Four kinds of design thinking: From ideating to making, engaging, and criticizing

Design thinking is spreading extremely rapidly among organizations in terms of interest and practices. Far from being linked to the “form” of products, design thinking is accepted as a formal creative problem-solving method with the intent to foster innovation. However, the spread of design thinking in practice has not been coupled with a similarly rapid and robust diffusion of its theoretical underpinnings. This paper aims to clarify the theoretical contribution of design thinking by identifying the practices that connote different interpretations of the paradigm. Moreover, we investigate the innovation challenges that the adoption of the design thinking paradigm aims to address. From an empirical perspective, through 47 case studies of consulting organizations that provide advisory services based on the design thinking paradigm in Italy, we identify four different interpretations of the paradigm characterized by different practices: creative problem solving, sprint execution, creative confidence, and innovation of meaning.