What is Design for Social Innovation?

Guest Blog by Cheryl Heller, Founding Chair, SVA’s MFA program in Design for Social Innovation 

This interview with Cheryl Heller was conducted by the Design for Social Innovation (DSI) program (taking applications now) and explores what it means to design for social change—a path Cheryl has dedicated her life to and writes about periodically.

DSI: How do you define design for social innovation?

CH: Design for social innovation is really interaction design in the broadest sense; it’s interaction between people that takes responsibility for positive, systemic impact. It can take any and every physical or visible form but it inevitably begins with the invisible dynamics and forces that drive human behavior. It takes place within the communities and systems it’s working with, not outside them.

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Cheryl Heller works with business leaders to transform organizations and industries – eliminating complexity, developing strategies and campaigns that energize communities and shift behavior. She has helped grow businesses from small regional enterprises to multi-billion global market leaders, launched category-redefining divisions and products, reinvigorated moribund cultures, and designed strategies for dozens of successful entrepreneurs. She has founded two companies, worked for some of the most discriminating clients in the world, and is now, along with her private practice, Founding Chair of a pioneering educational program that will produce the world’s next design leaders: MFA Design for Social Innovation at SVA in New York. She is blissfully married and loves to kick box.