Design thinking has come to be recognised as the go-to-model of solving wicked problems. Whether these problems pertain to improving customer experience, employee engagement, or business processes, design thinking — with its array of tools and techniques — has something to offer. Above all, the practice of design thinking lends the much-needed discipline to the otherwise ad hoc approach of creativity.

Does that mean design thinking is suitable to solve any problem? Certainly not. There is a certain class of problem that is best dealt with by embracing a design thinking approach.

In this article, I present three conditions that qualify as a problem or a context to be addressed with design thinking. The conditions are high levels of ambiguity, availability of time, and access to customers.

Embracing ambiguity We are increasingly living in a world full of surprises and with growing difficulties of sensemaking, the so-called VUCA environment (volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous). However, most of us would like to engage with a sliver of the problem to lower our cognitive load and engage with the problem one piece at a time. But that piecemeal approach may cause more harm than good, for one problem solved, can certainly create another.

Think of how the creation of the COVID-19 vaccine soon followed the complex task of administering it, twice in a gap of a few weeks, to millions of people the world over. Such complex problems need complex thinking and systems thinking so that one doesn’t fall into the trap of optimising locally and not taking eyes off the global good

Read more at: https://yourstory.com/2021/03/design-thinking-model-problem-solving