our mission
To inspire and equip our members with design and innovation principles and mindsets that they will use meaningfully throughout their lives and careers.
OUR HISTORY
The Design + Innovation Club was founded by students in 2011. The club has grown in size every year since its inception and is consistently one of the largest student groups at Yale SOM. Through our curriculum and programming – including educational sessions, experiential learning, and career-related activities – the club cultivates interest in design and innovation among a diverse student body. Club alumni hold positions in firms across the industry, including IDEO, frog, Google, Apple, Amazon, Innosight, and SYPartners.
OUR team
Contact us: club-designinnovation@som.yale.edu
CLARE BRODY
Pre-SOM: Fundraising at The Joffrey Ballet
Summer Internship: Summer Associate at Hugo & Hoby
Clare spent years studying the history of design and working in the arts. About 20 minutes in to the first meeting, she realized it was all groundwork for a life spent applying design-thinking principles to problems old and new. With a focus on human-centered design, she is excited to take her experience with built and visual culture and apply it to new business challenges. Speaking of new challenges, this year is going to be a weird one, but she’s excited to continue the D+I tradition of flexibility, substance, and whimsy alongside Avnee, Isabel, Anna, and Ian.
Avnee Jetley
Pre-SOM: Architect + Designer at COOKFOX Architects
Summer Internship: Partnership + Innovation Intern at 500 Startups
Prior to business school, Avnee worked in New York City as a licensed architect where her clients included Google, Yale University, and the New York City Housing Authority. After several years in the industry, she decided to take the plunge, come to business school and find out what the world outside architecture looked like. Her journey at SOM has been one of exploration, serendipity and retrospection, much like the D+I club itself. She looks forward to sharing ideas, working on big problems and bringing the much beloved (and sometimes loathed) critique to business school.
ISABEL SEN
Pre-SOM: Principal, Financial Crimes Compliance at Promontory Financial Group, an IBM Company
Summer Internship: Strategic Leadership Program Intern at Discover Financial Services
Before coming to SOM, Isabel was based in New York working as a financial crimes compliance consultant to financial institutions. But before all that, she spent all of her spare time in school working on productions and serving on the leadership committee for University Theater, the college's largest student-run organization. Through the D+I Club, Isabel found a vocabulary, frameworks, and principles for approaching complex business problems that tapped into both halves of her brain. Good strategy leverages both empathy and Excel! The D+I community has been a home base and source of growth at SOM, and Isabel is excited to help lead through the community through another year.
ANNA TROEIN
Pre-SOM: Fundraising at the Smithsonian Institution
Summer Internship: Senior Brand Manager Intern at Procter & Gamble
Anna comes from a fine arts background that led her to work in art museums in London and Washington, DC. Coming to SOM, she was searching for ways to use her creative energy in a business context and found no better way than through design thinking. Through the D+I club, Anna has discovered that design thinking is able to both ground her with a framework, but also draw out new ideas from classmates who would never have thought of themselves as creative. Most of all, she enjoys most getting to know the D+I community and the diversity of backgrounds and perspectives it represents.
Ian Veidenheimer
Pre-SOM: Director of Operations, Tsao & McKown Architects
Summer Internship: Innovation Fellow, NYC Mayor’s Office of the Chief Technology Officer; Research and Strategy Analyst, Ecosystems Team at 500 Startups
Ian came to Yale to learn more about the range of stakeholders and factors that shape urban development. Prior to graduate school, Ian worked in architecture in New York City, where he helped manage design offices and oversee large-scale masterplans and institutional projects across the United States, China, and Singapore. He is passionate about collaborative partnerships that improve cities for their residents. The D+I Club has become a wonderful home at SOM, and he looks forward to the programs, conversations, and critiques that the Leadership Team will host in the year ahead.
Cinnamon
Pre-SOM: Instagram Influencer (@cinnamonbunthedog)
Summer Internship: Squirrel Patrol
Originally from Korea, Cinnamon is a true third culture kid as a Swedish passport holder and current resident in the US. When not taking part in Design + Innovation Zoom calls, she likes to design new napping spots, innovate on how to make her toy squeak, and collaborate with her fellow pups on how to catch all the squirrels.