Our quest is to
‘find x’ and make connections.
To supercharge innovation, we create deep alignment across business goals, people, technology, and organizational capabilities.
What is the ‘X’ variable required to improve or help us grow to our aspired future state?
Strengthen ORGANIZATIONAL internal Capability
Along with our Project Services, we offer internal organizational strengthening and conditioning for leadership and teams, to maximize the chances of growing a strong innovation mindset for your unique business style.
Innovation Talks with Shilpi Kumar
Develop the right momentum for your organization's innovation journey. Equip yourself with fresh perspectives and strategies to navigate the ever-changing business landscape and evolving user behaviors—be it social, technological, or aspirational.
In these sessions, we'll explore navigating ambiguity, the role of human-centered design in streamlining innovation, and how to collectively foster a catalyst spirit within your team.
Diagnostic Workshops with tools & artifacts
Bring Khoj Lab's Five Mindsets Framework to your team’s annual offsite to diagnose bottlenecks, prioritize efforts, and ideate next steps to improve your capability. Our physical assets and tools empower individuals, teams, and organizations, providing a distinct advantage for any challenge.
These collaborative workshops will strengthen your internal innovation capabilities and help you find flow in your efforts.
Growth Experiments
with Khoj Lab
We lead "curiosity projects" to uncover the variables that drive innovation and encourage risk-taking. As a strategic research and design powerhouse, we partner with those who seek new value for the greater good.
These projects connect global leaders’ perspectives, fostering a platform for original thinking and impactful narratives in innovation, business, and design.
Innovation Talks
by Shilpi Kumar
With 15 years spanning roles like Team Leader, Design Strategist, and UX Researcher, Khoj Lab founder Shilpi Kumar has a deep understanding of integrating business processes through a holistic, insight-driven lens.
She champions a design-led approach to help innovation and strategy teams uncover new value, align stakeholders, and develop ideas for rapid user adoption.
Choosing Design-Led Leadership in Ambiguity
for Organizations & Leadership
Address resistance by visualizing challenges and applying problem-solving strategies through prototyping methods.
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Crafting Tomorrows: design’s evolving role in future thinking.
We’ve got a bottleneck situation! bumps, barricades, blindspots.
Find Innovation Flow: manage ambiguity, reduce complexity, and eliminate uncertainty.
Risk management through Design-led leadership
A “Heads-Down Culture” might work for an organization but chokes the innovation game in business growth
How your organization can adopt lean methods to manage waste - start by leveraging existing capabilities
Using Methods & Mindsets to Bring Alignment
for TEAMS
Orchestrate alignment to drive outcomes for organizations that seek to grow and innovate.
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Create conditions for innovation ~ An introduction to the Five Mindsets
Alignment on the innovation journey. “Where are we on the Innovation Maturity Model?”
Identify bottlenecks, prioritize issues, and strategize your ideas - leverage existing pathways and resources to implement change
Leadership in Collaboration - The Use of Design Methods 101
“How might we” measure key metrics for innovation performance?
The rise, fall, and confusion in the role of a “Product Manager”
Tackling the hard part of innovation - implementation
Framing research for innovation ambiguity
Reassessing the ‘Role of Design’ in Business
For Educators
Open the discussion on how we can create conditions for innovation effectiveness intentionally through design.
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Combining Design Thinking, Lean Startup, and Agile approaches to reduce uncertainty
What is NOT Innovation? Unleash your natural human instincts and grow!
Introduction to the phenomenon of Humanity-Centered Design
Insight-led approach to business growth management - Design Research vs Market Research
Design Thinking and its six key principles
Becoming a ‘Catalyst for Change’?
For CAREER/PROFESSIONAL GROWTH
Empower individuals to identify and eliminate sources of friction as a virtuous cycle of improvement.
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Establishing trust and meaningful connections with stakeholders
Five qualities of a good Innovation Catalyst
Unpack seven myths of innovation killing great ideas
‘Innovation’- the reason you are still in business. ‘design’ will be the reason you’ll make it big!
Try the rapid customer experience modeling
Maximizing the impact of research in organizations
Design-led approach to leadership
If you’re interested, contact us by choosing a date and time on our Calendly.
Diagnostic Workshop: Five Mindsets Framework
To become an innovation catalyst, organizations must break down silos and promote deep alignment among teams. In today's fast-paced corporate environment, unifying teams and objectives is not just advantageous; it is crucial for sustained growth and genuine innovation. This dedication to "Bringing Alignment" serves as a vital enabler, allowing ideas and efforts to flow freely, which ultimately enhances organizational agility and impact.
