ABSTRACT
This chapter explores possible synergies between entrepreneurship and design processes within a workshop context. To document this design-led phenomenon, we devised, implemented and tested a novel educational program that would map and recreate the dual development processes. The one-month startup program, initiated in 2014, has served, over a six-year period, as a living laboratory aiming at better understanding the role and importance of design within the entrepreneurial process. Results confirm that design plays a key role within the product development processes of “startups”, but its function as a strategic tool and methods are not well understood by the team. Interestingly, the “synchronicity” between the entrepreneurial and design processes is not optimal, nor does it seem to offer sufficient “anchor” points, both in practice and theory. A dialogic approach is finally proposed to embrace design and business processes.
