Founded in 1985 by architect Peter Lawrence, its defining principle holds that the quality of life and the effectiveness of organizations can be improved through design. Business school faculty represent a variety of disciplines, including operations, strategy, marketing, and organizational behavior. Marketing instructors, for example, are likely to have a greater interest in graphic or communication design, while operations and some marketing faculty hone in on product development and industrial design. Academics specializing in organizational behavior and human relations, on the other hand, will probably be more interested in the design of the workplace. Initially, most of the interest by business school faculty during the foundation's infancy was for its product design and development program, which took an interdisciplinary approach in bringing together students and faculty from business, engineering, and design backgrounds.
Designers learn how to work with business-minded people, and business people learn about design.
Collaboration is also at the heart of the Foundation's annual conference, initially developed as a forum in which faculty from different business schools could gather and compare notes. Since its inception the conference has grown, and is now open to corporate executives, management consultants, and design consultants as well. Most of the participants consider this a valuable opportunity. All of this is uncharted territory for scores of corporate executives and business school faculty. Our method is to work with them in finding the relevant connection that makes it part of their vocabulary.