B-013: Banking Reboot: Design Thinking for a Digital Era

Overview | Audience | Outcomes | DT Tools | Duration | Track Record

(1) Course Title and Code

Banking Reboot: Design Thinking for a Digital Era (B-013)

(2) Course Overview

In today’s rapidly evolving financial landscape, traditional banking institutions are facing unprecedented challenges from digital disruption, changing consumer expectations, and increased competition from fintech startups. These pressures demand a radical rethink of how banks design and deliver services to meet modern customers’ needs for speed, convenience, and personalized experiences.

Design Thinking offers a robust framework to navigate these complexities, emphasizing empathy, rapid prototyping, and continuous iteration. By adopting Design Thinking, banks can foster a culture of innovation and creativity, ensuring solutions are not only technologically advanced but also deeply aligned with customer desires and behaviors. This approach enables the creation of more intuitive and engaging banking experiences that keep pace with the demands of the digital era.

The AI-Empowered Design Thinking process with AI Design Thinking Agents for the Banking Sector (Details) encompasses a dynamic, end‑to‑end journey (shown below): Determining Challenges, Discovering Information, Defining Opportunities, Developing Ideas, Delivering Solutions and Driving Change. Each stage builds upon the previous one, creating a continuous cycle that transforms insights into impactful, intelligence‑driven innovation.

Design Thinking Agents are powered by advanced large language models from OpenAI’s latest GPT family and Google’s Gemini Flash Image (Nano Banana), delivering enterprise‑grade analytical outputs and clear, executive‑ready visual assets.

Banks typically increase project execution speed by approximately 48% to 95%, depending on complexity and readiness. At the same time, AI‑supported discovery achieves around 90% accuracy in identifying and clustering user needs, enabling initiatives to start with a precise, evidence‑based understanding of customers and employees.

In fact, we successfully led a bank in retaining its high-value customers through a Design Thinking-based customer experience enhancement project, resulting in over $3 billion in additional income from deposits, investments, and insurance services. Additionally, we guided an insurance company in enhancing its social selling model, resulting in a 127% increase in the closing rate from new clients. These successful projects were published in the Hong Kong Design Thinking Business Casebook 2019 and 2020.


(3) Targeted Audience

  • Banking Executives and Managers: This group includes senior decision-makers who seek to drive innovation within their organizations to stay competitive and relevant in a digital-first world.
  • Product Designers and Developers in Financial Services: Professionals involved in the creation and enhancement of banking products who need to integrate user-centered design practices to improve product-market fit and user satisfaction.
  • Customer Experience Strategists: Individuals responsible for the holistic customer journey at financial institutions, looking to leverage design thinking to enhance customer engagement and loyalty.


(4) Major Learning Outcomes

  1. Learn the guiding principles, core values, and execution model of Design Thinking to strategically overhaul traditional banking models and create innovative, user-centered financial products.
  2. Understand how to employ empathetic research methods to gain deep insights into customers’ evolving digital habits and preferences, enabling the development of tailored banking solutions.
  3. Develop the ability to quickly prototype and test digital banking interfaces and applications, enabling agile responses to user feedback and market changes.
  4. Gain skills in interdisciplinary collaboration, enabling teams to leverage diverse expertise in creating solutions that are not only innovative but also technically feasible and financially viable.
  5. Acquire strategic thinking abilities to anticipate future trends in digital banking, ensuring that solutions not only meet current customer expectations but are also adaptable to future developments.


(5) Design Thinking Techniques and Tools

Stage 1: Discover

  • Contextual Interviews (Code 208): Conduct in-depth interviews in real-world banking environments to gather insights on how users interact with digital banking tools, shaping the development of user-centered financial products.
  • Stakeholder Mapping (Code 201): Map all relevant stakeholders in the digital banking ecosystem to understand their needs and expectations, helping tailor innovative banking solutions.
  • Cognitive Immersion (Code 213): Immerse course participants in the mindset of digital banking customers to deeply understand their behaviors and preferences, enabling the creation of responsive and personalized banking services.

Stage 2:Define

  • Clustering (Code 301): Group customer behaviors and feedback from Phase 2 to identify patterns and common issues in current banking models, facilitating targeted innovations.
  • Empathy Map (Code 305): Create empathy maps to visualize customer emotions, thoughts, and experiences with digital banking, helping to align new products with user needs.
  • User Problem Statement (Code 320): Formulate clear and concise statements that define the core issues faced by users, guiding the development of solutions that address real customer problems.

Stage 3: Develop

  • Mind-Mapping (Code 402): Mind-mapping can generate a wide range of ideas for digital banking solutions, encouraging creative thinking and innovative problem-solving.
  • Impose Constraints (Code 406): Apply specific constraints to brainstorming sessions to focus ideas toward the most feasible and viable banking solutions.
  • Role Storming (Code 414): Engage participants in assuming different roles within the banking ecosystem to explore diverse perspectives and inspire unique solution ideas.

Stage 4:Deliver

  • Concept Poster / Cover Story (Code 502): Develop concept posters or cover stories that envision the future state of digital banking solutions to aid visual communication and the presentation of new ideas.
  • Concept / Idea Pitch (Code 511): Prepare and deliver pitches that succinctly communicate the value and impact of designed digital banking solutions to stakeholders, securing buy-in and support for implementation.

Remark: All the techniques and tools utilized in our training programs can integrate Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Big Data technologies to enhance innovation efficiency by up to 40%. This includes AI-driven User Demand Identification and Prioritization, Quantitative User Emotion Analysis, and AI-driven Innovative Idea Generation and Feasibility Analysis.


(6) Learning Materials (for Training Workshops)

  1. Course Guidebook
  2. Tool Guide
  3. Case Studies
  4. Pre-Course Reading or Watching Materials [Examples]
  5. Post-Course Continue-Learning Materials


(7) Deliver Modes and Durations

Our training programs boast exceptional adaptability. Offerings range from concise 2-hour introductory talks and 4-hour training courses to comprehensive 8-hour to 15-hour action-learning workshops and 30-hour project-based workshops (or Design Sprint Mini-Innovation Projects). This flexibility allows us to tailor each session to your specific needs and schedule, ensuring our training is both highly effective and strategically aligned with your organization’s objectives.

In addition to our training services, we also offer internationally recognized Design Thinking skill Assessment Services. These assessments are designed to help your staff identify and bridge gaps in their innovation competencies, further enhancing their effectiveness and your organization’s competitive edge.


(8) Track Record

Since 2017, we have successfully delivered more than 700 Design Thinking training classes across sectors, such as business, social service, public service, and education, in Hong Kong, Mainland China, and across Asia.

As the exclusive representative of the globally renowned DesignThinkers Academy in China, we offer programs that not only provide internationally recognized Design Thinking certifications but are also facilitated by globally accredited Design Thinking specialists. Our commitment to excellence ensures that each program meets the highest standards and is tailored to empower professionals at all levels with cutting-edge skills and innovative methodologies.

For more Design Thinking Courses for Other Sectors and Management Areas, please click here