Specializing Master in Service Design

The training course dedicated to the design of innovative and effective services and experiences in accordance with the transformations of business models.

The Specializing Master delivers an English teaching programme on service design employing a practical and learning-by-doing approach, based on lectures that underline the design discipline, and on applied and cutting-edge contents. Students will acquire the fundamental competencies to understand people's needs and behaviors, interpret changes within contemporary society, and design effective and efficient solutions, processes, and experiences.
The Master is supported by outstanding partners belonging both to the public and the private sector.

The last few years have challenged the world as never before, making us touch with our own hands what we previously had the chance to experience only through sci-fi movies; and disrupting, all of a sudden, our values, our habits, our vision of the future. But such turmoil has also proved that rapid, and sometimes even radical, innovation is possible, for both individuals and organizations. New standards of service are quickly taking over, paying attention to serious global-level problems, with more and more emphasis put on impacts they could generate on the planet in the long term.
 
In the wake of the acknowledgment received in the last decade, service design is going to be confirmed as the crucial discipline of our times, thanks to an approach that has improved and evolved following the challenges and the needs of the economy and the society. From design thinking to critical design, from a systemic to an ecosystemic perspective, from a human-centered point of view to behavioral transformation, a new service design era is arising, exploring new complexities and embedding into theory and practice further cross-disciplinary contaminations.
 
Created ten years ago in response to the growing demand for professionals capable of handling the complexity of services, the Specializing Master in Service Design by POLI.design – Politecnico di Milano is maintaining the pace with the evolution of the discipline.
 
Following the changes that invest in business and the society, the Master program, since its birth, is endowed with the mission of training professionals in the fascinating process of conceiving, developing, and delivering a service, fostering at the same time innovation culture, creative thinking, and cultural exchange.

Didactic Plan
The Specializing Master programme grants 60 CFU (Formative University Credits) equivalent to 60 ECTS.

The capability to manage complexity and act upon different design levels, and the capacity for creativity and vision are the main features of a service design professional.

These skills will be acquired through a highly experimental approach based on learning modules divided into lectures and design activities – called Service Design Pills, Service Masterclasses, Service Design Workshops – each one led by a different faculty member and focusing on a different topic.

Extracurricular activities

Service Design Tools
 
The Service Design Tools is an on-going project bridging academic research and professional practices. It's an open collection of tools and tutorials that helps dealing with complex design challenges. Founded in 2009 by Roberta Tassi, since 2020 started an increasing involvement and participation of POLI.design (in collaboration with the Master in Service Design and the Service Innovation Academy of POLI.design – Politecnico di Milano) to further develop the platform and evolve the project, with additional content and initiatives.
 
The students of the Master can actively contribute to the service design tools collection by finding interesting case studies and proposing them to the platform, to support and bring new points of view on the existing collection.

 

The Specializing Master invites applications from candidates with a degree, master's degree, or university-level diploma in design, architecture or engineering. Candidates may also be specialized in non-polytechnic disciplines for whom polytechnic skills can significantly enhance their prior professional training.

 

Selection is based on assessment of the candidate's skills, aptitude, and experience, as well as his/her goals and expectations toward the programme. The assessment is made by the Master Board on the basis of the candidate's:

Significant professional experience is also considered as a criterion for admission.

With regard to aptitude, the programme prioritizes highly-motivated candidates with creative and relational skills, curiosity, critical awareness, and a pragmatic mentality.

 

Conditional admission to the programme may be granted to:

Admission to the Specializing Master may also be granted to students possessing Italian university diplomas or three-year degrees (awarded under the previous university regulations) or qualifications acquired in foreign countries, provided that they are accredited, submitted in the original format, translated, and certified by the Italian consular authorities in the country in which they have been awarded, and accompanied by a declaration of legal validity.