Why design is necessary for DX promotion | Must-read for beginners! Explains how to use and success stories

Isn’t there a lot of people who want to know how to use design thinking to advance DX?

If you can understand why design is necessary to promote DX,

There are advantages such as

So this time, I will explain why design is necessary to promote DX.

In addition, we will explain not only why design is necessary to promote DX, but also how to use design to promote DX and successful cases of using design to promote DX.

What is DX

DX is the use of technology to transform business processes, products and services, and business and management .

In other words, it means using digitization as a “means” to promote the transformation of products, services, and business models.

Design thinking is about understanding what users want and constantly thinking between the technologies, businesses, and ideas needed to meet those needs .

And it does not end with just thinking, but refers to outputting it in the form of services.

It should be noted that design thinking is not just for designers and creators .

When we hear the word “design,” we tend to think of it as something necessary for creative jobs, but now it is a way of thinking that all business people, such as sales, consultants, and business development, should have.

Why design thinking is necessary to promote DX

To promote DX, design thinking is necessary because it is important to design in consideration of users (including employees of the company) who use services and systems .

This is because even if you go to great lengths to create a service or system, it is meaningless if users do not use it.

In other words, incorporating design thinking will help prevent DX failures .

A common example of DX failure is the introduction of advanced data analysis tools, but due to the low level of digital technology literacy among employees, they end up being left unused.

In order to avoid such failures, it is necessary to have a “design thinking” that properly understands what the user wants and reflects it in the design of the service system.

5 steps of design thinking

There are five steps to design thinking:

1. sympathy
2. Task definition
3. idea generation
4. Prototype (Prototype/Prototype)
5. inspection

I will explain each.

1. Empathy

In order to thoroughly empathize with the user’s feelings, we conduct interviews, questionnaires, observations, etc. The purpose of this step is to discover issues and needs that users may not be aware of themselves .

2. Defining the task

Once you have enough sympathy for the consumer, define the problem to clarify the consumer’s problem.

The problem definition in design thinking is not technology-oriented, such as, “How can a busy mother make cooking utensils that save time?” is based on a human-centered approach.

3. Coming up with ideas

“Creation of ideas” means to conceive and create new value. The purpose of this step is not to give the right answer, but to maximize the possibility of solving the problem .

This allows you to come up with creative and innovative ideas.

4. Prototype (Prototype/Prototype)

“Move your hands” to shape what you thought in the previous 3 steps. A prototype in design thinking is not to make a perfect one and find problems, but to make it simple first and find improvement points of the idea .

In this step, you can give shape to the ideas you had in mind and gain new realizations.

5. Verification

At the end, I have users try out my ideas and prototypes to see how they react and how I can improve them.

Validation is not just about finding solutions and problems with your ideas, but also about getting a better understanding of your users .

How to use design to promote DX

Illustrated Future IT Future DX According to the digital transformation , DX can be divided into two parts: “ DX environment improvement ” and “ DX practice ”.

From here, we will introduce how to use design to promote DX, divided into two parts: “Environmental preparation for DX” and “Practice of DX”.

Design necessary for DX environment maintenance

forming a vision

In order to raise awareness of DX within the company, it is important to have a common vision of “what we want to achieve with DX . ”

In addition, instead of having the vision decided by a few people, such as the president, each employee can formulate a convincing vision through discussion, allowing DX to proceed smoothly.

Therefore, we can help form a vision by holding workshops and outputting and sharing the real opinions of employees with illustrations .

Mindset building

The DX guidelines recommend repeating hypothesis testing as a mindset, which is exactly what design thinking is.

In a rapidly changing digital society, user preferences change quickly, so businesses can be created quickly by turning the hypothesis verification cycle at high speed .

System requirement definition

Design thinking is useful when grasping the needs of users (including employees of the company) who use services and systems and thinking about what digital technologies and IT systems are necessary.

When introducing an IT system, there are often people who say, “I don’t know the technical stuff, so I’ll leave it to the IT vendor.”

But it’s you, not an outside vendor, who knows your customer’s needs best.
As a result, unsuccessful development leads to the development of services that are inconvenient for users, resulting in failure to use them.

In order to prevent such failures, it is important to understand what the user wants and reflect it in the system design, which is called “design thinking”.

Specifically, what the designer should do is to get involved from the requirements definition stage, and clearly communicate to the IT vendor what the company wants to achieve and what the site is looking for.

Design necessary for DX practice

Utilization of data

“Design thinking” is necessary when taking new measures through data “statistics” rather than ending with “aggregation” of data such as customer purchase information .

in short,

Repeating the cycle of improvements such as this will lead to an increase in the number of users.

