What Is The Future Of Design Thinking In Business? | PGDM

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What Is The Future Of Design Thinking In Business?

13 Sep 2022
- admin
- Innovation & Design Thinking
Business Design

Table of Contents
“We must design for the way people behave,
not for how we would wish them to behave.

~ Donald A. Norman, Researcher, and professor at the University of California, San Diego.

Where Are The Roots And Origins of Design Thinking?

Design thinking has been prevalent ever since ancient times – ever since the wheel was invented, or even before that. Our human ancestors employed design thinking in the way they used to build hunting tools and materials for survival. Thus, design thinking has been a part of the human journey through the evolution chain. Humans have been trying to study the factors that led to the contemporary understanding of design theory, process and practice.

As thinkers studied the methods and processes behind innovation, the emergence of design thinking as a concept came to the fore. Though these references were more connected to the fields of architecture and engineering, the inflection point was probably the beginning of an industrial revolution. While the new age businesses grappled with the need for innovation, design thinking originated as a remedy to traditional software development that often resulted in an experience that was not intuitive for customers.

Design Thinking helped developers reframe issues from the perspective of the end user, using an experimental, iterative approach to generate original and creative points of view. It successfully helped prevent biases that stunt imagination, moving beyond to fresh ideas and perspectives.

Business leaders soon realized that Design Thinking’s human-centric approach could be applied to other business challenges as well. As an isolated effort, Design Thinking while designing solutions, did not address the issue of assigning a quantifiable value to the business. Thus the evolution of Business Design.

Businesses could now look at re-imagining business models, reinvigorate value streams, and look at a higher return on investment through a combination of Design Thinking and creativity with the strategic, operational, and technological expertise of Business. Design Thinking had now evolved into Business Design and innovation could be viewed in conjunction with practicalities such as budgets, competing strategies, revenue targets, resource allocations, and business models. There is no doubt that a Design Thinking approach forms the core foundation of Business Design and the synergy had the potential to radically change the way businesses looked at innovation with an empathetic approach.

Business Design is indeed rooted in a Design Thinking approach, with Design Thinking remaining a foundational practice for business designers. In Management Practice, the two concepts are viewed interchangeably. While design thinking is based on the workflow of designers, its purpose is to provide all business professionals with a standardized innovation process to develop creative solutions to business problems.

Summary

Design thinking has been a part of the human journey through the evolution chain. While the new age businesses grappled with the need for innovation, design thinking originated as a remedy to traditional software development that often resulted in an experience that was not intuitive for customers.

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What Are The Processes / Phases of Innovation?

Design Thinking is an iterative process that ventures interchangeably from concrete to abstract thinking. Abstract thinking is the base for innovation while concrete thinking ensures that the outcome is useful, practical, and viable.

Design Thinking can be broadly categorized into a four-phase process for brevity. However, before the process is begun, it is important to build an understanding of the target audiences. Empathy is fundamental to the process and ensuring the user remains the focus of the exercise is key to an impactful solution. This process entails –
1. Clarifying the issues – The first phase is to identify the problem statement. This is done after careful observation or research to determine the problem and the possible impediments to a solution. The key here is to have an unbiased approach without being assumptive. A comprehensive approach should be inclusive of the stakeholder’s views and facts.
2. Ideating – This is the abstract phase when Design Thinkers devise new and innovative ideas that solve the problems they have identified. The approach should be user-centric and free from bias or assumptions.
3. Developing Solutions – This phase involves developing concepts by evaluating and working on possible solutions. This may include prototyping, testing, and experimenting to come up with answers to questions about the concept’s viability. This phase is about experimenting with various ideas and seeing what works and what does not.
4. Implementation – This is when the entire process comes together. Implementation in a design thinking process starts with testing, deliberating on results, reiterating, and testing again. The reiteration phase is crucial till a successful and viable solution is found.
As such, Design Thinking is a dynamic, nonlinear, and iterative process.

Summary

Design Thinking can be broadly categorized into a four-phase process for brevity. Empathy is fundamental to the process and ensuring the user remains the focus of the exercise is key to an impactful solution. Here’s what the process entails…

What Is The Future of Design Thinking?

