design thinking case study in banking

Deutsche Bank

How deutsche bank used design thinking @ deutsche bank.

• Post author: Mathushan Kugappiriyan
• Post published: 2021-04-09
• Post category: How Companies Use Design Thinking
• Post comments: 0 Comments

Why does Deutsche Bank need Design Thinking at All?

When you think of Deutsche Bank’s description as a “multinational investment bank and financial services company”, you immediately have in mind complex structures, processes and investment strategies. But you wouldn’t suspect that Deutsche Bank also relies heavily on their relationship with their customers. But in retail banking, the bank depends on the trust of its customers. This trust can be gained by proceeding transparently in the development of new products and services. One way to do this is through customer-centricity in the innovation process. Customer-centricity is a term that comes up frequently in the context of design thinking. It describes the precise understanding of customer needs and demands in order to design appropriate products and services. With the increasingly rapid digitalisation, Deutsche Bank was also faced with the need to offer new innovative products and services. It used to be the case that the customer’s problems were passed on to the manager via an employee of the Business Division. The manager then agreed to pass the problem on to the IT Division. Once the IT Division had received the problem, it started to develop without any contact with the end customer. You can imagine how closely the final product fulfilled the customer’s needs if you have ever played “Chinese whispers”.

The Evolution of the Still Ongoing Design Thinking Practice at Deutsche Bank

The following evolution spans 6 years of work. This work has divided into three phases, Phase 1: Learning, Phase 2: Adapting and Phase 3: Diffusing. In Phase 1 the journey began. Very quickly it became clear that it was not possible to immediately change the thinking structures and processes in such a large international bank. For this reason, they agreed early on to take small, successive steps. Numerous challenges and restrictions followed. Deutsche Bank was very mindful of using few resources and generally maintaining a lean structure. As a result, no members from the IT division could be recruited for the Design Thinking team, as they were all working on ongoing projects. The Design Thinking initiative, on the other hand, was isolated from all projects. The heads of this initiative then came up with a new plan and, in the spirit of Design Thinking, they recruited people without any bias in the banking sector – namely interns. The interns had nothing to do with the banking sector, they were engineers, designers and physicians. But exactly this was an optimal basis for fully internalising the Design Thinking approach. But the disadvantages were also obvious: how can I embed a completely new concept into an already existing organisation – for that, let’s take a look at the organisational structure below:

The next phase was the adaptation phase, where the focus was on adapting the structural and educational aspects of the approach. Deutsche Bank was aware of the necessity to mix the teams, so they created the new DT teams with one full time employee and additional interns. The IT division was experiencing the results of the DT team first hand and adopted some techniques and approaches as well. For example, they changed the method from defining certain requirements. They also learned that there is not always one solution, but rather a variety of solutions to be explored. Furthermore, it was not obliged to consider ideas as radical innovation, but rather offered space for incremental innovation. This also allowed for better integration into existing work. A great added benefit was the valuing of the diverging phase. In a simplified way, hence the name DT Lite, they adopted basic concepts in the process of developing ideas. With increasing commitment, a stronger and stronger innovation community also developed. This was always supported with enough educational programmes. At some point, after the end of the Design Thinking projects, the members of the DT teams were transferred. For example, when an initiative was handed over to the IT Division, members of the DT team were also transferred in order to spread the gained knowledge.

This diffusion is a big part of the third phase. With this continuous diffusion, DT Methodology became more and more respected. People from the company were eager to learn about it and have it on their CVs. DT gained a lot of value because it was assigned to greater tasks. The assignments were often tasks that had been considered unsolvable in the company for a long time, and therefore even more employees elevated DT as a powerful way to solve difficult tasks.

Lessons Learned

What can be taken away from this story?

First of all, it is essential to recognise that the implementation of Design Thinking in an existing structure needs certain preconditions. A very crucial one is the organisational structure. Only with an organisational structure it can be ensured that the DT members can perform the methods properly. This also includes a certain budget for e.g. prototype development.

The second important point is the providing of important education programmes. For the diffusion of the concept, it is necessary to enthuse the workers for the idea in a configuration that is as accessible to them as possible. For example, they have to give presentations, deliver results, and so on.

The third point is the strategic positioning of DT team members. In order to use and spread the acquired knowledge, DT members must be involved in relevant projects, so that they can also share their knowledge.

The fourth point is definitely for Design Thinking and that is prototyping. Prototyping is an approach that has completely won acceptance at Deutsche Bank because it is so effective. There is hardly any comparable method that collects so much feedback on an idea so quickly. One manager said that the existence of a prototype in his office was enough for stakeholders to discuss about it.

The last point that rises a little above all others is the recommendation to take an evolutionary approach to build Design Thinking. Unlike other methods, Design Thinking is not just a tool, it is a culture. And as with any culture change, there are inherent challenges that need to be overcome. And that costs time, money and people. Some say that the term “innovative company” is an oxymoron in the context of large companies because large companies face a number of barriers to innovation. But the case of Deutsche Bank has proven that it works and can therefore be used as an important lesson for learning CIOs and IT directors.

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• Student Resources

MBA + MS Design Innovation (MMM Program) at the McCORMICK SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING and KELLOGG SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT

• Inside Our Program

Design Thinking with Bank of America

Mmm students helped bank of america reimagine the post-pandemic banking experience for their business innovation lab (bil) project..

With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, many branch locations for Bank of America were forced to temporarily or permanently close. The pandemic also expedited the world’s transition to digital technology, and in many instances touchless, particularly when it comes to banking.

To help navigate that shift along with a strong desire to maintain face-to-face experiences, Bank of America turned to Northwestern's MMM program. 

MMM is a dual-degree program between Northwestern Engineering and the Kellogg School of Management, where students focus on human-centered design thinking while also developing a rigorous business foundation. BIL is designed to give students time to deeply explore a solution for a real-world business client and serves as a capstore to the MMM program. 

Chung and her classmates honed their user-research skills by talking with Bank of America customers and banking associates to identify pain points, then sharpened their brainstorming and design-thinking talents by developing human-centered solutions to help take those pains away. 

“BIL was truly a great capstone to our MMM program because it encapsulated the entire design thinking process,” Hung Nguyen (MMM ‘22) said. “It was wonderful to realize that we had absorbed so much and were able to complete a design consulting project from end to end.”

One of the key lessons both Nguyen and Chung took away from their BIL experience was the value of communication, both internally within a team but also externally with a client. They saw the benefit of having a project timeline planned out from the beginning and the importance of sharing where on the timeline they were with the client. They also recognized the value of having frequent conversations with the client to understand their expectations as well as their feedback on work progress.

It was one of those conversations that led the team to tweak their solution late in the quarter following specific client feedback. 

"We were happy to be able to incorporate their feedback to make our recommendation more sound," Nguyen said.

Because of the frequent interactions with the client, the final presentation felt smooth for both the students and Bank of America. 

"The key thing is not only to deliver a great presentation at the end of the project, but to communicate with and update the client and get their feedback frequently," Nguyen said. "So actually, we kind of already did the work of the final presentation weekly from the beginning of the project."  

Chung agreed.

"There were no surprises when we delivered our final recommendation," she said. "It was a fun and conversational presentation because we communicated consistently with our clients every week via Zoom meetings and emails."

That communication not only created a good working relationship with Bank of America, but it also provided the students with added confidence they can now leverage as MMM graduates. 

"BIL validated the value of the MMM program and how we developed a toolkit to deliver high impact solutions for real clients, even of extremely high caliber like Bank of America," Chung said. "This allows us to hit the ground running and create and deliver value. It makes me feel confident I can bring a design thinking lens to the table no matter my role."

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Umpqua Bank > Umpqua Bank Rebranding: Umpqua – Slow Banking: Building a Community Experience

We differentiate between three editorial levels of stories:

1) Design thinking classics: Case studies that are well-documented and widely known, which we include in our collection for the sake of completeness. If not stated otherwise there are compiled by our editors via desk research.

2) Normal cases: Stories, which are less known and got collected and rewritten by our editors via desk research.

3) Stories with validated data: These cases are based on first-hand empirical information that our editors received during their research.

Banks are boring. Community banks are getting globalized. Then, how did a small Oregon-based bank succeed into one of the best in the world?

by Amy Buer , Kokoro Kuroiwa & Kyurie Shin

Design Thinking is always user-centered: focusing on delivering an experience that is desirable for customers, in the best case “delighting” them. However, creating a unique solution with Design Thinking doesn’t always mean inventing a unique solution out of thin air. An important part of Design Thinking in the “Understand”, “Observe” and “Ideate” phases, discovering parallels with other situations. Thus, you can use solutions that already exist in other contexts to solve your unique problem.

Often the greatest innovations come from combining two things in a new way. For example, Gutenberg is credited for inventing the printing press, but he didn’t invent anything completely new out of thin air. He combined movable type with a wine press in a new way. The CEO of Umpqua Bank, Ray Davis, is the Gutenberg of combining an enjoyable retail and café experience with a bank. 

Umpqua bank store has illuminated signs saying “Surf, Sip, Read, Shop and Bank”.

In 1994, when Ray Davis was called in to help the struggling community bank, with around 40 employees and six branches. He immediately noticed that all banks offered the same lousy experience: bland, boring, forgettable. Most banks offer the same products at basically the same rates, too. If Umpqua was able to come up with a great product, it would be copied by the bigger banks within days. “So, I felt there was little or no opportunity to have Umpqua stand out with products,” Ray Davis wrote in his book, “Leading for Growth: How Umpqua Bank Got Cool and Created a Culture of Greatness.” What could he do to make the bank better?

“Why would somebody want to bank with us?” Would it be possible to create a bank that people want to visit? He decided to offer his customers the opposite experience of a typical bank. He envisioned the customer experience at Umpqua Bank as friendly, delightful, and memorable.

Reframing the Challenge

Where do people go to hang out?

He started to think about other types of businesses where people enjoy hanging out, including hip clothing stores and Starbucks coffee shops.

They were all retail locations, where people bought products. He was selling products, too. Not coffee and shirts, but financial service products. His bank was, in fact, a retail location.

