It’s been just over a year since the HPI d-school building on UCT’s middle campus became home to the Hasso Plattner d-school Afrika. The new building has been purposefully designed to leverage the power of space (in both its architecture and interior design) in fostering collaboration, creativity, and innovation.
The building features radically flexible learning spaces where we can experiment and collaborate with the students to both understand and allow for the emergence of what future learning spaces could look like, and become.
In this context, space is the classroom, location, and physical geography in which teaching and learning happens. As a result and according to the Stanford d.school, space “can shape behaviour. When it comes to inspiring creativity, a student’s relationship to their physical environment is paramount.”
If the goal with a space is to embed a behaviour or enhance an activity, we need to see spaces as laboratories that are purposely designed to enable this. At the d-school Afrika, for example, we view the spaces as laboratories that have been carefully designed to drive the creative and collaborative behaviour that we want students to experience and ultimately, practise.
Consider traditional laboratories in universities, specifically at science faculties: all the equipment, furniture and space has been purposefully designed to drive knowledge development and practice in that field.
The same is relevant for design-thinking spaces like the d-school however, the focus is on driving innovation and co-creation.
At the d-school building this was taken a step further. For example, the various studios in the building are open plan and serve as a blank canvas that invites users to create their desired experimental setup for a given challenge they’re aiming to solve. The building also features interchangeable rooms that can either be used as a large workspace or split into two separate working spaces.
In addition, all the furniture and equipment (e.g., whiteboards, TVs, etc.) in the building are mobile – on actual wheels – and can be arranged fit for the user’s purposes. This affords teams the freedom to create and recreate the space for each collaboration session.
This freedom of mobility in itself also contributes to deeper collaboration, creativity, and innovation in the teams using the space.
Jonathan Ray, partner at KMH and lead architect for the d-school building explains that architects, as an example, understand how the various characteristics of any given space – from its size, proportion, materiality, lighting and acoustics, to how open or closed it is – help determine a space’s overall character.
“But this is only half the story,” he says “Spaces come to life and have meaning through their occupants and when they are in use. So, to a certain extent, every building is different and the designer needs to understand both the collective culture of the building's occupants and what they want to achieve in order to make successful spaces that foster a particular type of response.”
According to Jonathan, KMH found design-thinking principles and methods an extremely useful way to construct a deep and nuanced shared vision for a project such as the d-school building.
“We’ve successfully used these tools on another education-sector project,” he says “and it yielded a similar result to what we experienced with the d-school, in particular the sense of ownership and common purpose for everyone involved in the project, including the client.”
Using teams in an organisation as a further example of this practice, there is no one-size-fits all approach because every organisation is different. There will certainly be an element of exploration and experimentation to find out what works best for your teams.
However, there is an underlying principle that space alone will not drive innovation and co-creation.
Design-led Thinking should rather be viewed as an ecosystem consisting of a unique space (or laboratory), a structured process or activity within that space, and the diversity of people who are engaged within that space.
The 6 Star Green Star Design rating is a first for an academic building on the continent. It is the highest rating a building can achieve within the Green Star standard and recognises world leadership in environmental sustainability.
The Green Star rating tool provides an objective measurement for green buildings in South Africa and Africa and recognises and rewards environmental leadership in the property industry. The rating encourages and supports design professionals and developers working to create more environmentally sustainable buildings – for people and planet.
The SAPOA awards recognise elements such as design, functionality, environmental sustainability, facilities and user satisfaction, social impact, and economic and financial considerations.
Celebrating these achievements, UCT’s acting chief operating officer, Mughtar Parker, said, “The d-school Afrika was a well-planned and executed donor-funded project, notwithstanding the fact that this project was primarily designed and built during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
He added, “As one of three d-schools in the world, the others being at Standford and Potsdam, we are certainly in good company.”
“Personally, receiving the award filled me with immense pride and ensured UCT is certainly now a leader in the property ownership and development industry – and not only seen as the leading academic institution in South Africa,” Parker continued. “As one of the largest property owners in the Western Cape, this recognition enables UCT to go on and do far greater things as part of its social investment and urban regeneration initiatives. Strategically, this aligns with the UCT Integrated Development Framework and Urban Design Framework, and through continued support from donors, we certainly will entrench UCT being the top university in Africa – academically, technologically and infrastructurally –and attain our Vision 2030 objectives.
