Tag: empathy

  • Empathy in action – how to protect toddler naps in extreme circumstances

    You know the Fazer chocolates, right? You have seen them at the airports at least.   Some years ago, a construction company called NCC in Finland had to renovate an office above a nursery at the Fazer chocolate factory. This created a challenge: how to keep the noisy construction from waking up the toddlers during their…

  • Empathy – a Core Competence for Design Thinkers

    The modern business world is fast-paced and highly competitive. Companies must stay innovative to answer the complex demands of the ever-changing market and business needs. Design thinking has found its’ way to larger organizations as an answer to simplifying the challenges of both modern business and technology. (Kolko 2015.)   For business success, an empathic approach of design…

  • Empathy is the superpower you need to design truly innovative services

    In today’s world of complex systems and processes, people seek simplicity and real value. At the same time, companies’ competition for people’s attention is fiercer than ever. They face the challenge to differentiate themselves from competitors to gain the loyalty of their customers. Design Thinking might be the way we can add real and lasting…

  • Who are you designing for?

    For yourself? For the leadership who asked you to drive a new project? Think again. One of the first phases of applying Design Thinking is understanding who your audience is by building a deeper understanding of who you are designing for. Steven Portigal shares a great reminder by saying; “You may be a user but…

  • Empathy in focus: Design Thinking during disruption

    Today, the uncertainty around us is overwhelming. The world is saturated with Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity (VUCA). However, we need to manage our daily lives, improve, create, and deliver. Design Thinking (DT) methods provide us with a chain of systematic approaches to tackle the novel beast head-on and conquer. The DT process takes us…

  • Becoming a Design Thinking Organization: Sense Making through Empathy

    Co-authored by Airine Kariuki and Saper Sahbaz “There is only one valid purpose of a corporation: to create a customer” (Drucker, 2006). As called by some “the father of modern management”, Peter Drucker drew attention to customer-centricity 67 years ago, dividing the management practice into two camps: those who strive for customer value creation vs.…

  • Why do we need empathy in the design process and how to gain it?

    Introduction to empathy Most of us can probably recall products or services where it is clear that usability has been so far off from the priority list that the product/service is unreasonably difficult or even impossible to use. What is needed that these above-mentioned mishaps can be avoided and services and products designed are actually…

  • Using empathy as part of a creative process in Design Thinking

    Our assignment was to write a blog article in pairs reflecting on the topics discussed in the course Design Thinking. The two-day intensive course during September 4-5th 2020 was held by Katja Tschimmel, the founder of design agency Mindshake and the model Evolution 6² or E6² (2018), and our tutoring teacher Päivi Pöyry-Lassila.  In our group we used the model E6² to identify…

  • Is There Such A Thing As Too Much Empathy?

    Disclaimer:  These thoughts, opinions, and observations are mine, and mine alone.  They are not the thoughts of my fellow Dash team members, only myself.  I recently had the immense pleasure of participating in the 2019 Dash Hackathon in Helsinki (organized by the Aalto Entrepreneurship Society – “Aaltoes”) which is the largest design hackathon in Europe. …

  • Design Thinking process activated!

    I realized some time ago that service design is the key issue to improve and develop processes and customer satisfaction. After I found this definition and concept, it felt that different pieces found their places – I love developing customer experience and always try my best in understanding and identifying customer needs. I was thinking…