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In this assignment, a reflective report will be presented considering my own thinking about the Design Thinking activity. The weekly blogs and slides are already presented regarding the various activities related to innovation and creativity managed through the use of various Design Thinking activities. It will not only allow me to present a critical self-analysis but will also assist in reflecting the various learning aspects and provide a justified explanation to the various activities involved during the designing phases. This can beneficial for enhancing my depth of knowledge and even utilize my skills and expertise to ensure that the knowledge acquisition, development plan and knowledge designing activities remain successful all throughout. Not only the design thinking aspects, but also its impact on the process of managerial decision making, use of tools and techniques along with the identification of issues and determining effective solutions to deal with those problems associated with the innovative solutions (Johansson?Sköldberg, Woodilla & Çetinkaya, 2013). As the topic is based on the concepts of innovation and sustainable development, so the Design thinking activity is an important aspect of enabling innovation and for ensuring successful management of the business strategy process and at the same time, facilitate knowledge development and analysis of aspects to provide critical reflective analysis too.
From the Design thinking activity, I have understood about the visualizing of certain business management aspects and innovation related to it. The entrepreneurship concept is related to the business aspects where the individuals are allowed to gain good scopes and opportunities without much focus on controlling the flow of resources while it also involves turning the idea into business and ensuring that the human resources, financial resources and budgetary implications are managed well and good. The concept of innovation is related to the formation of new ideas, concepts and models required to enable innovation and creating a stable culture to foster new ideas and learn from mistakes. With the learning of concepts related to entrepreneurship and innovation, I have learned about how to start a new business, manage proper budget and the human resources properly too for dealing with the business risks and produce good quality products and services (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). From the idea, I have also found that the innovation problems and business risks that shall be dealt with to create new and improved services along with redesigning the existing services.
Based on the model of innovation proposed by Tidd & Bessant (2013), I have understood about the various components such as the search, select, implement and capture. By assessing the model, I have seek knowledge regarding the best opportunities to facilitate innovation, need and ways of enabling innovation, define methods to innovate and capture ideas to gain relevant benefits from the implementation (Kolko, 2015). The different aspects of innovation including the incremental innovation, platform innovation, component and discontinuous innovations can also assist me in designing an effective platform that will promote innovation and utilize the major technologies and core competencies to foster innovation of business. From the perspective of innovation, it is understood by me that innovation can be managed by making changes to the design and functional features of the products, changes to the processes, changes to the position along with the change in paradigm to ensure that the innovation is successful (Goldschmidt & Rodgers, 2013). These are the basic ways that foster innovation through improved business operations’ efficiency, increased revenue generation, higher productivity along with greater customer satisfaction and keeping the costs incurred during the management of business processes under control. Being social and enabling social innovation are integral aspects that facilitate social changes and can make the businesses fulfill its corporate social responsibilities too. All these aspects are surprising and the reason is that it can allow me to progress in my career and become a successful entrepreneur as well (Howlett, 2014).
The learning capability is facilitated by me through the assessment of Design Thinking activity and Design process associated with the reflection to be provided for the concerned report. Have been accustomed with the use of designing of applications and even used the Dweck’s theory, though I was unable to conduct a feasibility study properly. It is important for me to focus on understanding whether the design process for enabling innovation can be successful or not by breaking down the design thinking process into multiple aspects like journey mapping, analysis of value chain, mind mapping, conducting brainstorming sessions, developing relevant ideas and concepts, making assumptions during the testing phase, rapid prototyping, creation of more customer and finally launch of learning and development plan, all managed through proper visualization techniques (Mootee, 2013). As the innovation concept involves changing the features and functional abilities of the product, the rapid prototyping model can be done on paper by creating 2D structures while the later rapid prototyping concepts are understood by me. This has enhanced my strengths in the field of constructing 3D designs and creating robust systems and products to meet the business standards. Few of the weaknesses of mine include lack of knowledge about conducting role plays, wire framing and story boarding, which often created a lot of complexities in managing the design process for producing the ultimate product or service through innovation (Seidel & Fixson, 2013). The prototyping methods are wire framing, paper prototyping, sketching and conducting role playing sessions could be possible with the assessment of a proper case study to analyze the entire situation in details. This has made me think like the user of services and even strengthened my skills, knowledge and expertise regarding the use of suitable prototyping techniques to learn, test, think of getting investments and obtain inputs along with proper funding and utilization of inventor syndrome to foster innovation all throughout. It has been a fun while learning about the prototyping methods and it can also assist in managing the feasibility study to understand the benefits of innovating products and services through use of proper models and frameworks (Gasparini, 2015).