Business in today’s age is evolving rapidly. Convergence, disruption, and rapid obsolescence are leading to a disintegration of organizational silos and we move towards new disruptions and business models. Innovative ideas and talent are the new blacks.

To be future-ready and in growth mode, managing innovation is the way forward. Survival and future growth of organizations require convergent talent, disruptive thinking, and blurring of business horizontals.

Design Thinking holds the key for businesses to remain relevant. Design thinking methodology is nearing an inflection point and fast emerging to be an inescapable part of doing business. Design thinking gets around human bias, breaks the status quo, and behavioral norms, and eventually fosters the exercise of the imagination. The design-thinking process is adapted from the fields of ethnography and sociology and concentrates on examining what makes for a meaningful customer journey.

While traditional Management education has centered on training students to be analytical in their approach, Design Thinking thinks about adding value for all stakeholders. As such, it can add value for the entire spectrum of customers, vendors, distributors, community, and employees, and drive business success.

Summary

Design Thinking holds the key for businesses to remain relevant. While traditional Management education has centered on training students to be analytical in their approach, Design Thinking thinks about adding value for all stakeholders.

The SOIL PGDM In Design Thinking Programme

SOIL Institute of Management offers MBA – PGDM in Business Design and Innovation that offers insights to budding management professionals to unleash their inner potential. The focus is to learn better ways to creatively design new products/ services or to modify or extend existing ones.

SOIL Institute of Management’s MBA course looks to make an impact in changing management education. The PGDM aims at creating business leaders who excel in problem solving and creativity and be the change leaders shortly. The School of Business Design at SOIL integrates Design Thinking, Management, and Liberal Arts in a world-class curriculum designed by hand-picked leaders from the industry. The curriculum is refined to make it contextual and relevant to industry needs.

Summary

The curriculum of the School of Business Design at SOIL integrates and is refined to make it contextual and relevant to industry needs.

FAQs
What is PGDM?

Post Graduate Diploma in Business Management – PGDM is a diploma course that can be offered by autonomous institutes (not affiliated with any university). This program is innovative and incorporates cutting-edge trends in the industry. The sole aim of the PGDM program is to develop a well-rounded personality that is ready to take on the rigorous business world.

What are the types/ specializations of PGDM?

The students of the Post Graduate Diploma in Management (PGDM) program are exposed to the following functional core courses, in the first year. They then choose their specializations accordingly, in the second year. The popular specializations are –

Marketing

Finance

Analytics and Human Resource.

What are the reasons for pursuing a PGDM program?

Post Graduate Diploma in Management is meant for students straight out of college looking for a management career, or professionals with an experience of around two years wanting to advance their career prospects. The idea of the PGDM program is to integrate learning and exposure across all functional areas and also increase awareness. The sole aim of the PGDM program is to develop a well-rounded personality that is ready to take on the rigorous business world.

What does the PGDM curriculum entail?

With the autonomous nature of PGDM courses, institutes are very sensitive to the changing demands of the industry. The PGDM curriculum changes to ensure students are up to date with current industry trends. PGDM courses are much more adept at being industry-ready.

Why should you choose SOIL Institute of Management for PGDM?

The top PGDM institute in Delhi NCR, SOIL is based out of a start-up and innovation hub, hub began its journey almost a decade ago. Published by the ABP Group, Business World Magazine (leader in business news) ranked SOIL Institute of Management in the 18th position on its “Top B-schools for MBA courses” list.

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Summary

What is PGDM?

What are the types/ specializations of PGDM?

What are the reasons for pursuing a PGDM program?

What does the PGDM curriculum entail?

Why should you choose SOIL Institute of Management for PGDM?

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PGDM Batch 2025-27 Orientation Start Date - 20th June 2025

Register TO STUDY AT SOIL

What is PGDM?

What are the types/ specializations of PGDM?

What are the reasons for pursuing a PGDM program?

What does the PGDM curriculum entail?

Why should you choose SOIL Institute of Management for PGDM?

Never miss a beat. Get Blog updates regularly in your inbox

PGDM Batch 2025-27 Orientation Start Date - 20^th June 2025