Indian Institute of Information Technology, Allahabad

Department of Management Studies

Marketing Management
Assignment: - Design Thinking
Submitted By: - Vidhi Agrawal (IMB20200021)

What is Design Thinking?

Design thinking is an agile, iterative approach to design and innovation that focuses on the wants and
needs of customers and allows the business to pivot as the market shifts and technology advances.

Design thinking recognises that there is no single solution to a dilemma. As a result, the design thinking
approach promotes challenging, experimenting, observing, and innovating in a setting that welcomes
a wide range of viewpoints and ideas.

Design thinking benefits

One of the most appealing aspects of design thinking is that it can generate innovative concepts as
the team cycles through the inspiration, ideation, and execution stages, often repeating each cycle as
you formulate new ideas and solutions.

Design thinking is used in technology to build user-friendly human-centred interfaces and to bring
technology to consumers in a natural and intuitive manner. Design thinking is described by a set of
core principles.

1. Wicked problems: A term coined by design theorists Horst Rittel and Melvin Webber, “wicked
problems” refers to ill-defined or difficult issues with ambiguous solutions that necessitate
innovative thinking or unconventional methods to solve.
2. Problem framing: Concept thinking allows for multiple perspectives on a problem. Problems
aren't treated casually. Instead, they're re-interpreted and re-contextualized in order to find
a solution.
3. Solution-focused thinking: Rather than concentrating on challenges, a design thinking model
searches for solutions first, which may help with problem comprehension.
4. Solution-focused thinking: Rather than concentrating on challenges, a design thinking model
searches for solutions first, which may help with problem comprehension.
5. Abductive reasoning: This form of logical inference begins with an observation or collection
of observations and asks you to come up with the easiest, most probable explanation for the
issues you've seen. It's a form of logic used in design thinking to reframe problems or concepts
in order to come up with several solutions to the problem or opportunity.
6. Co-evolution of problem and solution: When working on a problem, concept thinkers
alternate between worrying about the problem and brainstorming solutions to help them
come up with even more solutions.

Design thinking process

When designing solutions and products, the team will cycle through four key phases of design thinking.
Design thinking provides a loose framework that you can interpret as required for your business needs,
rather than a detailed prescription to follow.
 1. Inspiration: - This is normally the first step in the design process, as you begin to grasp the
issue or opportunity. You'll need to figure out what your goals are, what your benchmarks are,
who your main contacts are, what your criteria are, what technologies you'll need, and how
your approach or product can fit into the business market.
2. Empathy: - One of the most relevant stages and concepts of design thinking is empathy. You
must fully consider the client's or end-viewpoint users when developing solutions, products,
services, or hardware.
3. Ideation:- During this process, you'll use both divergent and convergent thought to generate
as many ideas as possible. You'll vary between divergent thinking, which entails a diverse
group of people brainstorming in an organised manner, and convergent thinking, which
focuses on the best ideas and chooses one to pursue.
4. After you've narrowed down a few of the better concepts, it's time to start designing and
prototyping real goods and services that can be tested, evaluated, and improved.

Empathy in design thinking

Design thinking requires a high level of empathy. You will create the best product, programme, or
service by taking into account the desires and needs of your clients, users, and customers. You can
approach the process by thinking about how you can make the client's life easier, or how you can
make the finished product more fun, realistic, effective, or simple to use.

How Netflix have adopted Design Thinking

Introduction: - Who hasn't heard of Netflix? With over 117 million subscribers in 190 countries, he is
an innovator and Design Thinking Practitioner. But where did it all start? It all started in 1997 with
creator Reed Hasting's idea of streaming movies directly to people's homes through the internet.
Netflix began as a service that delivered movies to customers' doorsteps via customer mail back in the
day. Cable providers, on the other hand, quickly started to sell movies on demand. Netflix used Design
Thinking to better understand its consumers' desires and preferences, resulting in a new business
model.

Think Big and Start Small

Reed Hastings invested nearly $10 million a year on streaming research in 2001. He took the calculated
risk of foregoing the company's meagre benefit. In addition, he continued to test the availability of
online content at a rapid pace. Netflix began offering it as part of DVD subscriptions after performing
a series of Streaming Tests to determine its viability.

As a result, people became used to streaming while he continued to expand his library of offerings.
After ten years of research and experimenting, Netflix finally offered a streaming-only service for half
the price of a DVD subscription in 2010. As a result, it dominated the industry, while cable and internet
services grew rapidly.
Understanding the Customers

 Netflix, unlike others, never appealed to the masses. In reality, it has always catered to specific
niches and recognised their needs. So Netflix didn't stop there, and they continued to innovate
using Design Thinking. And it didn't take long for them to realise that their customers were
hungry for more provocative material. Netflix started producing original content in 2011, such
as Stranger Things and Black Mirror.
 The shows were much too controversial for the general public, but they were extremely
popular with the target audience. Netflix made improvements to its platform in 2016 in order
to delight its customers even more. Customers could view trailers while scrolling the interface
rather than looking at still photos or posters.
 Netflix shows no signs of slowing down; in fact, the company has developed a download-and-
go feature that allows users to download content and watch it offline. Netflix is revolutionising
the User Experience by using Design Thinking in this way.

References :-
Luchs, M. G. (2015). A brief introduction to design thinking. Design thinking: New product development
essentials from the PDMA, 1-12.