Design thinking is not the thing that most business think of when a problem or a change is required. Most of the businesses run on the concept of analytical thinking. Most decisions taken by C-level employees and other executives are based on the well derived reports and after a lot of logical reasoning. This has been successful for almost everyone.
But most of these businesses are unaware of the need for design thinking. They find it difficult to digest that there is a whole other aspect of thinking that is different from analytical thinking. Not because they are complacent but just the ignorance and lack of awareness about another type of thinking.
Here, we are going to discuss the main differences between design thinking and analytical thinking.
Reasoning
Reasoning is the foundation of any kind of thinking. Most decisions humans make are based on the reasons of the outcomes. When you are stuck at a a junction of thought and need to select a path, you always tend to come up with reasons which is logical to take a particular path. This process is called reasoning. There are multiple types of reasoning and that matters on how you define the type of thinking you do.
Deductive Reasoning
Most of us tend to make decisions based on this kind of reasoning. Deductive reasoning starts by considering the general rules and laws and then moves to the particular problem in hand. Basically from cause to effect. This helps making in logical conclusions.
Inductive Reasoning
Inductive reasoning starts from detailed observations based on experience or verifiable facts of reality rather than theory or pure logic. Once that is achieved then it moves to the next step of general plausible principle based conclusions.
Abductive Reasoning
Abductive reasoning starts with incomplete observations and moves to possible hypotheses. This type of reasoning achieves a plausible conclusion but does possibly verify it.
What is analytical thinking ?
Analytical thinking is the ability/skill of an individual to scrutinize and break down facts and thoughts into strengths and weaknesses. It involves thinking in thoughtful, discerning ways in order to analyse data, recall and use information which leads to effective decisions or solve critical problems.
Analytical thinking emphasises mostly deductive reasoning and inductive reasoning but no abductive reasoning. It also focuses on refinement and efficiency of a thought and on reliability, consistency and predictability of the outcomes.
It involves the following factors :
- Focusing on facts and evidence.
- Deductive and/or inductive Reasoning.
- Analysing data or information or systems.
- Dissecting data or information which is complex into simpler constituents.
- Partitioning or breaking down an analysis into mutually exclusive categories.
- Analysis of a problem into alternative possibilities and and then elimination or systematic rejection of unacceptable alternatives.
- Analysing trends or patterns over time.
- Predictions or conclusions based on past reference.
What is Design Thinking ?
Design thinking is the ability/skill mostly used by designers or innovators to make a user centric solution. Unlike analytical thinking, this need not necessarily be to solve a problem or make a change in the existing process. This thought process mainly points to innovative outcomes.
It refers to cognitive, strategic and practical processes by which design concepts are developed. Its the method designers use in ideation and development which can also has applications elsewhere.
Design thinking emphasises mostly abductive reasoning and it focuses on exploration (search, risk) which can lead to innovative outcomes and then validation of these outcomes to meet the user’s desired objective.
Design thinking has 5 stages. These stages are not always sequential and it is not required by the designers to approach them so. Designers will find the stages often occur in parallel and see repeated use on an iterative basis. So designers consider these stages as different modes that contribute to a project.
Empathy
Empathy, the first stage in design thinking is crucial because it allows you to set aside your own assumptions about the world in order to gain insight into users and their needs. This stage involves entering the world of the users and, having their perspectives so as to begin work on custom-designing a solution.
Define
During the Define stage of Design thinking, you put together the information you have created and gathered during the Empathize stage. You analyze your observations and synthesize them in order to define the core problems you have identified so far.
Ideate
This stage makes you ready to start generating ideas. With the knowledge you have gathered in the first two phases of design thinking, you can start to think outside the box to identify new solutions to the problem statement you’ve created, and you can start to look for alternative ways of viewing the problem.
Prototype
This stage of design thinking is where you produce inexpensive, scaled down versions of the product or specific features found within the product so you can further investigate the problem solutions generated in the previous step.
Test
This is where you go all in to test the finished product. You do all kind of rigorous testing on this product to ensure quality using the solutions identified during the prototyping phase. This is meant to be the final stage of design thinking, however in most cases, based on the test results the product is then redefined.
So which thinking is better ?
In the business world, analytical thinking is the “boss”, unarguably, it has provided with key insights and help make critical decisions. However, design thinking is what makes you stand out in the crowd. It helps you think out of the box, take risks and innovate.
Analytical thinking could be considered a part of the design thinking. Design thinking is a whole process put in place to create something new or come up with an innovative solution. This requires both strong analytical thinking and high amount of creativity.
Analytical thinking sticks to solving a problem by using data and making sense out of it and forming rich insights or patterns. Design thinking goes further and turns that information you learned and mixes it up with creativity and design skills to come up with some innovative (Be it in designing business models, new products or websites).
Without design thinking, innovation and competitive advantage becomes a lot more difficult. And, that’s what businesses should be aiming for. Companies are wise to create processes which encourage design thinking as well as analytical thinking.
A well balanced process of both analytical and design thinking could be the success formula the business are looking for.
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Disclaimer: The facts and opinions expressed within this article are the personal opinions of the author. Picasso Creative Writing does not assume any responsibility or liability for the accuracy, completeness, suitability, or validity of any information in this article.
