Design Thinking and Personal Reflection: A Deep Dive into the Process

This report examines the crucial role of personal reflection and empathy in design thinking. It highlights the benefits of incorporating personal reflection, such as enhanced empathy, brainstorming, and creative thinking, to improve the design process. The report references various studies and sources, including Adams & Nash (2016), Carstrais (2016), Dalton & Kahte (2016), and Köppen & Meinel (2015), which emphasize the importance of understanding user needs and the value of empathy in the design process. The report explains how the design thinking process, as exemplified by the Stanford School's model, prioritizes empathy to understand user needs and avoid biases. Furthermore, it discusses practical methods for fostering empathy, such as conducting interviews and adopting a learner's mindset. The conclusion underscores the importance of personal reflection in fostering a deep understanding of user perspectives and driving innovative solutions.

Role of personal reflection in
design thinking
References
• Adams, C., & Nash, J. B. (2016). Exploring design thinking practices in evaluation. Journal of
MultiDisciplinary Evaluation(pp.51-57)
• Carstrais J. (2016, may 5). learning by doing at our design thinking workshop. Retrieved from
https://medium.com/pancentric-people/learning-by-doing-at-our-design-thinking-workshops-c2c9398bfac1
• Dalton, J., & Kahte, T. (2016). Why empathy and customer closeness is crucial for design thinking. Design
Management Review(pp.34-46)
• Köppen, E., & Meinel, C. (2015). Empathy via design thinking: creation of sense and knowledge. In Design
thinking research(pp. 15-28). Springer, Cham.
Personal reflection is necessary for learning from
experiences. It provides various advantages to the
person whole learn from their experiences. In addition,
there are some good things , such as empathy, brain
storming and creative thinking. Besides, blog writing is
the best way for personal reflection. It will provide
better results (Adams & Nash, 2016).
Empathy
• Feel the situation from other person point
of view
• Provide proper decision them as human
beings
• Feel and communicate your understanding
and feelings about the particular condition.
Empathise methods adopted by human beings:
• Organize interview with empathy
• Ask What How Why
• Connect with enormous users
• Brainstorming
• Ask five whys
• Assume a learner’s mindset
Empathy to resolve various issues of their personal
and professional career. The Stanford School has a
Design Thinking Process diagram, and it puts
empathy at the beginning of the process, since they
feel that it can help in interviews, and in seeking to
understand the needs of the user without being biased
(Köppen & Meinel, 2015). It can help in researching
the people that have to be served by the creative
process so that the design thinking process has an
outcome that can benefit their needs. It can help the
design thinkers set aside their own assumptions and
think outside the box, which makes it more creative
as well (Dalton & Kahute, 2016). I learnt that
empathy assists us obtain a broad acknowledgment
and understanding of the emotional and physical
needs of people and how they see, understand and
connect with the people across them.