Vision

Our vision is to make the University of Pennsylvania and Wharton synonymous with innovation and cross-collaboration - leading to better ways of doing, working, and collaborating.

Mission

We seek to provide opportunities for our members to:

Explore new methods of thinking, doing and making; identify new career opportunities by integrating innovation and design.

Build and share skillsets to drive innovation in both new and established organizations

Connect with other like-minded students and faculty throughout University of Pennsylvania, and a greater community of industry professionals and thought leaders.

EXPLORE

  • Penn Design Challenge: The Penn Design Challenge brings together multidisciplinary groups of students across Penn to work on pressing challenges for a corporate sponsor. Over the course of four weeks, groups are coached by a leading innovation consulting firm to apply human-centered design techniques, such as ethnographic research, prototyping, and storytelling, to come up with creative solutions for their corporate client. Past challenge clients have included Michael Kors and Peter Thiel-backed fintech startup Able.
  • Penn Medicine Healthcare Challenge: In collaboration with Penn Medicine and the Wharton Healthcare Club, the Penn Medicine Challenge uses the same format as the Penn Design Challenge to address pressing problems in healthcare today.
  • MBA Innovation Summit: MBAIS is a yearly spring conference in NYC co-organized by Wharton, Columbia Business School and Yale School of Management; bringing together over 200+ MBA students with industry thought leaders and professionals, MBAIS is the leading innovation conference for business school students today.
  • ID Speaker Series: The ID Speaker Series brings industry thought leaders to campus from both innovation consulting firms like frog, SYPartners and Made by Many and internal corporate innovation divisions from Capital One, CVS Health, and Urban Outfitters to discuss pressing topics in innovation, design, and entrepreneurship today.

BUILD

  • Education Workshops: Our workshops help participants build new ways of approaching problems by learning new techniques from user experience, design thinking, and lean startup methodologies. Past topics have included Conducting User Research, How to Run an Ideation Session, and Building a Landing Page Prototype.

  • Career Workshops: Interested in getting a job at an innovation consulting firm or corporate innovation center? Our career workshops help you understand the industry, learn how to build a portfolio, and teach you how to position yourself for a career integrating innovation & design. Our students have interned and worked at firms such as IDEO, frog, Fahrenheit 212, ?What If!, and Capital One Labs

  • Treks: Via fall and spring treks to NYC and SF, students visit both consulting firms and design- focused companies to see firsthand what a job incorporating innovation and design might look like.

CONNECT

  • Penn Innovation Mixers: Organized in conjunction with the Mack Institute for Innovation Management, Weiss Tech House, and the Penn Center for Innovation, the monthly Innovation Mixer offers faculty and students across Penn the opportunity to come together, learn about the work of fellow faculty and student innovators, and network in through both “speed networking” and an Innovation Social at a nearby bar afterwards.

  • Happy Hours: Meet fellow club members from across Penn and nerd out about all things related to innovation, design, and entrepreneurship

  • Creative Nights: Drawing with your eyes closed? Name all the different ways to use a brick? Join us for fun nights to exercise your creative muscles, just because.

  • Small Group Dinners: Because sometimes the best nights happen when you’re just chilling with strangers over delicious food and libations.