With the d-school Afrika’s 6-star-rated building, UCT now has five buildings certified by the GBCSA, including these 4-star facilities: the New Lecture Theatre on upper campus; the Graduate School of Business Conference Centre at the Breakwater campus; Avenue Road Residence on lower campus; and the Neville Alexander School of Education on middle campus.
The d-school Afrika and the other Green-Star-rated buildings are a response to UCT’s policy on green buildings, which has been a requirement since 2012 for every new building on campus to be at least a 4-star-rated building. This policy has recently been updated with more detail and to expand this to all new buildings and refurbishments above R20 million, including some specific targets for energy and water.
UCT’s Minimum Green Building Construction Standard policy was approved by the university’s Council in their June 2023 meeting. It directly supports UCT’s Vision 2030, where sustainability is a key pillar, as well as supporting UCT’s Environmental Sustainability Strategy, which includes the goal of the campus becoming a net-zero energy/carbon, water and waste-to-landfill campus by 2050 or sooner.
Importantly, the 6 Star Green Star award underscores the importance of sustainability, one of the three pillars of UCT’s Vision 2030, along with transformation and excellence. So, too, is it an underpinning value for the building’s funders, the Hasso Plattner Foundation (HPF), said executive director, Dr Stephanie Ullrich.
In her congratulation, Dr Ullrich said, “[The award] embodies the d-school Afrika’s aspiration of being a hub for bright ideas that shape a better future. Sustainability is one of our foundation’s core values, emphasising long-term solutions and resource-consciousness.”
She added, “The d-school Afrika building vividly exemplifies this ethos and we eagerly anticipate the innovative ideas about to be sparked in its halls.”
Richard Perez, the director of the d-school Afrika, described the 6-star rating as “a great milestone achievement”.
“It honours our philosophy as a d-school. It was important when we were conceptualising our place that it spoke to who we are and what our purpose is. Design-led thinking is an approach and mindset that drives change and innovation.”
He added: “In building a home for ourselves, it was important that we built a place that enhances the behaviour of innovation but also embodied tackling one of our world’s grand challenges related to environmental sustainability and climate change. We needed a home that was going to be a beacon for this.”
Gershon Manana, the director of Campus Planning and Design, said the 6-star rating is a “testament to the potent combination of visionary concepts and the meticulous planning and execution that underpinned this project. It establishes a fresh standard for sustainable building practices, reaffirming UCT's resolute dedication to environmental impact reduction and community betterment.
“I extend my heartfelt gratitude to the dedicated, creative, and persistent project team, whose collective endeavors have not only brought this remarkable achievement to fruition but have also positioned our institution as a pioneering force in sustainable campus development.”
The 6-star rating evaluations are conducted across nine categories, each with a range of credits that address the environmental sustainability attributes of a building’s design, construction and operation.
These categories are: management; indoor environmental quality; energy; transport; water; materials; land use and ecology; emissions; innovation; (and an optional additional category: socio-economic for innovation points).
Among the d-school Afrika’s sustainable features are a rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) system; rainwater harvesting and reuse; low-energy lighting system and controls; low-energy cooling and heating system via a thermally activated building system; natural and mixed-mode ventilation; maximum daylight, fixed shading and low carbon concrete and steel; and electric car charging points and bays, to mention a few. The building also has a very flexible design for different spatial configurations, with all teaching spaces being flat and all furniture being mobile on wheels.
Its main atrium also features a large, glazed roof structure that provides wonderful daylight to the entire building throughout all floors, while limiting the heat ingress via low-emissivity (low-e) fritted (finely porous) glass, making for a light, multi-purpose meeting space on the ground floor.
The staircase to the roof was also designed specifically to allow for a maximum number of student visits to the roof to see the solar PV system and various other green features on the roof.
The d-school Afrika’s design process also included an important collaborative aspect, where alumni and students joined the design-thinking process. This was the most rewarding aspect of the project, said architect Jonathan Ray of KMH architects and planners.
“It was critical that this was a collaborative approach to develop the brief and building design through co-creation and co-design with the d-school and UCT stakeholders.”
He singled out SAPOA, which represents South African property owners and developers, for leading the change towards “more progressive and sustainable design for their buildings, over and above the minimum requirements”.
