The role of design education in designers’ pursuit of entrepreneurial opportunities

This article examines the relationship between design education and entrepreneurship by exploring the ways in which design education prepares, or falls short in preparing, students for entrepreneurship. Empirically, it draws on semi-structured interviews with 23 design entrepreneurs. Theoretically, it draws on the entrepreneurial opportunity literature, which highlights the significance of the knowledge, skills and abilities (KSAs) gained in higher education. Our findings propose five ways in which design education prepares students for entrepreneurship. Design education provides students with (1) a unique (“designerly”) way of seeing, reframing and handling problems, (2) a systematic approach to new challenges, (3) KSAs related to materials and production, (4) KSAs and experience related to oral and visual communication and (5) opportunities to discover students’ individual interest areas in design.