Global Trends to watch out in Innovation
-
Digital Transformation: How to create value out of it?
Digital transformation is like giving your business a digital makeover, changing how your organisation operates and delivering value to customers. At least – that is the idea behind it.
This trend is driven by advancements in artificial intelligence, cloud computing, data analytics and our personal connectivity. Organisations that do not invest in digital transformation, risk falling behind their competitors and losing market share.
The issue is that implementing technology is not a goal by itself. Clueless organisations simply digitise their bureaucracy and turn irrelevant paper product features into irrelevant digital product features.
Technology should be used to do things differently – solve issues, work more efficiently but most importantly:
“Technology should be used to develop that next big thing your customers will love”
You need promising starting points, and opportunities to focus your new technology on. This is where design comes in, by bringing much-needed empathy into technological advancement. Design empowers organisations to explore, pinpoint and deliver new value to users, customers, stakeholders and employees. Value that is enabled by your new technology. See it as the perfect tech-push, consumer-pull combination giving you that much-needed competitive edge.
Explore how we helped to set up a new AI by Design department for OLX – helping AI experts create value for their customers.

-
Customer Centricity: Why can it be so scary?
While traditional organisations were busy implementing an economy of scale, cost-cutting tactics and monopolistic power plays, they failed to notice the arrival of the demanding customer. Welcome to the economy of demand, where customer value is the highway to market dominance.
The key strategy? Delivering a superior customer experience. To do so, organisations must embrace customer-centricity in their core processes and start cultivating customer loyalty.
We believe design is the best methodology (and eventually culture) to embrace customer centricity and deliver superior products and services. And, therefore – ultimately – this superior customer experience across all touchpoints.
Check out our case where we helped the Dutch Railroads drive customer centricity by implementing journey management in the whole organisation.

-
Agility and Resilience: How to stay relevant?
Our world is changing faster than ever. And Darwin already knew (at least there are different theories on whether he said it or not). The evolutionary fact is that it is not the strongest of species that survives, nor the most intelligent. Neither the richest nor biggest organisations.
The ones that thrive are the ones most adaptable to change.
And this is where design comes in. Design makes organisations more agile and resilient by fostering a culture of experimentation and innovation. By having a culture that can discover opportunities, set the right direction, build stuff and execute faster than the competition. Embracing design, allows organisations to align ideas better, experiment faster, iterate more often and bring new successful products to market faster and cheaper.
We helped ING drive agility by building teams combining the best of Service Design, Agile & Lean Start-Up.
-
Sustainability: Overcoming our inertia
Sustainability can feel like a massive and interconnected puzzle with complex pieces, new compliance rules, regulations, slow transitions, etc.
So, although most business leaders feel the need for change, many organisations appear inert due to a lack of vision and internal consensus, sustainability has become a people problem, not a technological one.
That is why design is so important. Because design applies holistic and co-creative approaches to focus on people-first solutions. To understand motivations, to create relevant solutions, and to help us change our behaviour.
So, if you encounter inertia in your company, assemble a team led by designers – to align on your sustainability goals, principles and a roadmap to get there internally.
We gathered our expertise to develop a 5-step plan to make your circular vision concrete by infusing Service Design, with real-life examples and impact.

-
Talent Management: Wooing the next generation
Talent management is like a talent show for organisations, attracting, retaining, and developing the talent needed to stay relevant. In the end, we need talent to tackle all challenges described in this blog – even talent management itself.
Design can play a key role in talent management by creating an engaging and inspiring work environment that attracts talented people and fosters creativity and collaboration. By investing in design, organisations can create a culture that nurtures innovation and empowers employees to reach their full potential.
We like to call this Employee Experience (the younger sibling of Customer Experience), an approach focused on job needs and creating a dynamic work-life experience in which we can flourish and grow.
Check how we helped Sonae, the largest food retailer in Portugal, boost their Employee Experience, impacting over 30,000 employees.

Adapting to change starts with design
Organisations cannot afford to sit still. Change is no longer optional—it is essential. At Koos, we believe in the power of design, to empower organisations to do things differently, align technology with human needs, foster agility, and create a culture that can respond to constant change.
By giving design and its principles a strategic position within organisations, we see how they can overcome these challenges and come out on top, stronger and more competitive than ever.