take on the role of a consultant who has been brought in to develop and evaluate creative solutions for a business facing the effects of a global crisis. You have been asked to develop some potential solutions to propose to company leaders that could help the business shift its focus or innovate in the face of change. You will employ creativity and design thinking principles to address business needs and help the company assess its readiness for innovation and change. For the purposes of this exercise, here are some guidelines:
You will choose the company (or type of company) and create a narrative for the specific problem the business is facing. This could be a company where you have worked or with which you are familiar, or you can locate an example of a company and use it as the basis for your narrative. For example, you might select a larger company that needs to figure out a way to reach more customers since most of its local business has been temporarily halted, or perhaps you will choose a small business that operates locally and offers a product or service that is currently not relevant to the market’s needs.
Note: If you select a company with which you do not have personal experience, some of the questions related to the employees and other similar details may be more challenging to answer; however, you should feel free to use your creativity to respond to the questions as if you had already interviewed the company’s staff and leaders. Provide information that will help you craft your narrative. The purpose of this activity is to demonstrate your ability to think through and develop creative solutions to business problems, not to have all the “right” answers.
You will engage in aspects of the design thinking process to complete this activity but will not be able to complete all parts of the process (including interviewing stakeholders and prototyping the solutions). You may want to review any resources you have already read on design thinking and consider how you would conduct this process if you were an actual consultant for this chosen company.
With those thoughts in mind, construct Parts 1 and 2 of your business solutions design, being sure to incorporate appropriate examples, where applicable, as well as citations for relevant academic resources from the classroom, the Walden Library, and/or other appropriate scholarly sources to support your work.
Synthesize the business problem. Specifically:
Describe the company in question, including how many people work there, the industry the company is part of, and what types of products and/or services the business offers.
Explain the business problem, including what impacts the global crisis is having on how the business operates and its ability to meet customer needs and deliver its product(s)/service(s).
Identify the company’s present internal strengths and weaknesses, as well as external opportunities and threats that the current crisis is presenting to the company.
