You’re starting your own business, or you’re in the process of restructuring your business. You need a more innovative way because you want to survive or even thrive in the competitive market nowadays. You need an expert help you set up your business plan or come out with a new disruptive product. Your first thought might be hiring a business consultant and maybe have someone sketch for you later… but wait, what’s design consultant? “I thought designer only draws… How can a designer help my business? ”
The answer is no, not everyone designer can help you with your business strategy. Design consultant is the one understanding how design process can elevate your business and help you think outside of the box. Design Thinking or Creative Process has been a trendy term that is overused by people who don’t even have design training. It’s a user-centered process created by the founder of IDEO, David Kelly, almost 30 years ago and has been broadly adopted as a standard in the industry. It has been more noticed and valued in the past decade and even lots of business strategy firms started to learn and apply to their process.
So what are the differences between design consultants and traditional business consultants? Here’s the simple chart I made -
Despite the chart might be oversimplified (this is designed to be quickly understood not in-depth reading) and mostly from my personal observation (as I’ve been coaching for numerous business consultants), you can tell one has more divergent approach and the other one prefers single path. My previous boss (CEO) used to like to say “let the number talk!” I do agree that when it comes to test the ideas, data is the way to validate which one works. But it doesn’t help you to generate a new idea, a better product for users, or atypical solutions help you sell in the market.
Design consultant helps you to look into the problems in user’s shoes. When you’re solving user’s pain points, improve their life or give them what they want, it’s the solution that will sell - which is a good business. The design process is not just for designing a better product; it also can help you to restructure your company, rebrand, or provide a better experience for your employees. Design consultant guides you through the process and you’ll learn the design thinking by doing.