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Product platforms holds great potential for cost effectiveness since several components are reused in different product variations. This bachelor thesis evaluates the implementation of a product platform of simple geometric products by applying the two different product development theories Design Thinking and Product Platform Concept Exploration Method(PPCEM). Design Thinking is a well-used theory which is mainly applied for development ofindividual products with the user in focus, while PPCEM is used for building large-scale and complex product platforms. In collaboration with Seldén Mast AB the possibility of creating a product platform for their product was investigated. It was accomplished by first developing the platform through Design Thinking and then theoretically recreating it through PPCEM. The difference in performance between the two theories was then analyzed. The results showed that none of the methods are individually adapted for the development of modularity for smaller products and volumes. Great importance was attached to being able to identify and define the essential correlations between the reusable components that constitute the modularity, which was most effectively achieved by combining the two theories. The study is structured by a thoroughgoing implementation of Design Thinking where several methods and models are used to support the structure of the concept for the platform. The re-creation is then based on PPCEM, where the theories methods are used as a basis for defining the conditions and foundation of the product platform. The purpose of this report is to compare the implementation of the various theories and analyze its suitability for designing a product platform for simple geometric articles.

This study aims at exploring and developing an approach for user-centred product planning for product managers in multi-product tech companies. Applying the Design Thinking methodology in this research project allows for product managers to be involved in the design process as a whole. From research and interviews with product managers it can be seen that there is a global understanding of the importance of a shift in focus towards user experience rather than product features while planning, but that there are no clear means yet to facilitate this. Through co-design with product managers as well as individual prototyping, a lo-fi prototype of a planning tool is developed and tested. The results show that the prototype successfully facilitated multi-product planning and shifted the focus from features to experiences. The methodology used can be reproduced in analogous companies and the results can be used as a starting point to continue adapting and developing the approach. / Denna studie syftar till att utforska och utveckla ett tillvägagångssätt för användarcentrerad produktplanering för produktchefer inom tekniska produktutvecklingsbolag som utvecklar flera olika samverkande produkter. Metoden Design Thinking har använts i detta forskningsprojekt, vilket möjliggjort att produktchefer kunnat att vara involverade i designprocessen som helhet. Från initiala intervjuer med produktchefer framkom det att de förstod vikten av att ha fokus på användarupplevelse snarare än produktegenskaper under planering av flerproduktslösningar, men att de i dagsläget inte finns några tydliga verktyg för att underlätta detta. Genom samdesign med produktchefer formades ett antal prototyper av ett planeringsverktyg. En Lo-Fi-prototyp utvecklades och utvärderades av produktägare. Testerna visade att multiproduktplanering framgångsrikt underlättades och flyttade fokus från funktioner till användarupplevelser. Den metodik som använts här kan reproduceras i liknande företag och resultaten kan användas som utgångspunkt för att fortsätta anpassa och utveckla arbetssättet.

This dissertation entitled, Exploring Design Thinking for Instructional Practice, is situated in the cognitive rigor of design thinking instructional practice and engineering design-based capstone courses. The content of the instructional practice connects with educators employing a wide range of intellectual activities or cognitive tasks in formulating their curriculum. Key attributes of design thinking were identified through a focused literature review with an emphasis on theoretical propositions applicable to instructional practice. This dissertation contains two manuscripts: (a) an exploration of the theoretical literature related to design thinking explicating implications for instructional practice, and (b) a case study involving a small, purposive, sample of undergraduate faculty members teaching engineering design-based courses with findings broadly applicable to design processes in college curricula. The faculty participants in the case study were educators at a large, public, research-intensive university in the southeastern region of the United States. The data analyses involved triangulation of semi-structured interviews conducted with faculty participants and their design-based course materials, including syllabi and lesson plan materials. The study's thematic findings were not tied to engineering but rather course design, design process, and course management. The findings show the utility of artifact creation for learning with understanding for everyone, not just engineers and other traditional designers. Overall, the dissertation contributes to pedagogy that promotes student-centered engagement for learning with understanding. It recommends design thinking instructional practice for inclusion in designing and making artifacts of constructed knowledge for learning with understanding engagements across the academy. / Doctor of Philosophy / This dissertation entitled, Exploring Design Thinking for Instructional Practice, integrates a wide range of intellectual activities also referred to as cognitive tasks of student-centered design thinking activities. In this dissertation, these tasks are useful for tackling problems that are not well-defined, such as, open-ended, real-world problems. Examples of this pedagogy are useful for educators considering and/or implementing design thinking in their curricula. This dissertation contains two manuscripts: (a) an exploration of the theoretical literature related to design thinking from theory to artifact making, and (b) a case study involving undergraduate faculty members teaching design thinking in design-based courses. The study's faculty participants were educators teaching engineering capstone courses at a large, public, research university in the southeastern region of the United States. Their students design and make solutions for open-ended, real-world problems that are not in textbooks and do not have "right" answers. The study's data collection phase involved interviews with the faculty participants and course materials (syllabi, lesson plan materials, handouts, and course websites). Data analysis produced three robust themes: course design, design process, and course management. These themes suggest that a design thinking instructional practice belies perceptions that design thinking is tied exclusively to engineering and other traditional design disciplines. The findings suggest that design thinking pedagogy engages students in creation of artifacts, learning with understanding, hands-on experiential learning in iterations, use of productivity tools, teamwork, and new starting points when outcomes do not meet expectations. Overall, the findings suggest design thinking pedagogy promotes student-centered design thinking activities.

