Course description
Master - Service Design:
The training course dedicated to the design of innovative and effective services and experiences in accordance with the transformations of business models.
Course:
The Specializing Master delivers an English teaching programme on service design employing a practical and learning-by-doing approach, based on lectures that underline the design discipline, and on applied and cutting-edge contents. Students will acquire the fundamental competencies to understand people’s needs and behaviors, interpret changes within contemporary society, and design effective and efficient solutions, processes, and experiences.
The Master is supported by outstanding partners belonging both to the public and the private sector.
Contemporary society has changed a lot in the last decade, accompanied by substantial technological empowerment and important societal and economic transformations.
Throughout our daily lives, we increasingly get in touch with a huge variety of services provided to different users and contexts, which involve different types of innovation in many fields: mobility, health, finance, insurance, tourism, hospitality, and education, just to mention few. These experiences and performances need to be designed to create value for citizens, firms, not for profit organisations, public administrations as well as governments.
The Specializing Master in Service Design was especially created in response to the growing demand for professionals specifically able to handle the complexity of designing a service. To achieve this purpose, the Specializing Master programme integrates general theory with methodology and hands-on experience aimed at the creation of systemic, complex solutions that blend material and immaterial components.
Faculty:
The Specializing Master programme is taught by an outstanding Italian and international faculty, belonging to Italian and foreign universities, but also drawing on the expertise of design professionals and entrepreneurs working in Italy and abroad. It is supervised by an Advisory Board whose members represent Italian and international excellence in service design and innovation.
Didactics:
Training objectives:
The Master in Service Design is an international training programme focused on a user-centred approach, and the development of service ideas from contextual research to prototyping.
The overall idea behind the Master stems from the awareness of the significant changes that have occurred in the development and delivery of services and products by companies and public-sector organizations, and the radical impact that these changes are producing on professional skills and corporate capabilities.
It is thus essential to train professionals who can build and manage new physical and virtual patterns of service experience and interaction.
The complexity of conceiving, developing, and delivering a service requires innovation culture, creative thinking, and cultural exchange.
In order to strengthen the student’s abilities, the Master program relies on an educational model that merges the acquisition of broad and multifaceted methodological knowledge and a learning-by-doing approach through:
multidisciplinary modules,
experimental projects with real companies coordinated by international academics and professional,
service prototyping.
The objectives of the Specializing Master are:
to provide the specific training required to refine the design skills of students who have already acquired experience in the design sector;
to enhance the basic skills of students with a background in other disciplines by furnishing them with theoretical knowledge and practical experience in service design;
to furnish the means necessary to enhance the professional experience of students already in employment.
Didactic Plan:
The Specializing Master programme grants 60 CFU (Formative University Credits) equivalent to 60 ECTS.
The capability to manage complexity and act upon different design levels, and the capacity for creativity and vision are the main features of a service design professional.
These skills will be acquired through a highly experimental approach based on learning modules divided into lectures and design activities – called Service Design Pills, Service Masterclasses, Service Design Workshops – each one led by a different faculty member and focusing on a different topic.
Extracurricular activities:
Service Design Lab:
Service Design Lab is a design laboratory dedicated to experimentation in the field of service design. It is an initiative developed by the Master in Service Design – POLI.design in collaboration with H-FARM, with the purpose of promoting entrepreneurship and the development of innovative service ideas. It runs in parallel to the Master program, on a yearly basis as an extracurricular activity, and it is addressed to young talents from both the organizations, willing to challenge themselves in the development of new potential business, thanks to the mentorship of expert professionals.
The Lab entails an experimental nature and it is based on challenges launched every year with the starting of the Master and aimed at collecting service ideas with business potential or wanting to explore new methodologies, approaches and tools for pushing the boundaries of the service design discipline. Selected ideas will be developed following service design principles, up to the implementation of high-fidelity prototypes, beta versions, and, eventually, start-ups.
Didactic Modules:
The didactic includes:
Lectures: Theoretical lessons aimed at introducing the discipline, and methodological lessons devoted to the acquisition of processes, tools, and approaches.
Service Design Pills: Targeted seminars that delve deeper into approaches and tools through the experimentation on a topic.
Service Design Masterclasses: One day lectures provided by an expert or a Service Design guru to investigate cutting-edge topics emerging in the world of Service Design.
Service Design Workshops: Design labs, in collaboration with companies, dealing with a real briefing that is focused on user research, and the development of service ideas and prototyping.
Internships: 475 hours of training experience in a partner company of the Specializing Master or other companies suggested by participants.
Employment Opportunities:
The Specializing Master in Service Design trains specialists in the design of services for firms and public sector organizations.
The programme’s overall objectives are to produce experts and consultants with a solid design culture, vision, and the ability to design, manage, and organize the conception and implementation of a service. It also aims to develop innovation and entrepreneurship.
On conclusion of the programme, the participants will be able to:
Devise systemic innovation models for services
Deploy theoretical skills to operate with complex system
Use specific service design tools and manage redesign
Observe & Analyse user experience to construct a user-centred vision of complex interactions
Manage service conception, design and development
Foster entrepreneurship
Numerous employment opportunities are available to graduates from the Specializing Master in Service Design.
Potential roles include:
service designer as a specialized consultant at a design agency;
service designer as a consultant or employee of public-sector organizations, research centres, enterprises and authorities;
service designer as a consultant or employee of private-sector organizations, research centres, companies and organizations;
service designer as a freelance or self-employed professional (start-up).
Admission:
Requirements:
The Specializing Master invites applications from candidates with a degree, master’s degree, or university-level diploma in design, architecture or engineering. Candidates may also be specialized in non-polytechnic disciplines for whom polytechnic skills can significantly enhance their prior professional training.
Selection is based on assessment of the candidate’s skills, aptitude, and experience, as well as his/her goals and expectations toward the programme. The assessment is made by the Master Board on the basis of the candidate’s:
academic records;
professional curriculum;
online interview.
Significant professional experience is also considered as a criterion for admission.
With regard to aptitude, the programme prioritizes highly-motivated candidates with creative and relational skills, curiosity, critical awareness, and a pragmatic mentality.
Conditional admission to the programme may be granted to:
students enrolled at Italian universities whose final degree examination is scheduled for a date subsequent to the beginning of the Specializing Master;
students with foreign degrees whose validation is not yet complete.
Admission to the Specializing Master may also be granted to students possessing Italian university diplomas or three-year degrees (awarded under the previous university regulations) or qualifications acquired in foreign countries, provided that they are accredited, submitted in the original format, translated, and certified by the Italian consular au
