Experts praise design for Raiffeisen Innovation Centre
The Raiffeisen Innovation School is organizing a design thinking bootcamp at the Raiffeisen Innovation Centre at Johannes Kepler University in Linz. This space – recently completed by Evolution Design – is welcoming many innovation and design thinking enthusiasts, including our executive director Stefan Camenzind, who has first-hand experience in testing the newly opened spaces.
During this four-day bootcamp, participants have the exclusive opportunity to learn the methodology of design thinking from Stanford lecturers Anja Svetina Nabergoj and Scott Sanchez. They engage with real company contexts, gaining practical experience with design thinking tools and approaches. The bootcamp aims to develop participants' potential for innovation through a combination of short lectures, interactive learning exercises, customer interviews, and team activities.
We are particularly excited to hear feedback from Scott Sanchez, an expert in customer-oriented innovation and professor at the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford University. Scott shared his thoughts on the space:
«What struck me most was the amazing space we’ve been using. It’s hard to get an innovation space right. You must solve for form and function. This environment truly fosters innovative thinking, making it a fantastic setting for our sessions. It includes open areas that encourage team brainstorming, movable yet sturdy tables and whiteboards to quickly reconfigure the space for prototyping, well-placed lockers and spaces for our supplies, and a rooftop deck where we could be inspired and bond with our teams.»
This feedback underscores the positive impact of our design solutions and highlights the importance of a well-designed environment in fostering creativity and innovation. «Unfortunately, architects often design spaces based on their own sense of beauty and abstract concepts of space and design, rather than focusing on the practical needs and preferences of the users,» says Stefan Camenzind. «Therefore, positive feedback, especially from a leading expert in design thinking, is incredibly rewarding. It confirms that a user-centred design approach is precisely what is needed when creating spaces for people to come together and grow.»
