Professional Documents
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Rethinking Design Thinking
Rethinking Design Thinking
Lucy
Kimbell
A
later
version
of
this
paper
was
published
in
2011
in
Design
&
Culture,
3(3).
Please
do
not
quote
from
this
version
but
instead
the
published
one.
Part
2
will
be
published
in
2012.
Abstract
The
term
design
thinking
has
gained
considerable
attention
over
the
past
decade
in
a
wide
range
of
organizations
and
contexts
beyond
the
traditional
preoccupations
of
designers.
The
main
idea
is
that
the
ways
professional
designers
problem
solve
is
of
value
to
firms
trying
to
innovate
and
to
societies
trying
to
make
change
happen.
This
paper
reviews
the
origins
of
the
term
design
thinking
in
research
on
designers
and
its
adoption
by
management
educators
and
consultancies
within
a
dynamic,
global
mediatized
economy.
Three
main
accounts
are
identified:
design
thinking
as
a
cognitive
style,
as
a
general
theory
of
design,
and
as
a
resource
for
organizations.
The
paper
then
argues
there
are
several
issues
that
undermine
the
claims
made
for
design
thinking.
The
first
is
how
many
of
these
accounts
rely
on
a
dualism
between
thinking
and
knowing,
and
acting
in
the
world.
Second,
the
idea
of
a
generalized
design
thinking
ignores
the
diversity
of
designers
practices
and
institutions
which
are
historically
situated.
The
third
is
how
design
thinking
rests
on
theories
of
design
that
privilege
the
designer
as
the
main
agent
in
designing.
Instead
the
paper
proposes
that
attending
to
the
situated,
embodied
routines
of
designers
and
others
offers
a
useful
way
to
rethink
design
thinking.
Keywords
Design
thinking,
practices,
designers,
innovation,
organization
design
Biog
Lucy
Kimbell
is
Associate
Fellow,
Sad
Business
School,
University
of
Oxford
and
director
of
consultancy
at
Fieldstudio,
London.
She
has
taught
design
practices
to
MBA
students
since
2005,
having
previously
taught
interaction
design
at
the
Royal
College
of
Art,
London.
Her
main
focus
is
designing
services
in
the
context
of
public
policy.
[email protected]
While
much
of
this
critical
discussion
is
beginning
to
take
shape
outside
design
circles,
this
article
will
examine
design
thinking
from
within.
Now,
at
a
time
when
design
and
designers
are
working
in
challenging
new
contexts,
we
must
engage
in
discussions
about
the
place
of
professional
design
in
the
world,
If
we
explore
design
thinking
by
using
theories
of
practice,
we
may
better
understand
designers
work
within
the
social
worlds
in
which
it
takes
place.
Rather
than
viewing
design
thinking
as
a
disembodied
and
ahistorical
cognitive
style,
we
must
clarify
its
function.
Design
thinking
may
have
failed;
instead
we
should
understand
design
as
a
situated,
contingent
set
of
practices
carried
by
professional
designers
and
those
who
engage
with
designers
activities.
Asking
What
If:
The
Designer
as
Cultural
Interpreter
When
design
thinking
emerged
more
than
a
decade
ago,
it
offered
a
response
to
the
ebbs
and
flows
of
a
global,
mediatized
economy
of
signs
and
artifacts;
in
this
context,
professional
designers
play
increasingly
important
roles,
less
as
makers
of
forms
and
more
as
cultural
intermediaries
(Julier
2008)
or
as
the
glue
in
multi-disciplinary
teams
(Kelley
and
VanPatter
2005).
They
are
interpreters
of
changes
in
culture
who
then
create
new
kinds
of
cultural
form.
While
some
designers
have
always
seen
design
as
playing
important
roles
socially
and
politically
as
well
as
economically
William
Morris,
the
Arts
and
Crafts
movement,
and
Italian
groups
such
as
Superstudio
and
Archizoom
are
examples
(Julier
2011)
what
is
distinctive
about
the
development
of
design
thinking
is
its
adoption
within
managerialist
discourse,
in
particular
business
schools,
over
the
past
decade.
In
just
the
last
five
years,
the
term
is
more
and
more
ubiquitous.