By redefining Umpqua as a retailer, he was able to take advantage of the strategies that stores use to get customers inside, advise them, display products, sell products, and even encourage additional unplanned purchases. Umpqua locations are still referred to as “stores” and not “branches” as is common in the banking industry.

Observation

Then, he determined he needed to find out more about what makes a retail space enjoyable. So, he sent seven hand-picked associates to retail locations all over the country. They observed the signature in-store shopping experience at Restoration Hardware, Gap, Nordstrom, and Disney stores. They even observed how hotel guests interact with the space of the Ritz-Carlton hotel. He told them to use their senses to examine how things look, smell, and feel so that they could use their observations to develop new ideas for the bank.

Umpqua bank started their prototype by building one retail location. They also utilized techniques that have been proven successful in other retail settings. They allocated $4 million for the prototype, which was a hefty sum for such a small bank. They even hired a designer and consultant known for her work in the retail sector, Charlene Stern of Stern Marketing. She encouraged Umpqua to further adapt the practices of leading retailers and avoid falling into typical bank industry norms.

He hired sales associates from other retail locations. He rejected people who had worked as bank tellers in favor of employees who had previously sold pants at well-known department stores.

“ We had a computer café with free internet access and our very own Umpqua brand coffee, an “Investment Opportunity Center” for investment type products, and a “Serious about Service Center,” that offered general information and had a phone that connected right to my direct line. Anyone with a problem was invited to call the CEO, ” said Ray Davis.

Customers would enter the new location and ask sales associates, “Is this really Umpqua Bank?” Yes. It was. The CEO, Ray Davis, also made himself available to take calls. There was a direct line in the service center that anyone with a problem, both employees or customers, could use to call him. By gathering direct feedback, he was able to understand key issues and consider changes or additions to the new retail concept.

Results: It worked!

Within three years, Umpqua Bank became number one in their community bank market. They have expanded from six branches to more than 263 stores across five states in the USA. Small community banks and big players in the banking world visit Umpqua Bank to discover the secrets to their success.

They found various creative ways to create an inviting retail environment. They extended beyond only free coffee and they also offered their customers free chocolate coins to snack on. They found ways to display financial products with physical representations, like bags and boxes, and physical books on tables and in display cases in the store. They also sell gift cards, just like any other typical retailer. In their retail locations, they also have illuminated signs that say “Surf, Sip, Read, Shop and Bank”, the customer experience the bank provided – but welcoming, like what customers would expect from a retail store.

Umpqua Bank had created a unique space for banking and community. The local customers were engaging with the bank through their new marketing activities, which directly affected their day-to-day lives. Children were able to learn about money through Umpqua bank’s “lemonade stand kits” in 2007. Umpqua also branded ice cream trucks and drove around residencies, offering people free ice cream, with recurring events such as an open call for the design of the ice cream truck in 2014. Residents can enjoy yoga at their Umpqua bank in the morning before the store opens. 

Development is an ongoing process. Once a product or service is tested and launched, it needs to be continuously adapted to the changing needs of the customers. Design Thinking is an ongoing process, as users’ needs change, new solutions must be developed.

1.  Adjusting to the Digital Age

When Ray Davis took over in 1994, ATMs were starting to become more popular. The internet existed, but mainly through a dial-up modem. The first smartphones and online banking apps were still 15 to 20 years away. Davis capitalized on the trend of the internet by offering free internet access in his first Umpqua Bank stores. Umpqua Bank has continued to stay on top of tech trends and take a page from the Apple Store playbook.

Digital technologies have since advanced to a point where people no longer need to visit a bank to purchase a financial product. The actual purchase can be easily made online. However, consumers still have a desire for information and advice to answer questions. At the same time, a traditional bank experience is very pressured and forced when meeting with the tellers. 

Focusing on a customer’s desire for a 1:1 experience outside of traditional banking was Umpqua’s human-centered solution to the digital age. While the bank space and culture invite all people to come in, a “universal associate” is present to answer any questions in finance. With iPads, the company’s internal wiki, it provided a similar casual but professional approach as the bank version of the Apple “Genius Bar”.

2.  Adjusting to the Urban Age

Many millennials have chosen to live in or near city centers and walk or bike to shopping areas near their homes or workplaces. Thus, Umpqua started opening smaller “neighborhood stores” in 2006. In these stores some menus display local events in the community and a “Discovery Wall” that displays information about Umpqua products with printers, so customers can print the information they want. These neighborhood stores also provide computers for public use, free coffee, and events. 

The smaller size offers greater flexibility in terms of possible locations and they cost less to open and run, as compared to a larger bank. The size of these stores is around 90 to 140 sq. meters (1,000 and 1,500 sq. ft.). A new “neighborhood store” only takes 45 days to open, compared to six months for a standard bank branch. Strategies of how to open a store quickly were also taken from the playbook of Starbucks.

Umpqua offers digital interactive walls in their stores for their customers.

And How is it Doing Now?

Umpqua’s effort to make the customer experience friendly, delightful and memorable has taken over since 1994, even to this day. They listen to their customers’ changing needs and iterate their solutions adjusted to the needs. This human-centered approach to banking has proved its strength through time; In 2022, beyond having 400 stores across five states in the USA, Umpqua bank has been ranked the 12th in Forbes’ 13th annual America’s Best Banks list.

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Image Sources

• Umpqua Bank, Internal Design: Umpqua Bank | CC BY 4.0
• umpqua images.pptx (6): Umpqua Bank | CC BY 4.0
• Featured image: Umpqua Bank | CC BY 4.0

The Authors

This article was written by Amy Buer and edited by Kyurie Shin and Kokoro Kuroiwa .

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How Design Thinking is used

#Name-of-Case uses Design Thinking

1 At the periphery (e.g. via booking agencies or conducting workshops).

2 In parts of the organisation (e.g. the Ux department, R&D or marketing).

3 In the core of the organisation (e.g. within central strategy and planning processes).

Corporate Facts

Umpqua Bank

Umpqua bank is an American bank headquartered in Oregon in the United States. It was founded in 1953 and serves as personal and business banking. In 2022, Umpqua has $31 billion in assets and more than 350 stores in Idaho, Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, Arizona, and Colorado.

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How To Implement Design Thinking In Banking

Digital solutions based on empathy and customer needs achieve better results and have competitive advantages. That's why design thinking implementation has outstanding potential to make digital products in the banking sector customer-centered. UXDA has used the design thinking process and tools to develop over 100 digital financial products in 36 countries. By applying design thinking to the user experience in banking, we create more intuitive, user-friendly, and effective financial products that better implement business strategies in line with the needs of customers.

What is the Definition and Role of Design Thinking in the Banking Sector

Design thinking in banking sector is a creative problem-solving approach that focuses on the customer's needs. In the context of banking, design thinking can be used to create financial products, services, and experiences that are more user-friendly and effective. This can help banks and fintechs to better serve their customers and differentiate themselves in a competitive market. 

Additionally, using design thinking can help banks and other financial companies to identify and solve problems in new and innovative ways, leading to improved efficiency. Design thinking has become increasingly important in the banking sector as a way to improve customer experience and create innovative solutions to complex problems. In this context, the main role of design thinking is to help banks understand the needs, behaviors, and pain points of their customers, and then use that understanding to develop new products, services, and experiences that better meet those needs.

Some specific ways in which design thinking is being used in the banking sector are:

1. Customer empathy

Such design thinking methodologies as user research, journey mapping, and key personas, help banks to gain a deeper understanding of their customers and their needs. This helps design products and services that are more user-friendly, intuitive, and tailored to financial customers' needs.

2. Ideation and prototyping

Design thinking encourages companies to generate ideas and then prototype and test those ideas with customers. This approach helps financial organizations identify innovative solutions to complex problems and quickly validate those solutions with real customers.

3. Collaboration and co-creation

Design thinking encourages collaboration across different departments and stakeholders within the bank, as well as with external partners such as fintech startups and customers themselves. This collaborative approach helps to overcome in-house silos and leads to more innovative solutions that better meet the needs of all stakeholders.

Design thinking in banking involves empathy for the user, the ability to define problems and create ideas, prototyping and testing, and iteration. Potential benefits of using design thinking in banking include:

Improved customer experience

By putting the needs and preferences of customers at the center of the design process, banks can create products and services that are more user-friendly and effective.

Increased efficiency

Design thinking can help banks identify and eliminate unnecessary steps and processes, streamlining operations and making them more efficient.

Increased innovation

The iterative nature of design thinking allows banks to quickly test and refine new ideas, increasing the likelihood of developing successful, innovative products and services.

Improved risk management

By actively seeking out diverse perspectives and testing and iterating on new ideas, banks can mitigate the risk of introducing faulty products or services to the market.

Enhanced teamwork and collaboration

Design thinking encourages collaboration and co-creation among team members, fostering a culture of innovation and cooperation within the organization.

Design thinking in banking used to architect digital financial products in 5 steps: Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, Test. But it's not that easy, let's explain it through the Double Diamond model. The first diamond is known as Problem. It collects data through divergence and prioritizes key insights through convergence. The second diamond is about Solution and starts from diverging all possible solutions based on extracted insights and converging all into a prototype, which, at the end, is tested and delivered according to previously defined criteria.

Proven process of design based product development

What is the Process and Main Specifics of Design Thinking in Banking

Let’s explore each stage of design thinking in banking:

1. Empathize Digital Banking Users

At the Empathize stage, we collect a large amount of data about business goals, customer needs and pain points, and product features, thus researching the wire context around the product. Our aim is to feel and emphasize with the problem we are trying to solve. To achieve this, we need to step into the shoes of the customer and business owner.

2. Define Core User Problems and Value

At the Define stage, we analyze and synthesize collected data to define the core problems and prioritize key data. The main purpose is to understand what value we could bring to customers and why they would prefer it over other solutions. To achieve this, we need to approach data analysis from these different angles: business, psychology, user behavior, competitors, marketing, technology, etc.

3. Ideate Digital Banking Solution

At the Ideate stage, we start to generate multiple hypotheses about what our solution could be. Our main goal is to uncover the best way to solve the previously defined problems. To achieve this, we need to step out of the box and create dozens of potential solutions.

