Change Ventures 2014 - Day 11
Today’s Quote
When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, do not adjust the goals adjust the action steps ~ Confucius
What We Did Today was a full and intensive day of workshops led by Lizi Hamer and Olivier Soubiele. Today's sessions focused on the Lean Startup foundations and experimentation board as well as Design Thinking. Lizi's session on Lean Startup Foundations were helpful in sharing the key points and some examples of of products that we Minimum Viable Products. The session also touched on Business Model Canvas, Google Adwords, SEO. Olivier's session was a whole new concept for all of our students, really opening their eyes to a new perspective. Olivier went in depth into the Double Diamond Process and Experience triggers. The end of the day finished with mentor sessions with both Lizi and Olivier.
What We Observed
- At our daily check-in students were much more precise with their daily action items and were allocating more realistic time constraints to complete them.
- Lizi's session inspired the students to stop waiting for 'Perfect' and just get to testing and getting out there. Working in small groups, the students came together and worked on the experimentation board as well as the Lean Startup canvas. For many of the students except for 3 it was something completely new to them.
- Olivier's session really made the students get outside of their box, think about things from a different angle, that of the consumer and really understand their pain points and their behaviours. It taught the students to ask questions and be inquisitive about everything that may be in the environment and the customers journey. Students were broken up in pairs and we had a task of re-desining transportation. Students had to explore the relationship between customer and transport (public transport - how they get to work or on a day to day basis). The idea was to ask Why as many times as possible to get to the crux of the problem that customer had and see what ways we could make the experience or journey better.
- The Double Diamond Process was difficult for them to get their head around initially.
- Slight information overload with two back to back sessions on important frameworks and theories which was a little more like a reality check for some of the students who were considering starting their own business.
Key Takeaways
- The mentor sessions are working really well for the students and many are getting the quality time and insights that they are needing both on a personal and professional level. Having learnt along the way to ask the right questions and be prepared with their questions, it has allowed the students to get a significant amount of value. Time was allocated in blocks of 20 - 30 mins with the option to follow up again with the mentors.
- It would have been best to break up these two sessions or allocated more time for breaks in between which we are reviewing for next years cohort.
- A lot of food for thought today really brought the students back to thinking about their next steps and also provided students with more clarity.
