2020 uiguides, Image-reviewer, Bureaucrats, Interface administrators, oversight, Administrators (Semantic MediaWiki), Curators (Semantic MediaWiki), Administrators, Widget editors
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By now, you have spoken with lots of students, faculty and administrators at your school and, through your Landscape Canvas research, you have defined key gaps that point to opportunities to enrich the I&E ecosystem at your school. You've shared your research with UIF candidates from other schools and learned about what they discovered at their campuses. You have likely already considered potential solutions, some that are new and others that have been tried by Fellows on other campuses (see these [[:Category:Guides|Wiki-page]]s for inspiration).<br><br>As you move forward with implementing solutions for the opportunities you have uncovered, it's important to:
#go beyond the first obvious solutions;<br>
#invest time and resources on a solution that will be well received by students, faculty and administrators and that will have real impact. What appears like a great solution in your mind might not work at all in practice, while an idea that didn't seem that good might turn into a success. The faster you test your idea with the people involved, the earlier you will know if you are on the right path. But if you ask people what they think about an abstract idea, all you are going to get are opinions. Very often others might not understand your idea (this is especially true when we talk about novel ideas). This is where prototyping adds great value. If you can make it easier for people to experience or at least visualize or imagine what your idea is about, you will get usable feedback. And this feedback is key in order to understand what aspects of your idea work well and which need improvement. Even more importantly, you may discover that there is a more interesting problem than the one you set out to address.<br><br>To help you do this, we invite you to put in practice the ideation and prototyping mindsets we explored in Session 2 (Design Thinking). Each teammate should prototype one project. By the end of the session, you should have four to five UIF projects outlined that have the potential to improve the innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem on your campus.<br><br>
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|title=Always a prototyping mindset: an example from a Fellow
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When Fellow Tanner Wheadon completed training and presented campus leaders with his ambitious UIF project of creating a brand new innovation space he didn't get the response he was expecting. This is what he did:<br><br>{{#widget:Youtube|id=c2BhCnxOwlk|width=75%}}<br><br>Employing a prototyping mindset increases the likelihood that solutions will be embraced by the community they are designed for. Through training and after having visited the d.school, Tanner's wanted to take on the project of creating a space for student innovation. As you heard in the video, he gained traction by distilling the essential elements of what would happen in such a space, and he went through many iterations of prototyping that led to the successful execution of his big vision close to a year after he began the process:<br><br>
* Prototype 1: Outline of a 2-week design thinking module; pitching professor (3 weeks after training)
* Prototype 2: Actual 2-week module in general education course (2 months after training)
* Prototype 4: Design Thinking workshop for all 6 faculty who teach Gen Ed course (6 months after training)
* Prototype 5: One-day Design Thinking workshop for President and his cabinet (11 months after training)
* Prototype 6: Offered four spaces to set up his envisioned innovation space (12 months after training)<br><br>
Here's the bottom line: even though you are crafting a big-picture vision for your campus stakeholders, you must always have a prototyping mindset. Think big, start small, work fast and do something every day that advances your objectives.
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* '''Test the prototype''' with the relevant people -- students, faculty, etc., depending on what it is (see below some things to keep in mind as you test). Remember when you had to go out an interview someone on the first week of the challenge? Testing your prototype is similar to that: you might feel apprehensive about showing a prototype that doesn't look very polished to someone else, and that's understandable. Use some of the same strategies you used to set up your interview: introduce yourself and the project, establish a rapport with the other person, encourage him/her to be candid with you, and demonstrate you really care about what he/she says. You will find that people will be incredibly helpful, even flattered that you care about their perspective.
* '''Iterate'''. Based on what you learned about the problem or the solution, you might make a minor modification, learn that the you are solving for the wrong problem or make large changes in your strategy for how you solve the problem. Incorporate your learnings into creating a new prototype and test once again with the same person or different ones.
* '''Take a photo of people testing your prototypes,''' and include a short reflection about what you learned from the tests. If you are part of a Leadership Circle, combine all your photos and learnings into one submission.<br><br>{{Fmbox|image=none| style = border:5px solid #008b8b; background-color:#f1fcf8;|text=Due October 3 at midnight ET: A google doc containing a photo of people testing your prototypes, and a short reflection about what you learned from the tests. Drop this document into your campus folder in [https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1BrL69LY4a-Pe1Cu4bQ6uaKcDbEH1n2JZ this Google Drive folder].}}<br>:Here are some elements to keep in mind when you test your prototype:
* Do NOT sell your idea: Your goal is NOT to convince someone that your idea is good. You want to find out what can be improved.
* Capture the feedback: use [https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9aooElipwnccUdkX1BFcGtYLXM/view?usp=sharing this simple grid] to capture what worked, what could be improved, as well as questions and ideas that come up for you as people test your prototype.
Imagine your first meeting with the university president. Imagine taking them through your landscape canvas. Now imagine presenting one project you believe will improve the landscape. The President might think to themselves "That's cute, kid."<br><br>
'''Four to five strategic priorities'''<br>
Now imagine you've presented your birds-eye view of campus along with the four to five projects you believe would meaningfully improve your campus innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem. Your President might now say, "OK, this student really gets it."<br><br>Keep in mind that multi-faceted problems require multi-faceted solutions, and not all the projects will be implemented by you; that would be impossible to achieve as any one person (unless you were superhuman). BUT, you must create a bold two- or three-year vision outlining what needs to change in order to enhance the I&E ecosystem.<br>
* If you're on a team of four, each of you can serve as the point-person to lead a project.
* If you're the only candidate at your school, you may only be leading one project to start, but you should still take the position that the remaining projects need to be assigned to other people on campus.<br><br>
'''A consulting approach'''<br>
Approach your upcoming meetings with faculty and administration as though you are a set of consultants who your school has hired to recommend four to five projects to address the key issues facing the campus I&E ecosystem. What are those top four to five projects you believe your campus should implement in order to expand I&E on campus?<br><br>{{Fmbox|image=none| style = border:5px solid #008b8b; background-color:#f1fcf8;|text=Due October 3 at midnight ET: Link to completed/updated Strategic Priorities Wiki page.}}<br>{{Blue button|link=2020:Training/School Wiki Page Links|text=Click here to access your campus's strategic priorities Wiki page.}}<br>
On your Strategic Priorities wiki page, outline the four to five projects you have identified and refined by prototyping. Include not only the project name, but also the key tactics required to bring this project to life. Be as specific as possible, including assigning names of the team mates who will be in charge of each project. Make sure you review your plans with your uiguide and faculty champion(s) and take into account their feedback.<br><br> {{note2|'''Note:'''}} If you are a new campus on the program, you will be the first cohort to add content to the Strategic Priorities wiki page, but if you are a campus who already has Fellows, this page already will have content added by previous Fellows, and you should update the page to add your cohort's strategic priorities. Do this is reverse chronological order, so that the most recent set of priorities are at the top of the page, and clearly indicate to which cohort they correspond.<br><br>Visit the [[2020:Training/Submitting Assignments|Submitting Assignments]] page for more on how to submit this deliverable on the UIF Portal.
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