Business School

February 14, 2025

Take your design career to the next level

Amy Sheppard speaking into a microphone during a discussion at a leadership event. She is wearing a patterned black and white dress and gesturing with one hand. The background includes soft lighting and a floral arrangement, adding a professional and warm atmosphere to the setting.

Business School for Designers bridges the gap between design leaders and business strategy. Over six weeks, you’ll learn how to:

Expand your business influence
Articulate design’s value
Progress your leadership career

This course is a collaboration between world-renowned design leader Ryan Rumsey and Australia's leading digital champion, The Outlook. Uniquely delivered both in-person and online, you’ll have maximum learning impact while maintaining learning flexibility.

Business School for Designers is tailored to those who aspire to make a bigger impact. If you want to champion the value of design, lead cross-functional teams, or drive innovation in your organisation, this is for you.

It’s not just a course. It’s a launchpad for your next big step.

Course highlights

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Unlock your career growth

Level up your career by combining design leadership with business expertise.

A person holding a smartphone, viewing a message on the screen. In the background, a laptop is open on a desk with scattered stationery, creating a workspace scene

Articulate design's value

Evaluate, interpret, and communicate how good design drives good business.

Guests networking during drinks after an event, engaging in lively conversations in a stylish indoor venue. The space features warm wooden accents, high-top tables with stools, and a softly lit backdrop, creating a relaxed and collaborative atmosphere to conclude the event.

Build a network of peers

Reserved for design leaders, you’ll connect with bold professionals shaping the future of the field.

Course instructors

Three incredible instructors will guide you through the course.

Ryan Rumsey

Ryan is a former tech executive turned author, coach, consultant, and tiny business owner. He is the CEO of Second Wave Dive, founder of Chief Design Officer School, and partner at Jump Ship!. Ryan has extensive hands-on product, management, and executive experience at companies like Apple, Electronic Arts, USAA, Nestlé, and Comcast. I'm the author of Business Thinking for Designers and Play Up Your Impact.

Ryan will facilitate in both Sydney and Melbourne.

LinkedIn Profile

Emy Alegre

Emy is a Design leader based in Melbourne, Australia that has been building, leading, and evolving design teams for almost two decades, and designing and developing digital products for over twenty years—that feels like a long time, and at the same time, it doesn’t… It tends to happen when you really love what you do.

Emy will facilitate in Melbourne.

LinkedIn Profile

Rachel Zhang posing against a muted green background, wearing a satin brown blazer and pearl drop earrings. She has a calm and confident expression, exuding a professional and poised demeanor.

Emy Alegre

Rachel, a seasoned Experience Designer & Strategist with 15+ years in digital enterprises, showcases a diverse portfolio, including the transformative redesign of the Parliament of Victoria, initiatives for WorkSafe Victoria's digital Inspector's tool and career pathways at RMIT. With tenures at Telstra, Google, Accenture, and AKQA.

Rachel will facilitate in Sydney.

LinkedIn Profile

Course content

This six-week course begins with a two-day intensive in-person workshop, followed by online sessions. By the end, you’ll have a full repertoire of practical tools and strategies to boost your design leadership with business acumen.

Days 1-2: Kick-start the course In person

Kick off your learning with an intensive immersion. Meet your cohort, delve into the course and set yourself up for success.

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Build rapport with your cohort

Forge meaningful connections with your peers in person, creating a network to enrich your learning journey.

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Accelerate your learning

Uninterrupted concentration time sets you up to apply these lessons throughout your career.

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Increase your chance of success

Uninterrupted immersion helps you plan and prepare for the six weeks to come

Weeks 1-3: Navigating Different Business Types Online

The first half of the course builds your foundation in business fundamentals. Learn about strategic planning, the foundations of business models and how to understand the competitive landscape.

A young woman standing and holding a robotic arm, presenting to a classroom with students seated at desks and a teacher watching from her chair.

Storytelling for Decision-Making

Discover the story structures that help you identify opportunities and risk in trade-off decisions.

A person wearing a hard hat using a tablet to view a digital image of a room interior with a marble design

Understanding "The Business"

Gain a business perspective through empathy and by visualising the business you're in.

A modern workspace featuring a wooden desk with a computer displaying architectural designs, a desk lamp, a small easel, and a corkboard with notes. A bicycle is parked nearby.

Design's Value Proposition

View the value of your work from an outside perspective, letting you design for stronger business partnerships.

Weeks 4-6: Applying Business Concepts to Design Online

The second half focuses on applying the business fundamentals you’ve learned to the field of design. Here, you’ll explore how to plan and prototype ventures, measure business and design metrics, and extend your influence within your organisation. By the end of the course, you’ll have a whole gamut of practical tools and strategies for integrating business acumen with design leadership.

A notebook open to a page filled with sketches and handwritten notes, with a blue-tipped pencil resting on top

Getting Metrics Right with POKRs

Connect design value to business value by creating desirability cause-and-effect models.

A photograph of post-its and dot stickers created in a workshop

Scorecards for Desirability & ROl

Create framing statements and rating systems to monitor and validate your design experiments and ROl.

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Negotiating and Gauging Ambition

Hone your negotiation skills, verbalise your ambitions, and establish a plan to deploy your new skills.

Join us to transform your approach to business and design

Next Intake

Sydney Feb 20, 2024

Location

Sofitel Wentworth (2 Day Immersion)
Online (6 weeks)

Schedule

Mondays 6 – 8PM (AEST)

Facilitators

Ryan Rumsey, Rachel Zhang

Melbourne Feb 14, 2025

Location

Sofitel Melbourne (2 Day Immersion)
Online (6 weeks)

Schedule

Mondays 6 – 8PM (AEST)

Facilitators

Ryan Rumsey, Emy Alegre

Introductory pricing

$3,495 / entire course

Unrivaled access to industry leading content
Communicate your strategic value
Unlock your career growth

Join the next cohort

We are offering our introductory course at a discounted rate of $3,495, after which the standard course fees will increase to $4,495

How the course works

Two-day immersion, six weeks of online modules

We begin the course with a two-day, in person immersion as a group to set the stage, followed by six weeks of diving deep into the online content.

Small working teams

Work in small teams of five to collaborate on modules and complete activities. Teams constantly gather to share insights, discuss findings and receive feedback from peers and coaches.

Hands-on activities

Teams engage in practical exercises and tackle real-world scenarios throughout the course. This gives you full confidence you’ll apply the concepts back to your career.

Coaching along the way

Receive ongoing guidance and personalised support from industry-leading coaches throughout the course.

Reflect and plan

At the end of each week, you’ll reflect on your learnings and develop action plans to implement new strategies in your roles.

FAQs

If you have any further questions that aren’t answered here, please reach out to us at hello@wearetheoutlook.com.au

A unique part of this course is the two-day in-person immersion, followed by six weeks of online self-directed learning.

The Sydney cohort will be at Sofitel Wentworth Sydney, and the Melbourne Cohort will be at Sofitel Melbourne.

We estimate you can complete the weekly coursework in 4 to 5 hours, with an additional 1-hour Zoom call each week.

We want to make sure each cohort is roughly similar in experience and level. We carefully review each application to make sure everyone can get the most out of the course.

Don’t worry! We’ll keep your application on hand and look out for opportunities. As soon as there’s an appropriate cohort for you, we’ll offer you a spot.

We accept credit card, invoice, and split payments (i.e. pay-in-four).

It's totally okay to change your mind. If you request a refund up to 30 days prior to the course, we'll issue you a refund of 80% of the total course fee — i.e. $2,936. Refunds within 30 days of the course are not possible.

Business School

Take your design career to the next level