It can be said that this is exactly the use of design thinking (understanding what users want and outputting it in the form of services etc. to meet those needs).

Airbnb success story using design thinking to promote DX

Airbnb is a private lodging sharing service company headquartered in San Francisco.

All procedures can be done easily online, prices are more affordable than hotels and ryokans, and accommodation experiences close to the lifestyles of local residents are provided. We have grown into a large company.

By the way, two of the three founders of Airbnb are genuine designers who graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), which is considered to be the best art university in the United States.

Initial situation

Leveraging Design Thinking

Even though the founding members of Airbnb had almost no money, they went to New York four times in total to meet the users in New York who were the initial target, and interviewed them.

This fact shows that Airbnb really cares about meeting customers, clarifying their problems, and finding solutions.

In addition, we created a culture in which all new employees traveled using Airbnb in their first week of employment and actually experienced the service. And when I came back, I received feedback, and based on that, I repeatedly improved functions and so on.

Examples of functional improvements based on the opinions of new employees

One of Airbnb’s features is the ability for users to click on the star mark when they find a property they want to stay at, but after changing it to a heart mark based on the opinions of new employees, user engagement increased by 30%. is.

Currently, Airbnb makes final decisions based on data, but as a result of continuing to pursue “what users want” without being swayed by data, it has grown into a global company.

3 steps to promote DX to avoid failure

The following three steps are important for promoting DX so as not to fail.

1. Clarify your goals
2. Analyzing the Current Situation and Finding Our Strengths
3. Develop a strategy to fill the gap between the desired state and the current state

I will explain each.

Step 1: Clarify your vision

In step 1, clarify what your ideal company looks like.

This is because by clarifying the direction in which the company should aim and sharing it internally, employees can aim in the same direction toward DX .

As a result, you can prevent the common failure of DX getting stuck in the middle.

Step 2: Analyze the current situation and find your company’s strengths

The important thing in step 2 is to analyze the current situation of your company and find your strengths.

This is because in DX it is important to expand our strengths with digital technology and data .

Specifically, analyze your company’s current situation in terms of items such as business model, products and services, operations, organization, processes, and corporate culture.

Step 3: Develop a strategy to close the gap between what you want to be and where you are now

The important thing in step 3 is to classify DX into digitization and digitalization.

The axis of the DX strategy is to clarify the target and the current situation, and consider what kind of flow will be used to digitize analog data and what kind of technology will be combined with it .

Three mindsets necessary for promoting DX

The following three mindsets are necessary for promoting DX.

1. challenge
2. problem finding ability
3. entrainment force

I will explain each.

1. Challenge

The most important mindset in promoting DX is “challenge”.

This is because DX takes a long time (about 3 to 5 years) to succeed, and it is necessary to overcome many failures until it succeeds .

Therefore, even when facing difficult challenges, having a strong desire to “change the status quo” and continuing to take on challenges is the most important mindset for human resources who promote DX.

2.Problem finding ability

In order to promote DX, it is important to first identify the issues to be solved, formulate a hypothesis, and solve it with digital technology .

This is because if the current issues cannot be discovered, the purpose of DX, which is to “transform products, services, and business models,” will not be realized, and nothing will change.

Therefore, it can be said that DX human resources need to think through “what is best for customers” and discover current issues, regardless of past knowledge and experience.

3. Entrainment force

In the promotion of DX, it is also important to listen to the opinions of the other party and involve the surroundings .

This is because the purpose of DX is to “transform products, services, and business models,” and this cannot be achieved without the cooperation of the entire company, not just one department.

Especially when launching a new business, it is necessary to gather new human resources from other departments, so “involvement” is important.

[Must-see for beginners] Recommended books about DX and design

DX achieved through design thinking and transformation of organizational culture

You can deepen your understanding of the human-centered “design thinking” and “transformation of organizational culture” that are necessary for the realization of DX.
As a result, it is a book that eliminates the misunderstanding that “DX is mainly about technological innovation such as AI and IoT” and correctly recognizes the essence of DX.

Service design in the DX era Creating new businesses with the power of “meaning”

This is a beginner’s book written for companies and government officials who have not introduced “service design” into management and marketing, and students who are motivated to start a business.

* Service design: Designing activities on the provider side so as to maximize the experience and emotional value of users who use the service.

summary

This time, I explained why design is necessary to promote DX and how to use design to promote DX.

After inputting the concept of “design thinking” that is the basis of DX promotion, let’s take action along the 3 steps of DX promotion introduced in this article.