Design thinking innovation and trends foresighting

During the 20th century, designers focused primarily on the form and function of products to improve their value in markets. In recent times, design has become an increasingly used discipline to address more complex problems and to generate and promote strategic innovation not only within products, but on a broader scale.

This is what the conference article written by Alessandro Manetti, Pablo Lara Navarra and Enric Serradell López, member of the Management & eLearning (MeL) research group, is about. This was prepared for the Research and Innovation Forum 2022 conference.

About the article

18 professionals with a transdisciplinary and transgenerational profile participated in the study, prioritizing gender equality. Finally, nine women and nine men were selected, with an age range between 23 and 65 years, all of them linked to the different design disciplines.

The study concludes that the combination of a visualization tool and the design thinking process, known as the Deflexor methodology, is effective in fostering future innovation. This methodology allows creating detailed user profiles, not only describing the individual, but also showing their interaction with various social, economic, technological, environmental, cultural and interpersonal environments.

Visualization makes it easier to understand the complexity of trends and their interrelationships, which is crucial to establish and facilitate the generation of future scenarios.

The association between the visualization tool and the design thinking process overcomes the limitations of the technological approach. Highlighting the importance of an integrated perspective that combines digital, knowledge-based, human-centered and socially oriented approaches in strategy implementation of innovation.

The use of automated design-based tools supported by visualization techniques is essential to understanding the future. Although technology alone does not guarantee innovation, its correct application, together with flexible skills and knowledge, is key to success.

These platforms streamline strategic decision-making processes for the implementation of new products and allow users to be contextualized in the context of trends, macrotrends and megatrends, promoting strategic reflection and innovation.

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