Designing experiences for SMEs

This paper aims to show how design can become a strategic lever at the service of the productive context (SMEs, practitioners, corporate policy, research system). In particular, it focuses on the ability of design to enable social and economic connections among the actors involved, to find new ways for developing innovation within the SMEs, and to give a new meaning to the current definition of “Made in Italy”. In these years, the projects developed at the INDACO Department of Politecnico di Milano show how creativity can add value to the professional relationships between young designers and micro, small and medium companies. These projects include action-researches and their aim was the promotion of the design culture within the local productive realities and the districts. Based upon the action-research framework, the case studies use mechanisms of the design knowledge and technology transfer through the physical transfer of innovation agents (newly graduate designers) into companies. With the researchers' support, these mechanisms led to develop product, service and communication projects in collaboration with the companies. This model is so called “human capital growth”, and it adds expertise to the company, in an action-based perspective. The project was developed through a practical process of learning by doing and learning by interacting, through which the companies (previously unfamiliar with design) had the chance to understand and apply the potentials of design innovation, while young designers experienced real working situations, applying their technical knowledge on products and production processes. In synthesis, this paper describes some case studies, involving collaborative experiences with many small manufactory companies, aimed to create a permanent meeting place to exchange knowledge and generate innovative projects through the use of ICT, supported by both University and Entrepreneurial Associations as trust generators. The idea is to be able to create a low cost/low impact open source creative arena for designers and companies; a place to generate collective intelligence, changing the relationship between young designers and Italian SMEs.