It
found
its
way
into
conversations
at
Davos,
the
annual
meeting
of
politicians
and
senior
executives
from
global
firms
(IDEO
2006);
at
TED
(TED
2009),
a
conference
series
that
attracts
leading
figures
in
business,
technology
and
entertainment;
and
into
the
pages
of
the
Harvard
Business
Review,
an
influential
(although
not
peer-reviewed)
academic
journal
(Brown
2008).
Design
thinking
and
the
designers
who
say
they
practice
it
are
associated
with
having
a
human-centered
approach
to
problem
solving,
in
contrast
to
being
technology-
or
organization-
centered.
They
are
seen
as
having
an
iterative
process
that
moves
from
generating
insights
about
end
users,
to
idea
generation
and
testing,
to
implementation.
Their
visual
artifacts
and
prototypes
help
multidisciplinary
teams
work
together.
They
ask
what
if?
questions
to
imagine
future
scenarios
rather
than
accepting
the
way
things
are
done
now.
With
their
creative
ways
of
solving
problems,
the
argument
goes,
designers
can
turn
their
hands
to
nearly
anything.
Design
is
now
central
to
innovation
and
since
organizations
(1)
are
under
pressure
to
maintain
or
grow
market
share,
or
if
in
the
public
sector,
increase
user
satisfaction
and
effectiveness,
then
designers
and
their
thinking
have
something
important
to
offer.
(2)
The
Creative
Class
and
the
New
Spirit
of
Capitalism
To
understand
this
move
requires
attending
to
wider
developments
over
the
last
few
decades
shaping
what
goes
on
within
and
between
societies,
organizations
of
different
kinds,
and
political
institutions.
To
address
these
topics
fully
would
require
more
space
than
is
available
but
I
want
here
to
highlight
particular
themes.
The
first
is
a
view
of
capitalism
which
sees
it
as
unstable,
fluid
and
dynamic
(Lash
and
Urry
1994;
Thrift
2005).
Boltanski
and
Chiapello
(2005)s
description
of
a
new
spirit
of
capitalism
captures
some
of
the
energy
in
the
shift
from
hierarchies
to
networks
and
from
bureaucratic
discipline
to
team-work
and
multi-skilling,
as
capitalism
absorbed
its
critiques
and
remade
itself
as
offering
managers
both
autonomy
and
security.
A
second
theme
shaping
the
product-
saturated
developed
world
is
the
importance
of
the
economy
of
signs
that
ignore
state
borders
and
in
which
the
value
of
a
commodity
cannot
be
separated
from
its
symbolic
value
(Lash
and
Urry
1994).
A
sophisticated
effort
to
engage
diverse
audiences
or
stakeholders
in
establishing
the
meaning
of
these
signs
marks
out
those
commercial
firms
which
at
some
level
understand
this
(Verganti
2009).
A
third
theme
is
the
rise
of
what
Florida
(2002)
calls
the
creative
class,
for
whom
work
and
professional
identities
are
caught
up
in
creating
meaningful
new
forms.
For
Florida
the
word
creative
is
not
just
reserved
for
designers,
musicians
and
visual
artists
but
also
computer
programmers
and
opinion-
makers
such
as
columnists.
These
professionals
find
meaning
in
work
which
is
characterized
by
flexibility,
autonomy
and
creativity
and
which
blurs
their
professional
and
personal
lives,
as
they
move
across
national
borders
without
being
anchored
to
industrial
modes
of
production
and
consumption.
A
fourth
theme
is
the
ongoing,
but
recently
re-energized
questioning
about
the
role
of
business
schools
and
their
place
in
the
world
as
centers
of
research
and
education
(Harvard
Business
Review
2009).
As
the
global
financial
and
economic
crisis
of
2008
showed,
neither
MBAs
nor
their
professors
have
all
the
answers.
On
the
contrary,
some
of
the
practices
associated
with
the
world
of
high
finance
and
its
emblematic
product,
the
derivative,
carry
with
them
important
and
yet
unanswered
questions
about
governance,
accountability
and
values.