4. Prototype Digital Banking Product

At the Prototype stage, we take dozens of previously generated ideas about how our end solution could look and work, moving toward designing the final version. We check all the solutions based on previously generated user scenarios, business goals, etc. at the Synthesis stage. In this way, we narrow down multiple solutions into one or more that are delivered as visual prototypes and could be tested by users and business owners.

5. Test Banking Prototype

The final Test stage is needed to ensure that our visual prototype provides the needed solution according to the previously defined problem. If it is not, we then return to the first stage and repeat the process.

Some specifics of design thinking in the banking industry include:

User-centered approach

Design thinking in banking puts the needs and expectations of users at the center of the design process, and focuses on creating solutions that are tailored to their unique preferences.

Collaboration and co-creation

Design thinking in banking involves collaboration and co-creation with users and other stakeholders, such as bank employees, business partners, and regulators, to ensure that solutions are well-aligned with their needs and objectives.

Rapid iteration and experimentation

Design thinking in banking encourages rapid iteration and experimentation, and encourages designers to try out new ideas and approaches, and to refine and improve them based on feedback and user testing.

Data-informed decision making

Design thinking in banking leverages data and analytics to inform and guide the design process, and to make better decisions about which solutions to pursue and how to improve them.

Focus on customer experience

Design thinking in banking focuses on enhancing the overall customer experience, and aims to create solutions that are easy to use, convenient, transparent, and pleasant to users.

Continuous learning and improvement

Design thinking in banking encourages a culture of continuous learning and improvement, and encourages designers to regularly seek feedback from users, and to use that feedback to make ongoing improvements to their solutions.

Design Thinking in Finance Determines Success in Digital Age

Design and design thinking have never before played a more influential role in determining the success of any business in any industry. This fact is well supported by the Design Value Index (DVI), a summary of the market performance of 15 design-driven companies including Apple, IBM, Nike, and SAP. Those companies share a high level of design strategy implementation across their organizations. Their executives practice design in everyday work, and they have design positions at the management levels. Design-driven companies outperformed the S&P 500 by 211%.

The finance industry has experienced a turbulent period of Fintech disruption in recent years. In fact, 75% of the finance sector companies surveyed by KPMG stated that changing customer needs is the key area where disruptive Fintech companies have been challenging the traditional finance businesses. Although customers' needs are the basis for any business, in today’s competitive and customer-centric landscape, businesses must understand the customer on a much deeper level to come up with more innovative solutions. It is at this point that design thinking in finance comes in.

In its essence, design thinking in banking is a customer-centered process for solving problems. It includes understanding people’s needs, defining their challenges, brainstorming solutions, and then prototyping and testing the solutions. Through design thinking, teams and individuals combine what is desired and needed by the user with what is technologically feasible under the circumstances and viable for the business.

Banks acknowledge the importance of design thinking in financial services and look for ways to transform their organizations. BBVA has trained 1,000 design thinking experts to educate their employees to apply this approach on a daily basis. Capital One has developed “Capital One 360 Café”, a hybrid bank/coffee shop branch where the bank’s employees can freely speak with their customers to understand customer banking experiences. In addition, many banks worldwide have acquired Fintech companies, creating accelerators to attract them.

Yet, Fintech companies are becoming more popular among customers who are switching their current accounts from banks to Fintech organizations. For example, in only the first 3-year period, Revolut  acquired more than 1 million users, from which 250 thousand were active users and by 2021 they hit the mark of 15 million users.

Other Fintech companies are following a similar trend, with design thinking characteristics as a means to understand users, and continuously testing of products emerging as core advantages.

Main Challenges of Design Thinking in Banking

There are several challenges to implementing design thinking in the banking industry. One of the main challenges is the fact that the banking industry is highly regulated, which can make it difficult to innovate and try out new ideas. 

Many banks are large organizations with long-established processes and ways of doing things, which can make it difficult to change the culture and mindset to one that is more focused on design thinking. Finally, the nature of the banking industry itself can make it difficult to implement design thinking, as it is a highly complex and risk-averse industry that requires a high level of accuracy and attention to detail.

Resistance to change

Many banks have traditional and entrenched processes and systems that may be resistant to change. Implementing design thinking requires a shift in mindset and culture, which can be challenging for employees and managers.

Lack of design expertise

Many banks may not have a strong design team or the necessary skills and expertise to effectively implement design thinking. This can lead to a lack of understanding of the principles and practices of design thinking, and hinder its successful implementation.

Limited resources

Implementing design thinking often requires significant resources, such as training and development for employees, and investment in new tools and technologies. Many banks may face budget constraints and may be unable to allocate the necessary resources for a successful implementation.

Regulatory constraints

The banking industry is heavily regulated, and any changes to processes and systems must comply with strict regulations. This can limit the scope and flexibility of design thinking, and make it challenging to implement breakthrough solutions.

Customer resistance

Design thinking involves engaging with customers and understanding their needs and preferences. However, customers may be resistant to change and may not be open to new ideas and approaches. This can make it difficult to gather valuable customer insights and implement effective solutions.

How to Implement Design Thinking to Transform Banking Services

To use design thinking to transform banking services, use the following steps:

1. Understand the needs and wants of customers

Conduct user research and empathy mapping to understand the pain points and unmet needs of customers in their banking experience.

2. Generate ideas to solve problems

Use brainstorming and other ideation techniques to generate a range of possible solutions to the identified problems.

3. Prototype and test solutions

Create physical or digital prototypes of the solutions and test them with users to gather feedback and refine the design.

4. Implement and iterate

Based on the feedback from user testing, implement the solutions and continue to iterate and improve them based on ongoing feedback and user testing.

5. Communicate and educate

Communicate the changes and improvements to customers and educate them on how to use the new services.

By following these steps, design thinking can help to transform banking services into more user-centered and effective solutions that meet the needs of customers.

What Banking Experts Say About the Implementation of Design Thinking

To identify the path for successful implementation of design thinking in finance, we talked with experts from leading banks and Fintech companies in Northern Europe:

Get Ready That Declaring "Customer-Centricity" is not Enough

Experts from banks and Fintech companies agree that understanding the customer is the core of every business. In fact, customer-centricity is well-communicated among employees in banks. Yet, differences exist in how people in both types of organizations perceive customer-centricity. Fintech companies “step into customer shoes” and examine the customer on a deeper level to find new ways to disrupt existing financial services. Banks concentrate on how to maintain current services for their large base of customers.

Design-driven organizations are engaging with their customers to find out what they really think and what values they hold. For example, by approaching customers in a local bank branch and having a talk with them about their banking experience.

Yet, it is the management which usually sets the tone defining how deeply the company needs to understand the customer. Instead, bringing the customer in at all levels of the company can be an advantage. For instance, Jeff Bezos leaves one seat free at the boardroom and encourages the meeting attendees to imagine that it is taken by their customer - “the most important person in the room”.

Another common practice for raising customer-centricity in a company is field experience - have top/middle management spend a day per month working with people who work with customers on a daily basis. That's a way for management to truly understand their customer.

Moreover, a company can involve all employees to understand the customer on a deeper level. Every day, companies receive complaints and feedback from their customers. Why involve only customer support to answer them? Create a support deck where each employee receives one complaint to which a reply needs to be given. That way all employees become more aware of their customer, and feel responsible in their daily routines. Remember, customer-centricity is a special way to think and act, not just talk.

Don't Miss out on Specific Goals

Setting common goals and visions is easier in smaller organizations such as Fintech companies. Banks have many departments and teams which concentrate on various targets. In fact, lack of focus on defined problems and poor definition of challenges are the key obstacles of integrating design thinking process in international banks.

Defining goals is a crucial part in tackling any challenge. It is important to get them right to create a focus on the given problem. From a design thinking perspective, the goal can be defined as a problem statement which summarises ‘who is the customer’ and ‘what are the customer’s needs’ - in other words “the challenge”.

For example, Mark is a 25-year old Millennial who doesn't like to follow his daily finances. He needs a way to save up money from daily spending, while not taking too much attention from his routine. The first part describes the customer, and the second part elaborates on the need the customer is facing.

However, the goal formulation is not the problem, but the way it is communicated across departments and teams. In larger organizations, it is common to set goals with a top-bottom approach, excluding the opinion of regular employees.

Make a point of setting united goals by hearing the opinion of your employees. Traditional culture should learn from Fintech how to “hear” customers, employees and partners. This critical step can make the employees more engaged in the company by involving them in the goal-setting process. Encourage bottom-top and lateral as well as top-bottom communication across your organization.

Ensure Customers' Presence in Daily Routine

While large organizations such as banks spend a considerable amount of time organizing work between their departments, Fintech companies have budgetary and time constraints which motivate them to act quickly. Quick action includes brainstorming ideas and testing them as soon as possible to learn from mistakes. But there’s more to it than that.

The majority of specialists from various organizations have stated that only some customer-oriented departments, such as R&D and marketing, use design thinking. Fintech companies practice ideation more than traditional organizations, as they need to be flexible about what customers truly need to disrupt existing financial products. Due to the presence of extensive legacy systems, a large portion of bank employee time must be devoted to operational functions which are not related to the customer. Therefore, customer-centricity is more common in Fintech companies where the roles of the employees are more customer-centred.

Although banks encourage employees to participate in product brainstorming and testing sessions, the participation is low as it is not relevant to people who perform operational roles. Therefore, it is important to find a way to relate the work of all employees to customer-related challenges.

The example and attitude shown by management towards employees results in employees adopting a similar approach in their interaction with customers and customers’ challenges. If management doesn't listen and respect other people’s opinions and feelings, the employees do the same.

As discussed in the first obstacle, it is important to bring all employees in to solve customer complaints and raise the customer's presence in the organization. Yet, it is even more crucial to involve all employees in developing solutions to those complaints.

A good practice is to involve employees in a project-based activity that contributes to meeting a certain challenge. Create a team of 5-7 people from various departments (including operational departments) and hand them a customer-related challenge. Not only will employees sense a higher level of the customer's presence in their work, they will also have a more interesting, and more rewarding, work experience that complements their daily routine. That can help to develop change-orientated culture in any organization.

Encourage Experimentation Culture

As discussed above, ideation and rapid prototyping is practiced early on in design-driven companies. The rapid process helps validate ideas quickly, then move on with new ones and those with high chance of success. Yet, prototyping is not practiced actively in banks. While the obvious explanation is the lack of customer-centricity among employees performing operational roles, another important aspect is concern over experimentation.

