Using design to unlock Innovation

#cocreateDESIGN FESTIVAL and The 4th Annual City Development Africa conference

Over the last year I have spoken on many platforms about the important role of design in unlocking innovation when dealing with complex or wicked problems. 

Two such events coming up soon is the #cocreateDESIGN Festival and The 4th Annual City Development Africa conference both happening in Cape Town.

The #cocreateDESIGN FESTIVAL is taking place from the 22nd - 24th February at the Homecoming Centre Zonnebloem. #cocreateDESIGN FESTIVAL is an initiative of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in collaboration with The Craft and Design Institute and Future Cape Town. It is a collaborative public design festival that seeks to celebrate and examine the power of design as a solution driven process for innovation and problem solving to address current socio-economic and environmental challenges

The 4th Annual City Development Africa conference is taking place on 12 – 14th March 2018 at the Cape Town Marriott Hotel Crystal Towers. This year’s theme is smart growth and digital transformation and I will be doing a presentation on how design thinking can be used to unlock Afrikan innovation in cities at the opening session of the conference.

One thing that government and municipalities need to understand is that there is no longer a linear process that can be followed to create solutions for cities. Rapid urbanisation across the Afrikan continent means there are many moving parts when you’re developing a transport solution, an energy solution, a water solution, or any other infrastructure solution for a city.

Bringing creativity and art to the STEM world

As engineers, architects and people in the built environment, we need to get out of our silo based thinking and we need to start addressing a city’s challenges in a more systemic way. We need to be more innovative and one of the building blocks of innovation is creativity, so the solution lies in bringing creativity into our very analytical world.

Creative people such as artists, graphic designers and photographers think very differently to people who work in the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) world, but if we can bring these two worlds together we can find a sweet spot where innovation can really flourish.

Engineers are very innovative but in most cases, this happens within their silo. Transport engineers come up with amazing innovations within their area of expertise, so do water, energy and structural engineers. We are now using Design Led Thinking to discover how to find the ground-breaking innovations that disrupt the status quo and radically change the way we are doing things so that we can find better solutions for African cities.

Engineers need to start being creative outside their niches and to do this, we need to engage people who are outside of the STEM world that we’ve become so familiar with. Instead of jumping to technical solutions, we need to bring in people who think differently to us so that we can find the different, disruptive innovations that are desperately needed in Afrika.

At Aurecon, we’re now taking a trans-disciplinary approach and adding creatives to the mix when we work with government clients. We take our clients on a journey that brings in very different stakeholders of a city so that the underlying complexities can be brought forward. Having empathy for the end user means that better cities are being built for our people.

I look forward to discussing this topic and engaging with you at #cocreateDESIGN Festival and the 4th Annual City Development Africa conference. See you there!