Design Thinking: Empathizing to Understand the Problem

When you immerse yourself in the context of the user, you can uncover pain points and find opportunities for improvement or innovation not always evident to your audience. In this course, part of the Design Thinking MicroMasters program, you will learn how to use simple research methodologies including active listening to understand your target audience and uncover their obvious or latent needs. Emphasis will be placed on observation and interviewing as key methods to gain empathy for the user's experience and viewpoint. Equipped with this understanding, you will be prepared to identify and define more accurately the business problem. You will also review case studies and discuss strategies to foster productive client-stakeholder relationships, including user personification, context understanding, and empathy idea mapping (ideas that resonate with your target audience).

• Recognize the user’s emotive response to context and circumstance (i.e. products, environments, and services)
• Understand a holistic approach to problem solving
• Plan research activities to gather and analyze data from a user’s viewpoint
• Demonstrate an appreciation for creative methods to document user needs and illustrate future solution possibilities

• Successful completion of THINK501x