Learning to learn differently: Studio-based education for responsible management

Abstract

The pressing need to address the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in business education demands a shift from traditional teaching methods toward design-inspired pedagogical models. This paper introduces a specific pedagogical innovation, that is, a Design for Iteration (DFI) strategy embedded within a studio-based learning environment, developed through a cross-institutional partnership to educate future business leaders. The studio model emphasizes experiential, visual, and iterative learning processes such as the ‘crit’, prototyping, and peer-led feedback. Anchored in a heutagogical (self-determined) approach, this innovation moves beyond isolated creative exercises toward sustained engagement with complex, real-world sustainability challenges. Drawing on qualitative data from the implementation of the EULab Nantes studio, the paper explores how iterative, practice-based learning develops critical skills in adaptive thinking, problem-framing, collaboration, and system-level inquiry. The findings underscore the role of socio-materiality and peer-led sense-making in shaping meaningful learning and identifies the studio as a space for cultivating the mindsets and capabilities central to responsible management and sustainability education. By foregrounding the studio as a site for prototyping sustainable market futures, the paper contributes to reimagining business schools as platforms for transformative sustainability learning.