In the design process, Ray said Perez had the foresight to visit the Stanford and Potsdam d-schools to meet with the leadership of these facilities, observe the teaching programmes and how the spaces in the respective facilities were used before KMH started developing the brief.
Following these visits, the detailed brief and approach to site for the d-school was conceptualised and synthesised through a series of co-creation workshops and physical model building.
“The free-form lattice shell roof over the atrium could also only have been achieved through close collaboration with Leaf Structures who joined the professional team early on so we could develop the design in detail with the team who would ultimately detail, fabricate and install it,” said Ray.
“For me, the d-school demonstrates that successful buildings, those that are layered and nuanced and meaningfully meet all the most client’s subtle needs, cannot be the expression of some architect’s design genius, but are a composite, made through contributions from a whole team of diverse individuals working together to deliver a shared vision.”
Manfred Braune, the director of Environmental Sustainability in the Office of the Vice-Chancellor, concluded by paying tribute to the HPF.
“UCT is very privileged and honoured to have received such an extremely generous donation from the Hasso Plattner Foundation to build this incredible green education building, which many students will benefit from greatly, while also doing good for the planet.”
This article was originally published by UCT Newsroom.
You can’t generate original solutions using the same well-worn routes of problem solving. Different results demand new pathways – alternative ways of collaboration and ideation that get people thinking and moving differently. Some design thinking champions are embedding design thinking in company culture through games and exercises that have people practising out-of-the-box solution exploration.
Some are putting their own design thinking values to the test, practising deeper listening in their commitment to developing human-centric technologies. And others are cross-examining design thinking as a theory and practice, applying a critical lens make sure it is delivering on its promise of tackling our most complex problems. In four different sessions, change-makers share lessons from their experiences of putting design thinking to the test out in the world.
Launchlabs is a global entrepreneurial development platform that embeds design thinking into its coaching and mentoring curricula, but it does this in a playful, off-kilter way. In a breakaway session, Launchlabs facilitators hosted a game that challenged participants to reach a defined endpoint on a board – but without the safety and structure of prescribed rules. Instead of mastering a single skill and progressing down a linear path, teams worked together to interpret the rules as the game evolved. Completing tasks and advancing meant practicing cross-functional teamwork, customer focus, innovation culture and experimental mindset – principles inherent in taking a design thinking approach.
In their effort to apply research to real-life challenges, the D-School at the Universidad Mayor in Chile stretched their own out-of-the-box approaches. The programme set out to use design thinking methodology to help equip 20 entrepreneurial rural farmers with business and financial planning skills and train problem-solving methods for their equipment challenges. Then Covid-19 stuck and the project planners had to rethink their training approach. Instead of face-to-face encounters, they created videos and design booklets with information; they used radio stations and local municipalities extend their reach. Ultimately, the impact of the project spread beyond its original scope.
The World Design Organisation’s Young Designers Circle (YDC) harnesses the creativity and ambition of young designers across multiple disciplines and regions to design for a better world. Since 2020, the programme’s objective has been to promote the use of design to meet the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs). The team uses jam board bringing online and in-person delegates together to explore how design thinking can be a catalyst for innovation in healthcare. They aim to develop a human-centric and empathetic approach to help destigmatise mental health and promote well-being for all (SDG 2). “We can co-create thriving conditions for better mental healthcare that’s not only science-based and techno-centric but also rooted in alternative ways, such as indigenous knowledge systems and cross-cultural contexts,” said Corbin Raymond, Industrial Designer and inaugural 2019-21 YDC designer. “This requires a deeper sense of understanding and engaging with human-centric approaches.”
Pulling back from the notion of design thinking as a blanket panacea, some critical voices are working to keep design thinkers accountable to their own ideals. GK VanPatter, author of Rethinking Design Thinking and co-founder of Humantific, a New York-based consultancy, is asking: is design thinking really offering sense-making methods for change-making in a complex world? “In traditional design thinking, the methodology doesn’t quite match up to its philosophy’s promise,” said VanPatter. “There is a glaring disconnect between the two.” Examining four challenge arenas he identifies in his book, VanPatter showed that in 2019 approximately 90% of design thinking methods were operating in small-to-medium scale arenas, with visual, product, service and experience design challenges.. “With the vast majority of the design community focused there,” he observed, “most of the graduate programmes are as well. We see very few graduates coming out of postgraduate design schools with upstream skills.” The next generation of emerging practice is evolving towards large-scale challenges in organisations, systems and industries, and even more for the complexity of giant-scale challenges at the level of communities, countries and the planet.
