Level-Up Your Business Innovation Toolkit with Spring 2027 Business Design Electives

Posted on by
Reply



Do you want to deepen your strategic toolkit, improve your problem-solving, and stand out in competitive post-MBA roles?  As course selection draws near (Oct 23-29), the Rotman Business Design Initiative (BDI) is highlighting our specialized elective offerings for Spring Term 2027:

  • RSM2527 – Design Research and Insight-Driven Storytelling
  • RSM2528 – Service Design: Innovating Service-Based Organization.

RSM2527H: Design Research and Insight-Driven Storytelling
Building human-centered strategy

When: Mondays, 3:45 – 6 PM (first class is January 25) Taught By: Emma Aiken-Klar, PhD, Academic Director – Rotman Business Design Initiative

Final Exam: No exam; final major assessment is a report with group project presentation. Industry Sponsor?: Yes, TBC. Last year’s sponsor was the Toronto Transit Commission.
Prerequisites: None. Some familiarity with basic Business Design methodologies and frameworks may be helpful, but is not required.  

What is Design Research?
Ground strategic decisions in how people think and behave. Combine ethnographic research with business design to uncover unmet needs, challenge assumptions, and identify opportunities to create value.

What Will You Learn?
Practice observation and in-depth interviewing. Translate research data into strategic insight, and create evidence-based strategic narratives that guide decisions and drive action.

Why Does It Matter For Business? Understand where to compete, what to offer, and how to deliver value. Apply these skills across consulting, strategy, marketing, product and service design, and organizational change.

_________________________________________________________________

RSM2528: Service Design: Innovating Service-Based Organizations
Connecting customer experience with organizational delivery  

When: Tuesdays, 3:45 – 6 PM (first class January 26)
Taught By: Instructor TBC
Final Exam: No exam; final major assessment involves a group project.
Prerequisites: None


What is Service Design?
Connect what customers experience with how an organization delivers value. Examine the people, processes, technologies, and interactions that shape a service.

What Will You Learn?
Use human-centered methods, journey mapping, and service blueprinting to analyze services and design improved experiences. Connect customer needs with organizational capabilities and practical changes to delivery.

Why Does It Matter For Business? Differentiate services and improve outcomes for customers and employees. Apply these skills across consulting, strategic innovation, customer experience, and service operations.

Who Should Take These Courses? These electives are best suited for ambitious students and future leaders who want to: Differentiate themselves and stand out in interviews by demonstrating hands-on experience with modern business design and problem-solving frameworks. Translate abstract business strategy into tangible customer realities.  Fulfill requirements under Rotman’s Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Business Design Emphasis.

Next Steps & Course Selection Course Selection Window: October 23 to 29, 2026.

Need more guidance? Reach out to the BDI team at businessdesign@rotman.utoronto.ca to map out your elective choices alongside your internship and career goals.

Rotman Business Design Initiative – Fall 2026 Elective Information

Posted on by
Reply

As you prepare to pick your second-year electives during the Course Selection period (July 6-10, 2026), consider how you can differentiate your skill set this fall. The Business Design Initiative (BDI) is offering two hands-on electives to help you navigate ambiguity, think strategically about the future, and solve real-world business challenges using human-centered design.

Here’s what you need to know about our Fall 2026 offerings:

1. Futures Thinking: Developing Business Foresight (RSM2517)

2026 Dates: Fall Term – Wednesdays
Time: 16:00-18:00
Location: Rotman Room 4057 (the BDI Studio) 

How do you make strategic decisions about products, services, and business models before market data even exists? This course prepares you for the ambiguous challenge of driving a culture of innovation. Using “pre-design” and strategic foresight methodologies, you will learn to spot early-stage macro trends and transform technology and behavior shifts into viable business models.

Key Learning Outcomes

  • ‘Unlearn’ to Reframe: Train yourself to challenge assumptions and see global patterns of emergence from entirely new perspectives.
  • Translate Signals to Opportunities: Spot weak, early-stage signals in technology and human behavior and map them to future market opportunities.
  • Expand Your Data Set: Learn to translate abstract signals into concrete potential future opportunities and strategic leverage points. 

What Past Students Say:

  • “This has been by far the most interesting course of my MBA. The real-world attitude is energizing and has helped me transition from the academic ‘first-year’ mindset back into the ‘how do I translate this material into real on-the-job skills’ mindset I need as a second year.”
  • “It’s not easy to teach such a subjective course, but combining theory with practical use cases made it easy for me to visualize applications for strategic foresight.”
  • “This course was such a great experience… It was very hands-on, which was really helpful.”

2. Business Design Practicum (RSM2524)

Theme for 2026: Applying design to an AI innovation challenge with an industry sponsor, TBD.

Format: Intensive, immersive learning delivered over a high-impact, two-week period. Students will have the chance to visit design studios across the city to learn directly from industry leaders. 

Prerequisite Course: RSM2523 – Business Design Fundamentals

2026 Dates: Fall Intensive Term (FiT) – August 31 – September 11, Monday to Friday
Time: 13:30 – 17:00
Location: Rotman Room 4057 (the BDI Studio) and on-site at design studios across Toronto

This course blends interactive classroom lectures with direct industry engagement, taking you out of the classroom and into Canada’s business design and innovation ecosystem. You will learn industry-leading design methods, models, and case studies directly from firms using design-infused methods to innovate new services, processes, and experiences.

Past practicums have included site visits and unique engagement with leading organizations such as:

  • Consultancies & Agencies: Bridgeable, Synthetikos
  • Corporate & Finance: Deloitte, Scotiabank, Tim Hortons
  • Public Sector & Healthcare: The Ontario Experience Design Lab, SickKids

The ultimate goal is for you to understand exactly how to apply your human-centered toolkit to future summer internships and post-MBA roles.

Key Learning Outcomes

  • Apply Core Principles: Use management frameworks, ethnographic methods, and design techniques to find, frame, and solve complex problems.
  • Navigate Innovation Stages: Learn the foundational stages of the innovation development process within real organizations.
  • Conduct User-Centered Research: Discover how user-centred research is executed on live, real-world business challenges.
  • Master Problem-Solving Frameworks: Explore how empathy, creativity, prototyping, and storytelling are critical for driving innovation adoption in organizational settings.

What Past Students Say:

  • “The course is so thoughtfully designed to show the potential of Business Design as a powerful tool and how it’s being used in the industry. It helped me expand my ‘thinking hat’ and look beyond limited visible areas of opportunities… I loved every minute of this course.”
  • “This may serve as the model of an intensive course – with very prudent use of time and acceptable workload. As a complete novice, I was able to learn a lot… It is a great contrast and rounding out to the majority of classes which take place only in the classroom in lecture format.”
  • “I enjoyed the class; the field visits were truly educational and beyond the theoretical learnings. The immersive learning and visiting experiences have given me a lot of inspiration and assistance.”
  • “I leave this course understanding how business design is practiced in the workforce, which will help me not only in my own career choices but also as a future executive or manager in determining where and how to apply these concepts.”

How to Enrol

Both courses offer critical, practical frameworks that turn theory into immediate on-the-job skills. Look for RSM2517 and RSM2524 during the upcoming Course Match window to secure your spot!

About the Rotman Business Design Initiative (BDI)

The Business Design Initiative is Rotman’s experiential learning centre for human-centered design and strategic foresight. We help leaders at every level build mindsets to solve complex challenges, create differentiated innovation, and drive human-centered transformation.

Visit the BDI website
Follow us on LinkedIn and Instagram.
Book an 1:1 Office Hour