinking and Innovation Management: Matches, Mismatches and Future Avenues” that intends to critically reflect and enrich the scientific debate around Design Thinking. First, we aim at clarifying the distinction between “design” and “Design Thinking.” The former is a practice, to be studied; the latter is a paradigm, that is, a set of specific principles, methods, and tools to practice design. Second, we offer a brief overview of the community that has been investigating Design Thinking, a synthesis of the ten papers included in the Special Issue (distributed across this and the next issue), and show how they contribute to close the theoretical and empirical gaps with innovation studies. Finally, we suggest that the paradigm of Design Thinking is significantly contingent: its diffusion and success have been favored by the emergence of specific contextual conditions (substantially by the ubiquitous diffusion of digital technologies in direct interaction with users). As the context is dramatically shifting again, we wonder whether Design Thinking will keep its relevance and ability to support organizations in addressing the new challenges ahead? We address this question with the support of a contingent framework to position several design paradigms and suggest that the context ahead, where problems have multiple stakeholders and are undefined, will require the emergence of new paradigms characterized by a systemic (rather than user‐centered) and reflective (rather than ideative) practice. We therefore propose a few research questions that will hopefully encourage and shape future scholarly efforts into the study of the design practice for innovation in organizations.

Design thinking traits and cognitive passive resistance: mediating effect of linear thinking

“…This study responds to the request for more research to find theoretical links (Magistretti et al , 2021b; Verganti et al , 2021), that support empirically design thinking (Jaskyte and Liedtka, 2022; Roth et al , 2020), a concept that is greatly diffused and relevant in practice, yet receives little scientific support (Dell'Era et al , 2020; Klenner et al , 2021). There is also a call for more studies on innovation resistance (Huang et al , 2021), particularly on passive innovation resistance (Ghazali et al , 2020) and to study cognitive and situational passive resistance separately (Koch et al , 2021).…”

“…However, it is important to clarify that design thinking is a concept related to business management (Auernhammer and Roth, 2021) and is aimed at non-designers (Brown, 2019; Groeger and Schweitzer, 2020). Therefore, it must be differentiated from the concept of design practice (Verganti et al , 2021) because it has a different reach (Rylander Eklund et al , 2021). Some authors continue to study design practice under the denomination of designerly thinking, connecting the practices of professional designers to the field of design (Cousins, 2018; Laursen and Haase, 2019).…”

“…Although design thinking is based on designers' creative methods for working (Brown, 2019), the approach is oriented more towards non-designers (Groeger and Schweitzer, 2020; Laursen and Haase, 2019; Verganti et al , 2021; Wrigley et al , 2020), who seek to implement design thinking for business management (Auernhammer and Roth, 2021; Knight et al , 2020; Magistretti et al , 2021b; Rylander Eklund et al , 2021). Design thinking involves a cognitive process used to identify and solve problems (Dell'Era et al , 2020; Rylander Eklund et al , 2021; Wrigley et al , 2020).…”

The perceived relevance of design thinking in achieving innovation goals: The individual microfoundations perspective

“…Recent studies advocate the evolving and emerging interpretations of design thinking, expanding the consolidated application beyond the product and service innovation realm (Gruber et al, 2015; Knight et al, 2020; Micheli et al, 2018; Verganti et al, 2021). As such, design thinking is gaining a new strategic role: from designing novel products and services to delivering innovative strategies and supporting organizational transformations.…”

“…To mention just few, human‐centred design (Buchanan, 2001), participatory design (Sanders & Stappers, 2008) and design thinking (Brown, 2008; Martin, 2009) have marked the renewed and transformed role that design can play in innovation. As defined by Verganti et al (2021), design is a practice, whereas design thinking is a paradigm, that is, a set of specific principles, methods and tools to practice design. Obviously, design and design thinking are strictly related one each other, but design thinking represents just one of the many paradigms can be adopted to design.…”