Inspire

 
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Inspire covers the 2nd element of the design thinking process; Inspiration & Empathy. You will build inspiration by coaching client-led teams through knowledge scanning and empathy building activities to broaden perspective prior to the Design session.

This Field Guide provides an overview and step-by-step guide for the Inspire phase of the business innovation journey, along with templates and samples of everything you need to get started:

Sponsorship & Planning

Knowledge Scanning

Empathy Building

Share Learning

Templates, Samples & Exercises

+ WHAT & WHY?

WHAT | Inspire is a human-centered knowledge scanning and empathy building phase, where client-led design teams take time to research, engage, observe, and immerse in the best thinking on a topic before going into ideation and prototype design. First, teams conduct a knowledge scan for leading practices and disruptive shifts, followed by empathy building activities to better understand the user/customer experience and shape thinking that will fuel the rest of the process.

WHY | Knowledge scanning allows the design team to steep itself in the best thinking on a topic before we start to generate ideas. It also allows the design team to shape the thinking that will go into the rest of the process, by contributing what they believe to be the most important research, techniques, or perspectives on our topic.

Empathy building ensures we are taking a human-centered approach to understand the different perspectives of those who will use the design. To do so, we create “personas” of those people, summarizing their point of view by stepping into their shoes, so to speak.

+ THE BIG PICTURE – INSPIRE

A predetermined minimum number of knowledge and persona synthesis slides per team will be shared during the final Inspiration Learning Webinar prior to the Design session.

Final Inspiration slides may also be presented as a “Gallery Wall” wall for participants to “stroll” and gain insights during the Design session.

+ WHAT HAPPENS DURING INSPIRE?

1. Sponsorship & Planning

  • Identify sponsors and Inspiration teams
  • Determine Inspire approach and administration (including timeline, knowledge repository, knowledge scan categories, and empathy building activities)
  • Inspire Kick-Off Meeting
  • Team Check-Ins

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2. Knowledge Scanning

  • Inspiration teams conduct an external knowledge scan (researching trends and best practices, conducting stakeholder interviews, etc.) for leading practices and disruptive shifts.

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3. Empathy Building

  • Inspiration teams conduct immerse, observe, and engage empathy building activities that enable team members to “become the user”
  • Persona creation

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4. Share Inspiration Learning

  • Conduct a final webinar or meeting for Inspiration Teams to share what has been learned through knowledge scanning and empathy building efforts.