Course syllabus Academic BEST Summer Course Skopje 02-12 July 2013
1 Course description This course aims to provide students with a critical and systematic understanding of the process of innovation creation and its relation to the contemporary style of entrepreneurship. The second general aim of the course is to discuss innovation applicability in the business taking into account local and global business context. Objectives: The main objective of the course is to present and introduce creative thinking and its possible applications to the students. The course will also discuss: - Challenges that businesses have to face with the introduction of the novel technologies in order to deploy innovative technology to certain processes or services - Possible risks and benefits related with deployment of novel and innovative technologies. - Approaches of introduction of the novel technologies in order to support business processes - What critical decisions should be made and when, taking into account the business development strategy
Thursday 4th July
Lecture : Creativity and Innovation (Who is smart now?)
This lecture will deal with relation between individual creativity and innovation. It will elaborate different types of innovation; organizational structure needed for supporting innovation and explain the process of creating innovative product or service. The special attention will be given to the role of ICT in these processes. The course attendees will have to form mixed teams, they will perform small team building exercises, and finally the project theme will be presented to them.
company visit: G6 solutions number of working hours: 7
Monday 8th July Lecture : Startup initiation This lecture will investigate relation between Innovation and Entrepreneurship. It will explain how technology markets work, and Elaborate how to capture the value of technology ventures. Lecture : Entrepreneurship of innovation This lecture will give basic know how and paradigms needed for establishing start-up, spin-off or new product service using the example of new ICT Enabled venture.
Company visit: Infinite Solutions number of working hours: 7
Tuesday 9th July
Lecture : How to use innovation to achieve competitive advantage?
This lecture will analyze the relation among business processes, innovation and ICT. It will explain the basics for determining how ICT can help transform business project (service) to eBusiness project (service) and discuss potential benefits that can be obtained. The teams will have to analyze their project idea using knowledge obtained in this lecture.
Lecture : What is feasible innovation?
This lecture consists of two main parts. In the first part, the lecture will present two approaches (traditional and non traditional) for evaluation of the business service or product. In the second part, the lecture will discuss the principles of determining different types of feasibility of new service or product. The teams will have to determine the feasibility of their suggested ideas.
company visit: Seavus Education and Development Center number of working hours: 6
Wednesday 10th July Lecture : How to explain innovative service or product? This lecture will explain typical pitch process. It will elaborate approaches, and point out important parts of the pitching process. The teams will have to determine elevator pitch (teaser) for their projects. This will serve as warm-up session for the final project presentation.
company visit: Matrix Global number of working hours: 6
Thursday 11th July
Case study - project presentation Exam number of working hours: 5
2 Expected outcome 1. Knowledge and understanding: The students will gain knowledge and understanding of the possible gains and losses related to the deployment of the technology to the business processes. Different case studies will be presented to the students.
2. Applying knowledge and understanding: The students will be given assessment (homework and projects) that will focus on applying obtained knowledge. They will have to recognize possibilities, develop strategy and perform basic SWOT analyses. 3. Making judgment: The students will have to determine the best possible way to resolve different issues related to the presented case studies. 4. Communication skills: The group work and discussions are very important. The students will have to work in different groups and present findings in efficient way (the proposals will be presented in from of idea pitches with limited time) 5. Learning skills: The students that will pass exam will be able to understand, analyze and rate different risks related to the deployment of the technology in certain business process. They will be able to design and demonstrate solutions for different issues related to the novel technologies from the strategic development point of view.
3 Recommended bibliography
The Innovator's Solution: Creating and Sustaining Successful Growth Sales 2.0: Improve Business Results Using Innovative Sales Practices and Technology The Fast Path to Corporate Growth: Leveraging Knowledge and Technologies to New Market Applications Closing the Innovation Gap: Reigniting the Spark of Creativity in a Global Economy The Wide Lens: A New Strategy for Innovation The Other Side of Innovation: Solving the Execution Challenge (Harvard Business Review)