Tips for Building a Data Science Capability

RAPIDLY PROTOTYPE IN LOW-FIDELITY WAYS
Design thinking generates low-fidelity prototypes to
demonstrate applicability and test ideas quickly and
cheaply before making significant investments.
These prototypes span mock-ups, illustrations,
paper-based interfaces, narratives, and other
techniques that are quick and low cost to produce
and easy to test with customers and stakeholders in
near-real time. As feedback is gathered, teams can
build smarter implementation roadmaps. For
example, one technique we practice is a “cupcake
road mapping” approach in which solutions are
planned in delightful portions with increasing
complexity added only when a solution proves
worthwhile. This allows organizations to dedicate
resources to only the most viable solutions that can
make a difference.
CASE IN POINT
A major supply chain company was struggling
with manufacturing data and determining the right
questions to ask of the data. The Booz Allen team
introduced design thinking as a technique to help
reframe the questions and hypothesis. Using design
thinking trained data scientists, the team conducted
a co-generative workshop to unpack the problem
and iterated until they determined a hypothesis
and variable to test. The workshop and subsequent
analysis were so successful that the client
launched two international centers to apply the
same techniques on a larger scale.
FINAL THOUGHTS
The data science challenge is not going away, and it
is often not as simple as creating an algorithm to
generate organizational value. Rather, Booz Allen
finds value by taking a holistic approach deriving
meaningful insights by combining data science with
innovative and creative methodologies such as
design thinking. Booz Allen’s approach for realizing
the real potential of analytics rests on this broader
view of capabilities that moves beyond algorithms to
creative and organizational approaches to institutionalize
data science as more than a stove-piped
function, but rather as part of organizational DNA.
40 | HOW DESIGN THINKING CAN HELP YOU REALIZE ORGANIZATIONAL VALUE