Change by Design: How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires Innovation

This is an incredibly well written book that is accessible by anyone. With clear explanations of the key principles of the methodology, and compelling reasons why human-centered design is important, the book does a great job of explaining what design thinking is and why it's important. As someone who initially approached design thinking with a healthy degree of skepticism, this book really shook my view of how to develop new products and services. Tim Brown does a great job of laying out the methodology and providing examples of how it has been used to develop cool stuff. Perhaps the best part about this book is that it is an easy read, something you can easily digest in a weekend, and yet gets across the fundamentals of design thinking in a clear and compelling way. Can't recommend this book highly enough.

"Change By Design" is an introduction to Design Thinking written by the CEO of IDEO, the famous design firm from which Design Thinking originates. The book is about 250 pages and reads easy and relative quick. Design Thinking spreads techniques used by designers to be used for larger than typical design problems and also teaches these techniques to non-designers. So people in cross-functional teams can focus on usable well-designed and well-solved products. The book consists of two parts. The first part is an introduction to Design Thinking and the second part describes how it might affect the world. Part One introduces many Design Thinking techniques such as creating empathy, deeply understanding the customer, brainstorming, prototyping, iterating, etc. Each of these techniques is described with stories and examples. Part two starts of with design thinking in organizations but then moves towards the more idealistic space of using design thinking to do good and solve real problems in the world. Each chapter covers one topic on Design Thinking. Each topic is introduces mostly by stories related to that technique. Most of the stories are directly from IDEO. On one hand, it is nice to read the IDEO stories, on the other hand (as some other reviewers have pointed out), it makes it sometimes almost like a sales pitch of IDEO. It would have been nice to have a other stories also. The book is a nice and quick read. The stories are interesting and it provides a good introduction to Design Thinking. Four stars and recommended for everyone who wants to learn about IDEO and Design Thinking.

Tim Brown's book is one of the best I've read in the last twenty years. It reflects the changes we've seen in the environment - the speedup of change, the adaptability required for survival and prosperity, and the widespread effect of these changes across all of economics and society as a whole. And then, Brown recommends some adaptations that are proven effective in such an environment. In effect, it is a book on design thinking. As a veteran business professor, I've seen a lot of "fad theories" come and go, but this one is one I believe will stick around because it explains not only what's happening, but offers suggestions about what to do about it. In addition, it's a pleasure to read; it's articulate, literate, and well-argued, on the basis of "real world application" evidence. It's certainly worth your time and money. I have both the physical book, and an e-copy, and I've read both several times, usually learning something new every time.

Tim Brown has been a thought-leader in innovation and design thinking for decades, so it is an honor to get a glimpse inside and learn his POVs and philosophies on the matter. Change by Design provides a wonderful overview of how design-thinking has evolved, how it's applied in business and the impact this approach can have - not only on product and service development - but on how we might think about solving some of the larger problems facing humankind. Importantly, Mr. Brown clearly shows how the process can be applied at the enterprise-level so this should be required reading for top management. There are numerous examples provided from Mr. Brown's own experience at IDEO, although the details are often vague regarding the process itself.

The book is great for exploring the discipline of design thinking and even greater when it has applied it to so many cases of innovation in the context of "change". Tim has expansive experience in the field, no doubt about it. But, in many places in the book I found Tim wondering around aimlessly and that sometimes confused me, and many times made my journey of this read difficult. Maybe because he has the mind of a designer and design thinking could easily look like an aimless journey.. and coping with a mind of designer along a creative path is by nature an unpredictable experience. Besides, I wish Tim goes for a refresh on the book as 2008 is too old for an era of digital transformation and disruption. In my opinion, "design thinking" is a bad name for a way of work that has evolved over time and in many areas that hardly can be claimed as belonging to it. Empathy and human-centered approaches, observation, brainstorming, experimentation, and prototyping are all ways of work and development that you can find in many disciplines such as design, strategy, software, training, problem-solving, and many more. Being a bad name is because of two reasons: it emphasizes "thinking" and ignores "doing", and it mentally (not actually) attaches it to design while it applies to many other areas. But I guess "design thinking" is made to stick, and I have no real issue with that. I would recommend this book for those who would like to explore the topic and at the same be cautious of its fuzzy nature.

Overall, an interesting read. The book focuses on a human-centered approach to design and problem solving. A large emphasis is on the use of participant observation and other social anthropological research methodologies (e.g. want to improve the experience of air travelers? follow a bunch around from the minute they leave their house until they leave their destination's airport). Furthermore, the book places a great deal of emphasis on seeking out outliers rather than the "average" customer or user--the idea being that observing extreme users can yield very interesting insights into functionality and user needs, some of which would remain unknown if you just focused on average users. Finally, the book suggests ways for all sorts of business to create environments that lend themselves to innovation and ideation by incorporating some of the lessons of designers and design thinkers. Even business service firms can benefit from a research and development approach akin to some of the world's leading consumer goods companies (e.g. Proctor & Gamble). The book certainly could have been shorter--too many random examples and way too much of what seemed like a forces tie-in with environmentalism--but overall a thought provoking read.

This book both informs and inspires. I took my time - and copious notes - going through it. I challenged myself to think about how I would 1) apply it at the project level on service work we do 2) use it to guide innovation at a company level. This book allowed me to consider both applications. If you want to understand the basics of design thinking - and get ample examples of it in use - then this book as a great read for you.

For me, This is the second design and innovation book I have read for one of my business courses. Being a mechanical engineer, a lot of my experiences relate to systematic problem solving. In most cases, a top down approach is used for troubleshooting a system. Design thinking truly allows us to think in new ways and develop unique solutions to problems. I found this book extremely helpful, as it showed me how to step back from my projects and look at the purpose in a new light.