Innovation always starts with empathy

A recent article on Fast Co. Design ‘Innovation always starts with empathy‘ got me thinking about empathy and for some reason I remembered the above text from Colours of the wind from Disney’s Pocahontas.

It’s telling because it seems that just like when the settlers arrived in North America to take over without caring about the people already there, organizations do the same by pushing products to people without thinking if they will actually matter to them.

Empathy with the user is a powerful tool for innovation. It gives you insight into the problem, but even more important, it makes you care about the outcome.