Interest
within
business
schools
in
how
designers
go
about
engaging
with
problems
pre-
dates
the
crisis
(eg
Boland
and
Collopy
2004)
but
rests
on
the
idea
that
established
ways
of
thinking
about
managing
and
organizing
are
not
adequate
to
dealing
with
a
fluid
business
environment
(Tsoukas
and
Chia
2002),
let
alone
any
number
of
global
challenges
from
climate
change,
to
resource
inequality,
to
peak
oil.
What
this
has
meant
for
managers
and
policy-makers
is
that
the
urgent
quest
for
innovation
and
novelty
has
new
resources
a
creative
class
who
have
a
privileged
place
within
contemporary
capitalism.
Understanding
Design
Thinking
Even
on
a
cursory
inspection,
just
what
design
thinking
is
supposed
to
be
is
not
well
understood,
either
by
the
public
or
those
who
claim
to
practice
it.
As
Rylander
(2009)
points
out,
its
hard
enough
understanding
design
and
thinking,
let
alone
design
thinking.
So
it
is
not
a
surprise
that
those
who
support
its
application
to
business
or
more
broadly
to
public
services
or
social
problems,
have
trouble
articulating
what
it
is,
whether
all
designers
can
do
it,
whether
it
is
something
new
or
just
a
different
name
for
what
good
designers
have
always
done,
and
why
it
might
be
a
good
thing
that
non-designers
can
learn
it
and
do
it
too,
or
perhaps
they
do
it
already.
Decoupled
from
any
one
field
or
discipline
of
history
of
design
thinking
is
more
complex.
In
this
section
I
will
outline
some
of
the
main
contributions
and
then
summarized
these
into
three
broad
positions
in
Table
1.
Although
any
such
synthesis
reduces
diverse
research
into
overly
simplistic
categories,
it
can
advance
understanding
by
making
clearer
different
approaches
and
their
implications.
A
stream
of
research
originating
in
the
1960s
focuses
on
how
designers
do
designing.
What
began
as
the
design
methods
movement
(Jones
1970;
Buchanan
and
Margolin
1995)
gradually
shifted
towards
investigations
in
design
thinking
(Cross
1982);
researchers
sought
to
understand
the
processes
and
methods
by
which
(successful)
designers
went
about
design
activity.
This
exploration
also
lead
them
to
study
the
nature
of
design
problems
in
more
depth.
But
to
understand
how
design
thinking
emerged,
we
must
go
back
a
little
earlier
to
understand
how
design
itself
was
understood
at
this
time.
Designs
Fragmented
Core
To
this
day,
design
remains
a
fragmented
discipline.
When
in
1971
Christopher
Alexander
argued
that
design
is
about
giving
form,
organization
and
order
to
physical
things,
he
acknowledged
an
entire
school
of
thought.
For
Alexander,
the
ultimate
object
of
design
is
form
(1971:
15).
The
idea
that
form
is
a
physical
arrangement
remains
a
dominant
view
of
what
designers
do:
they
make
things.
Visitors
to
professional
design
studios
are
likely
to
note
a
disorderly
arrangement
of
objects
on
work
surfaces,
walls
and
floors.
Such
clutter
reminds
us
how
professional
design
still
involves
doing
things
with
and
to
objects,
even
for
those
designers
who
see
their
work
as
designing
intangible
services
or
experiences
(Figure
1).
Writing
contemporaneously
with
Alexander,
Herbert
Simon
was
also
trying
to
understand
and
describe
design.
Having
already
made
contributions
to
economics
and
organization
theory,
Simon
turned
his
attention
to
the
organization
or
in
his
terminology
design
of
human
action
in
the
realm
of
the
artificial.
In
The
Sciences
of
the
Artificial
(1969)
Simon
identifies
design
as
the
way
of
approaching
their
work;
they
rely
on
hunches
and
presuppositions,
not
just
facts.
But
he
also
argues
that
the
nature
of
the
problem-solving
process
itself
shapes
the
solution.
For
Rowe,
discussions
of
how
designers
actually
design
are
necessarily
shaped
by
wider
conversations
about
the
nature
of
architecture
itself.
We
need
to
move
directly
into
the
realm
of
normative
discourse
about
what
constitutes
architecture
and
urban
design
in
order
to
clarify
the
inherent
nature
of
the
enterprise
and
the
direction
in
which
procedures
are
inclined
(Rowe
1998:
37).
