What is Strategic Design Management?
It’s an integrated (reiterating) approach of Sensing, Analyzing, Synthesizing, Doing, and Measuring together.
How Strategic Design Management can be used in business?
For example, you are a manager, and you are inferred that one of your employees cannot even join the online meeting on time. Generally, we start with concluding with the reasons like that even when he doesn’t have to travel, why can’t he join daily morning meetings on time? We are paying him! Because of him, I’m getting late for many other tasks as the meeting starts late. And the list goes on. But which is actually not solving but maybe increasing the problems.
I feel the role-playing method would be better to express my interpretation of how Strategic Design Management can work for every business. In this case, for a while, let’s look at your employee as a user and your role as a Design Thinker. And you want to sell your importance to him to be on time for the meeting. I hope you are getting what I’m trying to convey.
The Strategic Design Management process starts with…
- Sensing:
Brainstorm one to one and learn about the problem of your employee, in this case, he is a user. (Practically, which is known as the process of primary Design Research) here sensing plays an important role, how to empathize, feel, and find the emotional gaps about why he has not been able to join the daily meeting on time? Maybe because of his daily routine habits, liking, disliking (behaviors), or the family intervention at the time of joining meetings? Maybe lack of motivation for him to connect on time, his knowledge or skills, he is feeling that he is already doing more than what was expected as per his profile, maybe he doesn’t like you by all means, and so on…
2: Analysing:
It is to think and reason the problem logically. Here rational gaps could be that users may not have the required internet speed, quality of gadgets, Wi-Fi issues, which happen in India, or facing network issues while connecting. Maybe the laptop takes more than usual time to start. Generally, our reasoning ends with judgments, like that’s not my problem? He is being appointed, and he should join on time. Period. I would like to recommend here if we can keep our judgment aside while analyzing the problem.
If you are confident that you have to assess both the gaps rightly that are emotional and rational, it’s time to synthesize them with the most desirable viable and feasible solution.
3: Syhtesising:
You need to synthesize all the emotional and rational gaps ( In integration) which you have sensed and analyzed and then plan possible solutions. For example, if your budget allows for the benefits, you are gaining in your business because of that employee, you can rationalize the problem by providing him with the latest gadgets and arranging for the required internet speed.
and emotionally, you can motivate him by expressing empathy through reflective listening. By avoiding argumentation. Acknowledging and exploring his resistance to change, rather than opposing it. Appreciate him for what he has been performing, let’s try to think of possible alternatives to solve the problem like changing the meeting time schedules, which is advisable and suits both of you, or maybe scaling up his income which can work. There could be more alternatives (emotional and rational) that can be filled to sustain the associations. To solve the problem finally, it all depends on how specific finding the gaps are.
The last step is to measure, check, to re-assess, and reiterate the solution as many times the solutions create another problem!!! As a Design Thinker, the most important thing is to understand the user’s end goals and find solutions that keep him satisfied.
Why this approach is important for any business?
In the end, Users are humans and our judgments and decisions are based on what we like and dislike. The role of Strategic Design Management is to deal with and fill both rational and emotional gaps in the business. The design management approach helps to identify and offers alternative solutions ( emotional and rational ) to improve the strategic, functional, or operational success parameters to achieve the business goals and objectives. It supports resolving internally and externally achieving the most desirable, viable, and feasible solutions to scaling up the bottom line, improving the performance, and generating favorable business experiences for the entire value chain.
