Understanding the design thinking process has given me a framework for how I can help address societal problems. I believe that the core components of this process — empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test — are key steps that should be followed in some form or another when designing solutions. The techniques I have learned through design thinking courses at Stanford, such as asking open-ended questions during needfinding interviews and creating judgement free spaces for people to express wild ideas while brainstorming, have been invaluable. They have both improved my skill in doing user-centered design and provided value in other aspects of my life (e.g. improving my skill in conducting career-related informational interviews or doing brainstorming in other contexts). These techniques encourage people to understand the needs of others and explore a variety of ways to design solutions, rather than relying only on their own perspective. By explaining design thinking in a simple framework, it becomes more broadly accessible.
However, the explanation of design thinking as a quick and easy, five step, linear process is greatly simplified and not really accurate to do high-quality design. Maggie Gram’s article highlights the perils of design thinking, especially for marginalized communities. If people think of design thinking as a quick and easy process that anyone can do in just a few days, people may rush through the process and not take into account the voices of marginalized communities. People also may not be given the time to engage in deep, solo thinking. Doing design thinking well requires a great deal of expertise and time. Designing for a new community requires a deep understanding of that community’s background and needs, which may be better left to a UX Researcher with expertise on needfinding techniques ranging from ethnographic studies to surveys. If user empathy is cultivated only by understanding the needs of the most prominent user group, marginalized communities could be adversely impacted because their needs are not incorporated into solutions. As an HCI student at Stanford, it is apparent to me that learning about the design thinking process does not make you qualified to do UX Research and UX Design, so it should not be marketed that way.
Women are often failed by design. For example, recent studies have found that women are more likely to be injured and to die during car crashes than men. This is because cars have been designed using car crash-test dummies based on the “average male.” In the context of the design thinking process, crash-tests for cars are a form of a prototype, as car manufacturers can iterate on their vehicle design if they are shown to be unsafe. However, if they only design for the “average male” user, then this puts much of the population at a high risk. Only in 2011 did cars start using a female crash-test dummy in addition to the male dummies. The situation has been even worse for pregnant women. I think that the reason for these failures is that the designers, in this case car manufacturers, have not been held truly accountable by the population to design vehicles that are safe for everyone. Societal pressure and government accountability should be amplified when the designs created by companies put certain populations at risk.
