INGENIEUR
SPECIAL REPORT
LEARNING TO INNOVATE
VIA DESIGN THINKING
Malaysia’s only Design Thinking School - Genovasi,
offers graduates, entrepreneurs and senior executives
unique learning experiences to solve real-life problems.
A mind map about Geovasi, the school for Design Thinking.
C
oined by renowned design company IDEO
founder David Kelley, the term “Design
Thinking” refers to a set of principles, from
mindset to process, that can be applied to solve
complex problems. The study of design thinking
is said to facilitate the innovation process and
thereby create future innovators. In short, anyone
can learn to innovate.
Two institutions, namely the d.school in
Stanford, California and the Hasso-Plattner-Institut
(HPI) School of Design Thinking in Potsdam,
Germany are pioneers in the development and
dissemination of Design Thinking. These schools
have unique teaching methods and real-life
relevance as they work with project partners to
solve everyday problems in industry and public
institutions.
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VOL
- DECEMBER 2016
VOL68
55OCTOBER
JUNE 2013
Design thinking can be described as
a discipline that uses the designer’s
sensibility and methods to match people’s
needs with what is technologically feasible
and what a viable business strategy can
convert into customer value and market
opportunity.
– Tim Brown CEO, IDEO
The Design Thinking process combines
methodology from engineering with experimental
aspects from the teaching of design. It minimises
the uncertainty and risk of innovation by engaging
customers or users through a series of prototypes
to learn, test and refine concepts. Design thinkers
rely on customer insights gained from real-world
experiments, not just historical data or market
research.