Design Facilitation: Training the Designer of Today

Abstract

Due to the inherent complexity of human-centered design—which focuses on diverse stakeholder collaboration and participation within the design process—simply understanding a design process and deploying design research methods is not enough. Rather, the designer of today must now be able to understand the increased value that stakeholders bring to the design process. The designer of today must be able to develop design activities that empower stakeholders to express, make, evaluate and collaborate. And the designer of today must be able to facilitate others, through the design process. These new abilities all point to an emerging design skillset called design facilitation. Embedded within this new skillset is the ability to develop the mindset, skills and characteristics—along with utilizing processes, process tools, methods and planning frameworks—in order to effectively facilitate others through creative, collaborative problem-solving.