Although
Rowe
is
rarely
cited
in
more
recent
texts,
these
topics
frequently
reappear
in
subsequent
literature.
Researchers
working
in
several
fields,
including
engineering,
architecture
and
product
design,
continued
to
study
how
designers
think
and
what
they
know
as
they
solve
problems.
Key
contributors
include
Nigel
Cross,
although
he
generally
prefers
to
use
the
phrase
designerly
ways
of
knowing.(4)
Cross
sees
designers
mode
of
problem
solving
as
solution-focused
as
they
tackle
ill-defined
problems
and
situates
this
within
a
larger
argument
about
design
as
a
coherent
discipline
of
study
distinct
from
the
sciences
and
the
humanities
(1982;
2006).
Donald
Schn
introduced
the
idea
of
framing
and
making
moves
when
problem-solving
during
professionals
reflection-in-action
(Schn
1983).
Bryan
Lawson,
on
the
other
hand,
studied
the
practice
of
designing
in
a
context
of
multiple
constraints
(Lawson
1997).
Nigel
Cross
and
Kees
Dorst
developed
the
idea
that
problems
and
solutions
co-evolve
(Cross
and
Dorst
1998),
and
Cross
suggested
that
designers
treat
all
problems
as
ill-defined,
even
if
they
are
not
(Cross
2006).
Attempting
to
explain
designers
tendencies
to
generate
new
solutions,
many
researchers
have
emphasized
abductive
reasoning
(Cross
1982;
Dorst
2010).
Dorst
(2006)
noted
that
since
a
designers
understanding
of
a
problem
shifts
during
a
design
process,
other
concepts
might
be
better
employed,
suggesting
instead
that
designers
construct
designs
that
transcend
or
connect
paradoxes.
Burnette
(2009)
describes
different
kinds
of
thinking
within
a
design
process.
One
focus
has
been
to
discern
different
levels
of
expertise
among
designers,
from
novices
to
visionaries
(Lawson
and
Dorst
2009),
although
without
much
reference
to
sociological
work
on
professions
and
institutions.
In
short,
while
there
has
been
a
sustained
effort
to
understand
and
describe
what
professional
10
designers
do
in
their
design
work,
this
has
not
yet
generated
a
definitive
or
historically-informed
account
of
design
thinking,
nor
any
explanation
for
why
they
might
have
a
particular
cognitive
style.
While
this
body
of
research
focused
on
designers
and
what
they
think
and
do,
others
continued
to
take
forward
work
defining
the
field
of
design.
Buchanans
(1992)
paper
Wicked
Problems
in
Design
Thinking
shifted
design
theory
away
from
its
legacy
in
craft
and
industrial
production
towards
a
more
generalized
design
thinking.
This
concept,
Buchanan
argues,
could
be
applied
to
nearly
anything,
whether
a
tangible
object
or
intangible
system.
Drawing
on
Pragmatist
philosopher
John
Dewey,
Buchanan
sees
design
as
a
liberal
art,
uniquely
well-
placed
to
serve
the
needs
of
a
technological
culture
in
which
many
kinds
of
things
are
designed,
and
human
problems
are
complex.
For
Buchanan,
design
problems
are
indeterminate
or
wicked
problems
(Rittel
and
Webber
1973).
The
designer
brings
a
unique
way
of
looking
at
problems
and
finding
solutions.
He
describes
four
orders
of
design
which
approximate
the
artifacts
that
design
practitioners
tend
to
work
on:
signs,
things,
actions,
and
thoughts.
This
version
of
design
thinking
is
less
concerned
with
individual
designers
and
how
they
design,
but
rather
seeks
to
define
designs
role
in
the
world.
Similarly,
Rylander
(2009)
also
compares
design
thinking
to
a
Pragmatist
inquiry
and
concludes
that
Deweys
work
on
aesthetic
experience
provides
a
useful
way
to
explore
designers
special
skills
and
examine
the
claims
made
for
them
in
more
detail.
Design
Thinking:
De-politicizing
Managerial
Practice
The
books
and
papers
that
have
done
most
to
popularize
the
idea
of
design
thinking
mostly
ignore
this
literature.