As banks want to maintain the trust of their large customer base, experimenting with new ideas is not as common as in Fintech companies. Startups see that discrepancy as a market advantage that allows them to deliver new products, updates, and customer satisfaction faster and more consistently.

Employees in banks are accustomed to a routine which excludes time for additional activities, such as working on new ideas that will improve results of their core work. Management failing to find time for employee participation in design activities is one of the key obstacles various international banks faced when attempting design thinking implementation in banking.

It is a common practice to build up a strong business case to initiate a project in banks and other large organizations. Therefore, testing is practiced only in the later stages of the project, increasing chances that the work invested might be for nothing. Many Fintech companies use short iterations and cycle times, and companies test ideas frequently to understand whether there is value in pursuing further development.

Yet, it is important to remember that the prototype of an idea does not need to be a perfect solution. Create simple prototypes of your ideas and test them among a subset of your customers to get rapid feedback. For example, if you want to develop a new concept for your mobile application, create three of your most important scenarios in a clickable prototype, then go in to the streets and perform "Guerilla testing" with people that you meet. In a matter of days, you will have tested an idea without risking your existing customer base.

Another question that arises is how to encourage customer-centric and innovative design thinking behavior from employees across a large and diverse organization. One of the best ways is to continue the work that many banks worldwide have already begun - innovation hubs. Retain the innovation hubs and encourage your employees to test their ideas there. Have representatives from innovation hubs in each department of your organization to provide guidance on experimenting with new ideas.

Alternatively, adopt another practice that is common among many international banks - develop independent units which focus on specific goals by embracing their own working culture. For example, Citibank launched its Fintech unit to work as an independent startup of 40 people tasked with developing mobile-first solutions for improved customer banking experiences.

Successful implementation of any innovative methodology depends on the culture of the organization. Most banks have been established for decades. Fintech companies have been founded just recently, allowing them to build their organizations from zero. Out of necessity, Fintech companies have been required to implement processes which reliably lead to the most effective solutions in the shortest time span, in order to survive in the market.

Although Fintech companies appear to be more aware of using design thinking in banking, banks have started many initiatives to transform their organizations. Innovation hubs, internal UX workshops, design support teams, and independent design units are only some of the initiatives taken to change the way how they think. But whether that will transform the established culture of their organizations is a question of time.

Additional answers that might be helpful:

What is the mindset required for design thinking.

Today, customers have dozens of new alternatives every year due to low entry barriers and open banking. That's why, in order to survive in the digital age, financial brands are required to adopt design thinking to make business customer-centered. And this requires from a new generation of bankers to bring their mindset in line with the design thinking approach.

The mindset required for design thinking involves empathy, curiosity, creativity, and collaboration. It requires understanding and empathizing with the needs and wants of users, as well as being open to new ideas and approaches to finding solutions to complex problems. In order to be successful at design thinking, you need to be willing to challenge assumptions, think outside the box, and embrace uncertainty and experimentation. 

There are five key attitudes that need to be implemented with the aim to make the team mindset customer-centered and shift the business toward Design Thinking.

Serve Instead of Sell

Emotions Over Information

Solution Instead of Features

Disruption Over Protection

Create Flow, Avoid Fragmentation

Read more about mindset >>

What are design thinking tools?

Design thinking tools are methods, techniques, and frameworks that help designers and innovators apply the design thinking process to a particular problem or challenge in banking industry. These tools help designers to better understand the needs and wants of users, generate creative solutions, and iterate on their ideas to develop the most effective and impactful solutions.

Some common design thinking tools include:

Empathy mapping

A technique for understanding and empathizing with users, by mapping out their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.

User personas

Fictional characters that represent the different types of users that a product or service is designed for.

Prototyping

The process of creating a model of a product or service to test and refine its design.

User testing

The practice of collecting feedback from real users to inform and improve the design of a product or service.

Customer journey mapping

A visual representation of the steps that a user takes to interact with a product or service, from their first touchpoint to the final outcome.

Read more about tools >>

What is the role of design thinking in the banking sector?

Design thinking is a popular approach used by many companies to improve their digital services. Such companies as Google, IBM, Amazon, Apple, Tesla use design thinking to better understand the needs and preferences of their customers and to develop digital services that are user-friendly, intuitive, and effective.

In the banking sector, design thinking is used to improve the user experience by identifying and addressing the needs and challenges of bank customers. This could involve conducting user research to understand their needs and preferences, developing user-centered solutions, and testing and refining those solutions through prototyping and feedback. By applying design thinking to the user experience in banking, financial institutions can create products that are more likely to be successful and meet the needs of their customers.

Read more about UXDA's 7 steps to improve banking experience >>

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Banking Outside-in: How Design Thinking is Changing The Banking Industry?

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50+ Design Thinking Case Study Examples

Design Thinking Case Studies demonstrate the value of the Design Thinking methodology. They show how this Design Thinking methodology helps creatively solve problems and improve the success rate of innovation and increase collaboration in corporations, education, social impact work and the public sector by focusing on the needs of humans.

There are many Design Thinking Case Study examples on the web, but few meet the criteria for a robust case study: a clear description of the methodology, steps undertaken, experimentation through rapid prototypes and testing with people and finally documented results from the process. In this section, we have been selective about the design thinking case study examples that we highlight. We look for Design Thinking Case Studies that demonstrate how a problem was tackled and wherever possible the results or effect that the project produced. Our goal in curating this section of Design Thinking Case Study examples is quality over quantity.

Browse this page to view all Design Thinking Case Study examples, or if you are looking for Design Thinking Case Studies in a specific industry or marketing vertical, then rather start with the Design Thinking Case Studies Index .

If you have an interesting application of Design Thinking that you have a case study for, we would be happy to publish it.

Submit your Design Thinking Case Study for publication here.

Design Thinking Case Study Index

Welcome to the Design Thinking Case Study Index. There are many Design Thinking Case Studies on the internet. Many are retrofitted descriptions of what occurred, rather than evidence of the Design Thinking process in action. In order to bring a higher standard to the practice of Design Thinking, we require stronger evidence and rigor. Only members can post and must provide strong evidence in the Design Thinking Case Study that the Design Thinking process was used to create the original idea for the product or service solution. The criteria that needs to be proved to make your project a Design Thinking Case Study are:

The Guardian: Benefits of Design Thinking

Design thinking helped The Guardian newspaper and publishing group change their funding model, boost revenue and adapt their culture and engage on an emotional level with their readers. In this case study, Alex Breuer, Executive Creative Director and Tara Herman, Executive Editor, Design explain how design thinking was able to achieve these goals for The Guardian.

Read more...

Tackling the Opioid Crisis at the Human and Systems Levels

How the Lummi Tribal clinic used design to address opioid overdoses

Applying Design Thinking Internally

Applying Design Thinking internally, within a group, community or to ourselves. This is a new application of the Design Thinking Methodology.

An internal application in this sense can have two meanings. First, the internal application of design thinking tactics within a group, organization or community, and second, the internal application of design thinking to one’s own self and life.

Can Design Thinking help you solve your own problems?

The Use of Design Thinking in MNCH Programs, Ghana

Responding to growing interest among designers, global health practitioners, and funders in understanding the potential benefits of applying design thinking methods and tools to solving complex social problems, the Innovations for Maternal, Newborn, and Child Health (MNCH) Initiative (Innovations) developed and piloted innovative interventions to address common barriers to improving the effectiveness of basic MNCH health services in low-resource settings.

Société Générale's Time Tracking Nightmare Solved

In 2017, employees, managers, and partners of Société Générale Global Solution Centre agreed that invoices based on time tracking and project allocation were a chronic and painful challenge.

At SG-GSC, customers were billed for the time each assigned employee worked. The process of collecting the time worked by those employees (HCC) was a complicated and difficult ordeal. It consumed 21 days per month for senior employees. These employees had to navigate different systems, many types of contracts, high staff mobility, and a variety of processes between business lines.

How to Stimulate Innovation in Your Organization With Design Thinking

In this use case the cities of Aalborg and Rotterdam share their findings obtained from design thinking initiatives. This is based on empirical research as part of an evaluation. The use case is written for other professionals in the field of design in public organizations.

One of the main targets of the Interreg NSR project Like! is to create a digital innovative culture in which citizens are engaged, and more inclusive services are build. To reach this the municipalities started several initiatives with design thinking. In these initiatives one of the objectives was to find out how design thinking can help us to develop innovative and inclusive services. To research what design thinking contributed, we evaluated the pilots with participants.

The Impact of Design Thinking on Innovation: A Case Study at Scania IT

Organizational culture represents a crucial factor for the introduction of innovation throughout the organization via Design Thinking and agile way of working. Thus, the organization must establish a culture that encompasses a shared vision with values that create a commitment to learn, experiment and accept failure.

Oral B - Putting the User At the Center of Innovation

Oral B wanted to integrate digital technology into their electric toothbrush. The Brands first thoughts were to help users to track how well they were brushing their teeth. Future Facility, a product design firm in the UK suggested a different approach. Focus on the pain points of electric toothbrush users.

This case study discusses the importance of placing the user at the center of your innovation activities.

Design Thinking at Innogy

eCarSharing:   Energy Solutions for the New Generation

In 2015, Itai Ben-Jacob pitched his own ideas for a viable business model and developed the idea for innogy’s eCarSharing project in a design thinking workshop. His goal was to explore one of innogy’s innovation focus areas, ‘urban mobility.’

Together with fellow innovation hub members he organized a series of design thinking workshops to wade through the expansive topic of urban concepts – one of them focusing on mobility: “ We wanted to understand urban mobility – what does it actually entail? What type of business should we start? “

Building Cape Town’s Resilience Qualities Through Design Thinking.

This case study focuses on a Design Thinking Workshop for primary school learners. The aim of the workshops was to provide learners with a new set of skills which they can employ when problem solving for real world challenges.

Building resilience is essential for cities that face increasing uncertainty and new challenges that threaten the well-being of its citizens. This is especially important when looking at the diversity and complexity of potential shocks and stresses. 

Cape Town’s efforts to build skills in design thinking supports the creation of locally-relevant and innovative solutions that contribute to building resilient individuals and communities in Cape Town.