Whether they’re academics, app-developers, youth designers, farmers or futurists, communities of design thinking practitioners are defining, teaching and evolving what design thinking is and what problems its champions are brave enough to tackle. Former YDC designer turned educator, Ralitsa Diana Debrah, put it perfectly: “We’ve been using design thinking as an enabler, tool, mindset and culture to design innovative solutions from a grassroots level in local communities with global impact.” With empathy, human-centricity and collaboration, shaping its processes, the hope is that the results will be radically transformative for society. But, it’s easy to default into old ways so design thinkers must be also be honest and vigilant about addressing the methodology’s weak points. As VanPatter acknowledged, “Historically, design has been exclusive. To change this, design has to become more inclusive and cognitively diverse.”
On the second day of the inaugural Executive Leadership Convention hosted earlier this year by the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business in partnership with the Hasso Plattner d-school Afrika, CPO at Absa Group Limited and d-school Afrika Alum Jeanett Modise took to the podium to discuss ‘How and why should diverse multidisciplinary perspectives be included in the business practice and what could they unlock?’
Having engaged throughout the morning with pertinent topics such as the rise, influence, and implementation of AI in the workplace, the necessity of new types of leadership in a VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous) world, and the uses of systems thinking and design-led thinking approaches when tackling complexity, Modise opened the presentation with a discussion regarding what leadership should look like in an era in which disruption is the norm, and asked what an organisation should look like during unstable times.
“Not every organisation or individual will thrive in uncertain times,” she said.
She noted that in today’s society, having a primary focus on shareholder interest is ill-suited and that it is important that we are not in business just to make money – but to generate value for all stakeholders.
“Bottom-line value increases when diverse perspectives are implemented,” she added.
Organisations taking this approach and integrating diversity seek to be fluid, agile and flexible so they can navigate complexity and uncertainty, reimagining strategies and delivering worthwhile, positive value across their value chains. Their business cultures are open, and they understand the values of collaboration between individuals, teams, and organisations. At the same time, they do not wholly abandon classic management capabilities; instead, they enhance them in such a way that they propel resilience throughout the organisation.
“They seek to thrive,” she said.
This drive to truly flourish is crucial in the present day: while some leaders may have strong technical ability, it takes even more to tackle a complex environment.
“You need to continuously learn and keep up with the change,” she said.
One way to do this is to learn to work together in diverse, multidisciplinary teams. It is only when we work together that we can achieve the goals that adhere to the business strategy and also benefit stakeholders, said Modise. Reconceptualising and re-examining business models and drawing conclusions such as this are one silver-lining of the COVID-19 pandemic, emphasised Modise.
“[Lockdown] was a good training ground [for reworking our models].”
Additional conclusions she drew from the years of the pandemic were that leaders need to evolve and shift beyond profit – they need to impact, and they to be brave and bold. So too, should they move from competition into co-creation, and to “eat, breathe and live the purpose of improving people’s lives.”
An example she provided of this maxim in practice was from her own experience as the former HR Director of SAP Africa. There, the organisation had the ability to look ahead in such a way that it did not merely aim to make money, but to drive continuous innovation and help customers run their businesses more effectively, efficiently and sustainably. This vested interest in their clients was essential – otherwise, they found, their promise would ring false.
“It’s an aspirational message, but we believe in it,” she said.
At the centre of Modise’s talk was the same principle that runs through the process of design thinking: the overarching importance of people.
“You can overachieve on financial goals, but if you trample on people, you get a zero. Be human-centred,” she said.
She described how treating every employee as a leader is a good strategy to motivate them to fulfil their potential and achieve what it is they are required to do. It is a guarantee that while at work, an employee may just be performing a certain task, but at home and in their communities, they are fathers and mothers – they are leaders.
“We have to treat our people well,” she said, “because they are what make us.”
Tiego Monareng has been a coach at the Hasso Plattner d-school Afrika since 2019. Alongside leading the d-school’s Foundation Programme, he is also coaching a group of Foundation Programme alumni through the creation of their startup, Xpecting, a company that aims to deliver ultrasound technology to women in rural areas of the Western Cape.
