Design Thinking - Abduction
Abduction used in the ideation phase of the design process, as well as for reframing and redefining the question, can also be applied to obtain new perspectives or interpretations of your current situation analysis, along with future scenarios.
What is Design Thinking?
The creative parts of the design process, definition and ideation, is attributed to abductive cognition and, together with the various methods in the other phases, broadly defines the term Design Thinking.
To understand this better we will have to go a bit philosophically behind knowledge work. In brevity much of planning is made by using a combination of deduction and induction. Deduction is mostly used to reason that general rules are true based on specific premises, whereas induction generalizes, without certainty, based on specific instances, like we see in statistics.
Abduction then is the creative perspective, the inferred possibilities based on what is known or perceived by the creative, the challenge is to balance imagination with realistic filters to arrive at what is plausible.
Abduction is not as widespread as the other more tangible ones. However creatives in advertising and design uses this a lot. Along with routine they have a personal aptitude or talent for quickly switching between idea generation and realistic criticism of the ideas.
Abducing Your SWOT
You bring knowledge - we add perspectives. In collaboration with you, we comprehend your strategic situation and future scenarios with abductive thinking.
When you are planning your new strategy or is in the need of a review, bringing in abductive design thinking can be a good layer of extra perspectives or redefinitions to seek an extra edge over the competition.