Designing Waste Out of the Food System

The average American  wastes  enough food each month to feed another person for 19 days. Through a number of projects with The Rockefeller Foundation and other organizations, IDEO designers from across the U.S. devised novel ways to tackle food waste.

B2B Design Thinking: Product Innovation when the User is a Network

When B2B companies talk about user experience, they are really considering the aggregated needs of multiple people and roles in a large ecosystem. But what happens when those objectives are vastly different for every individual?

“Humans don’t stop being humans just because they entered an office building.”

Self-Checkout: Improving Scan Accuracy Through Design

In this unique applied research study, academics and designers partnered with four of ECR’s Retailer members to immerse themselves in the self-checkout experience, understanding from the perspectives of the shopper and self-checkout supervisors, their journey from entry to exit, and their design challenges and frustrations.

Co-designing OTP Bank’s Strategic Plan for Growth

This is an example of accelerating a transformation through co-design. Eighty-two professionals gathered, representing OTP’s whole organization. Together, they were able to achieve months of work in just three days.

OTP Bank Romania (OTP) was at a key turning point in late 2018. The organization was undergoing changes in its leadership team. This new team helped them develop an ambitious goal:

OTP Bank will double its market share in 5 years.

They gathered for two Discovery sessions in December 2018. In these sessions, a carefully selected senior team chose three market segments to focus on. Then they built these segments into Personas.

IDEO: Journey to Mastery

While this is not a case study as such, it sits in our case study section as it is an important piece of information from a consultancy that played a large part in popularizing Design Thinking. In their Journey to Mastery section, IDEO discuss and shine a light on the shortcomings of the design thinking term and how it has been applied. I.e that it is not designing and that just knowing and using the practice does not in itself produce amazing solutions to problems.

It is worth a read to understand some of the nuance that is important to successful design thinking work.

Singapore Government: Building Service Platforms Around Moments in Life

In 2017, the product development team at Singapore’s Government Technology Agency (GovTech) was tasked to develop a tool to consolidate citizen-facing services previously delivered by different government agencies onto a single platform. The initiative, Moments of Life, sought to make it easier for citizens to discover and access relevant services during important changes in their lives by reducing fragmentation and being more anticipatory in the delivery of those services.

Organizing the delivery of services around a citizen’s journey, rather than fitting their delivery to existing processes, required extensive interagency collaboration beyond functional silos.

Mayo Clinic: Design Thinking in Health Care – Case Study

In the early 2000s, Mayo Clinic physician Nicholas LaRusso asked himself a question: if we can test new drugs in clinical trials, can we in a similarly rigorous way test new kinds of doctor-patient interactions?  

Consequently, the Mayo Clinic set up a skunkworks outpatient lab called SPARC. Within 6 years it had grown to an enterprise wide department called the Center for Innovation a dedicated research and design-oriented institute that studies the processes of health care provision, from the initial phone call, to the clinic visit, to the diagnosis and treatment of the problem, to follow-up and preventive care.

Design Thinking and Participation in Switzerland: Lessons Learned from Three Government Case Studies

Olivier Glassey, Jean-Henry Morin, Patrick Genoud, Giorgio Pauletto

This paper examines how design thinking and serious game approaches can be used to support participation.

In these case studies the authors discovered the following results.

Perceived usefulness. Based on informal discussions and debriefing sessions following all workshops, it is clear that the vast majority of workshop participants explicitly stated that both the actual outcome of the workshop and the methods used would significantly contribute to enhancing their performance in their work. Some workshops have actually led to follow up workshops or concrete actions based on the outcome.

Asili: Addressing an Entire Ecosystem of Need in a Rural Community

Design Thinking in HR at Deutche Telekom

Reza Moussavian, a senior HR and IT executive at Deutsch Telekom explains the company's journey and how important Design Thinking is as a business strategy for HR. Reza Moussavian's presentation provides great examples of issues tackled in HR and the results achieved. The presenter claims that there is not a singe issue that Deutche Telekom tackles in HR now that does not start with a Design Thinking methodology.

"Design Thinking solves 5% of our problems." says Reza Moussavian, "What we found out was that the magic was really in the implementation phase. We had to learn how to keep the momentum, the spirit and the fire from the co-creation workshops alive through the long implementation phase. Success is really about technology, transformation and leadership skills."

Design Thinking in Education: Perspectives, Opportunities and Challenges

This very informative article discusses design thinking as a process and mindset for collaboratively finding solutions for wicked problems in a variety of educational settings. Through a systematic literature review the article organizes case studies, reports, theoretical reflections, and other scholarly work to enhance our understanding of the purposes, contexts, benefits, limitations, affordances, constraints, effects and outcomes of design thinking in education.

Specifically, the review pursues four questions:

Design Thinking in the Classroom: What can we do about Bullying?

As children move from kindergarten, through middle school, and to high school, instruction shifts from stories to facts, from speculation to specifics, and imagination fades from focus. Design Thinking provides an alternative model to traditional ways of learning academic content by challenging students to find answers to complex, nuanced problems with multiple solutions and by fostering students’ ability to act as change agents.

Design Thinking is all about building creative confidence — a sense that “I can change the world.” In the Bullies & Bystanders Design Challenge, the students discovered that changing themselves might be even more important.

Following One School District's Approach to Innovation for the 21st Century

In her doctoral paper Loraine Rossi de Campos explores the use of Design Thinking in a school district for a 4-5 grade school.

India: Using ‘Design Thinking’ to Enhance Urban Redevelopment.

The discourse on urban planning and development has evolved over the last century with top-down methods of planning urban spaces giving way to bottom-up approaches that involve residents and other stakeholders in the design process. While the notion of participation and user involvement is considered critical to the design of appropriate and acceptable urban forms, there is no clear consensus in the literature on the methodology to be used to involve users and stakeholders in the design process. In this paper, we propose that the use of ‘Design-Thinking’ – a methodology for Human-Centred Design that is often used in product design and related industries – may be an effective methodology for engaging stakeholders in the urban design domain.

E*Trade: From Idea to Investment in 5 Minutes

Why the Financial Services Sector Should Embrace Design Thinking. Financial institutions need to evolve rapidly or risk disruption at the hands of nimble Fintech start-up companies.

In this article Kunal Vaed, The Street, describes how E*Trade used design thinking to enable the company to help investors get smarter by going from the idea of investing to an investment in 5 minutes.

E*Trade's Adaptive Portfolio service offering provides a good example of the work and results that E*Trade achieved with Design Thinking.

Fidelity Labs: Optimizing near-term savings goals

Thanks to providers like Fidelity, people can rely on easy, convenient systems to stay on track with their retirement savings. But when it comes to saving for important near-term goals (think: vacation, house, or wedding), people tend to be less organized. 

Fidelity Labs tackled this problem and defined the challenge as: "How might we improve the experience of saving for near-term goals? How might we make it easier, faster, and better?"

Design for Action: MassMutual and Intercorp Group

How to use design thinking to make great things actually happen by Tim Brown and Roger L. Martin. In this great HBR article, the authors look at design thinking in Finance with two case studies, one from MassMutual and the other from Intercorp. Group of Peru.

In this article highlighting the development of the acceptance of Design Thinking, they discuss how Design Thinking helps to create the artifact that creates the new solution as well as the intervention/s that brings the artifact to life.

How to Use Design Thinking to Make Great Things Actually Happen

Ever since it became clear that smart design led to the success of many products, companies have been employing it in other areas, from customer experiences, to strategy, to business ecosystems. But as design is used in increasingly complex contexts, a new hurdle has emerged: gaining acceptance (for the new solutions).

4 Design Thinking Case Studies in Healthcare: Nursing

The 4 case studies by Penn Nursing illustrate how nurses can be really powerful collaborators and generators of solutions within Healthcare. The videos describe the main attributes that nurses bring to the problem solving table

Philips: Improving the Patient Experience

Philips Ambient Experience service offers hospitals a way to radically improve the patient experience and results that they can achieve from their CT scanning suites. The best way to understand what it is is to watch this video  and this video  discussing the latest addition to the service. The white paper from Philips is also a good source of information on the Ambient Experience Service.

IBM: Design Thinking Adaptation and Adoption at Scale

How IBM made sense of ‘generic design thinking’ for tens of thousands of people. 

Generic design thinking often faces heavy resistance from influential skeptics, gets misunderstood or not understood at all, or less dire, it gets picked up with an unreflected euphoria and is applied as a “silver bullet” to all kinds of problems and projects (the famous “methodology misfit” we also see with Scrum for example). The big hangover often comes after the first experimentation budgets are expended and at worst a blame game starts.

Design Thinking in Public Engagement: Two Case Studies

Dave Robertson presents two case studies with the British Columbia Government (Canada). One with the Ministry of Transportation discussing their (public servant centered website), the other solving the problem of finding a solution to where to place a power substation.

Dave shows how he was stuck working in the public sector as a consultant and how creativity expressed through the Design Thinking methodology helped him to see a different, more effective way of creating solutions.

Bank of America Helps Customers Keep the Change

How do you encourage new customers to open bank accounts? In 2004, Bank of America used the Design Thinking methodology to look at the problem from a human centered perspective when they assigned design agency IDEO to boost their enrollment numbers: a problem that at the time, lacked any user perspective on why it was so hard for customers to save.

Redesigning The Employment Pass Application in Singapore

The Ministry of Manpower’s Work Pass Division (WPD) used design thinking as a tool to develop better ways to support foreigners who choose Singapore as a destination to live, work and set up businesses. The case reveals: Design thinking can potentially transform the perception and meaning of public service.

The team found out that the service redesign process required a better understanding of the decision points of both users and non-users. This involved taking a closer look at the opportunities and difficulties facing users, including those who had succeeded and failed within it, or had encountered problems or avoided it.

The US Tax Forms Simplification Project

This case concerns one of the earliest attempts by design thinkers at designing a large, complex system. It shows that design approaches in the public sector can look back at a long history. And it reveals how design thinking within the organization must include members of the whole organization in the design process.

Design has a long tradition and a rich history in the public sector. Nearly 40 years ago, when the US Congress passed the Paperwork Reduction Act into law, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) turned to designers in an effort to implement the new policy and to improve its relationship with taxpayers. 

