We’re back with another interesting blog here on the contrast between Design thinking and User-centered design. I have been asked by many people about the key differences and the use cases. So, let me tell you in detail!
What is the difference between user-centered design and design thinking?
As technology is advancing at a rapid pace, an individual designer or an organization has to keep themselves attentive to design user-friendly updates in products.
Let me brief you on how these are used – Design thinking is useful when we are trying to identify a significant problem and find a solution that will be adopted by people. On the other hand, user-centered design focuses on improving the usability of any tangible or intangible products that the user interacts with. This might not provide a clear distinction, so let’s briefly understand these terms.
Design Thinking (DT)
Design thinking is an approach to identifying a problem at the core level and coming up with an innovative solution. In this process, the designer must think from various perspectives to achieve the end user’s goals. This involves solving a very complex problem with a creative approach to achieve a feasible, viable, and desirable product. This approach might also create a breakthrough in the product development process.
Design thinking is an iterative process consisting of 5 steps-
- Empathize – Understand the user behavior and their needs and challenges through observation.
- Define – Study the data received and prepare a clear problem statement identified from the user observation.
- Ideate – Generate ideas with various methods that could help to achieve the solution.
- Prototype – Bring the ideas into the real world with a very frugal prototype.
- Test – Test the prototypes built with the users/stakeholders to validate the design, receive feedback, and iterate the process to improve the idea.
User-centered design (UCD)
User-centered design is an approach that keeps the user in the spotlight and meets their needs. Progress in achieving user-centered design is entirely based on iterations focused on fulfilling user requirements.
There are five profound principles of user-centered design –
- Early involvement of end users.
- A clear understanding of the context.
- An iterative process to achieve better user experience.
- User-centric approach for product development and delivery.
- Constant feedback.
The user-centered design process consists of 4 steps as follows-
- Explore – Understand the user needs and the product/service use case.
- Discovery – Specify the user requirements/ pain points from the exploration and set up a standard on the process to bring out the best user experience.
- Design – Come up with design solutions using user journey mapping, storyboarding, and mockups to define an efficient user flow that solves the problem.
- Deliver – Evaluate the ideas with the user and go for improvements based on user feedback.
Ubiquity between DT & UCD
There are a few similarities between design thinking and user-centered design processes.
– Empathizing with the user to understand their requirements, challenges, and behavior by imagining ourselves in their shoes.
– Diversified thinking fosters a holistic approach to achieving better solutions, rather than relying on a limited set of opinions.
– Turning the problems into opportunities, the innovative solution lies down in the problem itself.
– Experimenting more by involving the stakeholders is an efficient way to identify mistakes and learning from them could help in improving the product value.
– The iterative process helps to fill the gaps found in the evaluation stage of product development.
Polarities between DT & UCD
There are a few variations too between design thinking and user-centered design processes.
- Majorly, UCD involves the users from the initial stage and throughout the development process to focus on improving user experience whereas Design Thinking emphasizes solving challenging problems with creativity and innovation.
- UCD is very much for designing a production/solution for a specific audience while design thinking can be used to break the ice to solve a problem in organizations, communities, policies, etc.
“Usability is about the people and how they understand and use the product and it is not about the technology” – Steve Krug
Hope you had a good read here and I’ll catch up with you with more exciting things about Industrial Design and the design process next week.😎
Keep creating beautiful products people.🤟
If you have any needs, reach out to us, we are here to bring your ideas to life!
AUTHOR
Prem Kumar D
Sr. Industrial Designer, Srushty Global Solutions
As an innovative Sr. Industrial Design Engineer, he specializes in creating functional and aesthetically pleasing products. He blends creativity and technical expertise to develop designs that enhance user experience and meet market needs. He has contributed to a diverse range of projects, from consumer electronics to furniture design. He is known for his attention to detail and commitment to sustainable design practices, always striving to push the boundaries of what is possible.