The Five Phases ofDesign Thinking「d.seed」model

Eirene Management School
Design Thinking InstituteAuthor: Takanori Kashino
Ver1.0About d.seed model
What is the d.seed model ?
The d.seed model represents design thinking, an innovation methodology, in five phases.
The five phases are Discover, Specify, Explore, Experiment, and Develop—forming d.seedusing the initial alphabets from each phase.

詳細化
Specify

探求
Explore発展
Develop

発見
Discover

実験
Experiment

Importance of the d.seed model
In design thinking, there are phases where hands-on approaches are important, such as
understanding customers and prototyping, as well as phases where abstract thinking andinnovation are important, such as identifying the demands and concept development.
Through d. seed model, you can better understand what to take note of and what to focus
on in the respective phases. This allows you to use it as a common language in your team,and to maintain an iterative innovation process.

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Features of design thinking and the structure of
the d.seed model
Design thinking is a non-linear process that creates new market opportunities andvalidates the value of new concepts through repeated divergence and convergence of
information and ideas.
For example, after validating a prototype in the Experiment phase of the d.seed
model, all the team members may notice a lack of customer understanding. It ispossible to proceed with the development as it is, but this raises the risk of creatingproducts and services that are low in customer value. In such cases, it is recommended
to return to the Discover phase and investigate again to further study the lack ofcustomer understanding.
Non-linear progression is important, but judging when to proceed and when toreturn for the time being is tough if you are not used to the process. If you or yourteam are trying to understand the process of design thinking, firstly, you should workon understanding the whole picture through iterative divergence and convergence asshown in the following figure.
Like team sports, design thinking improves by working both right and left sides of thebrain and both the head and body. Please do be mindful this is repetitive practice.

DiscoverSpecify

Explore3

Experiment Develop

Discovery
What is Discover ?
The first step in innovation begins with some kind of discoveries, such as social changes
and customer behavior that you have never known. Understanding the kind of action
customers usually take and their reasons through interacting with them personally—it isespecially helpful to learn about each and every customer and the stories behind them.
In this phase, you put aside the idea of classifying customers by general properties such asage, occupation, annual income, and address. Instead of interacting with customers before
knowing them and after they were categorized, you should understand them by deeply
empathizing with the kind of person they are and the background stories that surroundthem.
Understanding customers through empathy and a human-centered manner helps you
grasp new opportunities that drive innovation. These include new customer aspects thatare unidentifiable simply by referencing macro data or discussing in a meeting room, suchas how people perceive their daily lives and work, and what is meaningful or pointless tothem.

Importance of the Discover phase
While resources such as organizational technology and funds are also important in driving
innovation, products and services created through using of resources can spread throughoutthe world because of the customer support they have received. To win customer support,
you must create new value for the customers.
To create value, you need to know what customers view as important and what they see
as valuable. Progressing this phase carefully increases the likelihood of making discoveries
that lead to innovation.

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The methodology of the Discover phase
In order to find new opportunities that lead to innovation, you need to put yourself in
relevant areas that drive innovation and understand these environments and context froma multi-angle perspective. Specifically, they are experience, observation, and dialogue.
1. Experience
Use existing products and services to experience what a customer feels. For example,
if you want to create a mixer as a new cooking appliance, you can try cooking using
an existing mixer. By beginning from purchasing ingredients from a supermarket andexperiencing a customer’s usual life as such, you will be able to understand the strengthand the area of improvement of existing products from a customer’s perspective.
2. Observation
Understanding the customers’ behavior objectively. For example, if you want to starta new service for a restaurant, you should check how customers behave in a cafe orrestaurant and understand how they make use of the services. Visiting such places will
provide you chances to discover new customer behaviors that you did not know before.

3. Dialogue
Understand the stories behind the customers better by interacting with them about thecircumstances and reasons leading to their behaviors. It is important to close in on theirthinking and feelings by deeply empathizing with them.
Refrain from asking questions that seek to validate hypotheses. Instead, talk to thecustomers and elicit unexpected thinking and opinions so that you can form newhypotheses.

5Specify
What is Specify ?
In the Specify phase, you organize and analyze the customers and information about their
behaviors obtained in the Discover phase, and obtain insights that lead to customer needs
and innovation opportunities.
It is necessary to take a new perspective on the gathered facts while sharing the resultsof the investigation. You have to develop a consistent interpretation of the customers’
behaviors and thinking as you unravel their stories.

