For a while, “design thinking” was business world’s most fashionable concept. Companies tried it, sent their employees for training, and so on. Then things changed. Now Google’s frequently used search phrases include “design thinking is bullshit” and “design thinking is dead.” If you read the naysayers' articles, the common rant is “there’s nothing new.” I do not agree with the Google phrases, but I do agree with the claim that there's nothing new in design thinking. Here's why.
Beginning in the late 90s, I created and upgraded what I called a “marketing kit.” This label did not refer to a set of brochures, white papers, and such standard things of questionable value. It referred to the following set of items designed and laid out in a purposeful and human-centric way:
This Cognizant case is similar to the IBM case described in a recently published book Solving Business Problems with Design Thinking. Using the services of an experience marketing firm, IBM recently transformed its trade show experience for customers"from spectacles into conversations, from monologue to dialogue. This was achieved by a combination of seating and standing areas, public and private spaces, and formal and informal settings to accommodate different learning styles of audiences." (More)
I did not go to a recent Rotman course to learn to design the marketing / customer experience I described above. My learnings primarily came from a mid-90s human-centric design course that ACM Lifetime Achievement Award winner Richard Anderson taught at UC Berkeley Extension. My learnings also came from my visits to museums in various cities in the US. I not only enjoyed interacting with the exhibits, but took pictures of display techniques and passed them on to the firm that did the building/interiors that housed the layout.
Clearly, there’s nothing new about design thinking.
The more important question though is, is there value in using design thinking? The answer, in the case of Cognizant, is: if you constructed a strategy map, you can see an upward pointing arrow linking the “marketing / customer experience design” just described to customer acquisition and retention. Also driving that success is the method and the talent used in project execution. Always, specific assets and processes must come together to deliver the kind of customer value that can result in positive business outcomes.
Marketing / customer experience design
Beginning in the late 90s, I created and upgraded what I called a “marketing kit.” This label did not refer to a set of brochures, white papers, and such standard things of questionable value. It referred to the following set of items designed and laid out in a purposeful and human-centric way:
Gallery: A casual, standup conversation facility. Here, we had
conversation-starting posters. The posters had quotes by customers and others. Some showcased thought-leadership in terms of innovative methods, publishing, speaking, biographies, media coverage, and conferences organized. The gallery also had the optionality of projecting slides on a wall.
Show-and-tell lab: High traffic user-interface testing facility. Nearly every prospect/customer was given a walk-through. The “touch, feel, participate” nature helped prospects/customers believe in our claims we made about our method and talent.
Try-me interactive: Pre-programmed interactive stuff for customers and employees. It allowed people to work with the Before and After of a software application and immediately computed and showed productivity and dollar savings based on their actual performance. Essentially, it demonstrated what a customer can typically expect from a Cognizant reengineered application. A lot more effective than a traditional self-running demo.
Giveaway: A copy of my 90s book published in the US. For Western customers visiting India, this was many times more credible than claims made via presentations, white papers, etc.
ROI proof-of-concept: In the sales cycle, we created a small prototype of a prospect's or customer’s software. Most organizations do this. Here's what we did differently: we demonstrated a customer’s potential business benefits in terms of cycle time reduction and dollar savings.The lab was not just a marketing tool, but part of customer experience as it was meant to be used when projects have been won and are being executed. Besides the gallery and the lab, which were laid out to promote customer tours, the layout also included team workspace, my office, and conventional conference room. The layout was located in a piece of real estate that the company considered its most prestigious at the time.
New?
This Cognizant case is similar to the IBM case described in a recently published book Solving Business Problems with Design Thinking. Using the services of an experience marketing firm, IBM recently transformed its trade show experience for customers"from spectacles into conversations, from monologue to dialogue. This was achieved by a combination of seating and standing areas, public and private spaces, and formal and informal settings to accommodate different learning styles of audiences." (More)
I did not go to a recent Rotman course to learn to design the marketing / customer experience I described above. My learnings primarily came from a mid-90s human-centric design course that ACM Lifetime Achievement Award winner Richard Anderson taught at UC Berkeley Extension. My learnings also came from my visits to museums in various cities in the US. I not only enjoyed interacting with the exhibits, but took pictures of display techniques and passed them on to the firm that did the building/interiors that housed the layout.
Clearly, there’s nothing new about design thinking.
Value?
The more important question though is, is there value in using design thinking? The answer, in the case of Cognizant, is: if you constructed a strategy map, you can see an upward pointing arrow linking the “marketing / customer experience design” just described to customer acquisition and retention. Also driving that success is the method and the talent used in project execution. Always, specific assets and processes must come together to deliver the kind of customer value that can result in positive business outcomes.