Transport, a lack of sonographers, and cultural barriers all contribute to the scarcity of maternal care for women in rural areas of the Western Cape. Xpecting seeks to alleviate this problem by developing an application that receives images from a wearable, portable ultrasound device that enables easy, remote, real-time virtual consultancies.
Presently, the team of six is prototyping minimal, viable models of their idea. Tiego’s been helping them to develop and refine their product by using resources and methods from the Foundation Programme. Included among these are: becoming comfortable with the nonlinearity of devising solutions to problems, building confidence by navigating uncertainty as a team and maintaining a sense of curiosity that drives continued exploration. He explains how design thinking has helped to construct a core that can withstand the eventual pressures that come with problem solving.
“Most startups fail, and usually the cause of that is that they’re not solving for a real-world problem,” Tiego says.
But design thinking’s early stages demand that problem-solvers probe deeply into the challenge they wish to resolve and make sure that they are attempting to meet the real needs of real people.
“We test our assumption around the problem first by going out and speaking to people to find out whether or not they experience the problem the way we see it,” Tiego says.
The group’s view of the problem is something they discuss in depth during the Understand Phase of the design thinking process. Here, team members align their thoughts about the challenge and co-create a joint worldview that ensures everyone has a similar grasp of the task at hand and the tools that it will require.
This phase, and the subsequent stages of observing and problematising, ensures that the team – however diverse it may be – is equipped with a common language that “neutralizes levels of hierarchy and invites joint levels of collaboration,” Tiego says.
This is one of the many beauties of using design thinking when building a team.
“You can have someone who is an engineer working with someone in healthcare, and they don’t really speak a common language that can really enable them to collaborate. But once they’ve gone through the design thinking process, we feel that they have enough of a common language with the design thinking tools to communicate and work well with each other.”
Coaching the startup has been one of Tiego’s highlights during his time at the d-school. He’s also enjoyed seeing members of international, multilateral organisations shift from states of scepticism to moments of sheer joy and creative confidence after experiencing the design thinking process.
“They get really excited! They seem to really care about it – and that feeling is quite cool,” Tiego says.
Tiego’s found that design thinking has changed the fabric of his friend group, too. They tend to argue quite a lot. “But, like, it’s a style. Design thinking hasn’t reduced the argument’s quality – it’s just streamlined it. Very quickly, we try to clarify: What are we debating about right now? Is this a thing that you disagree with? Do we agree with this?”
It’s just like using the Understand Phase, Tiego says.
“Now, we’ll always start with a little bit more clarity, because we try to understand the worldview around what we’re speaking about before we go forward.”
And then they can go forward.
The Hasso Plattner d-school Afrika Foundation Programme in Design Thinking hosted its graduation ceremony for its 14th cohort. This marked the culmination of more than nine weeks of hard work and creative collaboration in one of the most exciting and cutting-edge programmes in the world of design thinking. At the end of the course, they not only left with a certificate but an innovative solution to a real-world problem.
The programme, in partnership with the Western Cape Government Libraries, is designed to equip students from all backgrounds with the design-thinking tools and techniques needed to solve complex problems. This cohort consisted of three multi-disciplinary teams of five to six students, guided by professional design thinking coaches.
Redesign multi-use library experience for young adults in under-resourced communities in a world where they see libraries as a facility for the youth in school, and they feel excluded from the resources libraries offer and the communities they foster.
Each team focused on a different aspect of redesigning the multi-use library – not a fictional library, however, but the Wellington Library. They were asked to think creatively, collaborate effectively and approach their problem from multiple perspectives.
Team Damnzel focused on supporting library assistants to create a space within the library that targets the needs of young adults. They recognised that the library doesn’t have a designated space or a frontline worker for the relevant services young adults need and use.
The solution: Youth Development Initiative (YDI), a section within the library that provides personal development opportunities and job-related services to young adults. Through the YDI, a person will be present specifically to assist young adults with creating CVs and cover letters and improving their interview skills.
The Flex Sabres narrowed its profile of its library user and targeted the needs of an elderly widow who frequents the library and needs a way to feel more connected to her community.