This research explores how design-based learning can be used as a pedagogical strategy in K-12 classrooms to foster students' 21st century skills in such areas as communication, collaboration, and critical thinking. The research aims to identify what students and teachers who participated in a design-based learning environment perceived to be the benefits and challenges of the project. The findings are used to suggest strategies that can be used to capitalize on the benefits and mitigate the challenges of the strategy. This research employs a multiple case study methodology to investigate the unique perspectives of three audiences who participated in the study: (1) an eighth grade English teacher, (2) an eighth grade social studies teacher, and (3) fifty eighth grade students. It gives a detailed description of the results of post-implementation interviews during which participants reported on what they perceived to be the benefits and challenges of the project. The results of the interviews are utilized as the primary data source for the findings. The study reveals that a majority of the participants perceived that students benefitted from the environment. They gained skills in communication and collaboration, developed the ability to empathize by exploring multiple perspectives, gained real-world experience that prepared them for their future by solving problems they identified in their immediate world, and gained knowledge and skills from a variety of disciplines. The teachers also benefitted from the environment in that they gained a new respect for their students' skills and abilities, explored and re-defined their own pedagogical philosophies, and improved their own design thinking skills. While participants reported multiple benefits to the learning environment, they also acknowledged several challenges. Time was a challenge for everyone involved. Teachers perceived keeping students motivated when they faced ambiguity and assessing students to be a challenge. They also noted that administrative support for design-based learning is a challenge that must be overcome in order for wide-scale adoption to be realized. While students also identified many challenges to the environment, they consistently acknowledged that the challenging aspects - communication, collaboration, exploring multiple perspectives, managing real-world constraints, and critical thinking - were ultimately beneficial. The findings translate to an overarching message that design-based learning is hard, but it's worth it. / Ph. D.

Through both a theoretical analysis of the framework itself, as well as ethnographic research of one particular university-community engagement project underway in Provo, UT, this thesis explores both the process of training students for this type of community engagement as well as the malleability of the program format for potential application across other schools and communities. The research findings highlight how the program itself, taking the form of an offered undergraduate course at a liberal arts college in Provo, offers unique opportunities for undergraduate students to engage in applied anthropological work for a client, as well as how the local community center partnered with the university benefits from (and in some cases, resists) the findings of the community engagement made possible through the program.

[pt] A tese discute a relação existente entre a criatividade e o design thinking e o universo da infografia e da visualização de dados, com destaque para a criação de um método de construção de infográficos a partir dos estudos empreendidos nas referidas áreas, baseados em bibliografia compatível e atual. Através principalmente da lógica do visual thinking, é elaborado um método de construção de infográficos. Além disso, o próprio infográfico aparece como possível ferramenta de pensamento visual dentro do design thinking, otimizando as possibilidades desse processo. A infografia e a visualização de dados disponibilizam um novo e vasto campo de trabalho para o designer em parceria com outros profissionais. No entanto, existe uma carência de métodos de construção e desenvolvimento de infográficos. O método de construção proposto pela tese para preencher essa lacuna identificada, até pela minha própria prática profissional de ensino, poderá ser aplicado tanto por designers já atuantes no mercado quanto ensinado a estudantes de Design ou Comunicação. / [en] The thesis discusses the relationship between creativity and design thinking and the universe of infographics and data visualization, proposing a method of construction of infographics from studies in these areas, based on current and compatible bibliography. The method of development of infographics follows the logic that belongs to visual thinking. In addition, the infographics itself appears as a possible tool for visual thinking within the design thinking, optimizing the possibilities of this process. Infographics and data visualization provide a vast new field of work for the designer in partnership with other professionals. However, there is a lack of methods for building and developing infographics. The method of construction proposed by the thesis to fill this gap identified, including my own experience as a professor in this area, can be applied both by designers who are already in the market as can be taught to students of Design and Communication.

