Innovation and entrepreneurship

As a higher education institution it’s DSA’s responsibility to formulate a student’s perspective on how to develop an idea, and consider the commercial requirements to commercialise it. We do this by stimulating entrepreneurship that creates a positive impact on the people affected by the design, the technology enabling it, and the organisation needed to get it out into the world. 

The power of persuasion

To enable real innovation and change, design students must be able to communicate their intentions to industry peers and more importantly, non-designers. This ‘can do’ attitude is nurtured through the student journey of defining their professional identity using visual and verbal rhetoric such as logos (persuasion by citing fact and construction of a logical point of view), pathos (persuasion through emotional appeal), and ethos (persuasion through credibility credibility). 

Incubation

DSA encourages new ventures and start up incubation perspectives for its students through two distinct areas: value creation–externalising and expressing the design through the lens of the user, and leadership and negotiation: developing a mindest to influence the producer, organisation, stakeholder, and user groups. Experiences with co-op industry partners and a professional network support this culture of change with the belief that design innovation is an outcome of intuitive leaps, not an incremental process.