End of Academic Year Reflections

Since middle school I already had in mind what I wanted to do when I ‘grew up’; in 11^th grade I already knew in which university I wanted to go for my under grad degree; and since after my exchange programme in the second year of university, I already knew that I wanted to go in a foreign country to study for my master. So, here I am, at the end of it all.

It has been a long year with new interesting challenges that we had to face as an individual and as a group. Design Thinking and Entrepreneurship in Practice has been a very dynamic module where we learned “by doing”, “by observing” and sometimes “by failing”.

Empathy

Empathy has been the first thing that I have learned in Design Thinking module. It has been defined in the dictionary as:

1. The intellectual identification with or vicarious experiencing of the feelings, thoughts, or attitudes of another.

2. The imaginative ascribing to an object, as a natural object or work of art, feelings or attitudes present in oneself: By means of empathy, a great painting becomes a mirror of the self.

So, empathy is very complicated to explain, but easy to feel.

In a few words, we could say that empathy is understanding others, because maybe we had a similar experience or feeling. I have learnt that empathy is important in many aspects of life: from family, to friendship and down to business. In my opinion, understanding others, many times is crucially important because your communication skills, social awareness, ability to relate with people will only become better. In addition, it is a good emotional experience that can connect designers with customers, especially through prototyping.

Observing

At the Frieze Art Fair  was my first real attempt in concentrating to observe the surrounding environment, people and objects. London was still a new city to me and everything fascinated me. The fair experience taught something about the job of the arts: think about things under a different perspective in order to create… creativity. Moreover,

“The art we buy is as much about who we are as it is about the artists who create it” (Klonoski, 2010),

so observing what was around me in a new city taught me to keep always my eyes open because:

“Things that seem for the moment meaningless or irrelevant, using the twists and turns of the creative process, lead you back to an important encounter that at first seemed quite neutral or even something that made you feel repelled or exasperated” (Smith, 2008).

User Model

In this module I have learnt that a system is a set of interacting entities forming an integrated whole, in our case creating the User System Model.

“By visually mapping out the relationships in this way, it becomes easier to identify which aspects of the system may or may not be included in the solution or considered by the designer. This ‘USER’ system model acts as a framework that identifies first, the people involved in an activity and secondly, how objects, roles and rules can be adjusted to improve the overall experience for the user and people involved” (Beaumont, 2010).

Comparing two different but similar systems so important to todays society, such as the public transportation, made me realise how important is to think about the end user when designing a product or service. The main thing that a designer has to do is to look closer and ask him/ herself a few questions that will help realise how efficient and beneficial his or her innovation and creativity will be to a few people or to the world. In life, and in business, we all have a common goal: make things right, and analysing the surrounding environment with the USER model, helps us to understand that everyone has an important role.  

Design Thinking

Innovation and creativity are the hot words in today’s conversations and discussions. In the module, we learnt that creative design is everywhere and puts the end user at the centre of attention. However, design is not just about beauty and coolness, but it tackles a whole range of creative business issues. In fact, Design Thinking wants to create value in the world through an innovative approach.

An interesting thought that I have learnt in this module and that I want to bring with me in my future is that “…great creativity…” (Hobsbawm, 2009) could save the world  and a very effective example is the Do The Green Thing website.

In fact, during the entire MACE course we tried to define creativity. The best definition that I found comes form Bilton and Cummings (2010), who define creativity as a

“temporal system with three levels,”

which are the content, the outcome and the process. The content of creativity should be new and valuable to society or surprising in a social context. The creative outcome transforms the surrounding environment, opening up new possibilities for future creativity. Lastly, the process of creativity describes the interactions through which creativity occurs (Bilton and Cummings, 2010).  Moreover, the main outcome of creativity must be change (Bilton and Cummings, 2010) and it occurs through the organisation of existing elements into a new useful solution (Testa, no date).

Storytelling: Blogs

Before starting this course, I have tried to set up a blog, but with no success. Since I missed the first class of Design Thinking, the day that I got there I already felt that I had so much to catch up: WordPress blog, Twitter, Delicious, KU email account, check weekly MACE blog, ect. and I did not know where to start.

One day I got my MacBook, and with the company of my favourite radio channel, I started to struggle setting up all these new things. Things that later during the year started to have a shape, meaning and where of real help with my studies. The funny thing is that once I realised how delicious was helpful for my studies, yahoo decided to shut it down  (Heals, 2010), but fortunately Corinne told me about Diigo, which I recommend, especially for dissertations or other projects for the ‘useful websites’ section.

However, now I feel that I have become a good blogger and actually enjoying it mainly because I blogged more than I have been asked to. In addition, I see my blog as a sort of portfolio for my job seeking, since many firms have the norm to google your name. At the end of the day, the blog is telling a story, and in my case it tells the story of my studies, of my passions and interests, see it as a very long and descriptive personal business card, because that is what it is.

Always concerning story telling, I told to Federica Postiglione, GA Manager for pazienti.org and my mentor for this module, the story of my dissertation in oredr to help me to join the dots. She told me that accessible information and transparency is the key behind healthcare communication. The lesson that I learnt is that patients are not just medical record numbers, they want to feel understood and, at the same time, they want to understand what a doctor is saying to them. That is why healthcare communication is very important: ordinary people want to be sure to whom they are giving their health and doctors should communicate their skills in a clear and direct way. So, what Brown (2006) argues:

“…choose a problem, tell a story, offer a solution…”

which is very important concerning many aspects of communicating with people,such as consumers.

