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IIT ID DESIGN STRATEGY CONFERENCE
Over the course of a year, IIT Institute of Design traveled to four cities around the world to explore what was emerging and disrupting with the individuals and the organizations working in uncharted pathways to innovation. The Strategy Reader combines moments from the exploration with reflection, offering a unique perspective on some of the trends on the horizon. As a graduate student at ID, I followed the group to Detroit and visited several local businesses and entrepreneurs to learn their approach to design and social innovation. I helped to create a model for type of business growth in Detroit and design the book.
Key words: social innovation, business model, book design
GROWTH IN DETROIT
Throughout the tour, Michael Brennan, founder of Civilla, reiterated how hard it is to explain what is happening in Detroit, but that you know it when you feel it.
There is something deeply moving about the work. This work is so expansive, so complex, and so endless. The changes our guides wish to see cannot happen quickly, it may not happen in our life times. But it is the work that needs to be done, the work of creating a better life for yourself, and for your neighbors. It’s the work of building communities through meals and projects and challenging conversations. There is so little ego, and such immense love that permeates the change work happening in Detroit.
The issues in Detroit might not be as flashy as Silicon Valley, but tinkering with the levers of complex systems in the city opens up possibilities for immense change. Entrepreneurs know it’s easier to make a provocative prototype than make lasting change, but they are committed to developing solutions across time with multiple stakeholders.
After the tour to Detroit, I created a model of different types of business growth we saw in Detroit. I think the successes that entrepreneurs in Detroit got may apply to other cities with similar situations across the world. The model can serve as a reference and beginning point to document social innovation practice.
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