Throughout this season of the series host Doug Powell has been looking at the impact of AI and other emerging technology on the future of design and design leadership with a particular focus on the top academic design programs in the US—looking at how students are learning design in the classroom can be a great predictor for how they will show up in the workplace in the years ahead, which of course will have a major impact on how design teams and scaled design programs will operate.
Doug’s guest for this episode is Vivek Rao, director of the Masters of Engineering in Design & Technology Innovation program at the Duke University Pratt School of Engineering. A mechanical engineer by training, Vivek spent his early career at the design and innovation consultancy IDEO. He then did his PhD studies in design, innovation, and emerging technology at the University of California, Berkeley, before joining Duke in 2023.