Design in Action (DiA) was conceived to articulate design principles and practices, to exemplify their value to the creative economy, and to build the opportunity to use Arts and Humanities thinking in the establishment of businesses. DiA built a team of 29 academics and professionals committed to developing a programme to support new business development, positioning design at the heart of each business and enabling its values to drive the process. This introduced new ways of innovating through a viable co-creation process called “Chiasma” developed by The Glasgow School of Art and underpinned by design principles. Knowledge Exchange (KE) was core to DiA’s research approach and a KE model was developed as part of the research outcomes. DiA is an academic construct, which builds upon the knowledge inherent in the academy, offering this to the business community, particularly small and micro SMEs.