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Trump’s federal government shutdown, May’s Brexit proposal, Sears’<\/a> and Victoria’s Secret’s<\/a> retail strategy, even my own struggling start-up<\/a>: these are all examples of potentially failed strategies. These strategies might have had a chance had they been created using a little Design Thinking. This is a creative problem-solving process that eschews grand solutions in favor of an incremental, failure-welcoming, iterative learning and building process. Organizations and individuals can use Design Thinking to build better strategies and tactics, increasing chances for success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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An effective strategy begins with a mission statement, covers the whole organization, extends a year or more into the future and helps make sure we’re taking the right risks<\/em>. Strategy consists of carefully constructed goals, whose success or failure can be measured (via Key Performance Indicators<\/a>) and is driven by available resources and structures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whether we’re working on a business, political or personal strategy, this can be an overwhelming task. Indeed, we rarely start from scratch, so status quo bias (we prefer things as they are) and loss aversion (we hate mistakes) can limit our creativity, willingness to take appropriate risks and effectiveness. Design Thinking can help. The diagram below depicts the four-step process. Let’s apply it to strategic planning for organizations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Design
Design Thinking Process. SOURCE: DECISION FISH LLC<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The first stage is Discover<\/em>.<\/strong> If our strategy is intended to increase our chances of success, we need to understand the mission: what are we trying to achieve? My personal favorite mission statement, because of its clarity, ambition, optimism, failure-tolerance and measure-ability is from Star Trek:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no one has gone before!<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

A useful tool for discovering the context in which the mission is to be pursued is the SWOT matrix. It helps us consider factors that can help or hinder our success, from either internal and external sources. Here’s how it applies to the original Star Trek series:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Star
Star Trek SWOT diagram. In this example, diversity can be both a strength (due to improved decision quality) and a weakness (due to potentially reduced trust).
SOURCE: DECISION FISH LLC<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The second stage is Build<\/em>.<\/strong> We gather a team to brainstorm our prototype strategic plan, including goals and tactics that will help us achieve our mission, given the SWOT analysis. To maximize creativity and reduce the risk of groupthink, the team should be diverse, with no hierarchy, and a commitment to creating as many ideas as possible, initially without regard to their feasibility. We can then narrow down to an initial set of feasible, strategic goals. Useful goals are SMART goals, that is, they are:<\/p>\n\n\n\n