KEY AREA:
DESIGN STRATEGY AND PARTICIPATORY INNOVATION Design and innovation seek to improve people’s wellbeing by introducing products and services that respond to human values, human interests and experiences. While disciplines such as anthropology, sociology, and psychology have contributed social theory and methods to understand human behavior as a basis for design, design and innovation are also social processes. Valuable change is not created in isolation or through the work of a select few, but may originate from unlikely sources. How product, service or system concepts originate and are nurtured through a process has increasingly involved the users themselves, as well as other amateur or professional sources.
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e find that drawing on valuable resources for design and innovation demands introducing new frames through which to view the objective and the processes of any initiative. ‘Context’ takes on special meaning in relation to both the ‘context of change’ and the ‘context of production.’ Learning about human behavior is very different from applying that knowledge to a process. Sometimes the context of change and the context of production can be one and the same, other times it is valuable to keep them separate. We have a long history of experimenting with valuable ways of engaging in change through design whether the starting point is societal priority, user interests, new technology, or business.
• Challenges conventional thinking throughout the process to socially valuable design. • Avoids ill-conceived project directions while prioritizing others at early stages. • Provides contextualized understanding and assessment in short-term and long-term efforts. • Increases organizational learning through inclusive formats of engagement. Ideas are not born, they are socially shaped!
We draw upon social theory, technological development and design to plan and participate in design processes with our partners. We specialize in introducing new ways of engaging unlikely contributors that address social and cultural values and interests. Critical and socially informed project planning, execution and facilitation: CASE
KEEP THE INNOVATION PROCESS IN MOTION
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