Innovation and Future Thinking | © Proyecto:  Waiting Journey. Estudiante:  Emma Krejberg Bak

Language

English

Start date

July 2027

Frequency

Part-time

Fruition

On campus

Duration

2 Weeks

Develop strategic thinking to acquire foresight; comprehend, plan and create solutions in a context of rapid and constant change.

 

In this Summer Course in Innovation and Future Thinking, you’ll be detecting signs of change, organising ideas into comprehensible models, finding new ways to assess possible futures, identifying potential barriers and opportunities, designing innovative ideas, products and services.

This course, taught in English, focuses on the strategic, innovative and creative aspects of future thinking. You’ll start with data collection and modelling, explore and adopt narrative development, strategic foresight, prototyping, and find out how to effectively inform users about new products and services. This new know-how will be put to good use in the form of a final project providing solutions for the problems found.

 

Information to decide

A course, taught in English, to acquire the methodologies and tools you need to identify and evaluate signs of change, proposing innovative solutions for future thinking.

 

Starting from the question, "Why think about the future?" you’ll discover the fundamental concepts of futuring from a theoretical perspective. In this first part of the course you’ll focus on trend identification and analysis, watching out for weak signs and macro trends. This phase is characterised by an observational analysis of urban environments.

The focus then shifts to creating scenarios, roadmaps and timelines, using retrospection and creative ideas to develop new narratives. Futurists, innovators and designers will show us how to use these techniques to put theory into practice.

You’ll study innovation practices and processes and see how they’re used by both major companies and start-ups.

To finish the course in style you’ll develop a final project to provide long-term solutions for the problems found.

The Summer Course in Innovation and Future Thinking is for students and professionals from a variety of fields and backgrounds with one thing in common: a healthy interest in innovation and creative thinking.

People looking for new ways to create products, services and business concepts will find the course both interesting and useful with its mix of strategic business vision and product design development.

If you want to combine creative skills with a rigorous approach to thinking, this course is a great place to start.

In this course you’ll develop new forecasting skills and acquire the techniques and tools you need to detect change, as well as an understanding of the dynamics of change in modern society.

 

After this course you’ll be developing concepts, services and products with greater foresight and a strategic new look. You’ll also consolidate your teamwork skills and share ideas using sector-specific language. 

It’s a course, taught in English, with a strong international focus for students from a wide range of backgrounds and a variety of profiles that is sure to enrich your learning experience.

You’ll be studying in Barcelona, a benchmark in the world of design and innovation. Two weeks in a city that leads the field in terms of observational analysis. The city itself will be your case study as you search for and find indicators, behaviours, messages and signs for predicting change. 

Syllabus

LEARNING PHASE

CONNECTION PHASE

CREATION PHASE

Faculty

Course Leader

Christina Bifano

Designer, educator, researcher

Teacher

Manuela Procopio

Service Designer and Digital Design Specialist

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