Design Thinking with Artificial Intelligence: Practical Tools for Business Innovation

This book is a timely and valuable guide for innovators, designers, managers, and students who want to boost their design thinking projects through leveraging artificial intelligence capabilities. It offers over 40 traditional design thinking tools enhanced with AI. Each AID tool is ready for use, with specific step by step instructions that require little previous AI knowledge. So, if you would like to use AI to create a “Critical Items Diagram,” deploy “Explorative AI-to-AI Interviews,” build a “Customer Journey Map,” engage in “Rapid Prototyping,” or  “Create a Pitch,”  there is a tool to support your project!

The book highlights how AI can support and enhance each phase of the design thinking process — prepare & train, emphasize & define, ideate & select, prototype & test, and implement & learn. In addition to the AID tools, the authors provide specific guidance on how to build your own AI Agents for design thinking projects and overviews of over 100 unique AI programs used in this book. Importantly, the authors offer specific means and examples of how AI programs can elevate the success of the design thinking process, offering a solution to the challenge of producing creative outcomes that are also “faster, better and cheaper.”

Created through a collaboration of design and business scholars with members of the Design AI lab, this book blends rich knowledge and practical insight on use of AI for innovation. Packed with real-world use cases, examples, and practical tools, it serves as a valuable resource for both educational and professional settings.

Praise for Design Thinking with Artificial Intelligence

 “We live in a world where technology is not just a tool, but a partner. In a new era of AI, the conversation is shifting from whether machines can be creative to what happens when we collaborate with them. It's a fundamental change in how we innovate and solve problems, moving beyond the "man vs. machine" debate and into a powerful new synergy. In this groundbreaking guide, authors Graff and his team demonstrate that AI doesn't diminish human ingenuity; it augments it. Drawing on real-world experiments, they reveal how the future of creative work lies in a dynamic dialogue between human intuition and computational power. This book is a manifesto for the next great leap in innovation – a practical framework for unlocking human-AI collaboration and building a future where imagination and computation work hand-in-hand.”

- Anna Phan, UX Lead, Monetization, Google

 “Most people think of design as a way to make things look better. This book asks a deeper question: what happens when design itself starts to think? In Design Thinking with Artificial Intelligence, Graff and his team show how AI doesn’t replace creativity—it reorganizes it. Their experiments with students, businesses, and algorithms reveal something quietly revolutionary: the future of innovation isn’t man or machine, but the conversation between them. It’s a manual for the next creative leap – when intuition meets computation, and imagination learns to collaborate.”

- Ling Fan, Founder, Tezign & Atypica.AI

 “Design Thinking with Artificial Intelligence explores how designers and AI systems can work together to enhance creativity and problem-solving. Graff, Clark, Li, and Xia examine the intersection of emerging AI tools and established design methods, emphasizing practical workflows and human-centered judgment. The authors offer a pragmatic playbook of workflows, prompts, and use-cases that explore how teams can ideate faster, prototype smarter, and make decisions with greater insight.”

- Prateek Kukreja, Head of Product and Design, Workhelix

 “Design Thinking with Artificial Intelligence bridges the essential gap between human creativity and machine intelligence. This timely and practical book offers a structured roadmap for design scholars and practitioners to meaningfully integrate AI into the design process, fostering more collaborative and connected innovation.”

- Sheng-Hung Lee, Assistant Professor of Urban Technology, University of Michigan; Founder, d-mix Lab

 "This comprehensive, thoughtful book masterfully lays out the foundations of Design Thinking and the immense potential of integrating AI to accelerate and improve any design process. Packed with practical, 'how-to' examples, the authors demonstrate how to seamlessly weave AI into your existing workflow, equipping you with powerful new tools and techniques for every step of the design process. Most importantly, the book proves how AI can augment—not replace—human innovation and creativity, providing the knowledge to effectively upskill talented designers. By putting design and human creativity firmly at its core, this is a foundational, essential resource for anyone looking to enhance their creative edge in the age of AI.”

- John O’Hara, Design and Technology Leader

 “Design Thinking with Artificial Intelligence is an essential guide for navigating the future of innovation. This book provides a relevant framework for professionals and students to deploy effective human-AI collaborations to solve complex problems and drive meaningful innovation.”

- Prof. Yongqi LOU, Honorary Doctor, Royal College of Art, President, Shanghai University of Engineering Science, Chaired Professor, Tongji University

“This book arrives at a critical moment for leaders navigating the intersection of AI and human creativity. True AI transformation in enterprises is not merely a technology challenge—it’s a human capital challenge. Success depends on how effectively organizations can reimagine workflows, empower teams, and reskill their workforce to collaborate with intelligent systems. By linking design thinking with AI, this book offers a practical roadmap for making that collaboration real. It’s an essential guide for executives, innovators, and educators who believe the future of enterprise innovation lies in an AI + human workforce.”

- Ranjan Dutta, Founder & Managing Partner, ThothProAI, Advisor on AI Transformation, Human Capital, and Workf

Daniel Graff is Distinguished Research Fellow and Research Director of the Design AI Lab at Tongji University, China. He has 16 years of experience in design innovation and research. He teaches Design Thinking, Design Methods & AI, and Business Model Innovation.

Mark A. Clark is Professor of Management and Faculty Fellow of the Institute for Applied Artificial Intelligence at the Kogod School of Business, American University, Washington DC, USA. His research and teaching centers on team performance, leadership, and collaboration.

Dan Li is a PhD student in the Design AI Lab at Tongji University, China. Passionate about integrating art and technology, she focuses on innovative solutions in smart city visualization, art installations, and branding strategy.

Lei Xia is a PhD student in the College of Design and Innovation at Tongji University, China, and a visiting PhD student in the Ideation lab at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a product designer and researcher with expertise in user experience, industrial products, and enterprise systems.