Here’s what happens when we team up our multidisciplinary student teams and industry partners to tackle spaces that transform business as usual.
We are no strangers to complex, networked challenges that face organisations, communities, and broader society. It can be overwhelming, exhausting and create barriers to progress. Or, it can be invigorating, exciting, and transformational. At TD School, we approach complex, networked problems as the latter. And we encourage our students to do the same.
The Industry Innovation Project (IIP), a final year subject in the combined double degree Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation, invites our industry partners to put forward a complex challenge to students that is pertinent to their organisational strategy.
Together, multidisciplinary student teams and industry partners embark on a three-month project, tackling those hard-to-answer questions.
The IIP 2022 student team with Matthew Hart, General Manager and Matthew Millar, Account Manager from Commercial Partnerships, Venues NSW.
As we hit the halfway point of 2022, IIP is wrapping up for another year, again, with some exceptional outcomes for students and partners alike.
IIP Highlights
In 2022, we had the highest number of industry challenges competing to capture the attention of our talented students. Among the successful briefs, a big focus was placed on environmental sustainability, social impact, and envisioning the future of work across corporate, government, not-for-profit, and start-up sectors.
Of the 30 projects selected, half were returning partners who bought fresh challenges to the table. We also welcomed 15 new partners into the TD School innovation ecosystem.
IIP is an opportunity for industry to collaborate with some of UTS’ brightest students. Across the thirteen-week subject, final year BCII students work in small multidisciplinary teams to develop creative initiatives and interventions to complex organisational challenges put forward by our partners.
Over the course of the subject, we invited industry partners to share their expertise and experiences with the students and connect with each other. Topic areas included reframing, proof of concept, and reporting to industry.
BCII Alumni returning as industry partners joined us for a panel sharing their own experiences as transdisciplinary practitioners in the workforce.
A highlight of IIP 2022, was having Chris Ellis from Future Friendly, a long-time partner of TD School and previous IIP industry partner, running a session on the diffusion of innovation with the BCII final year cohort. Chris has previously run this session for organisations including ABC, Facebook, and Commonwealth Bank of Australia.
The expertise and lateral thinking the students bring in problem exploration, their ability to blend their own experiences from their disciplines, and the professionalism of their approach to our stakeholder groups resulted in a very tangible outcome for us to meaningfully take forward and implement.
We're already discussing next steps from here, and I look forward to engaging with the program again next year.
– Daniel San Martin, Innovation Partner at Aurecon
IIP Outcomes
After thirteen weeks of deep-diving into the problem space, stakeholder interviews, reframing, drawing insights, prototyping, and experimentation, 171 students across 30 multidisciplinary teams presented a summary of that work to their industry partner and TD School tutor.
Speaking with our IIP 2022 partners, the overwhelming consensus was that our students wowed them with their professionalism, enthusiasm, passion, collaborative approach, and outcomes. More than ever before, our industry partners have expressed intent to implement the ideas presented by their student team.
Industry Innovation Project creates real organisational progress, forging pathways to tackle those complex, networked challenges we all face.
Congratulations to all our final year BCII students and industry partners on another outstanding IIP experience. We look forward to following the students as they prepare to join the innovation ecosystem as transdisciplinary practitioners. Thank you to all our industry partners, we hope to see you again next year!
If the Industry Innovation Project (IIP) sounds like something you or your organisation would be interested in participating in, get in touch with the partnerships team, TDSchoolPartnerships@uts.edu.au, to find out more and stay up to date on IIP.