Design thinking An academic survey shows how and why design thinking works By now design thinking, with it’s emphasis on using diverse teams to consider ethnographic research, reframe problems, and to experiment together, has been around long enough to become ridiculed as just a trend du jour. So, Jeanne Liedtka did a deep, seven-year study to look at 50 projects from a range of sectors, including business, health care, and social services. Her survey convinced her that design thinking is a social technology that has the potential to do for innovation exactly what TQM (total quality management) did for manufacturing in the 80s: unleash people’s full creative energies, win their commitment, and radically improve processes. Article: Why Design Thinking Works