Research & strategy

Design Thinking

Empathise, Define, Ideate, Prototype, Test: a human-centred way to solve problems.

⏱ 12 minBeginnerBy IDEO & Stanford d.schoolSince 2000s

Use it when

Team problem solving and workshops that start from empathy.

You'll walk away with

A point-of-view statement, ideas and tested prototypes.

Step 1 · The idea

Solve problems the way designers do

Design Thinking is a human-centred way to solve problems, made popular by the design firm IDEO and the Stanford d.school in the 2000s. Tim Brown, IDEO's CEO, described it in Change by Design (2009).

The d.school version has five stages: Empathise, Define, Ideate, Prototype, Test. They aren't a straight line — teams move back and forth as they learn.

Design Thinking and the Double Diamond describe the same spirit. Empathise + Define is the first diamond; Ideate + Prototype + Test is the second.

Step 2 · Play with it

The five stages

Select a stage. The dashed arrows show where you might loop back.

Empathise

Who are we designing for, and what do they experience?

What you do

Observe people in their real context
Interview with open questions
Try the experience yourself (immersion)

Output

Stories, observations, surprises

Tip: Look for what people do, not only what they say.

Three lenses

Desirable, feasible, viable

IDEO's test for a good idea: it sits where all three overlap. Rate an idea and see where it lands.

Idea

Desirability — do people want it?8

Feasibility — can we build it?6

Viability — does it work as a business?7

Sweet spot. “Shared cart so a family can order dinner together” scores well on all three lenses. Prototype and test it.

Step 3 · Worked example

One dinner, five different tastes

A fictional team at “Thali”, a food delivery app, uses design thinking to help families order together.

Thali checkout

🛒 One phone, one cart

Fast checkout for one person

Step 1

A proud team

The Thali team had built a quick, clean checkout. They visited families at home to watch a real dinner order.

Before

Friday, 8 PM

👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Five people pass one phone around, arguing about what to get

After 20 minutes, one person orders for all

Step 2

Empathise: a noisy living room

They watched the phone go round the room and realised the app was built for one person deciding — but dinner is a group decision.

Empathise

Point of view

Families ordering one dinner need everyone's choice to count, because passing one phone around means the loudest person decides.

Step 3

Define: the real need

The problem wasn't the menu or the checkout. It was how a family decides together.

Define

Shared cart

🔗 Share the cart link in the family chat

🍛 Everyone adds their own dish from their phone

Paper sketches + a clickable mock-up

Step 4

Ideate and prototype

With help from families, the team sketched many ideas and prototyped a shared cart. The menu stayed the same; the way of ordering changed.

IdeatePrototype

Results

Families ordered much faster

Fewer “I didn't want this” moments

“For once, nobody had to shout their order across the room.”

Step 5

Test: dinner, sorted

In tests, families finished ordering sooner and were happier with the meal. Empathy changed the outcome, not a bigger menu.

Test

Fictional worked example for teaching. Thali is not a real company, and the research findings and results are illustrative.

Step 4 · Try it

Point-of-view statement builder

The bridge between Empathise and Ideate. A good POV names a user, a need and a surprising insight.

User (be specific)

Needs (a verb, not a feature)

Because (the surprising insight)

Point of view

A parent ordering one dinner for a family of five needs to feel sure everyone gets something they enjoy because passing one phone around takes ages and the quietest child never gets asked.

How might we…

How might we help parent ordering one dinner for a family of five feel sure everyone gets something they enjoy?
How might we let everyone choose without passing one phone around?
How might we turn ordering dinner into a moment the family enjoys?

Watch out

Common mistakes

✓ Do

Spend real time with real users before ideating
Loop back when you learn something new
Prototype cheaply and early
Mix people from different roles
Test with users, not just colleagues

✗ Avoid

Running a one-day workshop and calling it design thinking
Skipping empathy because “we know our users”
Falling in love with the first idea
Polished prototypes that nobody wants to criticise
Treating the five stages as a strict checklist

Cheat sheet

Design Thinking in one screen

STAGES (non-linear)
EMPATHISE  observe, interview, immerse     → stories, surprises
DEFINE     synthesise, POV, HMW            → the real need
IDEATE     brainstorm, sketch, go wide     → many ideas
PROTOTYPE  cheap, fast, just enough        → testable things
TEST       watch, ask, learn               → refine or loop back

POV     [User] needs [need] because [insight].
LENSES  desirable (people) · feasible (technology) · viable (business)
MINDSETS  bias to action · show don't tell · embrace ambiguity

Use it at work

Figma template

A ready-made canvas for running this framework with your team. Free, editable, and it works in Figma and FigJam.

Figma & FigJam · free

Design Thinking sprint board

Five stage columns
Point of view statement
Three lenses check

1Download the SVG, or copy it to your clipboard.
2In Figma or FigJam, drag the file onto the canvas — or paste with ⌘V / Ctrl V.
3Everything arrives as editable layers: type in the boxes, add stickies, duplicate rows.

Download SVGOpen in Figma ↗

Check yourself