A critical requirement for a startup is to identify a real user need for which a product proposition can be built. Thus, Design & Design Thinking has become imperative for entrepreneurs. The contribution of Design is to see things from human centric perceptive to define and identify relevant problems.
Now the design isn’t the top skin. It is not just beautifying any product, but to bring market relevance and deliver meaningful results to it. It is to make sense out of ill-defined, unclear and fuzzy problems. And, being an innovator, the designer observes, experiments and network your products. He is an expert in practicing innovative design thinking behaviour to bring out the best in the products and entice buyers.
They can wear many hats in the early days of the startup. Being multidisciplinary; equipped with a high range of skills, they understand user requirements and simultaneously develop the solutions. They are good in user research, information architecture, creating interaction and communication design, making them deliver the best product or solution to the market. And being technically sound, a designer masters the world of technology and the world of people very well.
Entrepreneurship comes with a host of challenges. And the biggest challenge of any entrepreneur is to make an experience for customers memorable. It is imperative for them to fit into the user’s mental map and understand their unarticulated needs. And so they put their trust on designers.
Designers are the champion of the user experience. They are highly skilled in the world of technology and people. The technical skills of a designer helps him in making effective use of tools and technology for designing whereas his exposure to people and their purposes makes him understand their expectation.
They change people’s behaviour. They make them perform the targeted action. A designer studies and examines his subject thoroughly and accordingly makes the change in its real behaviour. Also, he invests hundreds of hours in product testing to create an excellent customer experience and make the customer buy a product. He hypnotizes the buyers and makes them do what he wants.
Spending their time on extensive research, designers believe in the fact that design is a method of examining the problem area of the business/ customer then beautifying the product. So, they understand the market, map out the behavioural pattern, problem area and then accordingly develop the solution.
Design Thinking and Design Doing – Design process, methods and tools, enables a startup to convert abstract and fuzzy ideas to real products and services. While it’s easy to come up with an innovative idea, the real challenge for startups is to quickly move from the problem space to the solution space and in this process, design can be a great catalyst.
Innovation and creativity are inherent to design. With design at its core, a startup can create an enriching and engaging consumer experience. Design adds the spunk and spark to all internal and external processes for a startup and creates value in multiple ways.
A beautiful quote by Donald Norman, the author of ‘The Design of Everyday Things’ concludes these benefits very well. He quoted – “It is not enough that we build products that function, that are understandable and usable, we also need to build products that bring joy and excitement, pleasure and fun, and, yes, beauty to people’s lives.”
So, when you start your business amidst the giants in the industry, a good designer is much needed. He can be a big asset to your startup who distinguishes you and your business through design mindset and outstanding products. If you want to keep your business sailing high, you need a dedicated person who understands the user’s mental map and suggests effective solutions to your business challenges.
In the coming years, consumer expectations with online experience will surely rise and their design will become pivotal to startups. Hire a designer for your company today and make him sit at the table with decision makers. Increase their engagement to the business and use their excellent craftsmanship, relentless determination, and passion to make a change, ability to overcome rejection and resourcefulness, resulting in better understanding of consumer, business and products.
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