A Tough Crowd: Using Design Thinking to Help Traditional German Butchers

Between 2004 and 2014, more than 4000 butcher shops were forced to shut down in Germany. When last was the butcher shop redesigned? The process started in the 1990s, as supermarkets became the favored spot for meat-shopping. As if a dramatic loss of market share was not enough, the industry as a whole started suffering from a serious image crisis. It was time to apply design Thinking to the traditional German Butcher Shop.

The initial problem statement read “Create the meat shop 2.0, an up-to-date version of the classic butcher business”. 

IDEO: Using Design Thinking to Create a Better Car

The challenge.

Remove roadblocks that can compromise the in-car experience for the Lincoln car company.

The final product, the Lincoln MKC luxury crossover, is credited with helping the Lincoln brand outpace growth in the luxury segment by more than two-to-one over competitors.

THE OUTCOME

A pop-up studio where IDEO designers helped departments communicate and collaborate more effectively.

Transforming Constructivist Learning into Action: Design Thinking in Education

In an ever changing society of the 21st century, there is a demand to equip students with meta competences going beyond cognitive knowledge. Education, therefore, needs a transition from transferring knowledge to developing individual potentials with the help of constructivist learning. A Scheer, C Noweski,  C Meinel , University of Potsdam, Germany.

Design Thinking is the most effective method of teaching constructivist learning.

Scaling Design Thinking in the Enterprise, a 5 Year Study

During Julie Baher's five years at  Citrix  between 2010 to 2015, she was fortunate to gain first-hand experience leading a transformation in product strategy to a customer-centered approach. It began when several senior executives attended the  design thinking boot camp  at Stanford’s d-school, returning with a new vision for the product development processes. Julie goes into detail about how they scaled up the customer centric methodology across the organizations 8,000 employees.

Developing Environmental Sustainability Strategies

Developing environmental sustainability strategies, the Double Diamond method of LCA and design thinking: a case study from aged care. Journal of Cleaner Production, 85, 67-82. Stephen J. Clune*, Simon Lockrey.

Developing an App for Type II Diabetes

Development and testing of a mobile application to support diabetes self-management for people with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes: a design thinking case study. Numerous mobile applications have been developed to support diabetes-self-management. However, the majority of these applications lack a theoretical foundation and the involvement of people with diabetes during development. The aim of this study was to develop and test a mobile application (app) supporting diabetes self-management among people with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes using design thinking. The article was written by Mira Petersen and Nana F. Hempler.

Improving UX in Public Transportation

In this case study the project leaders goal was to  improve the experience of bus users  on Madrid's EMT system by offering a technological solution to  increase the users’ satisfaction with regard to accessibility  during the bus trip as well as when waiting for the bus to arrive.

Transforming Life Insurance through Design Thinking

To some fintechs, non-insurance incumbents, and venture capitalists, the industry’s challenges suggest opportunity. The life insurance value chain is increasingly losing share to these players, who are chipping away at the profit pool. 

How might incumbent life insurers keep pace in today’s fast-moving competitive environment and meet customers’ changing needs?

Deploying the Design Thinking methodology in the insurance sector could be the key to helping save insurance from itself. Here's what McKinsey has to say about design thinking in insurance in their article "Transforming Life Insurance through Design Thinking".

"Better addressing the evolving needs of consumers can help incumbents win their loyalty—and protect against new competitors. 

Bringing Design Thinking to the Insurance World

Pancentric helped  Jelf kick-off a several-year digital transformation journey by getting to know not just their customers better, but their own staff, too. Jelf has dozens of offices around the UK, all with specialties in insuring different kinds of commercial businesses. For our project team trying to determine a roadmap of new developments, there was no easy overview of how each office operated or what the entire customer experience looked like.

The Features of Design Thinking in Fast Moving Consumer Goods Brand Development

This paper investigates what features of design thinking are employed in FMCG brand development via stakeholder interviews in three domains: agencies, companies, and retailers. This paper concludes with suggestions of how design thinking can be embraced in FMCG brand development.

A Chain of Innovation The Creation of Swiffer

This is a great case study that underlines the complexity of bringing game changing products to market. It helps to provide an understanding of just how much more is needed that a simple five step process of idea generation.

Read more from Continuum , the Design Firm responsible for the Swiffer

The Guardian: Using Design to Reaffirm Values

The Guardian's redesign, which launched in January 2018, illustrated the business impact when design is valued. The Guardian has a strong culture of design and increasingly, how design thinking can contribute to organizational change and development.

The Accidental Design Thinker

Bringing Design Thinking to All

40 Design Thinking Success Stories

I’m incredibly optimistic of the power of DT but also always on the lookout for design thinking success stories and examples. As I’ve shared my knowledge of design thinking with others, I’ve frequently been asked how often it delivers demonstrable results and how broadly it can be applied. Below is my collection of design thinking success stories that have helped reinforce my conviction that design thinking can deliver incredibly powerful results and be applicable to everyone.

Consumer Packaged Goods

• Designing a Simplified IoT Electric Toothbrush
• Indra Nooyi HBR Design Thinking Interview
• Using Design Thinking to Guide Product Development for Oil of Olay Brand
• Design Thinking for K-12 Educators
• Great Fast Co Design Article on Teaching Kids DT
• Design Thinking STEAM School Case Study
• Awesome Case of Designing an Entire High School Via Design Thinking
• Dense but Rich Dissertation of Use of Design Thinking in a School District
• The Power of Empathy in the Elementary Classroom

Financial Services

• Click Link & Scroll Down for Bank of America Case Profile
• How ABN AMRO Leverages Design Thinking
• 3 Banks Integrating Design Into Customer Experience
• Evolution of Design Thinking in Deutsche Bank’s IT Division
• Bank of Ireland’s Lesley Tully on the Value of Design Thinking
• GE Healthcare – From Terrifying to Terrific
• NY Times – Design Thinking for Doctors & Nurses
• Design Thinking in Healthcare – Schizophrenia
• Design Thinking Lessons from Mayo Clinic
• Design Thinking at Stanford University Medicine
• Design Thinking Case Studies in Journalism
• Why Design Thinking & Journalism Go Together

Non-Profit/NGOs

• Design Thinking & Winnebago at GGRC for Better Service
• Collection of Design Thinking Case Studies from Museums
• Improving Quality of Life for the Elderly Via Better Food Service
• Mobisol’s Use of Design Thinking for Solar Energy
• Leveraging Design Thinking in Cambodia Video
• How Nike Became a Fashion Powerhouse Through Design
• Nordstrom Innovation Lab Video Profile
• Popular Airbnb Design Thinking Success Story
• Innovation at Apple – Design Thinking Case Study
• IBMs Design Centered Strategy
• Design Thinking at IBM
• Google’s 3 Step Process for Generating Innovative Ideas
• Intuit’s Designing for Delight
• How the Uber Eats Team Designs
• Design Thinking in Action at SAP

Transportation

• Cool Step by Step Case of Applying DT to a Common Challenge for Travelers
• How Makassar Plans To Use Design Thinking to Improve Transport

Self-Improvement

• Designing Your Life Through Design Thinking – My Personal Story
• NY Times – Design Thinking for a Better You
• Stanford professor’s Take on How DT Can Help You Lose Weight, Stop Worrying, & Change Your Life
• Designing Your Life – Insight into the Most Popular Class at Stanford!

If you’re at the beach and would rather read an actual book full of design thinking case studies, I’d recommend ‘Solving Problems with Design Thinking: Ten Stories of What Works’ by Jeanne Lietdka.

In summary, there are plenty of available and powerful design thinking success stories, that will hopefully increase your conviction in the strength of DT. I’m always on the lookout for new examples and will continue to add to this list. Please don’t hesitate to share any great examples that I’m missing and continue to check back in as this list grows in size!

Interested in expanding your design thinking mindset and skills?  Click here for my collection of design thinking tools and resources!

• Category: Design Thinking , Innovation , Marketing & Branding
• Tag: Best Practices , Case Studies , Design , Design Thinking , Innovation , Success Stories

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accidentalDT- thank you for sharing so much amazing resources on your site.

[…] Be an Advocate for Design Thinking – Know, believe, share, and celebrate the success stories of design thinking. Here are 40 design thinking stories that will help make anyone a believer […]

[…] Check out my collection in the Self-Improvement section of 40 Design Thinking Success Stories! […]

[…] It was wonderful hearing case studies to supplement the research I’ve conducted on design thinking success stories. […]

Thank you for your valuable contribution to Design Thinkers!

My pleasure Denise! Thank you for your kind words and for visiting my site; it means a ton to me!

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Inside Design

Bank of America + IDEO: Designing an empathetic solution to saving

Kaysie garza,   •   aug 24, 2017.

W hat would you do if you were tasked with inspiring people to open bank accounts? In 2004, Bank of America gave this same challenge to design firm IDEO—and a human-centered, ethnographic-based approach led to the solution, a campaign called “Keep The Change.”

After making observations across the country, the IDEO team realized several people in charge of household finances were intentionally fudging their math. That is—they were rounding up to make addition easier, which also added a buffer in their bank accounts.

Read: The full “Keep The Change” case study on DesignBetter.Co

This was something IDEO could really use. Instead of starting inside the walls of Bank of America headquarters with marketing tactics and assumptions, IDEO ventured into the field to observe real people’s relationships with money.

IDEO’s final solution became a huge business success for Bank of America, but it also created a change in mental state for customers. And that is why empathy is so crucial to design thinking.

“More than a methodology or framework, design thinking combines the problem-solving roots of design with deep empathy for the user.” —Eli Woolery, DesignBetter.Co

Guiding your own team to practice empathy is the surest way to create a relevant product that’s functional and delightful to use. To help people practice empathy, Stanford’s d.school created a challenge called The Wallet Project.

This project tasks participants with designing a wallet in just a few minutes. After they’ve sketched use cases and specifics, the participants are directed to interview someone specific. Following this conversation, they’re again directed to design a wallet—but for the specific individual instead.

We adapted this exercise so you can use it with your own team. The scope has been pared down, so it fits well within a 15-minute time block. In the interview portion, we also suggest a few specific questions elicit feedback that has the potential to truly influence your designs.