Notre recherche vise à identifier pour notre partenaire socio-économique, le Pôle services à la personne PACA (PSP PACA), les manières possibles dont il peut soutenir l’activité d’innovation de ses adhérents et des acteurs du champ des services à domicile. Nous avons dans un premier temps, à l’aide de revues de littérature, bâti un modèle théorique d’analyse nous permettant de mettre en évidence l’ensemble des activités cognitives, politiques, constructives et productives, fondamentales dans la conduite de projet entrepreneuriaux visant à transformer ou à renforcer un champ. Nous nous sommes pour cela appuyés sur une littérature portant sur la perspective fondée sur le projet, et sur trois ensembles de littérature sur l’appropriation d’objets de conception. Nous avons ensuite mobilisé ce modèle d’analyse dans la lecture approfondie de deux cas de projets conduits par le PSP sous forme d’actions collectives. La mobilisation de ce modèle d’analyse nous a permis d’examiner les dispositifs (organisationnels, d’animation, d’accompagnement, …) mis en place par l’équipe du pôle au niveau des actions collectives, et leur incidence sur les activités qui s’y sont déroulées. Celle-ci nous a également permis d’identifier, en contexte, les éléments qui ont été par la suite appropriés ou adoptés par les opérateurs de services, durant la conduite de leurs propres projets. Nous avons alors mis en évidence un certain nombre de leviers d’ordre méthodologique, sur lesquels peut s’appuyer l’équipe du pôle pour optimiser l’organisation et l’animation de telles actions collectives. Ces résultats nous ont alors conduits à émettre trois principaux axes de discussion théorique / Our research aims to identify, for the PSP PACA our socio-economic partner, the possible ways to support the innovation activity of its members and the home-care services field players. Firstly, based on an expanded literature review, we built a theoretical model of analysis allowing us to highlight all the cognitive, political, constructive and productive fundamental activities in the implementation of entrepreneurial projects intended to transform or strengthen a field. Thus, we rely on a project-based view literature and on three sets of literature on the appropriation of human artefacts. Secondly, we mobilized this model of analysis in the in-depth reading of two cases of projects carried out by the PSP PACA, setting up collective actions. Mobilizing this analytical model allowed us to examine the different ways (organization, collective animation and individual support) by which the PSP team carried out theses collective actions, and their subsequent impact on the activities. It also allowed us to identify, in context, the elements that were appropriated or adopted by the participants while conducting their own projects. We then highlighted a certain number of methodological levers, on which the team of the cluster can rely to optimize - according to its aims and its orientations - the organization and the animation of such collective actions. We articulated these levers according to four different modalities in order to facilitate their mobilization by participants or project carriers. These results then led us to put forward three main axes of theoretical discussion

<p>Design Thinking är ett spännande och fortfarande relativt outforskat område med rötter i Service Management. Med hjälp av designerns verktyg och metoder och en mångvetenskaplig grund med fokus på kundens behov kan Design Thinking bidra till att utveckla produkter och tjänster och genom detta öka lönsamheten för företag. Syftet är att göra en deskriptiv studie av området Design Thinking som metodiskt arbetssätt vid tjänsteutveckling. Detta appliceras sedan på verkligheten för att komparativt se hur tre svenska bolag arbetar med tjänstutveckling inom en av världens största tjänstebranscher utifrån områdena Service Management och Design Thinking. Uppsatsen beskriver utvecklingen från Service Management till Design Thinking och hur man har gått från att utveckla tjänster till att <em>designa</em> tjänster. Uppsatsen har använt en kvalitativ metod vid datainsamling. Detta har gjorts genom intervjuer med de tre valda försäkringsbolagen samt med en tjänstedesignbyrå som samarbetat med ett av bolagen. Teoriavsnittet inleds med en teoretisk bakgrund där en djupare förståelse skapas inom områden Service Management och Design Thinking. Detta för att underlätta tolkningen och analysen av teorierna. En teoretisk modell för tjänsteutveckling har valts ut för respektive område, samt en som tolkas dess skillnader och likheter. Samtliga teorier har sedan tolkats och analyserats utifrån den empiriska studien av försäkringsbolagen. Några slutsatser som uppsatsen har genererat är att de studerade försäkringsbolagen inklusive tjänstedesignföretaget arbetar utifrån kundens behov när det utvecklar tjänster. Däremot visar undersökningen att försäkringsbolagen inte interagerar med kunden i den utsträckning som teorin säger samt att försäkringsbolagen anlitar tjänstedesignföretaget i ett senare skede av tjänsteutvecklingen än vad som egentligen är syftet enligt teorin. Intresset för Design Thinking kommer främst från tjänstedesignföretaget och inte i första hand  från försäkringsbolagen. Utvecklingen från Service Management till Design Thinking visar även att designerns roll har förändrats då denne nu kommer in och är med genom hela processen istället för att som tidigare endast vara med i slutskedet.</p> / <p>Design Thinking is a relatively young and unexplored field with its roots in Service Management. By using the tools and methodology of designers, working in multidisciplinary teams and focusing on the consumers needs Design Thinking can contribute to the development of services and thereby increase the profitability for business. The objective of this paper is to construct a thorough description of the field Design Thinking and its methodology in service development. This is subsequently applied to the swedish insurance sector to comparatively describe how three insurance companies develop their services in one of the worlds greatest service industries. The paper initially describes and explores the development from Service Management to Design Thinking and how one has gone from merely developing services to <em>designing </em>services. Some conclusions that the paper has discovered are that the insurance companies we studied focus on consumer need. However, the study shows that the companies don't interact with the consumer to the extent that is described in the the theorethical models relevant for the paper. According to the study of Design Thinking, the designer is supposed to be involved throughout the entire process and not merely in the later fases as they are in Service Management. The analysis shows that the insurance companies choose to recruit designers only when they feel it to be neccesary, not involving them in the business development which is the next competitive advantage for companies today.</p>