Designers make great entrepreneurs, they just don’t know it yet | WIRED
An interesting article on the low ratio of designers as start-up founders.
The key trade of both designers and entrepreneurs is…problem solving
“thinking like a designer means being better suited for the open-ended ambiguous problems that epitomise the startup journey and having the skills needed to iterate towards product-market fit.” You’re excited to apply the design mindset to rethinking organisational structure, go-to-market strategy, and the many other challenges that inevitably get thrown your way”
‘Pushing entrepreneurship on people that live only for designing interfaces, products, or logos is therefore not a good use our time. If someone just loves to design for design’s sake, or is focusing on just that when designing a product, then maybe he or she shouldn’t start a company. I’d say the same for people who just love to code or just love to sell.
But if what they really love is the process around designing — around solving problems they are passionate about — then they are well-suited for entrepreneurship.
Many designers don’t even know they want to go out for entrepreneurship or that it’s a possibility.
For some this lack of awareness or exposure is the fault of education. For too long, designers have been trained to be agents: working at the will of someone else’s vision. …..schools, with occasional exception, sprinkle rather than embed entrepreneurship into their programs.’
Steve Jobs pointed out that “Design is a funny word. Some people think design means how it looks. But of course, if you dig deeper, it’s really how it works.”
Actually, it goes a level deeper. Design is not just about how it works, it’s about the process of how you get it to work. And that’s what founding a company, what entrepreneurship is all about.
7 Creative Leaders Answer: What is a Design Entrepreneur? | HOW
Entrepreneurs, don’t give up your day jobs (yet) | WIRED
Why you shouldn’t quite your day job until you’re established.
Entrepreneurship in Design by kathryn H. Anthony; Design Intelligence
- ‘opportunity recognition and resource acquisition that leads to the creation of something new’
- Her class course objectives are:
- Understand the value of entrepreneurship in architecture and the design professions to society.
- Identify and critically analyze major issues in entrepreneurship.
- Become familiar with some of the leading figures in entrepreneurship at the Academy for Entrepreneurial Leadership at the University of Illinois; social entrepreneurs whose work has impacted the built environment world-wide; environment and behavior design consultants; and diverse designers in nearby metropolitan areas.
- Understand how these individuals have benefited from entrepreneurial knowledge and skills.
- See how their future career can be enhanced by acquiring some basic entrepreneurial knowledge and skills.
- Gain some hands-on experience proposing future ventures for creative entrepreneurship and for non-profit organizations.
- Present prospective ventures in a way that communicates effectively for future prospective clients.
- Materials
- Book: Innovate Like Edison by Michael Gelb and Sarah Miller Caldicott
- Thomas Edison’s five basic competencies
- solution-centered mindset
- kaleidoscopic thinking
- full-spectrum engagement
- mastermind collaboration
- super-value creation
- Thomas Edison’s five basic competencies
- Book: Patterns of Entrepreneurship Management
- Book: The One Page Business Plan
- Book: Design Like You Give a Damn by Architecture of Humanity
- Book: Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson
- Book: Innovate Like Edison by Michael Gelb and Sarah Miller Caldicott
- Course assignments:
- Seminar presentation on a design entrepreneur: Students identify and interview a design entrepreneur and present information about him/her to class using innovative technology.
- Seminar presentation based on Horan’s One Page Business Plan for Non-Profit Organizations: Students produce an innovative venture for a nonprofit organization or produce an innovative for-profit entrepreneurial effort based on what they learned from the course.
- Google assignment: Based on what they learned from a class visit to Google, students design an office for their own entrepreneurial venture to spark the highest possible levels of creativity.
- and more mentioned in article