The solution: A guided event-planning framework and application that assists libraries to easily plan social gatherings, encouraging more gatherings and helping to foster a stronger sense of community.
The third team, L+ve, sought to assist an experienced librarian passionate about outreach programmes but needs a way to feel supported when running them. The team was conscious of the limitations of government funding to cover such additional activities.
The solution: A process that aids librarians in running more initiatives by sourcing and managing volunteers and matching them to community members seeking further library services and programmes.
The ceremony began with an inspiring keynote speech by Richard Perez, the director of d-school Afrika, who highlighted the importance of innovation and creativity in today's rapidly changing world. He added that all humans have the capacity to think creatively and to be creative and that, at the core of it, the programme is about unlocking that creative confidence.
Tiego Monareng, the programme lead at d-school, encouraged the graduates, “They should move with this experience,” he said – in other words, they should adapt it to all challenges.
Alongside the formal ceremony were several interactive presentations showcasing the work of the graduating class. They demonstrated the students' ability to apply design thinking principles to a wide range of real-world challenges, namely toward redesigning the Wellington Library. Assistant Director Pieter Hugo of the Western Cape Government Libraries was well pleased with the work done by the students. Pieter Hugo said the golden thread that linked all the presentations was they all recognised what the library currently offers but looked beyond it to the needs of the wider community to design additional community services that were outside a traditional library.
Kiese Mpasa described her experience: “This was an empowering journey for me. Especially when it came to embracing ambiguity, I learned a lot.” Atondaho Ramudzuli elaborated further: “Upon joining the programme, as a scientist, I quickly discovered that I had to be spontaneous and not afraid to let go of something that’s not working.” In closing, speaker Maurisa Moloto urged the graduates to be fearless in showing the world their creative confidence.
On Thursday, 18 May, the Hasso Plattner d-school Afrika, in partnership with the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business, launched the inaugural Executive Leadership Convention, a two-day event hosted at the d-school Afrika’s premises on the University of Cape Town’s middle campus.
Richard Perez, founding director of the d-school Afrika and UCT GSB EMBA alum, along with Sean Lewis, guest lecturer on the Executive MBA programme and UCT GSB alum, commenced proceedings with a panel discussion themed ‘Our World and Wicked Problems: Systems and Design Thinking to Tackle the Challenges Leaders Face Today.’
Portia Heynes, acclaimed professional speaker and lecturer on systems thinking, diversity and inclusion, digital transformation, strategy execution and people and talent management, also an alum of the UCT GSB EMBA, moderated the discussion and opened with a presentation that highlighted some of our most perplexing and entrenched social and environmental issues – our wicked problems.
Heynes noted that the boundaries that used to provide the structure of work have been dismantled by technology and AI. She argued that the future of work would not be about roles or titles but rather about capabilities and unique skills as AI begins to take on the administrative and technical features of most jobs and reduces the need for human involvement. Heynes posited that it was now more important than ever for people to upskill and reskill themselves toward roles that would be relevant in the future.
Lewis then provided a portrait of the systems thinker, using Gandalf the Grey from J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings as an analogy. Like Gandalf, Lewis said the systems thinker has a deep understanding of complex systems, a multidisciplinary approach to problem-solving, and a focus on addressing root causes rather than just treating the system.
He described a system as being complex when it is comprised of subsystems, explaining that the people within the subsystems are systems themselves. Each system, he said, is interdependent on the next in order to produce a purpose that is greater than what they can produce on their own. “The complexity resides in the interdependence,” he said.
He then used the example of Cape Town’s water crisis to illustrate the impact of systems thinking when tackling complexity. Although the underlying problem was a lack of water, this wasn’t the cause of the crisis – the root of the issue was our massive consumption.
“We haven’t changed the shortage problem – but we created a change in the overconsumption problem,” Lewis said.
Taking a holistic approach and uniting around a common goal can lead to better results and long-term success, Lewis concluded.
Following on, Perez introduced a modified Danish Design Ladder to explain design-led thinking, indicating that design-led thinking sits at the top of this ladder. “Design Thinking is about teaching people how to see the world through a design lens. It’s about unlocking creative confidence and the mindset to be able to tackle complex challenges.”
