The Use of Design Thinking in the U.S. Federal Government

Few organizations have more power to improve lives through innovation than the U.S. government. In this article, we focus on design thinking, a promising innovation methodology that marries a human-centered focus with iterative prototyping and testing. Design thinking has been much discussed in the private sector and in international government circles, yet its use in the U.S. federal government is less prominent and less explored by scholars. Though U.S. federal agencies report anecdotal success at a project level, empirical research examining the demonstrated impact of the approach is not yet available. Therefore, a partnership between a university and a not-for-profit operator of federally funded research and development centers was formed to conduct a preliminary study on the use of the method, the results of which are presented here. We conducted interviews with a cross-section of government design-thinking practitioners representing a diverse set of federal offices and identified the specific contexts in which they applied design thinking, the outcomes these practitioners observed, and the enablers and barriers to implementation they experienced. We conclude with recommendations for future research and practice, to help government confront the challenges of the twenty-first century and, in doing so, improve the lives of its citizens.