Art Thinking, a vital skill for responsible innovation

Organisations are increasingly exhorted to enlarge their vision of innovation to encompass environmental, societal and economic challenges rather than purely commercial ones. To develop a collective commitment of care for the future and to identify innovation targets in a more ethical, inclusive and equitable manner, innovation managers need to develop new skills and competences. In this paper, we propose an original framework that combines three complementary approaches, Circular Design, Design Thinking and Art Thinking, to develop new innovation skills with a broader consideration of responsible and frugal innovation. Design thinking is a user-centred approach that emphasises empathy, problem definition, idea generation, prototyping and testing. Art thinking is a creative approach that uses emotional engagement, sensemaking, imagination and artistic expression to explore ideas and possibilities. Circular thinking takes into account the entire life cycle of products and services, and helps to minimize negative impacts on the environment and society.We surveyed businesses in seven European countries to assess their openness to new, art-based approaches to responsible innovation and we find that organisations consider three principal sets of skills as important in their innovation efforts: Soft Skills, Unconventional Skills (future thinking, sensemaking etc) and Artistic Skills (Creativity and aesthetic sensibility). Our study contributes to the academic conversation about framing innovation skills in a wider context that includes art thinking, responsible innovation and the circular economy.