Agile has helped spawn methodologies that address business processes and broader scopes than software, websites, or digital marketing. One of these is “design thinking,” which has its origins at IDEO, a design studio that does a lot of work in human-centred design and has completed a broad range of projects that involve user experience.
The easiest way to describe design thinking is as a philosophy that approaches business challenges with a clean slate. Instead of improving upon something which currently exists, it starts with the question, “What is the problem we’re trying to solve?” and designs a solution from that.
Design thinking is similar to agile in that input is sought beyond the primary team doing the work, and it requires an iterative process to achieve the best solution to the problem.
What sets design thinking apart from agile is that it is even further from the waterfall methodology. Agile still assumes a particular end solution is a right approach. Design thinking does not make any such assumptions. The solution is designed around the user and not around a specific method, channel, or medium.
