Course Number
16:137:529
Credits
3
Semesters(s) Offered
Summer
Description

Design thinking is a human-centered, prototype-driven process for innovation that can be applied to product, service, and business design. Learn how to promote and manage design thinking and innovation in the sciences and technology. Explore successful use of design thinking frameworks for the design of strategies, funding techniques, business models, risks, and reducing barriers for introducing breakthrough products and services. Study the importance and role of experimentation and learning from failure, as well as provide access to a series of tools that can help an organization decide whether, or not, to continue with a specific development process. Learn theories and practices for innovation, tools, and methods for design inquiry, and characteristics of “design attitude.”

Course Objectives
  • Establish a holistic product development framework for a new product idea, realized in a mobile or web-based software application, within the context of a larger corporate entity, applying the concepts introduced in the class.
  • Analyze the outcomes of a self-developed, new product development plan created, implemented, and launched into the marketplace.
  • Identify differences in new product development and launches across customer and market segments, including international marketplaces.
  • Understand the importance of failing forward and rapid iteration cycles, supported by rapid digital prototyping skills to quickly validate product concepts, so critical in today’s new product development domain in the Digital Economy
  • Evaluate best practices in innovation cultures and the new product development processes of product teams and companies, driven by design thinking, small, rapid experiments, and agile, lean startup methodologies