19th DMI: Academic Design Management Conference: Design Management in an Era of Disruption (Sep 2014, London UK)

Dates: 2-4 September 2014
Location: London, UK
Website: http://www.dmi.org/academic2014
Deadline for submission of abstracts: 15 January 2014

Design Management in an Era of Disruption
Hosted by the London College of Fashion

The Design Management Institute has issued a call for papers for the 19th Academic Design Management Conference to be held in London, UK September 2–4, 2014. We welcome early-career researchers and PhD candidates with work in progress. We are also seeking those interested in conducting workshops.

The theme of the conference is Design Management in an Era of Disruption. The management of design has arguably never played such an important role as it does today. Changes to the business and social environment are making consumers more knowledgeable and discerning. Innovations and developments in new technologies make it possible to respond to these demands in the form of mass-niche, mass-customized, or micro-niche product strategies, leading to changes in business models and the location of manufacturing as consumers increasingly participate in the product design and development process. These are all indicative of major disruptions to the ways that products and services are designed, made, and distributed. The role of the designer is in many contexts transformed. The purpose of this conference is to explore how design management is changing in this era of disruption.

The conference is organized around 7 meta themes divided into 16 tracks:

· Design in the creation of meaning
· Transformational design management
· Contextualized designing
· Design management futures
· Design thinking, leadership and impact
· Educating Design Managers for Strategic Roles
· Open Track

Abstracts due January 15th, 2014
More information on submission is available at http://www.dmi.org/dmi/html/conference/academic14/academic.htm.