From industrial design education to practice: Creating discipline through design sprints

Abstract

This paper looks into the value of design sprints as a means to training industrial design students towards practice within industry through the analysis of five consecutive years of design sprints with 280 interdisciplinary student teams of engineering, business students, and industrial design students. In the past several years, several design schools and many companies utilize the methodology of design sprints through human-centered design. This interdisciplinary ‘time boxed exercise’ is meant to rapidly focus product innovation to drive more valuable outcomes for the user; however, the design sprint also has considerable benefits towards teaching and ‘disciplining’ students for the work they will later engage in professional practice. Our results reveal three highly significant contributions of design sprints to aid students towards transitioning to professional practice including: (1) aiding towards working through design fixation, (2) creating ambiguity that leads to heightened innovation, and (3) making linkages between digital collaboration (what most students know well) and in-person collaboration.