Strategy is the origin of meaningful, lasting change. Whether that is within a for-profit enterprise, in a non-profit organization, or even government agencies, successful strategy is frequently the difference between success and failure. Yet, strategy as it is practiced today is wanting, both in terms of process and accuracy as well as social and ecological imperatives. Designers, architects, and all creative individuals are perfectly poised to both create better strategies than their peers (due to their customer orientation and comfort with qualitative data) and fix the many deficiencies present in today’s, state-of- the-art strategic processes. This course helps creators of all kinds use both qualitative and quantitative techniques to investigate the root causes of sub-standard situations, survey key stakeholders, integrate social, ecological, economic, technological, and other trends, and discover opportunities to shift fulcrums toward better outcomes.This course looks at the myriad stakeholders that exert pressure on society and it’s various systems and helps students identify opportunities to apply design interventions to affect positive change.This course uses a new, expanded process for creating strategy and will focus on one specific social issue throughout the semester, resulting in a palette of strategic solutions, initiatives, and tactics to successfully counter those challenges. In addition, we will use a variety of social and ecological impact measurement tools to identify challenges and integrate these impacts into the solution.

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