01 Strategy Design

The starting point of this research process is strategy design, and how methodology and planning can support in the design of a service tailored to the user, analyzing needs before they arise, and resulting in a winning product. Our society is changing at a fast pace, and the evidence is impossible to ignore. As a civilization, we shifted from a time when issues were relatively straightforward, understood, and self-contained to a time when they are complicated and intertwined. The difficulties of today require that we operate at the crossroads of several area of knowledge. Strategic Design focuses on multiple areas of expertise to explain the architecture of the problem, revealing major opportunities, when brought in early.

First and foremost, strategy must be defined. A strategy is a concept, a plan, the overall vision that aspires to specific goals. A goal is an achievement that the company must attain. Strategy is the vision that ensures that all day-to-day activities (or tactics) contribute to the attainment of goals. Tactics are activities that are carried out in line with the goal's plan. To be effective, the objectives must be established, and the audience must be aware of who to approach.

Strategy design is thus a management process that entails the use of futureoriented design concepts in order to improve an organization's innovative and competitive potential. Strategic design is a promising capacity in the face of the modern world because of its ability to cope with unpredictable and unstable environments, to connect the minute details and the broad picture, and to comprehend the relationship between quality of idea and quality of execution.This process can be appliad both to company development matters and to more universal problems. In facts, today's pressing issue is applying design ideas to "big picture" systemic difficulties such as health care, education, and climate change. It is frequently used in business development to strengthen product branding, product development, corporate identity, corporate branding, operational models, business models, and service delivery.

Strategic design may be used to control risks by creating a structure that facilitates cooperation, creativity, and the development of a method to solve challenges in a meaningful way. It is associated with innovation, since it enables ideas to become real and profitable applications that can be efficiently managed, bought, utilized, and/or consumed by target audiences. Because of its human-centered approach, it develops meaning by successfully making the buyer comprehend the product and its value.

Strategic decisions have a long-term influence on businesses, involve several stakeholders, and need the investment of resources. Through the use of three major themes, they reframe how challenges are treated, highlight chances for action, and aid in the delivery of more complete and robust solutions. 1.Integration: to provide an olistic point of view, emphasize the intricate network of relationships – between people, corporations, and objects. 2.Visualization: the use of visual representation to communicate complicated relationships that would be difficult to describe in text and mathematics. 3.Stewardship: to ensure that vital ideas retain their integrity throughout the creative process.

Strategic design provides a mechanism for businesses to differentiate their goods and services from the competition by analyzing external and internal trends and data, allowing design decisions to be made based on facts rather than aesthetics or intuition. This procedure is divided into three steps: desirability refers to the degree to which the project meets people's needs and requests; applicability refers to giving the strategic result a tangible and solid form in the present or in the foreseeable future using current resources; and feasibility refers to whether the strategic result can be successfully applied to the company and generate value.

It is possible to study how strategic designers tackled a specific issue to provide some instances of how strategic designers work. Fitch Design's John Rheinfrank demonstrated to Kodak that their disposable cameras were not designed to replace regular cameras, but rather to satisfy special demands such as weddings, underwater photography, and others. As a result, he defined the most crucial questions that a company's goods and services should answer. Apple Inc. put out the iPod+iTunes ecosystem gradually over time, rather than introducing all of its elements at once, prioritizing the order in which a portfolio of products and services should be offered.

In the following page are some additional instances of how recurrent and reproducible patterns in strategy design frequently define a company's success more than the product or service itself.

Nespresso product integration created a wide ecosystem to interact with.

Ryanair has broken down its offer by allowing people to buy only what is necessary or desired and thereby lowering the cost of flights.

Ikea has placed the customer at the center of the production process, thus enhancing its offer and differentiating itself.

Starbucks has broken every logic making environment and experience protagonists of their offer instead of coffee, the product.

Daggiù supports mothers and fathers who have always eased the distance of children who live and work in the north by sending products of the territory.

The Gin Way responds to gin lovers with an exclusive selection sent out every month.