it consulting and mentoring

Why does your company need a hackathon?


New practical way to solve the problem and find an innovation solution, if your business is deadlocked
it consulting and mentoring

Why does your company need a hackathon?


New practical way to solve the problem and find an innovation solution, if your business is deadlocked
More and more companies are about to find new ways to or new markets or develop new products. Because just to increase productivity or optimize the flow is no more enough for the company to succeed. But if you find more value-added activities and integrate them into the current production flow or develop a new product or service for the clients you already had it can add more revenue.

Max
Attentive PM
Clever programmer
Design Thinking Mentor
"Hacker" client's problems
Today developing new product is impossible without using data, cutting edge technologies and software. I don't want to say that very different groups of people can't generate great new ideas. I just think that having engineers in a team and using his knowledge can be extremely helpful at any stage of idea generation: from empathise to test phase, especially on prototyping.

And this is when, I believe, hackathon can go on stage. From the perspective of all hackathons I was involved into, all attendies can be separated into several groups:
entrepreneurs with the team
engineers/ developers
people with idea
others people
entrepreneurs with the team
engineers/ developers
people with idea
others
people
So, simply, hackathon is a place when ideas meet with engineers can implement them into the final product or prototype.

The Design Thinking process asks teams to prepare prototype and test it with a "real" customers was previously interviews.

Still, hackathon, why companies need it?


Well-well, we are almost there. At the end of any hackathon I always saw projects (definitely, less than at the start) ready for testing with the real users and ready for monetization. It is amazing what can team do in 24 hours: not only a prototype, but real applications, cloud services, even real device using PCBs like Arduino or Raspberry PI for IoT projects.

So, what can hackathon adds
to the Design Thinking process?

Engineers
People, who loves challenges, solving real-life problems and their knowledge and experience. In addition, their ability to concentrate on a task can be inspiring for other team members. I often saw how people who is not dedicated to engineering/development getting surprised with the ideas and capabilities. What is seems hard can be easily and quickly implemented by a good teams.
Advanced final prototype
Well-organized and focused team can achieve unbelievable results. Even in 24 hours project idea can be transformed during the prototype building, Stakeholders from the company can convinced the project idea can be real and implemented so developers will be more motivated that leads to more effective and complex solutions.
After-hackathon project development
I saw a lot of great ideas stays only on paper after Design Thinking workshops. Also, I saw a lot more hackathon teams continue working on their idea even after hackathon end. Some of them become successful and get funding. It's easier to sell an idea to the investors with a great playable prototype compared with the only presentation slides. From the company employer's perspective it's better to have something to show their boss advantages of implementing the idea.

Therefore, we can add to the concept "Design Thinking" a new point "Hack"

Empathize

Define

Ideate

Prototype

Test

Hack

So, what is application?


For the Hack octagon, I think, the best place will be near Prototype and Test ones. Usual Design Thinking workshop should be extended with 24-hours hackathon, engineers that plan to take part into it should go through all the design steps with the team from the very beginning.
This upgrade wouldn't break the well-defined and proved design process but extend it. Developing and holding the hackathon is very similar to the workshop and organizators don't need any additional skills or inventory.

Resume

If your company experiences difficulty
- identifying or delivering new products and technology to the marketplace;
- differentiating new services from your competitors;
- delivering products to customers on time;
hackathon with the design thinking model is just what your business needs for.

In the end, the design thinking process helps you to understand what your customers really want and hackathon helps you create a final prototype or the first version of your product.
Sounds good, isn't it? =)


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