Importance of the Specify phase
During the Specify phase, as you carefully review and check the customers’ information,
you can obtain a new perspective that your team or organization had not anticipated. This
new perspective will lead to the next innovation.
You do not simply list down the information obtained from customers but integrate itskilfully and form into a story. It is important to create a new framework or pattern of thecustomers that are different from before.

6The methodology of the Specify phase
There are three key details: understanding the whole picture, understanding customer
needs, and understanding the insight.
1. Understanding the whole picture
Focus on what you find surprising or memorable in the stories you have heard from thecustomers. Probe into why the information was memorable. There should be some kind of
specific pattern or story embedded.
You do not only deepen your understanding of the customers, but also consider whether
you can explain the environments and context surrounding the customers from a newperspective.
2. Understanding customer needs
Other than understanding the whole picture, at the same time, also list down the needsof every customer. When listing down the needs, you too identify the customers’ actions
and statements that lead to them. On top of understanding the facts, you should formulate
needs that can interpret them anew.
3. Extracting the insight
Based on the whole picture and customer needs, you should verbalize perspectives thatyou and your team have overlooked. An example could be the differences between yourexpectations of the customers’ daily lives and how they seemed like in-person.
The differences may be caused by a discrepancy between the perspective you and yourteam have and the customer’s unique thinking patterns and behavioral rules. By verbalizing
customer behaviors and the environment using a new framework, you can create newopportunities for innovation.

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Explore
What is Explore ?
In the Explore phase, candidates of new concepts that can create values are identified
through an investigation. As the name Explore suggests, it is important to expand thepotential of new businesses, products, and services, rather than invent a single perfectanswer. Through this phase, you can acquire the opportunity to create innovative solutions
for customers and society.

Importance of the Explore phase
Very rarely would you encounter only a single method to meet a customer’s needs. Onceyou have narrowed down the issues and problems that customers possess, you create as
many methods as possible that can solve them. It is important to come up with as many
options as possible during the Explore phase, especially so when the project or businessdevelopment process is in the early stages.
The more options you have, the more the potential of the project will expand. Ultimately,in this phase, you only focus on the divergence and spreading of ideas. You will check
which ideas and concepts are actually valuable to the customers only in the Experimentphase, which will be getting introduced two pages later. Again, in the Explore phase, it isimportant to come up with 100 to 200 ideas or concepts that might be the best, rather thantrying to find just one best solution.

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The methodology of the Explore phase
During the Explore phase, it is important not to evaluate ideas immediately. Specifically,
you consciously divide this phase into two timings: divergence of ideas and convergenceof the many disseminated ideas. By dividing into different timings, the entire team canconsciously switch between focusing on increasing the number of ideas and focusing on
assessing the potential of ideas.

1. Idea Creation: Divergence
The most common method is brainstorming, advocated in 1939 by Alex Osborn, founderof an advertising agency. Borrowing other people’s ideas and plans, create new ideas one
after another, like a word association game. There are two particularly important points inbrainstorming.
1. Focus on quantity, not quality：Many ideas will generate good ideas. Avoid the actof evaluating ideas as it focuses on quality.
2. Collaborate to come up with ideas：Combine yours and other people’s ideas orcome up with ideas from what another person said.

2. Idea Selection: Convergence
The goal here is to select ideas with potential that might be worth prototyping andexperimenting with.
A common mistake in this stage is to judge based on only technical feasibility andprofitability. Apart from feasibility and benefits, you should also not forget to judge thepotential to provide new values to customers and society.
At the early stages of a project, ideas with potential
for development are selected, and feasibility andprofitability are confirmed and verified throughprototyping in the Experiment phase.

9Experiment
What is Experiment ?
In the Experiment phase, you acquire customer feedback by materializing ideas. The goal
is to experimentally demonstrate how are the ideas you have envisioned valuable to thecustomers.
In design thinking, a prototype is a low-cost method to materialize an idea without
spending much money or time. It is a tool that minimizes the risk of failure and effectively
corrects the direction of a project.

