From Design Thinking to Design Feeling

In our book Jugaad Innovation, we show how resource-constrained entrepreneurs use DESIGN FEELING to find an ingenious way to solve their OWN problem (a pain they viscerally experience at very*personal* level), and then scale up this frugal solution to benefit others

How can Western entrepreneurs go beyond design thinking and practice “design feeling” ?

The Financial Health Network’s FinX (Financial Experience) shows the way. FinX is a unique in-the-field experiential learning program in which fintech entrepreneurs go through multiple real-life challenges faced by people with financial difficulties on a daily basis. They literally “get under their customer’s skin”.

For instance, they have to walk miles to cash a check and pay a hefty fee for doing it — whereas most of us can do it instantly on our mobile phone for free

Equipped with these deep market insights, these entrepreneurs use the “engage & iterate” principle to rapidly experiment with multiple frugal solutions with customers and use their constant feedback to refine their business model and zero in on the most impactful product or service

Read my Stanford Social Innovation Review article to learn about FinX and design feeling: https://ssir.org/articles/entry/frugal_solutions#

Read also my article on Conscious Design.