He noted, too, the importance of leaders creating exploration environments in which this creative confidence could be unlocked. These are spaces where teams can easily glean qualitative data and delay the need to rush toward the solution space that is sometimes insisted upon prematurely. They are spaces where teams are allowed to “fail early, fail fast, and fail cheaply” – and where they can celebrate that failure, too.
“It’s messy,” he said. “But what you’re doing is bathing in the problem. You explore, make sense, develop ideas, test ideas – and repeat, interlink, weave.”
Questions and comments were then put to the audience, and there was a consensus that language is important when discussing a challenge and that systems thinking and design-led thinking approaches need to be made more accessible to leaders.
Thereafter, the atrium began to buzz with positive chatter and a jazz band started to play. Participants resumed the convention the following day.
If you’ve seen Tebogo Chaka conduct a design thinking training session, you’ll want to know how she does it: How does she get complete strangers and serious, driven people – corporate executives, civil engineers, academics – to be at ease enough to share openly and to dance – in front of each other?
She’ll be quick to tell you.
“I think it starts with you as a coach. You need to create that space where people feel comfortable enough to do the things that you want them to do. If I’m saying, OK, guys, I want you to be comfortable and dance, it means I must be comfortable and dance and lead the way as a coach.”
This is something she brings into her life outside of design thinking, too – which you can experience right away in an interview with her. The purpose of our meeting was to speak about her work, but Tebogo takes the opportunity to remind you that first and foremost, she’s human. In our case, she did this by bringing her smiling, waving 9-month-old daughter with her, who now and then would erupt with sounds of joy.
“Say hello!” Tebogo says. “Hello!”
It is a moment that breaks the boundaries of the video call, and brings us all near. Suddenly, it is not an interview: we are just three people, speaking.
During Foundation Programme sessions, Tebogo’s methods of generating comfort are, of course, different. But it is evident that this is something she’s become expert at, having to constantly renew and refresh a space in which it is OK to keep trying, even as circumstances change.
(For example: can we continue the conversation while she is bottle-feeding her daughter? Yes – seamlessly. Can her daughter sleep while we are speaking? Are we not being too loud? “I have a trick,” Tebogo says. She straps her daughter to her back. “Look,” she says, not five minutes later, swivelling the camera to her child’s sleeping face.)
About design thinking itself, Tebogo continues to speak with joy.
Some years ago, she coached a group of Foundation Programme students through the creation of a solution to a problem a project partner was experiencing. The solution that the team came up with – generating income by monetizing digital content – was so impressive that the project partner chose to implement it. However, as things sometimes go, the implementation did not occur in the end. Although this was disappointing, Tebogo still finds immense value in the experience, and it remains one of her highlights as a coach.
“The team was very into it,” she says. “They were very into the process – they wanted to learn, to come up with solutions. I was very blessed.”
She brims as she details how one of the members of the group, Reitumetse Kholumo, has gone on to use the design thinking methodology during the creation of her own business, Kwela Brews, which recently launched on the 29th of April. Reitumetse is a stellar example of the effort that design thinking can inspire – it can bring about real change. Bringing awareness to the local African tradition of homebrewing and empowering the women who do it participate in business are just two significant ways that Reitumetse effects real, positive change in our society.
It’s this ability to inspire change – no matter how big or how small – that drives Tebogo as a coach. She notes that design thinking is not just about finding a solution to a problem – a significant part of the design thinking journey is about embodying the mindsets and principles that underpin it. Ultimately, the ideas of a bias to action, the ability and curiosity to navigate uncertainty, and the will to play with possibilities should become second-nature to the practitioner and a common language between the team.
“Just having participants take something from the session – just one thing, an activity, or a mindset that would make a difference to them when they go back into their own spaces – I think, for me, that is making the difference.”
You leave the conversation feeling like the generosity of Tebogo’s spirit is so great that, no matter what you were speaking about, you were always speaking about exactly what design thinking is about in the end: humans.
The Hasso Plattner d-school Afrika at the University of Cape Town hosted yet another creatively charged Design Thinking Dash on 10 May 2023. The design thinking blitz is a highly concentrated version of the d-school Afrika’s full design thinking courses.
Aiming to introduce design thinking methodology in a fun, fast-paced, hands-on workshop, the Design Thinking Dash guides participants through the key stages of the design thinking process, including empathising with users, defining the problem, ideating potential solutions, prototyping and testing. Makaziwe Radebe, a fine arts student, said of the programme: “I gained consciousness of being mindful of other’s inputs, which links to the mindset of being human-centred.”