While
the
term
design
thinking
originated
with
academics
who
conducted
research
within
design
disciplines,
today
the
phrase
most
often
situates
design
thinking
in
terms
of
the
challenges
facing
organizations,
especially
businesses
(Figure
2).
Concern
with
designs
place
in
the
world
and
thus
with
larger
social
or
political
questions
is
lost
when
design
is
mobilized
within
a
managerialist
framework.
As
Sam
Ladner
(2009)
puts
it:
11
12
13
14
Key texts
Design thinking as a
Design thinking as
Design thinking as an
cognitive style
a general theory of
organizational resource
design
Buchanan 1992
15
Individual designers,
Design as a field or
especially experts
discipline
organizations
in
need
of
innovation
Designs purpose
Problem solving
Taming wicked
Innovation
problems
Key
concepts
Design ability as a
Design has no
Visualization, prototyping,
form of intelligence;
special subject
empathy, integrative
reflection-in-action,
abductive
thinking
Nature
of
design
problems
ill-structured, problem
wicked problems
design problems
Traditional design
Four orders of
expertise and
disciplines
design
activity
Given
the
diversity
of
these
approaches,
there
is
still
no
clear
description
of
design
thinking.
On
what
principles
is
it
based?
How
different
is
it
to
other
kinds
of
professional
knowledge?
Do
all
designers
exhibit
it?
What
are
its
effects
within
the
worlds
where
design
takes
place?
How
can
it
be
taught?
Further,
these
descriptions
present
several
issues
which
need
to
be
addressed
by
researchers
studying
professional
designers,
as
well
as
the
managers
and
educators
who
apply
these
practices
social
innovation
or
management
education.
In
the
next
section
I
identify
three
such
issues
and
then
suggest
how
design
thinking
might
be
reconsidered.
Acknowledging
the
Cultures
of
Design
Many
studies
in
design
thinking
replicate
a
dualism
within
research
fields;
they
reflect
important
differences
in
the
underlying
ways
the
world
is
understood
and
what
can
be
known
about
it.
Researchers
who
focus
on
the
individual
designer
16
and
his
or
her
cognitive
style
rarely
study
the
world
within
which
the
designer
works
(cf
Bourdieu
1977).
Such
researchers
usually
cultivate
objective
rather
than
subjective
knowledge;
moreover,
their
research
assumes
there
are
clear
boundaries
between
the
designer
and
the
world
s/he
is
in;
further,
the
researcher
is
construed
as
remaining
outside
this
world.
These
studies
describe
what
designers
do
and
trace
how
their
thinking
develops
in
the
course
of
a
project,
but
they
often
ignore
key
aspects
of
the
designers
world.
For
example,
several
studies
of
design
thinking
as
a
cognitive
style
rely
on
protocol
analysis
based
on
recording
and
then
analyzing
what
designers
say
about
what
they
are
doing.
This
is
usually
monitored
during
an
artificial
exercise
in
which
the
designers
are
given
a
problem
to
solve.
While
these
studies
may
produce
interesting
findings,
this
approach
sometimes
presents
a
version
of
design
thinking
as
a
simple
form
of
information
processing
with
inputs
and
outputs
(eg
Badke-Schaub
et
al
2010).
Alternately,
design
thinking
can
be
presented
as
a
process
that
is
supposedly
applied
to
an
organization
(eg
Brown
2009),
though
this
approach
never
clarifies
how
easy
it
is
to
import
it
from
one
context
to
another.
In
contrast,
some
ethnographic
accounts
of
design
thinking
do
not
make
distinctions
between
designer
and
world,
or
between
researcher
and
object
of
study
and
produce
thick
description(Geertz
1973)
of
what
goes
on
during
designing.
These
accounts
attend
to
the
situated,
embodied
ways
that
designers
go
about
their
work
and
the
artifacts
they
engage
with
and
make
(eg
Bucciarelli
1994;
Henderson
1999).
Given
extensive
research
in
design
fields
(eg
Winograd
and
Flores
1986;
Suchman
1987;
Ehn
1988;
Ehn
2008),
not
to
mention
sociology,
anthropology
and
organization
studies,
embodiment
and
being
in
the
world
are
perceived
as
a
condition
of
knowing
and
action.
