individual creativity

bounded rationality
individual methodology
access through learned + interpreted schemas and heuristics

leap of faith
individual creativity
individual creativity
leap of faith
leap of faith

co l l a b o r a t i o n
for problems with compounding complexity
requires protocols for disagreement and a desire for a common ground
organizational politics
protocols for debate, mediation, and issue resolution

governance
boundaries for disagreement
desire to focus on the problem, mutual respect, motivation to make progress, a general agreement about the problem solving sequence, and egolessness

project issues
debate, discussion and argument towards agreement
brand rules
client identity forces

Fluid Process
Understand that problems can be wicked. Map existing patterns to problem and
select activities from situation, team capabilities, budget, constraints and input accuracy.
Be proactive and flexible enough to change with the problem.

disagree
Satisfice
Know that anything more than ‘good enough’ is
impractical and pick tasks that maximize action.
Know when to stop and move on to the next useful activity.
think Shared Understanding
Suspend disbelief to seek true values and opportunities by egolessly
and objectively investigating business, technical and audience needs.
Come to an agreement about a clear & collective problem definition
through the creation of visual decision making artifacts.

audience
constraints ↘ “good enough”

o p p o rt u n i ty
idea, market, blue sky
possibly a wicked problem
→ business
constraints → → → → o u tp u t
product, service or solution

technical
constraints ↗ early & often

The Impact of Language

Voice and language are quickly becoming key differentiators in
the cluttered world. Constantly consider semantics and assign,
remove, or invent terminology as needed by the brand and
make
balance micro-focus & macro-focus
the solution. Build a vernacular that is differentiated, protectable
and resonates with the audience it is intended to serve.
Visual Decision-Making
People respond to visual information far better than long prose.
Egolessly deliver a logical, structural representation of the synthesized
information. Isolate the product, the problem, the purpose and the people
egolessly delivered in the problem, arrange them spatially, and make a platform for generating
a response and exposing new opportunity. Output could be a diagrammatic
model, a wireframe of an interface, a screenshot of a website, a 3D rendering
of a product, or any of a number of outputs depending on the project
requirements and the activity selected.

Visual Language
Build or endorse a brand language for the project.
Learn and utilize the brand character and rules of combination
and grow the depth of the brand with the depth of the solution.
This fosters quicker adoption through building support over time.

ego
personal identity forces

Designing for Disagreement

Increasingly, the problems the design community is being engaged to solve
are compounding in complexity. As a result, what used to be something one
person could solve alone now requires participation by a group of comple-
mentary collaborators. With such problems, the ways in which individuals
solve problems has become less useful than understanding the ways a
collaborative team solves a problem.
The value of Design for today and tomorrow lies with understanding and
employing collaborative problem solving—including the methods that enable
a fluid design process, the practice of rapid creation, and the value of
disagreement in solving complex problems. This is a visual explanation of
think/make, a new method of creative problem solving with the ultimate focus
on expeditious, honest, and accurate results.

A Note About Collaboration
The difficulty of fluid collaboration is that everyone in the organization needs to have an impassioned They can no longer strictly sit inside the task and rely on the process to carry them through. Instead the
understanding of how to solve a design problem regardless of a particular process. The problem solver designer must become fluid moving freely between thinking and making as each new situation
must be confident, assertive, inquisitive, pragmatic, empathetic, and passionate. Each designer must emerges. And ultimately, the designer must learn to use visual decision-making as a way of presenting
value themselves and their opinions but also be respectful of the opinions and experiences of others synthesized thoughts to generate a response—disagreeable or not.
on their team. They must not only understand how to execute on tasks but they must be able to rise out
of a task and look holistically at the problem considering all parts of the system from the business
issues to people management to production requirements.

© 2007 Thinktiv, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Story AC4D 04/24/2010

Name - Be meaningful, memorable, future-proof, protectable, positive, visual. Types: Founder, Descriptive, Fabricated, Metaphor, Acronym, A combination of

Value line - What is the end benefit to your customer? Types: Imperative, Descriptive, Superlative, Provocative, Specific

Pain Point - Who is the customer and why are they suffering?

Purpose - Demonstrate the value of the company by describing how you make the customer’s life better, where you product fits in the market; tell a story.

Business Model - Freemium, Subscription, Service, Product, Ad-Supported, etc Pile of Money - How big is the market and how much of it can you get?

Pricing - Who is going to pay for what, how often and for how long? Lifetime value - What is the lifetime value of a customer?

Product Line Up - Illustrate the what your making, major features, it’s system/architecture; make me believe it can be real.

Semantically Describe Your Idea

Thinktiv, Inc. 512 745 8100 office

1011 San Jacinto Street, Suite #202 512 857 7751 fax
Austin, Texas 78701 usa
The Product AC4D 04/24/2010

Product Description

Product Features

Visually Articulate The Product

Thinktiv, Inc. 512 745 8100 office

1011 San Jacinto Street, Suite #202 512 857 7751 fax
Austin, Texas 78701 usa
The Product AC4D 04/24/2010

Product Description

Product Features

Visually Articulate The Product

Thinktiv, Inc. 512 745 8100 office

1011 San Jacinto Street, Suite #202 512 857 7751 fax
Austin, Texas 78701 usa
The Product AC4D 04/24/2010

Product Description

Product Features

Visually Articulate The Product

Thinktiv, Inc. 512 745 8100 office

1011 San Jacinto Street, Suite #202 512 857 7751 fax
Austin, Texas 78701 usa
The Product AC4D 04/24/2010

Product Description

Product Features

Visually Articulate The Product

Thinktiv, Inc. 512 745 8100 office

1011 San Jacinto Street, Suite #202 512 857 7751 fax
Austin, Texas 78701 usa