Driving competitiveness in industry

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We're helping businesses seize new opportunities by exploiting design

How can design help deliver better health services?

Stage: The Design Council is demonstrating how design can help hospitals stay clean and individual people manage their own healthy active lifestyles
Addressing: Driving competitiveness in industry, Improving innovation in public services

What can design do to help improve our nation's health?

Bad health is putting pressure on us and on our health system. We think that design can help find ways to motivate people to lead more active lifestyles and to manage their health more effectively.

Perspectives

Richard Seymour

Director, SeymourPowell

'There’s a good way of looking at Design Bugs Out. It’s probably the most important thing you can do this year, or maybe in your entire career, is to tackle as a designer this issue or issues of this type. This is people’s lives we’re talking about here. It’s not about how pretty the cruet is or what shape the damn car is, it’s about life and it’s about savings lives. So, I think that’s the right agenda. In my book, design is making life better for people. So lets do it'

Alan Johnson MP

Secretary of State for Health

'Although the chances of acquiring a healthcare associated infection are relatively low, when a patient does it is extremely distressing for them, their family and the NHS staff treating them. Infection is also costly. On average, it adds three to ten days onto a patient’s length of stay in hospital, and for Clostridium difficile (C. difficile) that stay will be even longer. Financially it can cost between £4,000 and £10,000 more to treat a patient with an infection' ... 'What we need to do is equip the NHS with the tools it needs to take on the problem of healthcare associated infections and win.'

More perspectives and the chance to contribute

Can design help businesses survive today's tough economic climate?

Stage: The Design Council will soon publish case study evidence of how design has helped small businesses overcome tough market conditions
Addressing: Driving competitiveness in industry

How have other firms succeeded when times are tough?

In the middle of an economic downturn, SMEs need all the help they can get to survive the tough times. Design can help them take advantage of new market opportunities, and there's tax credits available for strategic R&D.

Can design help make UK technology fit for market?

Stage: The Design Council has run a pilot scheme to help Technology Transfer Offices use design to commercialise technology
Addressing: Driving competitiveness in industry, Design skills development

Why is technology transfer an interesting new market for UK designers?

The UK has a world class science and technology base. Results show we are getting better at commercialising research outputs from our universities but there is scope for further improvement. And design can help.

What makes the UK an innovation nation?

Stage: The Government's Annual Innovation report describes our progress in making the UK the best place to run an innovative business or public service
Addressing: Driving competitiveness in industry, Improving innovation in public services

Can the Government help make the UK more innovative?

The Government department in charge of making us all more innovative has published the first of its annual reviews of innovation in the UK. DIUS wants to help both public and private sectors take advantage of new opportunities created by the demand for innovation.

Chris Downs from service design consultancy LiveWork shares his ideas with a group of government officials

Can universities bring business studies and creativity closer together?

Stage: We have been looking at international examples of best practice
Addressing: Driving competitiveness in industry, Design skills development

Why is this an issue for design?

Designers need to help decide what kind of centres should be set up to enable multidisciplinary groups of designers, scientists, anthropologists, economists and others to drive innovation

What stops small companies using design?

Stage: We have launched a programme called Designing Demand to help SMEs increase profit, sales and market share using design
Addressing: Driving competitiveness in industry, Design skills development

How can design make sense for smaller businesses?

The share prices of design-led companies out-performed key FTSE indices by 200% over ten years, but SMEs don't always understand the value design can add to their business

This project is part of The Cox Review of Creativity in Business