Innovation and Sustainable Business

Innovation and Sustainable Business Development
NAME OF STUDENT
NAME OF COLLEGE
AUTHORS NOTE
INNOVATION AND SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS

INNOVATION AND SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS
Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Discussion........................................................................................................................................2
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................9
References......................................................................................................................................10
Appendices....................................................................................................................................11
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INNOVATION AND SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS
Introduction
Design thinking is procedure of innovative thinking that applies elements of empathy and
experiment to create innovative solutions that integrates human centred approaches to fulfil
people’s needs, deliver new opportunities and meet business requisites of growth. In this report,
design thinking innovation trend at Tesco has been discussed which has helped them emerge as
winner and market leader in grocery industry.
Discussion
1. Design thinking acts as an effective process which delves deeper into opportunities
within a problem that is unrealised or unknown and works hard to interpret the human
requirement that are linked to the problem. Design thinking serves as tool to identify
problems and emerges with solutions that meets customer needs in a better manner. Also,
because design thinking includes numerous brainstorming stages, prototyping and testing
so it helps businesses contemplate effectiveness and accuracy of design solution prior to
actual implementation (Johansson‐Sköldberg, Woodilla & Çetinkaya 2013). Like many
successful firms, Tesco also follows design thinking trend and maintains five step
procedure towards design thinking approach i.e. empathise, define, ideate, prototype and
testing. In empathise phase of design thinking process Tesco studies the audiences and
recognises opportunities to execute corresponding design solutions, in define stage of the
process, Tesco, focuses on target segment that is aimed to be catered and interprets their
problems and requirements (Razzouk & Shute 2012). In ideate stage of design thinking
process, Tesco brainstorms ideas and develops multiple potential solutions which is then
followed by prototyping stage, where Tesco presents the idea or model and
communicates to others in innovation team of organisation before moving to final stage
of Testing where executed solution is tested, pros and cons are evaluated and then
improvised. This approach of design thinking allows Tesco to ensure customer centred
and problem solving approach which helps them to propel innovation (Carlgren, Rauth &
Elmquist 2016). Tesco can be considered as successful firms that have executed design
thinking process to ensure better innovation, convenience, quality and designs. For
example, Tesco, HomePlus supermarket in South Korea is an innovative design thinking
process solution that has brought future of grocery into life where Tesco successfully
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INNOVATION AND SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS
launched a virtual grocery outlet in subway station in South Korea which will facilitate
customers to buy merchandise through use of smartphones. A wall length billboard is
installed in subway that is designed to appear like supermarket shelves that displays
images and prices of essential products each having QR code. Customers can scan the
code with their smartphone, add items in virtual shopping cart and after finishing
transaction these items are delivered to doorsteps within a day (Sun & Runcie 2016). This
virtual supermarket is a design thinking solution that has added convenience to time
deficient lives of city people as it provides both gift of time to people and also offers
Tesco interactive advertisement, retail space that is convenient to fit into busy lives of
customers.
2. Tesco is a British grocery chain that has multinational operations and specialises in
general merchandise with headquarters located inn Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire,
England, UK. Tesco is third biggest grocery retailer in the world in terms of total revenue
and ninth biggest across the world y revenue. It was established in 1919 and operates
across seven nations throughout Asia and Europe and is market leader in UK in grocery
industry with market share of about 28.4%. Their current revenue is £57,491 mn in 2018
with net income of £ 1208 mn. Tesco currently has over 460,000 associates and has over
6569 outlets (Tesco 2018). Tesco is one of the leaders in global business innovation and
works continuously to build better quality of life and easier living for customers through
offering great products, value and customer experiences that makes their lives little better
each day. The interest of Tesco in understanding their customers and what matters to
them has helped them to continuously improvise their level of innovation, trying to make
things better using tools that are at disposal. Acting by changing and innovating to fulfil
customer needs is the only approach that has helped Tesco remain at top level in
innovation even with 100 glorious years in the market.
Design Thinking Innovation trend in Tesco:
Design thinking is human oriented approach to problem solving that helps customers and
Tesco to become innovative with collaborative process that syncs with customers needs
with what is technically possible and is then rendered with feasible business strategy.
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