Importance of the Experiment phase
Through the Experiment phase, you can determine which part of the created idea tofocus on when progressing with the project development, and use customers’ feedback tohelp shape the process. An important part of the Experiment phase is to learn something
new the team has not noticed before. The learning effect can be divided into the following
three main categories.
1: The team can pursue more ideas.
During prototyping, the team may encounter new and unanticipated ideas or concepts
when they were coming up with ideas during the Explore phase.
2: Empathize deeper with the customers
By testing prototypes and getting customers feedback, you can empathize deeper andgain a better understanding of the challenges customers face in their daily lives andoccupation.
3: Refine and validate solutions
You can use prototypes to refine solutions with the customers, or you can validate thecustomer behaviors anticipated by the concept—the direction of the project will become
clearer.

10The methodology of the Experiment phase
The Experiment phase assumes the following three steps to be repeated multiple times.
1. Prototype creation as experimental materials
The prototype can be in any physical form, such as a pictorial representation of an idea ora three-dimensional interface made using hand tools. The first prototype can be something
made in about 30 minutes using drawing paper or Simili paper. Customers rarely acclaim
early prototypes. Take note that the prototypes are not meant to impress or persuadecustomers and build them quickly and cost-effectively.
2. Experiment through customer interaction
Once you have a prototype, you can have customers and potential customers use it. Youshould actively talk to them about their experience of using the prototype and, needless tosay, observe how they use it. The purpose of the experiment is to learn what the customers’
needs are and how they behave. You should avoid asking questions from the developer’s
perspective (e.g., “Do you want to buy this product?”). Instead, you should hold dialogues
that draw out their thoughts and feelings by asking, “How did you feel using this prototype?
3. Organize the experiment results and decide on a direction of improvement
Organize customer feedback. For example, you can categorize the prototype by its
strength, area of improvement, questionable aspects, and new features. After organizing
the feedback, you should discuss the future steps. For example, you may decide to enhanceor remove a feature, or you may switch to a completely different direction from what wasoriginally planned. Once the direction is decided, you can create the next version of theprototype that reflects this direction.

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Develop
What is Develop ?
Once the utility of a new concept has become more apparent than before, the process ofcommercializing this new concept can be driven with the help of internal parties involved,
who are not part of the team, as well as external partners. Specifically, you will expand thebusiness operation in two directions to enhance business feasibility.
One of the directions is the functional aspect. As you forecast the kind of businessmodels that will create values and predict the specific product and service development
specifications, you communicate key elements of the business implementation to internaland external parties involved.
The other direction is the sensitive aspect. What kind of value will the current projectprovide the customers and why must our company engage in this business—you create astory that can be understood instinctively and communicate it as you gain empathy.

Importance of the Develop phase
By carrying out the Develop phase, stakeholders such as team members, internal parties
involved, and external partners can create opportunities that provide themselves thesupport they need for future business development.
Specifically, they can reduce the difficulty of performing difficult actions that areimportant for future steps, such as securement of internal budgets, preparation for prerelease promotional activities, and acquisition of initial customers after release.

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The methodology of the Develop phase
Several tools can be used to develop effectively. The tools introduced here are mainly theones important for the sensitive aspect. For example, storyboards, media mock-ups, andshort videos. An important point all these tools share in common is that they immediatelyinduce new imagination of the customer’s life and behavior in those who have seen thefinal product.

1. Storyboard
Create a story that captures the daily lives of customers in a picture-story show format.
You can create a story from a more human-centered perspective by dividing it into thefollowing four stages.
1) Usual customers behaviors
2) Customers’ challenges and issues
3) Benefits for the customers who use the product currently under development
4) The kind of changes in their daily lives after using the product2. Media mock-up
After a product is put on the market, will it be the magazines or the TV if it were to befeatured in the media? What kind of value will the product be featured? Visually represent
how the products developed by you and your team will be introduced while imagining themedia that potential customers usually use.

3. Short video (2–3 minutes)
Visually represent the actual changes in customers while bearing the storyboard inmind. For example, you need to provide suggestions about the kind of customers the newproducts will provide value to, the kind of lives they areliving, and how their daily lives will change after theypurchase the product.

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Credit
The Five Phases of Design Thinking: d.seed model
Version 1.00 Issued on April 20, 2020
Author: Takanori Kashino
Published by: Design Thinking Institute, Eirene Management
SchoolPublished by the Design Thinking Institute: Eirene Management
School, The Five Phases of Design Thinking: d.seed model islicensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercialShareAlike 4.0 Unported License.