Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO and one of the foremost thought leaders on design thinking, defines the approach as “a discipline that uses the designer’s sensibility and methods to match people’s needs with what is technologically feasible and what a viable business strategy can convert into customer value and market opportunity.” The concept has emerged as a key source of competitive advantage: 79% of surveyed executives consider design thinking to be important. (Appendix 1) When applied to reconceiving organizational people processes, powerful results emerge: the most value-adding HR teams are almost 5 times more likely to be using design thinking than their peers. This executive summary presents a general framework for the process, ways to measure efficacy, and case studies that illustrate successful utilization of design thinking principles.