Design Management

About

On this three-week Design Management course, you will apply three design management cornerstones of process, facilitation, and strategy to address complex design challenges with empathy, insight, agility, ethics, and contextual intelligence.

You will be introduced to some of the most contemporary practices in Design Management with tools that you will learn to apply to a variety of real life uses, including business model canvas, systems thinking rich picture tool, culture maps, empathy maps and user journey mapping.

Each day will be spent working with theory and practice – we learn by doing – and there will be opportunity to collaborate, work collectively on creative activities together to apply your learning in practice.

We will also be looking at organising for innovation and will apply contemporary design management practice to better understand contemporary marketing and branding, entrepreneurship and problem-solving in business and leadership, global cultures, innovation, and sustainability.

Target group

18+

Students applying for this course are expected to be independent and highly motivated. Summer Study Abroad is suitable for students wanting undergraduate-level study.

Course aim

This course is taught through a series of lectures, seminars, and collaborative studio roundtables by expert practitioners and academics.

Design management stems from industrial design in the 1950s, through to architecture and computing science in the 1960s to social design in the 1970 and latterly marketing and brand management in the 1990s and early 200os. In the digital and post-digital era, design management has embraced design thinking and thinking in systems. Design management is a creative process driven activity that isn’t just a job title: it’s a holistic outlook than enables, and instigates, enterprise and innovation.

We will apply three design management cornerstones of process, facilitation, and strategy to address complex design challenges with empathy, insight, agility, ethics, and contextual intelligence. Together offer a creative and experiential approach to the study and practice of design, problem-solving, business and leadership, global cultures, innovation, and sustainability. We understand that finessing a multidisciplinary and process-driven technique is the route to success.

Our key themes are design research, understanding organisational structures, thinking in systems, providing creative economy analysis, future thinking, applying human and planet centred design principles, inclusive design, strategic thinking, and creating enterprise & innovation through design.

Fee info