Innovation and the Prosperity of Nations

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“Those who go ‘full speed a-Stern’” he answered—providing an instant Thackara-ism.

What government can do is a modest part of the story, he argued, especially if they simply say ‘Consume less.’ Instead, he outlined the approaches he and his team are developing in the Dott 07 project, which starts by asking “How do we want to live?” Thackara’s suggestions included the observation that innovation is all around us: we need to discover it and bring in resources as needed; we do not need to start more organisations and initiatives. Further, we need to ask people how they want to live rather than telling them how to live. In conclusion, he noted that we can run by old rules “and run slap into a rock called climate change,” or we can do things differently.

During the first panel, on Creative People and Places, Graham Hitchen, Project Director (for the London Development Agency) of the Cox-proposed International Centre for Design and Innovation discussed the characteristics the Centre might have. Considering the unexpected success of clubs such as Manchester’s famed Haçienda, he noted that while space is important, it is not sufficient. “Physical space is the stage, the dance floor.” He backed this up with observations from the Cox US Mission, which took a group of academics, officials, and policy makers to universities and design firms in California, Chicago and Boston, including Stanford University’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design; the Ford Engineering Center at Northwestern University; and the Engineering Systems Division at MIT.

The National Centre “is not a centre,” argued Hitchen, but a trading place for the exchange of ideas and innovation, a meeting point for different disciplines. This might involve “bringing ‘people in white coats’ into design spaces,” he suggested, around a strong programme, including informal activity. In particular he noted the plan for an International Design/Business Exchange, which would be “a dance floor for international, design-led innovation.”

Professor Stuart MacDonald, Head of the Aberdeen-based Gray’s School of Art, argued that the Lighthouse architecture and design centre in Glasgow, of which he was the director, “is Britain’s national design centre,” having, in the spirit of the Cox Review, established a new business model and tools for the design sector. He also covered the forthcoming Six Cities Design Festival, which he described, in somewhat Trotskyite language, as seeking to “foster a permanent design revolution in Scotland.”

The panel on Strengthening Links Between Industry and Education Providers, brought together Professor David Gann, Principal of Imperial College London’s Tanaka Business School; Professor Jeremy Myerson, Director of Innovation RCA at the Royal College of Art; and Rolls-Royce Chief Design Engineer for Civil Aerospace Geoff Kirk. What does industry want from academics? asked Professor Gann. “Well trained people, inquiring minds, rigour.” What should academia avoid? “Second rate consulting to third rate firms is the road to misery,” he argued. Instead it should consider collaborative models, take a long-term view, work out its attitude to intellectual property, and consider incentive models. In the context of the first point, he described one of the increasing number of links between Imperial and the Royal College of Art, some motivated by the Cox Review.

Professor Myerson noted that the Cox Review had separated creativity (‘generation’) and innovation (‘exploitation’). He also observed that design is not the whole story, and that there is a need for collaboration with other disciplines. His suggestions to policy makers were to address demand by business for academic expertise, not just its supply; and to support real inter-disciplinary generation of knowledge.