One of the major weaknesses faced by me is the lack of experimentation done within the market place and due to this; I faced barriers related to understanding the marketplace conditions too. The learning launch planning could assist me I overcoming the barriers faced furthermore move from the hypothetical concepts to real customers’ behaviors and remain open to feedbacks provided by the clients to make necessary changes (Carlgren, Rauth & Elmquist , 2015). Few examples include innovation of Nicorette managed through the learning launch to establish a smoking cessation initiative with the use of proper media channels via internet. As I have previously worked as an IT engineer, I am habituated with the use of IT components along with management of databases, networks and internet connectivity, which can help me to create channels to deliver the right messages and information to people and make them know about the initiative undertaken by Pzeifer to reinvigorate Nicorrette (Lammi & Becker, 2013). To implement the learning launch activity properly, it is important to maintain tight boundaries associated with the time, location and goals assessment along with fostering the development of diverse teams to provide conflict resolution mechanisms. Because of my good interpersonal skills, I have managed to cope up within a diverse workforce team, which has continuously prioritized on the customers’ experiences and their expectations. To promote effective learning launch, it is important to maintain proper values and ethics and make behavioral interpretations that are required to utilize the design components and prototyping techniques for making prior assumptions regarding the innovation aspect (Geissdoerfer, Bocken & Hultink, 2016). Not only do my creativity and innovation skills have improved, but also the ability to manage business properly with effective designing concepts are known to me.
The learning based on the Design Thinking activity is facilitated with the obtaining of information from various sources related to the ways by which problems can be dealt with along with development of skills. This will also assist me in developing creative problem solving approaches for the creation of value and benefits. It can also enable me to think as a designer, furthermore assist in developing growth potential and study the various aspects of business such as the assumptions of reality, rationality, objectivity and even fostering social constructive approaches for gaining a better answer to the designing methods used in business (Welsh & Dehler, 2013). The processes involved in the design activity could include analysis and planning processes where the actions to be undertaken could be identified. This would also make me capable of maintaining proper values and ethics, furthermore promote better control, flexibility and stability along with better control over the business and conducting the target market segmentation along with the analysis of behaviors of customers regarding the purchase of products and services (Dweck, 2013).
I have obtained sufficient knowledge and information related to the Design Thinking activity by conducting the REAL launch, which could be beneficial for managing successful business activities and increase the revenue generation capability too. The knowledge and information obtained according to the Design Thinking activity include the objectivity, rationality and predictability of various actions undertaken and furthermore make an analysis of various methods and processes associated with the designing activity (Fook, 2016). This could assist me to perform my roles and responsibilities as an efficient marketer and ensure that the segmentation of target market is done properly along with the assessment of behaviors and needs of people while making purchases of pr0ducts and services. By understanding the design thinking activity, I would be able to be creative and experiment with various things for predicting the varying behaviors and changing needs of clients, furthermore present data analytically and manage proper hypothetical planning approach to management of innovation. From my perceptive, the deign process might be complex, though it should be considered that the design process should be broken down into multiple components and design tools for innovating and bringing creativity all throughout (Moon, 2013). My personal development could be possible with the acquisition f knowledge and information based on the DT process, which includes discovering, defining, designing and delivering the most effective solution.
