During design processes, interim results, i.e. ideas, are imagined, elaborated and shared in an on-going reflective creative conversation. One can argue that designers have an educational role in building a shared understanding with clients and other stakeholders, across disciplines of what the design is and why it is what it is. Especially in the context of trans-disciplinary collaboration, it is essential to reflect on what it means to collect and capture ‘the whole story’, i.e. not just the designed object, but also the context and the choices made in terms of what is of importance or essential for a resulting design. Building such a shared understanding consists of the three following steps:
1. Inventorizing and building an understanding of the system
2. A prioritization of what is of essence, what is of importance,
3. Defining a direction for seeking solutions.
We call this ‘information set’ (understanding, essence and direction) the Design Vision. Related to this view, we explore media used to depict or articulate such a vision. It will be argued that the choice of representation (text, metaphor, sketch, etc.) is highly influential on the richness and usefulness of the collected information and the following creative process.

Collaborative design projects in Latin America between academy and industry, have been commonly focused on New Product Development processes. Nevertheless, collaborative experiences at the Fuzzy Front End (FFE) stage are more frequent between company partners to emphasize the potential for organizations to collaborate, rather than academy and industry. This paper presents the experience in the set-up and execution of an international project, so-called “First View DesignLab” organized between Universidad EAFIT and TUDelft to be executed in Colombia with five local companies in collaboration with Product Design Engineering (PDE) students. Each company proposed a company case where the objective was to find new opportunities for new product/service concepts. Design Thinking (DT) tools were used to trigger co-creation and open innovation in order to explore new opportunities by each company. Important aspects have been of great value to identify best
practices to better develop academic collaborative projects at the FFE. Reflections are presented as useful insights to enhance innovation capabilities and idea generation skills for both, academy and industry to identify opportunities.