Innovation & Design

(2.5 Credits)

Many firms that have experienced dramatic gains in shareholder value over the last few years (e.g. Google, Apple, Motorola) register innovation as a central driver of their progress. One can argue that innovation, and a culture that inspires and supports innovation, is the only sustainable competitive advantage. A frequent manifestation of recent innovation has been breakthrough design. Design represents a powerful alternative to the dominant management approaches of the last few decades and is an important perspective for leadership to embrace. The course structure will focus on a process used to describe a way of thinking and set of deliverables associated with creative concept exploration in product, digital, and/or environment design projects. Each week, the course will represent the phases conducted by an innovation consulting firm to synthesize real-time research, and approach ideation and investigation on parallel tracks.