It
seems
reasonable
to
explore
how
this
approach
might
describe
and
explain
designers
approaches
to
their
work
and
the
nature
of
design
thinking.
Drawing
on
Dewey,
Buchanan
(1992)
and
Rylander
(2009)
do
not
rely
on
this
separation
between
knowing
and
world;
instead,
they
offer
an
understanding
of
the
act
of
designing
by
studying
designers
in
the
world.
However,
they
do
not
share
the
close
attentiveness
paid
to
the
role
of
artifacts
found
in
material
culture
approaches
influenced
by
17
18
19
customer
(eg
Bauer
and
Eagan
2008).
Even
when
design
thinking
involves
designers
having
empathy
with
users,
the
designer
(or
manager
practicing
design
thinking)
is
presented
as
an
agent
of
change
within
an
organization
or
project.
This
perception
starkly
contrasts
with
extensive
work
in
fields
such
as
anthropology,
sociology
and
consumption
studies.
In
the
latter
context,
users,
stakeholders
and
consumers
of
designed
things
all
act
in
ways
that
can
challenge
or
disrupt
the
intentions
of
designers.
For
example,
Lucy
Suchman
(1987)
showed
how
people
using
photocopiers
ignored
the
plans
of
designers,
by
not
following
instructions
displayed
on
the
top
of
the
machine
fully
and
therefore
being
unable
to
use
the
copier,
which
did
not
know
they
had
made
a
mistake.
Combining
consumption
theory
with
studies
of
science
and
technology,
Elizabeth
Shove
et
al.
(2007)
argue
that
innovation
in
products
often
requires
innovation
in
practices.
Suchman,
Shove
and
other
researchers
have
rethought
design,
presenting
it
as
a
distributed
social
accomplishment
within
which
artifacts
and
other
humans
play
important
roles;
they
help
constitute
the
meaning
and
effects
of
a
design.
In
contrast,
accounts
of
design
thinking
continue
to
privilege
the
designer,
however
empathetic,
as
the
main
agent
in
design.
But
such
ideas
may
limit
research,
education
or
practice.
Like
anyone
else,
designers
can
be
attentive
to
some
things,
and
not
others.
We
must
acknowledge
that
design
practice
is
shaped
by
designers
own
theoretical
and
political
commitments
(Fry
2009);
we
must
make
such
knowledge
part
of
practice
and
research
analysis.
Is
Design
Special?
This
essay
assumes
that
designs,
knowledge
and
research
are
constituted
in
practice.
As
studies
of
design
practice
are
gathering
pace
(eg
Suchman
1987;
Ehn
1988;
Julier
2007;
Shove
et
al.
2007;
Ehn
2008;
Fry
2009;
Tonkinwise
2010),
the
field
is
increasingly
positioned
as
part
of
a
wider
turn
within
contemporary
theory
(eg
Schatzki
2001).
But
design
thinking
has
captured
the
imagination
of
practitioners
and
educators
in
a
range
of
fields;
this
widespread
interest
leads
to
a
discussion
of
design
based
more
on
anecdotes
and
claims
than
theoretically
or
empirically
robust
arguments.
These
accounts
of
design
thinking
rely
on
descriptions
of
designers
doings
and
sayings,
the
things
they
make,
what
they
20
know
and
how
they
act
in
the
world.
By
focusing
on
situated,
embodied
material
practices,
rather
than
a
generalized
design
thinking,
we
may
shift
the
conversation
away
from
questions
of
individual
cognition
or
organizational
innovation.
Instead,
design
becomes
a
set
of
routines
that
emerge
in
context.
Such
explorations
help
clarify
designers
material
practices.
They
also
force
us
to
decide
if
design
is
a
special
way
of
engaging
with
and
acting
on
the
world,
unique
to
designers,
or
shared
by
others
such
as
managers
too.(6)
Although
this
body
of
research
is
based
on
a
range
of
theoretical
orientations,
it
raises
important
issues.