After you give this exercise a go, imagine how you could apply the practice to your work.

For expert insights and suggestions—or to learn more about IDEO and Bank of America’s “Keep the Change” campaign—check out the Design Thinking Handbook on DesignBetter.Co.

More posts on empathy and product design:

• Increase conversion with empathetic UX
• Secrets of design masters (a podcast by True North)
• What to prioritize for a successful, scalable product design process

by Kaysie Garza

Kaysie is a content specialist at InVision. She's helped strategize and write launch campaigns across the company, including all DesignBetter.Co programs, The Design Genome Project, and more. You can find her devouring books, French fries, or hiking trails when she isn't working on words.

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Design Thinking in Banking- A Complete Guide

This blog discusses the application of Design Thinking in Banking sector, and highlights how this solves customers’ problems by highlighting their needs. It emphasises the importance of comprehending customers’ requirements, behaviours, and challenges, which is essential for success in banking.

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Design Thinking is like a breath of fresh air for the Banking industry. As banks grapple with the ever-increasing demand for personalised experiences and streamlined services, this methodology fosters innovation.  Design Thinking in Banking represents a customer-centric approach that employs empathy, creativity, and rationality to solve complex problems.  

The iterative process of Design Thinking includes understanding the user, defining problems, ideating solutions, prototyping, and testing, all of which combine to enhance efficiency and customer satisfaction. This paradigm shift is shaping the future of banking. This blog will explore Design Thinking in Banking and how the banking sector employs a creative problem-solving approach centred around customer needs.

Table of Contents  

1)  What is Design Thinking in Banking? 

     a)  Stage 1: Empathise 

     b)  Stage 2: Define 

     c)  Stage 3: Ideate 

     d)  Stage 4: Prototype 

     e)  Stage 5: Test 

2) Roles of Design Thinking in Banking

2)  Benefits of Design Thinking in Banking 

3)  Challenges of Design Thinking in Banking 

4)  Conclusion 

What is Design Thinking in Banking ?  

Design Thinking is a methodology that employs a cyclical process to gain insights into users, reframe challenges, and devise innovative solutions. It applies design concepts in a manner akin to human interaction with their surroundings. This approach is particularly effective for addressing complex or undefined challenges.

In our complex and interconnected world, it’s crucial to continually evolve Design Thinking abilities. This ensures a deep comprehension of customers and the agility to adapt swiftly to the dynamic shifts in their contexts and actions.

Traditional banking methods are at risk due to the emergence of FinTech startups in recent years. These new service providers challenge established banks with their latest business strategies and customer-centric technologies. 

Stage 1: Empathise  

The first step in Design Thinking is to empathise. Here, the focus is given to gaining an empathetic understanding of the problem to be solved. This is achieved through user research, i.e., understanding the user's needs.  Only after that can be taken to ensure their needs are met.    

Design-driven efforts promote reaching out to customers. The motive here is to discover the services that attract them to the offering. Getting in touch with customers in a local bank branch and collecting feedback about their banking experience can be a good example. It makes the management follow Design Thinking and become customer-centric.  

Stage 2: Define 

Once the problem has been identified, it’s time to accumulate all the information gathered during the first stage. These observations are then analysed and synthesised to define the core problems. These observations are called ‘problem statements’.  

One important thing to remember is that organisations should not define the problem as their own need. Instead, they must pitch the problem statement from the users' perspective. For example, saying, “People should have insurance policies to deal with some unforeseen circumstances,” is far better than saying, “We need to sell more and more insurance policies to people.”  

Stage 3: Ideate 

The third step in Design Thinking is to create ideas. Once the problem has been identified and defined, it’s time to generate ideas. At this stage, you are expected to look for alternative ways to look at the design thinking problem and develop innovative solutions through brainstorming.    

There are many techniques of creativity. One of the commonly used example is brainstorming. Brainstorming is typically the most used technique at this stage of creativity. It allows people to generate as many ideas as possible.   

The worst possible idea is an unconventional technique. It's a method for seeking the worst solutions at this stage ‘purposefully’. This process helps people relax, boosts their confidence, and stokes their creativity so that they can examine these ideas, challenge their assumptions, and gain insights into great ideas.  

Stage 4: Prototype 

This is an experimental phase where the aim is to find the best possible solution to the problem. Many scaled-down suggestions are presented at this stage. These prototypes are confidential and can be shared and tested within the team (sometimes with other departments). Paper prototyping is the best example of this process.  

Stage 5: Test 

 This is the final phase of the five-phase model in which solutions are tested. Since Design Thinking is iterative, the results are often used to redefine one or more further problems.  Testing aims to get as deep in understanding the problem as possible. At this point, it’s time to put the product into the end user’s hands and ask for feedback. The whole process is experienced from the user's perspective.

Role of Design Thinking in Banking 

 Design Thinking is a human-centred problem-solving methodology that emphasises empathy, collaboration, and innovation. In the banking sector, this methodology is proving to be a game-changer, helping institutions enhance Customer Experiences, drive innovation, and adapt to changing market dynamics.

1) Empathising with digital Banking users:  During the empathy stage, it is essential to collect a significant amount of data about customer needs, pain points, business goals, and product features. Thorough research can help gain knowledge about User Behaviour and find ways to enhance the onboarding experience for new users. Empathising is also crucial to determine if the digital Banking journey is frustrating. 

2) Defining core value and user problems: During the empathise stage of a project, research can be conducted to gain insight into the issues the users face. This helps understand the users' needs and highlights potential areas for innovation. By compiling and analysing the data gathered during the research, you can identify common pain points and unmet needs, which can provide valuable insights for designing effective solutions.

3) Ideating online value and user problems:  After the consumers' unanswered needs have been identified, the next step is to gather and explore various creative ideas to address those needs. At this stage, all team members collaborate to share ideas, brainstorm, and build upon each other's thoughts. 

4) Prototyping digital Banking products: When prototyping digital Banking products, the aim is to determine which parts of the ideas are effective. It's essential to evaluate the impact of your ideas against their feasibility through receiving feedback. Additionally, the concept can change based on feedback, and the prototype can be updated accordingly.

5) Testing Banking prototype: Once you have developed a prototype, testing it with your target audience is crucial. This will help you determine whether your product meets the users' requirements and addresses their issues. 

Additionally, do not hesitate to gather feedback from your customers and continuously improve your product. Doing so will ensure your product remains relevant and beneficial to your target audience. 

While Design Thinking offers significant benefits to the Banking industry, it is not without challenges. Implementing design thinking requires a cultural shift within organisations, which can be met with resistance from traditional, risk-averse structures. Additionally, this process can be time-consuming and may require a significant initial investment in training and resources.

Unlock innovation and transform problem-solving with our Design Thinking for R&D Engineers Training – sign up now!  

Benefits of Design Thinking in Banking 

There are several Benefits of Design Thinking which can motivate the Banking companies to implement its concepts and processes.

a) Design Thinking is a tool for innovation. It helps create new products, services, and experiences that are more user-friendly and more efficient.   

b) By incorporating Design Thinking, banks can develop in-house apps that cater to customers' needs. Based on Banking customers’ feedback and ideas, services can be improved accordingly.   

c) Design Thinking can also help banks create or expand their brands. In the Banking industry, products like mobile banking apps and credit/debit cards shape the organisation's brand. So, banks’ strategy should consider how to provide a good brand experience to users. In order to achieve this, the product must offer the right features to the right people.    

d) Design Thinking is a non-linear process, where one stage leads to the next with a logical conclusion. However, the results often redefine one or more further problems. Different teams within an organisation may conduct more than one stage concurrently.  

e) Apart from banks or other financial institutions, it can also help Financial Advisors and Brokers better understand their clients‘ needs. The finance sector is full of complex concepts that many people find difficult to understand.  

f) Design Thinking can help simplify this knowledge. This way, Design Thinking can help clients make better financial decisions. It is believed that all employees, regardless of their position and role, should begin to see themselves as Design Thinkers. It will help enhance the Customer Experience and provide banks with a competitive edge over their competitors  

Challenges of Design Thinking in Banking 

The Banking industry is highly regulated. Banks must abide by several norms. Sometimes, innovating and implementing new ideas is difficult because prospective changes must comply with regulations. This can sometimes reduce the scope and flexibility of Design Thinking.   

Even if the norms don’t stop a bank, long-established traditions and ways of doing things can also be a hurdle in the path of Design Thinking. It's sometimes difficult to change the culture and mindset that has been used for a long time. Moreover, the Banking industry is complex and risk-averse. So, the management may resist implementing new changes to avoid risks.   

Design Thinking is a customer-centric concept that focuses on fulfilling customers' needs and preferences. However, customers may sometimes resist change and not be open to new ideas and approaches, which can also create problems in implementing effective solutions.   

Some organisations may not have a strong design team or the skills to implement Design Thinking effectively. Smaller organisations mainly deal with problems like training employees and investing in new tools and technologies due to limited budgets.   

Unlock your potential as a visionary problem-solver with our Design Thinking Training – empower innovation today!

Conclusion 

 We hope you enjoyed reading this blog on Design Thinking in Banking and learned about it, its stages, advantages, and disadvantages. Design thinking is very useful in the banking industry. Especially when newly established fintech companies compete with the traditional banking system, it has become unavoidable for banks to accept new ideas. 

Join our Creative and Analytical Thinking Training to enhance your problem-solving abilities and unlock your full creative potential!

Frequently Asked Questions

Design Thinking initiatives in Banking are measured using key metrics like customer satisfaction scores, Net Promoter Score (NPS), user engagement rates, time to market, innovation adoption rates, and overall impact on revenue and cost efficiency.

Banks can refine Design Thinking solutions by collecting and analysing customer feedback, conducting iterative user testing, and implementing insights-based changes. 

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So what is Design Thinking for real?

Design thinking is growing in popularity, but not a new phenomenon, implementation of design thinking in the banking industry, how design thinking works for banking industry, empathy is a critical factor in design thinking for banking industry, let everyone contribute ideas, how design thinking is changing the banking industry.

Banks and credit institutes don’t usually take ‘the human factor’ into consideration while developing products and services. But several financial institutions are now starting to understand how important it is. They are using proven business strategies called ‘Design Thinking’ to foster creativity and innovation. 

