Reframing Design Maturity: a New Perspective on the Development of Design in Public Organizations

Authors

Geert Brinkman, Department of Public Administration and Sociology, Erasmus University Rotterdam, the NetherlandsFollow
Ahmee Kim, Graduate School of Public Administration, Seoul National University, South KoreaFollow

Abstract

Although design is a core activity of public organizations, the dominant perspective to this day is that public organizations are void of design. Existing design maturity models based on this perspective thus do not reflect, nor do justice to the practice of design in public organizations. In this conceptual paper we therefore propose to reframe design maturity as a matter of versatility and alignment - i.e. as an organization’s ability to tailor their design activities to the different design tasks it faces, while establishing productive interactions with other concurrent design activities. This offers a new perspective on how design can be fostered in public organizations. This paper proposes four ways in which this can be done. As such, it contributes to the evolving discourse on design in public organizations.

Keywords

design; design maturity; public organizations; public sector innovation

DOI

https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2024.973

Citation

Brinkman, G., and Kim, A. (2024) Reframing Design Maturity: a New Perspective on the Development of Design in Public Organizations, in Gray, C., Ciliotta Chehade, E., Hekkert, P., Forlano, L., Ciuccarelli, P., Lloyd, P. (eds.), DRS2024: Boston, 23–28 June, Boston, USA. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2024.973

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Conference Track

Research Paper