Tim Brown

Roger L. Martin

<article-ideainbrief class="article-ideainbrief">
 <h4 class="ideainbrief-title">Idea in Brief</h4>
 <div class="ideainbrief-contents">
  <h5>The Problem</h5>
  <p>Complex new designs of products (say, an electric vehicle) or systems (like a school system) typically struggle to gain acceptance. Many good groundbreaking ideas fail in the starting gate.</p>
  <h5>Why It Happens</h5>
  <p>New products and systems often require people to change established business models and behaviors. As a result they encounter stiff resistance from their intended beneficiaries and from the people who have to deliver or operate them.</p>
  <h5>The Solution</h5>
  <p>Treat the introduction of the new product or system—the “designed artifact”—as a design challenge itself. When Intercorp Group in Peru took that approach, it won acceptance for a new technology-enabled school concept in which the teacher facilitates learning rather than serves as the sole lesson provider.</p>
 </div>
</article-ideainbrief><p>Throughout most of history, design was a process applied to physical objects. Raymond Loewy designed trains. Frank Lloyd Wright designed houses. Charles Eames designed furniture. Coco Chanel designed haute couture. Paul Rand designed logos. David Kelley designed products, including (most famously) the mouse for the Apple computer.</p>

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<p>Ever since it became clear that smart design led to the success of many products, companies have been employing it in other areas, from customer experiences, to strategy, to business ecosystems. But as design is used in increasingly complex contexts, a new hurdle has emerged: gaining acceptance of the &#8220;designed artifact&#8221; into the status quo. In fact, the more innovative a new design is, the more resistance it&#8217;s likely to meet. The solution, say the CEO of IDEO and the Rotman School&#8217;s former dean, is to also apply design thinking to the introduction of the innovation itself.</p>
<p>This process, <em>intervention design,</em> grew organically out of the iterative prototyping that designers did to help understand customers&#8217; reactions to new products. Not only did iterative prototyping create better offerings, but it was a great way to get organizational funding and commitment, because it improved the chances of success and reduced fear of the unknown. Intervention design uses iterative prototyping to get buy-in too, but extends it to interactions with all the principal stakeholders&#8212;not just customers.</p>
<p>When Intercorp Group devised a revolutionary concept for Peru&#8217;s schools, it needed to win acceptance for corporate-run education and for a very different role for teachers. Thanks to intervention design, it now has 29 schools in operation and is rapidly growing.</p>
<p class="reprint">HBR Reprint R1509C</p>

Design for Action

Ever since it became clear that smart design led to the success of many products, companies have been employing it in other areas, from customer experiences, to strategy, to business ecosystems. But as design is used in increasingly complex contexts, a new hurdle has emerged: gaining acceptance of the “designed artifact” into the status quo. In fact, the more innovative a new design is, the more resistance it’s likely to meet. The solution, say the CEO of IDEO and the Rotman School’s former dean, is to also apply design thinking to the introduction of the innovation itself. This process, intervention design, grew organically out of the iterative prototyping that designers did to help understand customers’ reactions to new products. Not only did iterative prototyping create better offerings, but it was a great way to get organizational funding and commitment, because it improved the chances of success and reduced fear of the unknown. Intervention design uses iterative prototyping to get buy-in too, but extends it to interactions with all the principal stakeholders—not just customers. When Intercorp Group devised a revolutionary concept for Peru’s schools, it needed to win acceptance for corporate-run education and for a very different role for teachers. Thanks to intervention design, it now has 29 schools in operation and is rapidly growing. HBR Reprint R1509C

Design for Action

Resumo.

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