People mistakenly believe that “design thinking” is all about aesthetics — a philosophy only limited to creative types of people, who specialize in design. But that’s not at all the case. It does not mean that you can ignore aesthetics, but a good-looking design that does nothing for consumer needs or does not solve any consumer problems has zero chance at success.

• What is Design Thinking?

Design thinking is about applying the design principles to the way people interact with the world, rather than focusing solely on aesthetics. An iterative process in which you try to know the user, challenge your own assumptions and re-define problems in an attempt to identify different solutions that might not be easily apparent using conventional methods. Design thinking revolves around developing a deep interest in understanding users of products and services. This helps you develop empathy with the target user.

This is the complete opposite of how banks and credit institutions traditionally design products and services. Financial institutions tend to develop products based on their own internal processes and operational efficiencies, instead of focusing on the consumers. Finishing up the product with a pretty wrapper and calling it a day.

Financial institutions then wonder why consumers get frustrated with their products and service For example – A customer abandoning the online account opening halfway through the process. The process doesn’t meet the user’s need or address their problem;  to open an account without having to go to a branch. Design thinking, in theory, can help solve that problem.

Also Read: How Recessions Have Impacted Professionals And Businesses – A Ground-level Outlook

Design thinking is not a new concept. It’s been around in some form or the other since the 1960s. In fact, today it will be difficult to find a Fortune 100 company that does not incorporate Design Thinking or at least some aspects of design thinking in how they get products and services to market.

Financial services organizations are laggards in adopting laggards but there are some exceptions. For Example, BBVA launched a program “Design Thinking for Leaders” to help the bank innovate and design for its customers.

Rob Brown, Head of Marketing, Design and Responsible Business at BBVA, believes that “All employees, regardless of their role, should begin to see themselves as a designer that contributes to improving the customer experience” giving the bank an edge over it’s competitors.

Design thinking is big with technology companies that focus on the consumer experience first. Making it likely that more financial institutions will turn to design thinking since they increasingly find themselves competing against both mega-tech and fin-tech firms.

Also Read: Improve your Sales with Design Thinking

Design thinking has four or five phases, dispensing upon how you perceive a problem.

1. Empathize:

 Conduct research in order to develop knowledge about user behaviour. Hypothesize that your goal is to improve the onboarding experience for new users. In the first phase, you talk to varied actual users, you observe what they do, how they think, and what they want. 

Understand user motivations, discouragements, if they experience frustration at any stage of the process. The goal of the empathize phase is to gather observations, so you can truly start to empathize with your users and their perspectives.

Combine your research from the empathize stage and observe where problems exist from a user standpoint. When stating your users’ needs, highlight opportunities for innovation. Use data gathered in the above phase to draw insights. Lay down all your observations and draw parallels across users’ current experiences. This will help you identify a common pain point or an unmet need.

Brainstorm and collate a range of crazy, creative ideas that address the user’s pain points or unmet needs. There should be total freedom while ideating, quantity trumps quality. Bring all your team members together and share ideas with one another and build on each others’ ideas.

4. Prototype 

The goal of this stage is to understand what parts of your ideas work, and which do not as you start to weigh the impact versus feasibility of your ideas through feedback on your prototypes. Your ideas should be as real and tactile as possible (not always easy in a service industry like banking). Change your concept based on feedback, prototyping again and again quickly.

Return to your users for feedback. With questions like  ‘Does the solution meet users’ needs?’ and ‘Is there an improvement in how they feel, think, or do their tasks?’  Put your prototype in the hands of real people and see if it achieves everyone’s goals. Even after you start executing your vision, you should continue to test.

One of the key concepts in design thinking is empathy. Without it, design thinking might look like any other creative process.

Empathy means putting aside your own ideas to understand why consumers think and behave the way they do. For example, in banking, you go to the branch and talk to consumers, watch them interact with the tellers. Invite them to focus groups and let them play around with the new unreleased mobile banking app. Take feedback, but also observe their body language and facial expressions. Try as much as possible to feel what the customer feels.

Design thinking is all about uncovering thoughts, feelings, pain points and motivations – Why are consumers visiting the branch so much? Why didn’t the users use the mobile app?

The Bank of Ireland’s team of design thinkers met with customers who had recently experienced a bereavement. Based on what they gathered, the bank designed a personalized concierge service to handle the administrative tasks and paperwork that the grieving customers may not be able to deal with.

Without design thinking, you risk having a product that may look great and be technologically advanced but ultimately fails due to not meeting a user’s need. For example, Google Glass – a wearable product released in 2013, was received with much fanfare. It was touted as the coolest thing at that time but failed to gain traction with consumers. Why? Because the product was not developed to solve any consumer need rather it was something that the engineers thought people needed.

Also Read: How to use Design Thinking in HR

Another key aspect of success in the design thinking process is that ideas can come from anywhere in the organisation. Some traditional financial institutions still only allow innovation ideas to originate from top executives, notes Jim Van Dyke of Futurion. Those projects not only took longer to come to market but also employee confidence and employee morale in these projects were also lower.

If you want to find out if your organization supports an ideas-can-come-from-anywhere approach, here’s a test. Identify ten innovations in your organisation, and poll employees to understand where the ideas came from. If only a handful of these ideas came from employees who work with consumers, products, or technology, then you have a disconnect and a problem.

Employees generating ideas don’t have to be subject matter experts. Diverse employees should come up with ideas since they’ll bring different approaches to the problem.

To solve the design thinking and innovation puzzle, some banking and finance companies have started to set up “Innovation Labs”. These labs are often siloed and hence struggle to make design thinking part of their everyday culture and processes.

Catherine Bessant, Chief Operations and Technology Officer at Bank of America, does not believe that an innovation lab is critical to implementing design thinking.

“It’s much more powerful to capture innovation from 10,000 people than to put 10 people in a lab,” Bessant told the Wall Street Journal.

Design thinking is disrupting all industries and it is high time traditional industries like banking and finance also move towards Design thinking.

If the design thinking approach excites you but you do not know where to start, look no further and start with this Design Thinking course .

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How deutsche bank's IT division used design thinking to achieve customer proximity

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Société Générale TimeGivers: a “fitbit”-like gamified experience for in-company time tracking

Otp bank co-designing otp bank’s strategic plan for growth, co-designing otp bank’s strategic plan for growth.

This is an example of accelerating a transformation through co-design. Eighty-two professionals gathered, representing OTP’s whole organization. Together, they were able to achieve months of work in just three days.

OTP Bank’s Challenge

OTP Bank Romania (OTP) was at a key turning point in late 2018. The organization was undergoing changes in its leadership team. This new team helped them develop an ambitious goal:

OTP Bank will double its market share in 5 years.

They gathered for two Discovery sessions in December 2018. In these sessions, a carefully selected senior team chose three market segments to focus on. Then they built these segments into Personas.

With this new focus to guide them, they developed another vision of cultural turnaround. Their secondary goal was:

To shift from a products and procedures focus to customer-centricity.

The Accelerated DesignShop 2019, Bucharest

The DesignShop partnered with OTP to organize a workshop in Bucharest on January 20-22, 2019. The workshop aimed to build a growth strategy focused on the three Personae OTP’s leadership developed based on their marketing segments. It also focused on creating a subsequent business plan with operational details and cost-benefit calculations. The secondary aim of the workshop was to create the context of a new way of leading and working. This method was based on transparency, cross-functional collaboration, supportive creativity, and employee centricity. We organized the workshop along with OTP under the theme: gOTP! Jump Ahead! To Market Makers!

About the DesignShop

To help OTP accomplish their new goals, we organized an Accelerated Design Shop in January 2019.

The DesignShop is a collaborative design method invented by Matt and Gail Taylor and refined over four decades of practice with large corporate for-profits, non-profits, and other organizations. It optimizes its approach for every client – offering the environment and customized process needed for large, inclusive teams to co-design integrative solutions for difficult and complex problems.

The program’s foundational axiom is: “People support what they help create.”

It also builds on the principle of cross-functional teams and time-compressed assignments. These create the space, focus, and speed necessary to achieve difficult business outcomes in just three days.

The Workshop

Eighty-two participants attended the workshop. They represented OTP’s headquarters in Bucharest, branches across Romania, as well as regional and central decision-making units in Hungary and the region.

These participants worked on individual, pair, and group assignments. They had a chance to meet teammates from all over the organization and step out of their comfort zones.

Throughout the workshop, the teams developed a new understanding of the problems their company faced. They also gained a deeper understanding and empathy for customers through exposure to contextual interviews with real people. These people represented each Persona group.

The groups also had a chance to gain a deeper understanding and inspiration from outside sources. Some of these included:

The first day was “Scan Day” . It kicked off the workshop with an introduction to the problem and goals.

At the end of the first day, each team created visual strategic models of their future.

The second day was “Focus Day” . It was dedicated to brainstorming and developing solutions. The strategic models the teams created on day one served as starting points to build more tangible versions of the strategies using two perspectives:

• A customer experience perspective
• A functional point of view (the 8 Ps)

The Solution

The third day was “Act Day” the day when the solution always comes together.

The teams revisited the customer experience prototypes, which led to a better understanding of what areas are priorities for OTP. These were different from their pre-workshop assumptions. For example, many had previously assumed the easiest solution would be to design a plan around the 8 Ps.

However, they learned through the workshop that a customer experience perspective by channels made more sense. In addition, it was even aligned with several employee pain points which impacted their service.

This change in perspective showed one benefit of holding a large, inclusive workshop. It also led to an organic blend of initiatives that solved both customer and employee pain points. Since these pain points affected both parties, they were the most important and urgent to address.

Final Outcome

The final solution after the workshop was a strategic plan consisting of eight initiatives. Each initiative was detailed with execution plans comprised of actions, resource allocation, timelines, milestones (of 6 months and 3 years), and cost-benefit analyses.

The participants developed four key messages, that they brought back to their colleagues to share what they accomplished with the workshop:

Build your strategy with solutions to complex problems in days instead of months. 

Do You Have a Challenge? Let’s Solve It Together!

If you’re also facing a challenge, talk to our team of experts about our services. Then, let’s find a custom project together that will transform your organization.

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