Changes

<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap; font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Anyone who sticks to and applies the skills learned during their time training in the University Innovation Fellows Program can be a badass. As Ryan Phillips, a current Program Manager at Microsoft and former University Innovation Fellow, tells us, "The UIF Program allowed me to come into my new job, understand what was expected of me and learn how the organization worked, and then be able to sit at tables with high-level employees, even as a new hire." Ryan says skills he learned in the program directly influence how he acts today, even if he uses said skills in a less structed manner. He says design thinking reinforced how important it is for him to see problems with products from a customer's perspective and to empathize, which he believes is invaluable in product innovation and production. He has also found he has utilized a landscape canvas every day since he began. Even if he is not explicitly writing it out, Ryan always is thinking what connections can be made, what connections are missing, and now how can we make them, when addressing problems, i.e. becoming intimately familiar with and readdressing his in-house resources that are available to him and his team to be used to solve their problems.</span>

<span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size:small;"><span style="font-weight: 700; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the biggest challenges we face as innovators, entrepreneurs, and designers is our attitudes. We are taught to let crticism to roll off our backs, to not pay attention to the "haters," but rather, to stay focused and achieve what you're aiming for. However, to become a badass in any indsutry - and to stay a badass - requires taking others' perspectives into consideration, slowing down and listening to peers and teachers, and achieving a role of humility in your industry. Note that humility does not mean passiveness. Instead, it requires an attitude of understanding, application, and thinking of yourself as an equal to your associates.</span></span></span>