Growing by Design
lessons from fundraising
I just completed a very different project for me...fundraising for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS). I was naive about how to approach it so I did what I knew to do...treated it like a marketing campaign. To my surprise, I won the Cincinnati Woman of the...
suggestion box vs. co-creation
I overheard a conversation the other day and the people were talking about how their company is eager to co-create so they have asked their stakeholders for suggestions. I immediately cringed. A suggestion box, or inviting people to share their feedback, is an...
Iteration vs. Rework
I remember my first "one page memo" at P&G as a newly minted MBA. It was redlined and revised 16 times (I counted) making non substantive changes so that it could be properly positioned. It was an excrutiating process that sucked the life out of me. It was...
Happiness by Design
One of the gifts of working in a way that is human centered is that it is fulfilling, as you tune into the needs, motivations and realities of someone's life. People leveraging design thinking find they "fall in love" with the person for whom they are solving. This...
Insights are T.H.A.T.
In my last blog I talked about the Magic of Empathy. There is a great gift empathy provides as part of that magic: it reveals deep insights that previously were obscured. With design thinking, and empathy in particular, these insights become clear. Sometimes they...
The Magic of Empathy
Recently I felt that magic moment when deep empathy emerges as I was wrapping up an engagement with a client. You may have felt this moment...when all of the sudden something comes into focus for the first time that makes everything clearer. You can hear a pin drop...
Fascinating Rhythm
There is a rhythm to design thinking. Design thinking is not just about creative thinking. It balances creative thinking with analytical thinking. Daniel Kahneman calls it in his book Thinking, Fast and Slow System 1 & System 2 Thinking. Design...
To everything there is a season
Tis the season! I have been silent lately, not having blogged since November 14th. I think that is fitting. In the US, at least, it is crazy time with people celebrating Thanksgiving in November as a lead in to a myriad of holidays that fall in November/December....
Shine Your Light
There is a marketing concept that is so critical in branding and innovation…point of difference, or POD. What is it that is unique about you, your idea, your business? If you don’t know what is distinctive, how can you make the impact you hope to have? With that...
Hidden in Plain Sight
I am often shocked by how simple design thinking innovation is. It is breakthrough and yet simple. I am also constantly amazed at how design thinking can be useful in so many contexts from creating products to business strategy to health care. For instance, Design...