POLIMI GSoM
Building a Brand That Works Like an Experience
Redefining a Business School Brand for Global Impact
Red Dot Award - Brands & Communication Design
Client: POLIMI Graduate School of Management (Politecnico di Milano)
Agency: Interbrand Milan
My Role: Experience & Product Design Director
Scope: Brand Experience, Identity System, Digital Ecosystem, UX/UI
Engagement Type: Full-cycle strategic and delivery leadership
In Brief
- A leading business school with a bold new purpose but no system to deliver it.
- Academic depth. Weak connection. Too many confusing touchpoints.
- We rebuilt the brand as a modular, experience-led system teams could actually use.
- Teams used it to align, design, and deliver across digital, print, and space.
- The award-winning brand works like an experience.
1. Challenge
A leading business school with a bold new purpose but no system to deliver it.
POLIMI Graduate School of Management, formerly known as “MIP,” has a top-tier ranking, but its identity didn’t reflect its ambition and purpose. Internally, the name caused confusion. Externally, the experience felt generic.
The goal was to transform its "Shaping Better Futures for All" motto into a brand system that people could trust, work with, and build upon.
2. Insight
Academic depth. Weak connection. Too many confusing touchpoints.
Research with students, alumni, faculty, and partners clarified the gaps. The school possessed real strengths, such as academic depth, a human-centred mission, and an inclusive mindset; however, these qualities were not reflected in its appearance or operations.
We uncovered two critical truths: the school needed to clarify its identity and function as a unified system across physical, digital, and verbal touchpoints.
3. Change
We rebuilt the brand as a modular, experience-led system teams could actually use.
Designing for a single device or input type is no longer enough. Technology has expanded customer journeys, channels, touchpoints, and branded experiences.
We started with human truths: what students, alumni, and businesses expect from a modern school. We then moved beyond a visual identity, transforming the brand into a digital experience that’s consistent across platforms and interactions.
I led the redesign of the brand system and delivered its digital platform, ensuring it serves as a shared foundation for teams across disciplines.
4. Delivery
Teams used it to align, design, and deliver across digital, print, and space.
We built a cross-channel design system from digital tools to spatial identity and communications so that teams could work with shared standards across the board. We named the school POLIMI Graduate School of Management, mapped journeys, created UX prototypes, and built a scalable modular system.
The website became the central platform, modular, responsive, and reflecting the system. Shared tools, modular components, and early prototypes enabled us to accelerate delivery, minimise duplication, and maintain quality. Internal adoption involved communications, technology, and faculty collaboration.
The result: a brand grounded in purpose, delivered through real journeys, and built for long-term ownership.
5. Impact
The award-winning brand works like an experience.
POLIMI GSoM’s rebrand, which won a 2022 Red Dot Award, enhanced its international presence.
The new experience is more accessible, human, and consistent across audiences, channels, and platforms. It replaced fragmented assets with a unified toolkit, giving teams confidence, clarity, and control, and turned the brand into a platform for action.
Internally, it brought clarity and pride, while externally, it made the school more visible, coherent, and credible, backed by a scalable system. The brand became a tool for action, not just expression.
Agile loops
cut dev time
by 1 month
5 audiences
1 unified experience
100%
accessibility compliance
in design system
"This represents a very important development for our School, part of the great journey of change that began in 2020, when we redefined our purpose and core values and launched a new strategic plan.
Working with Interbrand has been an amazing journey, a path of listening, analysis and co-creation that involved hundreds of students, alumni, prospects, and corporate and institutional #partners. I am glad I had the chance to be part of this journey, and I am extremely proud of the work we have done together as a team.”
Sergio Oliveri
Chief Communication Officer
POLIMI GSoM
Ale