PodcaST [4-EPISODES]
From Frustration to Flow: The Five Mindsets Framework
No matter your discipline, this podcast is about confronting friction points that limit impact while finding solutions to improve its flow. Based on research conducted between 2018-2020, Khoj Lab developed “The Five Mindsets” to guide and inform organizations aiming to improve their workflow. Listen here
Workshop [1-3 HouR]
Create Conditions For Innovation: Corporate Teams
In this session, we introduce a new framework called the ‘Five Mindsets’. These mindsets emerged from research conducted by Khoj Lab with leadership from various industries, business models, regions, countries and users.
Diagnose bottlenecks, prioritise issues, and take action. This workshop is designed to help you broaden your spectrum of innovation opportunities, and most importantly, find flow. Download Workshop Overview PDF
Card Deck [Prototype]
“Mind. Set. Go!”: Seek Innovation Effectiveness
Empowering individuals to identify and eliminate sources of friction creates a virtuous cycle of improvement. With the right training and frameworks, the squeaky wheel can become a musical call to action instead of an annoying sound to avoid. Derived from the Narratives by Khoj Lab
What you get with the ‘Five Mindsets’ Framework:
Diagnose your organization’s strengths and weaknesses, and identify gaps in innovation implementation
Generate ideas toward actionable changes and initiatives to eliminate or encourage specific behaviors
Broaden areas for investment to improve innovation effectiveness in your organization on all critical aspects.
Eliminate bottlenecks that are slowing down the flow of good ideas
Identify catalysts in your organization beyond their defined job description
If you would like to know more about the “Five Mindsets” framework — Read full article on Medium or let’s connect on a Zoom Call.
Narratives by Khoj Lab — Promoting an Innovation Mindset
This Khoj Lab initiative sparks new perspectives, challenges assumptions, and helps envision the future of innovation
Narrative 1
Myths of Innovation ~ And Detangling Them
As young leaders, trying to navigate the complexities and ambiguity of innovation, learn ways to bust these 7 myths and take a chance on the impossible.
narrative 2
Catalyze Your Innovation ~ Five Human Qualities to Resolve Bottlenecks
We uncover five Human Qualities to resolve bottlenecks and gain innovation flow and clarity.
Articles & Dialogues
We articulate the voices of those who are passionate and willing to explore the space where innovation finds its meaning within complex business-organizational systems. Through this KhojX initiative, we also push the limits of where innovation can lead us, our communities, and businesses.
More Medium Articles authored by Shilpi Kumar
Innovation is a problem of flow, not a lack of ideas
Combining lean startup and agile with a design-led approach reduces business risk
Innovation is not ideation: it’s a process that enables ideas to flow towards impact
Short videos to spark a conversation about creating the right conditions for innovation to grow in the ecosystems across your business, internally as well as externally.
Read more short articles on LinkedIn, and leave a comment to start a conversation.
Sustainability is an outcome of good design.
What is design? It’s about a purpose.
What is sustainability? It’s about impact.
At Khoj Lab we're constantly looking for user-friendly ways to explain complex and complicated thinking and processes. So in this article, we take a look at how design and sustainability work together to create great value impact for humanity. Read more
To find the core value of your offering, start with design thinking.
Markets are getting overly saturated, competition is reduced to profits and there is an increase in solutions designed to create more problems than bring new human value.
If you are a young researcher or designer just stepping into an organization, think about the core value you are solving for. This short read gives you an understanding of how "Design Thinking" works, when you should start, what is the role of the designer and what are some potential pitfalls in the process. Read more
What it means to be ‘you’ at work.
Why wait for someone else to make the first move? If you’re willing and have a purpose to do something, speak first, do first, and act first.
Every time there’s a venting session about our jobs, we find ourselves focusing on "the lacking" on the part of the companies we work for, how "they" need to adopt XYZ and support us better, and how this is, in turn, affecting us as employees within that framework. Even if all those are valid points… why wait for someone else to come along to make those changes? Why can’t it be YOU? Read more
“We need to shift how we think about innovation.”
“There was a time when corporations had to be convinced that innovation was important. Today, every corporation has some form of innovation strategy, either outsourced or in-house.
However, most innovation leaders find that there is a lack of integration of such projects internally, leading to unsuccessful outcomes. It’s important not just to have the right idea but also to synchronize it with all your stakeholders as it evolves. This cannot be accidental. It must be managed.”
— Shilpi Kumar
Founder of Khoj Lab, Innovation Catalyst, Corporate Speaker, Facilitator and Prinicpal Researcher