During the Design Thinking Dash, participants worked in small teams to apply design thinking methodology to a real-world problem. In this case, the task was to create a student management tool, which is a system that allows students to mitigate challenges that they encounter in their academic careers. Reflecting on the lived value of the process, Evan Robinson, a coach at the d-school said that “design thinking means questioning your mindset and thinking with tangible things.” He explained that this means using objects to find solutions, these can be Lego pieces, building blocks etc – anything that aids in developing a prototype for a solution. Later, Evans advised students to not be afraid to start with something awful, but continuously test it.
This intense, condensed programme is, by design, highly interactive and deliberately pressurised, forcing participants to work together without hesitation, and to prioritise action and movement over careful deliberation – offering a dose of what it's like to work in a design thinking team. Shaakira Davood, an environmental sciences student, mentioned that she appreciated that the “design thinking process is applicable to any life situation and that it is adaptable.”
During the activities the participants were surprised to see Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis pop in for a visit. Mr Hill-Lewis had been touring the newly built three-storey d-school sustainable building and was privy to part the workshop. Observing the students ideating in action, he commented, “If you are not thinking with the person you are trying to serve in mind, first and foremost, and what their experience of the service or product is, then you are planning to fail. The more people that we can get to understand design thinking, the more impact we can have in the world.”
The Africa Tech4Democracy Venture Day, a competition for startups developing technologies that reinforce democratic principles and values, was held on March 7 at the HPI d-school building at the University of Cape Town’s middle campus. Tech4Democracy is an IE University initiative in partnership with the U.S. Department of State and with the strategic support of Microsoft.
Trustur, from FloodGates Limited (Ghana), received the award for the best democracy-affirming startup in the continent. Trustur provides users with a verifiable and secure digital identity and promotes inclusion by simplifying access to government and other services. The other four finalists that pitched their innovations were Deaftouch (South Africa), Legal Standpoint (South Africa), Ongea na Demokrasia (Tanzania) and Uamuzi Foundation (Kenya). All finalists will receive up to 150,000 USD in Microsoft cloud credits, free productivity software and GitHub Enterprise access and mentoring from business and technical experts.
Trustur, from FloodGates Limited (Ghana), was crowned best Democracy-Affirming Startup in Africa at the Tech4Democracy Africa.
Trustur secured a spot in the Tech4Democracy Global Final that will take place in Washington, D.C., during President Biden’s Summit for Democracy at the end of March, where all the winners of the five continental Venture Days (Europe, South America, North America, Asia-Pacific and Africa) will compete for a monetary prize.
The jury was composed of a diverse group of experts from the entrepreneurship, academic and corporate sectors in Africa, namely: Andrew Bailey, Senior Manager: Innovation, University of Cape Town; Buntu Majaja, CEO, SA Innovation Summit; Zanyiwe Nthatisi-Asare, CEO, Digitally Legal; Richard Perez, Founding Director, Hasso Plattner School of Design Thinking Afrika, University of Cape Town; Vanessa Ramanjam, Program Manager, Solutions Space, Graduate School of Business, University of Cape Town; and Dikatso Sephoti, entrepreneurship consultant.
During the event, Irene Blázquez, Director of the Center for the Governance of Change at IE University, stressed that “it is crucial to illustrate a democratic and liberal vision of technological development that upholds the values that explain us as a society.”
Richard Perez, Founding Director of the Hasso Plattner d-school Afrika at the University of Cape Town, stated: “It was a great honour to have played a role in this important initiative and to acknowledge our continent’s innovations. Design-led thinking and human-centred design, with its emphasis on empathy and collaboration alongside creativity and rigour, offers the world a tried and tested framework to work on the complex challenges and problems that we face.”
U.S. Consul General Todd Haskell shared that “the United States has made significant commitments to ensure technologies work for, not against, democracies. That is why the United States is working to expand access to technology that fills gaps and helps citizens, activists, lawyers and judges to work together to continue to build their democracies and hold their institutions accountable.”
The event also included Microsoft’s Digital Advisor Khaliq Dollie and a keynote address on how technology can reinforce democratic values by technology entrepreneur Melvyn Lubega, founder of the first South African unicorn.
