The myth of innovation is that brilliant ideas leap fully formed from the minds of geniuses. The reality is that most innovations come from a process of rigorous examination through which great ideas are identified and developed before being realized as new offerings and capabilities.

This book introduces the idea of design thinking - the collaborative process by which the designer's sensibilities and methods are employed to match people's needs, not only with what is technically feasible, and a viable business strategy. In short, design thinking converts need into demand. It's a human-centered approach to problem solving that helps people and organizations become more innovative and more creative.

Design thinking is not just applicable to so-called creative industries or people who work in the design field. It's a methodology that has been used by organizations such as Kaiser Permanente, to increase the quality of patient care by re-examining the ways that their nurses manage shift change, or Kraft, to rethink supply-chain management.

This is not a book by designers for designers; this is a book for creative leaders seeking to infuse design thinking into every level of an organization's products or service to drive new alternatives for business and society.