Design Thinking 101

This is a Design Thinking 101 episode in the Ask Like a Designer series. Ask Like a Designer helps people explore creating services and solutions by thinking and solving like a designer.

You’ll learn about design thinking, service design, learning design, leading and building high-performing teams, and ways to achieve better outcomes.

This episode is based on this article: ALD014 // 5 Ways Nobody Cares About You and ...

Julie Dirksen is the author of the books Design for How People Learn and Talk to the Elephant: Design Learning for Behavior Change. She is a learning strategy consultant with a focus on incorporating behavioral science into learning interventions. Julie was my guest for episode 42 of the show. In this episode, we talk about her latest book, ways to motivate learners and workshop participants, designing learning experie...

David Lemus is an independent design strategist with engineering roots working with organizations to empower teams to be customer obsessed and have a culture of iterative learning. He has designed and facilitated dozens of design thinking workshops across Fortune 500 companies, non-profit and government organizations. David is also currently an adjunct professor at the University of Portland's Pamplin School of Busines...

Liz Chen is Design Thinking Lead at Innovate Carolina, the unit dedicated to innovation, entrepreneurship, and economic development at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Liz is also a co-author of The Experimentation Field Book, a practical how-to guide on rigorously testing assumptions and concepts. We talk about teaching and applying design thinking in higher education, and learn more about The Experime...

Dr. Lesley-Ann Noel is an Afro-Trinidadian design educator and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Design Studies at North Carolina State University. Lesley promotes greater critical awareness among designers and design students by introducing critical theory concepts and vocabulary into the design studio. We talk about questioning design practice, dreaming and prototyping, and her book, Designing Social Change...

Victor Udoewa works in the Office of Public Health Data Surveillance and Technology at the CDC. Previously, he worked at the Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs at NASA, as well as at 18F and Google. We talk about his journey into design and leadership, the role of design in the civic space, radical participatory design, and orchestrating relationships in complex systems.

Pinar Guvenc is a partner at the award-winning global design studio SOUR, where she leads design innovation strategy. Pinar is also a member of the faculty at Parsons School of Design, and she serves on the Board of Directors at Open Style Lab, a National Design Award-winning nonprofit organization initiated at MIT, with the purpose of making style accessible to people with disabilities. Today on the show, we talk abou...

Justin is an internationally-renowned design leader, author and speaker from Chicago. You'll often find him at AIGA's speaking events, he’s been interviewed in Forbes magazine and Medium's "Forge" publication, and he writes articles for Aquent, CEO World Magazine, and A List Apart. He speaks internationally on culture and design, and today on the show, we talk about values, aligned design, nurturing teams, and design l...

Scott Shigeoka is an internationally-recognized curiosity expert, speaker, and the author of SEEK: How Curiosity Can Transform Your Life and Change the World. He is known for translating research into strategies that promote wellbeing and connected relationships around the globe, including at the University of California Berkeley's Greater Good Science Center and through his groundbreaking courses at the University of...

Natalie Foley has over 20 years of experience leading teams in designing and launching new products, programs, and strategies across the private, public, and not-for-profit sectors. Recently, she joined Opportunity at Work, where she builds, tests, and launches new services to help rewire the labor market for the 71 million workers in America whose skills were acquired through alternative routes instead of a four-year degree. Today...

Rob Lister is a designer in healthcare, creating meaningful experiences in many arenas, including medical device design, care delivery, service design, and population health strategy. His experience as a design leader at IDEO and AT&T, and his background as a mechanical engineer, inform a strategic and operationally focused approach to innovation in healthcare. We talk about service design in healthcare and using desig...

Shipra Kayan is a product evangelist at Miro, a designer, and a facilitator. She has built inclusive, engaged, and effective distributed teams at companies like Upwork and Miro. Armed with two decades of experience teaching design teams to collaborate across time zones, cultures, and knowledge silos, Shipra is a leading advocate for adopting visual collaboration within distributed teams. ...

Sheryl Cababa drives a human-centered design practice focusing on systems thinking and evidence-based design, working on everything from robotic surgery experience design to reimagining K-12 education through service design. In her work with consultancies such as Substantial, Frog, and Adaptive Path, she has worked with a diverse base of clients including the Gates Foundation, Microsoft, IHME, and IKEA. Sheryl is an in...

Kip Lee is a designer and healthcare executive at University Hospitals Health System in Cleveland, OH. As Vice President of UH Ventures, he manages an innovation portfolio that supports University Hospitals’ strategic initiatives and partnerships through product innovation and human-centered design. Outside of work, Kip serves on the editorial board of Design Issues, a design and innovation journal published by MIT Pre...

Nahal Tavangar is a self-professed generalist who has worked in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors across two continents. These roles and experiences have given her valuable insights into design thinking in various industries, work environments, business models, and workplace cultures. Today, we talk about research workshops, metaphors, and designing feedback.

Listen to learn about:

Nick Fink is a design and research leader with over two decades of experience in the industry. Nick currently consults and advises businesses on design and research in Seattle through his company, Craft & Rigor.

Listen to learn about:

>> Core disciplines of UX design
>> What is interaction design?
>> What does it mean to be a UX designer today?
>> The challenges UX and design face in today’s b...

Alvin Schexnider is an emancipatory designer and a business operations strategist who helps institutions become more effective, just, citizen-centered, and innovative. He has 15 years of experience in leadership across design, strategy, equity, and business operations in the government, nonprofit and for-profit spaces. Currently he is a part of Capital One's Equity and Design team as a senior equity design strategist. ...

Allen Higgins joins me as we share host and guest roles to talk about design practice systems and creating for and with the people we serve. Alan is a research associate and lecturer in the Center for Innovation Technology and Organization in the School of Business at University College Dublin.

Listen to learn about:

Design and design thinking process
Design thinking mindse...

Mike Monteiro is a designer and the author of Ruined By Design, You're My Favorite Client, The Collected Angers, and the newly-revised Design is a Job.

Listen to learn about:

>> Mike’s book, Design is a Job
>> Ethics in design
>> Designing society so that ethical behavior becomes the norm

Our Guest

Mike Monteiro is the co-founder and design directo...