Guest Podcast: Think Like a Designer with Ayse Birsel

Great design can stop us in our tracks. We marvel at its elegance and functionality, thinking: “WOW – this is brilliant! Who’s come up with this idea?”

Often, we wish we had the same ability to imagine things, to create something uniquely beautiful and undeniably useful. Something that others would come to love and couldn’t imagine living without.

Our guest, Ayse Birsel, has come to believe that we all have this ability.  

Contrary to popular belief, ordinary people can be extraordinarily creative – when given the right tools and processes.

We can use creativity in all sorts of unique pursuits, including reimagining and reinventing our teams, our cultures, and our workplaces.

In this episode, Ayse talks about how to think like a designer to create a team, a company or a culture that we love.

Episode Highlights

• Ayse’s first encounter with industrial design
• The mindset we need to think like a designer
• How the “Deconstruction – Reconstruction” process can be used to design a compelling employee experience
• Benefits of engaging others in creative problem solving
• The power of dichotomies and focusing on both our needs and our wants
• How to identify our values by reflecting on who our heroes and role-models are
• Why design thinking is not enough and what else we need to be successful
• How to get the best ideas from the worst places

If you enjoyed listening to this, you can find more episodes of the CultureLab with Aga Bajer here.

Ayse Birsel was named to the Thinkers 50 Radar.