Design Thinking
Design Thinking is a human-centred innovation process developed at Stanford's d.school that moves through five phases β Empathise, Define, Ideate, Prototype, and Test β to solve problems by deeply understanding users before generating solutions. Popularised by IDEO and adopted by IBM, Google, and Apple, it is the dominant framework for product innovation, service design, and organisational problem-solving that prioritises desirability (human need) alongside feasibility (technical possibility) and viability (business case).
Storyboarding
Storyboarding is a visual narrative technique originally developed at Walt Disney Studios in the 1930s that uses sequential images (with optional annotations) to map out a story, experience, or process before it is built. In product design and service design, storyboarding makes abstract user journeys concrete, reveals friction and delight points, communicates vision across teams, and identifies failure modes early. It is one of the most powerful tools for aligning cross-functional teams around a shared understanding of experience design.