Design thinking offers a concrete framework towards solving hard problems. It allows designers, engineers and business folk feel aligned about usually nebulous, fuzzy processes like brainstorming, ideation and creativity. In the name of design thinking, teams can align on making space for ideation and creativity which ultimately does encourage positive outcomes.
Although having such frameworks may in fact help tackle these problems, the vision and buzz sold alongside design thinking is its biggest peril.
These perils can be seen in the Gainesville example. The town was likely sold this shiny, new idea of design thinking (and overpromises) under the context of it being a universal approach towards tackling hard design problems. The problem is that this approach was not only invented by Silicon Valley designers and engineers to solve problems in Silicon Valley, but that through such an emphasis on the shiny design process, the entire context of the problem was missed. Instead of cutting and pasting this framework directly onto this problem without regard for the context and history behind this problem, the designers should have spent more time familiarizing themselves with the basics of the problem, instead of diving deep in the wrong direction.