Firstly,
accounts
of
design
thinking
often
make
a
distinction
between
thinking
and
action
and
between
the
designer
and
the
context
in
which
they
are
designing;
secondly,
they
propose
that
there
is
something
shared
by
all
designers
while
not
acknowledging
important
differences
in
how
design
professions
and
their
institutions
have
emerged;
and
thirdly,
they
emphasize
designers
as
the
main
agents
in
design.
Instead,
an
alternative
approach
is
proposed.
This
alternative
draws
on
extensive
work
in
anthropology,
sociology,
history,
and
science
and
technology
studies.
Moreover,
these
attend
to
the
routine
practices
of
those
involved
in
design;
they
include
not
just
designers,
but
also
known
and
unknown
users
and
other
stakeholders.
Design
thinking
is
hardly
the
failure
described
by
commentators
like
Bruce
Nussbaum
(2011):
the
practices
of
designers
play
important
roles
in
constituting
the
contemporary
world,
whether
or
not
design
thinking
is
the
right
term
for
this.
Design
thinking
does,
however,
remain
undertheorized
and
understudied;
indeed,
the
critical
rethinking
of
design
thinking
has
only
just
begun.
Acknowledgements
Versions
of
this
paper
were
presented
at
the
European
Academy
of
Management
conference,
Liverpool,
May
2009,
and
at
the
Centre
for
Research
on
Socio-
Cultural
Change
conference,
Manchester,
September
2009
in
a
panel
I
co-
organized
with
Laurene
Vaughan
and
Nina
Wakeford.
The
paper
was
improved
with
feedback
from
the
editor
and
anonymous
reviewers
and
through
discussions
with
Simon
Blyth,
Fred
Collopy,
Anne-Laure
Fayard,
Tony
Fry,
21
Armand
Hatchuel,
Philip
Hill,
Guy
Julier,
Steve
New,
Ken
Starkey,
and
Cameron
Tonkinwise.
Notes
1.
The
term
organization
is
used
here
to
refer
to
formally
and
informally
constituted
entities
that
come
together
to
work
on
a
shared
purpose,
rather
than
being
confined
to
businesses.
2.
It
is
beyond
the
scope
of
the
paper
to
explore
claims
that
designers
have
an
entirely
distinct
way
of
working
in
comparison
to
other
professionals,
let
alone
to
assess
whether
applying
a
design
approach
leads
to
increased
effectiveness
and
efficiency
and
more
innovation,
and
hence
to
organizational
value.
Asking
such
a
question
is
of
course
already
framed
by
assumptions
about
how
value
is
thought
about
and
assessed.
3.
Simons
views
developed
over
the
three
editions
of
The
Sciences
of
the
Artificial
and
his
work
remains
open
to
a
diversity
of
interpretation.
A
recent
paper
in
the
field
of
management,
for
example,
identified
three
main
approaches
to
design
in
Simons
work
(Pandza
and
Thorpe
2010)
whereas
for
Hatchuel
(2001),
Simons
version
of
design
is
best
thought
of
as
problem-solving.
4.
A
book
with
the
title
Design
Thinking
by
Nigel
Cross
was
published
by
Berg
in
2011.
5.
Although
there
are
closer
links
to
Browns
version
of
design
thinking
as
discussed
in
Dunne
and
Martin
(2006)s
study
of
business
education.
6.
I
should
draw
attention
to
my
own
stake
in
this
conversation:
I
teach
in
a
business
school.
While
it
is
somewhat
overshadowed
by
the
rather
older
university
of
which
it
is
a
department,
as
a
young
school
founded
in
1996
it
has
tried
to
chart
a
path
that
offers
a
vision
of
management
education
that
draws
on
several
disciplines
and
on
critical
discussion,
including
among
its
specialisms
science
and
technology
studies.
Having
come
from
an
art
and
design
practice
background,
I
have
taught
a
version
of
design
and
design
management
to
MBA
students
since
2005.
My
MBA
elective
is
taken
by
up
to
50
students
a
year,
giving
them
a
brief
exposure
to
the
material
practices
of
design,
opportunities
to
collaborate
with
designers,
and
an
orientation
to
the
artifacts
and
arrangements
within
organizations
as
sites
for
design
inquiries,
idea
generation
and
22
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