Director of Innovation and Entrepreneurship and Associate Teaching Professor, College of Design, Iowa State University
Ana Luz is the Director of Innovation and Entrepreneurship and an Associate Teaching Professor at the College of Design, Iowa State University. She has a double track in design & architecture and education sciences and is certified in curriculum development and disruptive innovation. For the past 20+ years, she has trained and instructed K-12, undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate students, faculty, staff, corporate, industry and government human beings on design thinking, problem-solving, insights’ systems, team dynamics and creative leadership, and strategic change management. She does not sit still for long, yet pauses are her favorite tempo and place of be[com]ing.
Design INtrapreneurship: How to Innovate from Within
The everyday term ENTREpreneurship is largely attached to the leap from individual start-up drive to larger business venture, an outward commercial practice or the introduction of a viable product in a new market. Intrapreneurship inverts this arch of movement of extending an outcome out, and focuses on the internal undertaking of individuals finding a place of action from within a company, collective or corporate. This interactive workshop will depart from these profiles and explore design tools and speculative tactics on how to foster this intra- and extrapreneur mindset in others and individually. Question-asking, problem-loving, what if? and why not? are key points to draw innovation roadmaps that impact behavior and performance, and together push our collective charge in Design.
The audience will learn:
Intrapreneurship operates from a social capital perspective, it allows an[y] employee to ‘act like’ a business entrepreneur but from within an organization, towards the organization, and in favor of the internal human growth of the organization. Therefore, intrapreneurs comfortably embody both the innovation mindset and the entrepreneurial spirit, and they are usually found in the midst of in-house change management initiatives or organizational innovation teams that encourage experimentation, tolerate failure, recognize points of success and share the wealth of best practices to move forward. Intrapreneurs know how to identify, pivot and support new ideas or concepts that build an inclusive culture of social innovation, civic engagement and community-ensembles beyond outreach and extension, in favor of within-reach and building bridges. Intrapreneurs operate between ambiguous endeavors of collaboration, cooperation, teaming, and connection.
