IDBMers in the Making: Three Student Journeys

Rochelle

I’m Rochelle Claire Toscano, with a background in design. I hold a Bachelor of Design from Aalto University, where I also completed a custom minor in Creative Marketing and Management. My passions lie in project management and service design. Outside of academics, I’m deeply interested in visual communication design, fashion, branding, and martial arts. I currently work as the IDBM ARTS Thesis Experience Coordinator at Aalto.

I chose the IDBM program because it brings design, technology, and business together in a way that’s rare in higher education. Many design students move through their studies without real exposure to multidisciplinary collaboration, only to face it suddenly in professional environments. IDBM offers the opposite; an early, integrated way of learning alongside people from different fields, developing a realistic understanding of how cross-disciplinary work actually functions. I’ve always worked well with business and tech professionals, and IDBM felt like a natural extension of that.

I entered the program with no fixed expectations, preferring to approach new environments openly. The first period, especially the IDBM Challenge, was genuinely enjoyable, and working with a strong, diverse team while hearing perspectives outside design broadened the project in ways that felt meaningful and practical. It’s rare to be in a course that lets you focus entirely on the problem space of an innovation process, and this period was very much centered on that. The ways of thinking introduced to us should be standard in any progressive design education. The second period focused more on technical work, with a course based in industrial design and engineering. Coming from a non-technical background, it demanded a different kind of learning. It pushed me to adapt, ask better questions, and communicate clearly when navigating unfamiliar concepts. Working closely with people whose expertise is different than my own has been one of the most valuable parts of the program so far.

Bayonle

I am Bayonle Adelakun, a Finnish-Nigerian first year International Design Business

Management (IDBM) student. I grew up in Czechia, Sweden and Lapland. Looking back, I chose the IDBM programme to fulfill my aspirations to understand bridging the gap between creativity, globality, and strategy, motivated by a wish to expand the boundaries of my previous digital marketing roles and provide the insights and innovations to shape the future through design-driven business practices. The IDBM programme was, in my mind without a doubt, the ideal springboard for this journey.

My background is in business - by trade, and I fulfil my heart with art. I considered myself a robust applicant, with an intent to prosper in business and art. To balance, I decided to push for towards a path that would allow me to enjoy my business with a flair of inventiveness, and learn to the radiate comfort and expertise in interdisciplinary domains. In art, I had found an avenue to explore a language that I viewed to be free of constraints, being self-taught and driven by emotions and memory. I chose to dedicate myself to deconstruction and reconstruction, synthesis and renewal, creating pictures in suspense, dreamlike and transient yet intimately familiar. Perhaps this same desire of maneuvering complex internal systems was mirrored in my steps towards interdisciplinarity.

My previous accomplishments showcase a breadth of interests and experience, I had exhibited as an artist, modelled, travelled, built communities, hosted events, and honed a professional craft in digital marketing. I had acquired an array of unique skills, yet skills that felt fragmented, and didn’t yet encompass all I wanted to contribute. I had a trove of potential, that I felt needed strategic confidence, perhaps to clarify the ambiguity in innovation that creativity craves. I knew the practice-oriented IBDM programme would push me to find and communicate my expertise, by supporting my development through valuable guidance in the programme and the perspectives of new peers.

In practice, my time thus far has helped orient myself amongst the spectacular minds that IDBM attracts. We are a cohort of unique, driven experts offering the best our domains have to offer. The courses pit us together and in collision with our differences. Each course offers an opportunity to explore a new domain, to speak a new language and tackle a new problem. And this variance is all tied together by the omnipotent systems design thinking, our tool to re-orient to any task.

We have spent this first semester in playful comradery, in competition and collaboration. We are suspended in a state of flux, taught to deliver nonetheless. As we work together, in ever-changing teams, we learn to work with new characters, backgrounds and expertise.

The most valuable resource we are here to build is the people, and ourselves in relation. Building a community of likeminded, yet infinitely diverse people. This is a place to encourage, inspire, and contribute to a collective growth.

Anna

My name is Anna Parkkinen and I'm thrilled that I've started my journey as a first-year student in the International Design Business Management program.  

I did my Bachelor's in Computer Science Engineering and I currently work at a database company alongside my studies. While I've liked my technical background, I was missing more of a creative side. I am driven by a passion to learn about design and build a stronger understanding of business. I was searching for a way to tie together my technical skills with creative and strategic thinking. Discovering the IDBM program at Aalto felt like the perfect answer to all my interests!  

Outside of the classroom and work, I love spending time with friends. I'm often going to student events and playing football. My other great passion is traveling. I constantly seek to explore new cultures and meet new people, which is another reason IDBM's international focus drew me in.  

The first few periods have been incredibly exciting! We have such a diverse, kind, creative and smart group of students. I'm so glad to have met them all. I've already been able to dive into fascinating courses including lessons on Strategic Design and strengthening my engineering mindset in the Network Partnering and Product Innovation course. Our long-awaited Industrial Project has also kicked off. We'll be solving real-life problems proposed by companies until the end of spring.  

I feel truly honored to be part of this program and learn with this inspiring group. I have a feeling this is only going to get better!