There were few areas of weaknesses, which often created complexities for me to manage the business functions properly and thus to improve the attentiveness, I watched the values and interpreted those, furthermore made sure to consider the problems as opportunities rather than considering those as limitations or constraints. By listening attentively to what the higher authorities speak, I would be more willing to learn and prioritize on the present reality and not just the future. This could not only make them accept the views and opinions of other team members, but would also allow me to share and exchange my ideas with others to foster collaborative working. One of the major barriers faced by me has been the organization developmentposters, which I was not much habituated with (Boud, Keogh & Walker, 2013). The design thinking activity should assist me in understanding the messages to be delivered, maintain proper page layout, use proper visual aids, add the right colors and fonts, sequencing and provide references. The knowledge and information have been developed with the design thinking activity through and it can facilitate critical and creative thinking for resolving issues and problems, furthermore keep the processes user centered. This will surely assist me in developing a systematic approach and ensure that the problems are resolved with much ease and effectiveness along with maintenance of flexibility and innovation perspectives such as visualization, testing, prototyping methods and brainstorming sessions (Baldwin, 2016). As an entrepreneur, it could also help in assessing the needs of the customers and underpin the technological aspects for meeting the business requirements and ensure business success and longevity
Figure: Action Plan (Rayna & Striukova, 2016)
The action plan provided an insight about how the empathize, i.e., to understand the audiences is essential, define the approaches to construct a view, gather ideas through brainstorming sessions, develop a prototyping method and test the results based on the feedbacks to identify any changes or improvements to be made. All these are based on the acquisition of knowledge and it can be obtained by assessing the four major components of design thinking activity including the connecting, creating, collaborating and converting. The connecting approach of design thinking activity can combine the analytical and creative approaches for resolving issues in business and at the same time, understanding the needs of clients and their behaviors regarding purchases too. The create aspect enables creation of prototypes and transforming the ideas and concepts into something more tangible to ensure technological efficiency while undertaking the project. The collaborating approach, as the name suggests, has managed connection between the internal and external individuals to conduct brainstorming sessions along with sharing and exchange of information and messages for identifying the areas that need changes or have been left unexplored (Rayna & Striukova, 2016). The conversion means transforming the ideas and concepts related to the prototyping into market scopes and opportunities for delivering value and benefits to the customers. This will not only align the strategies with the business goals, but can also maintain technological feasibility to ensure customer value creation and launching a project in the test market too. All these major aspects have contributed to the development of knowledge based on the design thinking activity, furthermore allowed me to experience various aspects of lifelike value chain creation for Woolworths, preventing unethical behaviors within organization and even establishing goo communication with others while working as a team (Jin, Li & Gao, 2013). The interviews conducted with the managers of organizations have improved my skills of practice interviewing, which can not only assist in managing the ongoing design thinking activity properly, but will also facilitate critical thinking for innovation and creativity all throughout. Knowledge and learning aspects are promoted easily s I have understood about the Dweck’s theory and it will allow me to progress in personal and professional career with much convenience. The visualization of various business aspects and learning to create posters and knowing about the prototyping methods can also establish a sense of positive skills and knowledge required to promote effective learning and design activities effectively (Liedtka & Ogilvie, 2011).
From the report, it could be understood that own thinking was developed regarding the Design Thinking activity and most of the facts were related to the innovation and creativity. The topic illustrated about how the design thinking activity and its related aspects could assist me to progress on my career, furthermore could make me present myself as a successful entrepreneur and manage business successfully too. The critical self analysis would define the various aspects of innovation that should help me in manage value creation while the reflection of learning based on the Design Thinking activity could allow me to frame the prototypes and manage the design process to manage consistency of product creation and managing the feasibility too. There were various weaknesses, that should be overcome with the utilization f my strengths and this would contribute to assessment of behaviors of clients regarding their purchasing habits in business, furthermore develop optimum level of knowledge and information to create an action plan as well. I also understood about the ways of developing posters and manage visualization of data and information, which could also improve the skills, knowledge and expertise in dealing with the business issues that might be faced.
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