How it works

Human-centered design is an approach to innovation that grounds any initiative (service, program, or product) in real human needs by engaging the end-users in the design process. Innovation starts with deeply relating to and connecting with the humans it is intended to serve. Once their needs are assessed, their desires and pain points can be understood and used to design the innovation initiatives. Human-centered design is rooted in the belief that anyone can learn the power of innovation. To make it accessible, innovation and creativity are turned into a process with easy-to-follow steps.

The human-centered design process is usually broken down into five steps: empathy, problem framing, ideating, prototyping, and iterating.