Business: Innovate Group

Setting up and running a business was entirely a new challenge for me. At the begging I could not think of what it could be done as a business, because I wanted to be creative and innovative as possible. One night, while I was watching the finale of Ramsay’s Best Restaurant and I saw two young chefs dealing with innovative Italian food. At the end of the meal they served a lemon sorbet accompanied by an artificially created lemon vapour, so that the consumer could use all its sense and try a 360° new eating experience. So, I thought, why not create a 360° experience also for university life?

At the end of the academic year the Innovate Group managed to give this possibility to the students, helping to create and develop the BizBoard. The main experience that we managed to give to out target audience is a touch of real life and this happened in giving them the tools to set up and run their own business, and in a way to create their own future. The main challenge faced in running a business was obtaining the critical mass and create awareness about the service. As I wrote:

“To make popular our business: we have to make sure that we are well-known. We will tackle this goal firstly giving out leaflets at the different university campuses and hopefully with word-of-mouth.”

Unfortunately it was easier said than done. I realised that people still do not take me enough seriously, and probably this is due sometimes to my lack of confidence, which is something that I am trying to overcome.

In addition, and in my opinion very important, an important thing that I did not manage to overcome very well was the fact that I did not feel the BizBoard as my own, and it is know that many entrepreneurs see their firms as their “babies”. I participated in implementing it because I thought it was a good experience and possibility, but still it was not my idea and I could not do what I wanted with it: I did not have the freedom to try out, experiment and maybe sometimes fail as much as I felt it was necessary, since it was not 100% mine, and above all since I was working for Kingston University.

As a student in Advertising, the best part of the business for me was the inventing the advert for our businesses. I am not an animator or computer geek, but I am happy with the prototype that the Innovate Group has developed.

Team Work

Learning how to set up and run a business has also been a challenge concerning teamwork. Setting up a business is a big amount of work, so you cannot do it by yourself, especially if it is your first experience. It also can be more challenging doing it with people whom you just met. It can be challenging because while you have to intensely work and commit, at the same time you have to bond with them and have get to know them. However, it is great to get to know many different and interesting people who have something to share with you: their passion and culture.

Unfortunately, teamwork does not always work out as best as it could. Concerning my group different people put a different kind of effort in it, and I found myself being an ‘experimenter’, a ‘director’ and a ‘set designer’ (Kelley, 2005) and sometimes I also felt left alone and I had to run after members: in my opinion is not a professional way to act.

The February and April fairs have been two very good occasions to publicise our work has a team. I consider myself a shy person, but I have managed to overcome these difficulties by “getting out there and talk to people” as Corinne always advised to us in class.

Compassion2One project has been a very interesting and stimulating. It was a good feeling knowing that we were helping to find a solution to how to create awareness about sex trafficking: this is an example of how “…great creativity…” (Hobsbawm, 2008), again, could save the world. 

Future Goal

When I applied for Advertising and the Creative Economy I hoped that it would help to prepare me to the ‘working world’. I still do not feel ready, but as someone once said: “learning is a never-ending process.” I decided to use the ‘Design Thinking’ methodology also in my dissertation, which is investigating the effectiveness of integrated marketing communication in order to inform healthcare patients. I think that what we learned in this course is essential if you want to succeed as an entrepreneur and problem solver. I already have a small job offer for when I go back to Milan in September, widely connected to what I have learned in this module. It is exactly want I want to do: inform people about how looking after their health can benefit them, and my dissertation will be my perfect business card.

To conclude who cares about the unfairness of life, bureaucracy, technology, studies and fate: I have learned that what goes around comes around, so if you are a good person, you will always find your way on the curvy roads of life.

I want to leave MACE with this thought from Woody Allen (2009) movie Whatever Works:

So remember, the real genius is the one “…who sees the whole picture…”

Good luck with the future.

Final Business Report for INNOVATE

The Innovate Group

Ilaria Cacciamani

Ilaria Cacciamani graduated in summer 2010 in Communication Sciences and Technologies and currently is a MA student in Advertising and the Creative Economy. Her role in the Innovate Group was of marketer and graphic/web designer. She likes to observe the environment that surrounds her and offer new solutions to everyday problems, giving a small contribution to this changing world.

Arinola Nnatuanya

Arinola Nnatuanya is a student at Kingston University in MA in Music and the Creative Economy: a combination of music business and production. She has a first degree in Computer Science and a few years ago decided to change her career part. She has a Higher National Diploma in Music Performance and has a passion for developing people musically. Arinola enjoys singing and is part of the choir in her local church. Her hobbies include drawing, DIY and swimming. she is responsible for PR within the group.

Camilla Dickson

Camilla Dickson is taking an MA in Management and the Creative Economy. She also has a first degree in dance. Camilla hopes to own a dance agency in the near future. She is responsible for market research within the team. One of her roles was to deal with questionnaires and interviews.

Jide Onikoyi

Jide Onikoyi studied Business Administration at the University of Hertfordshire. The aim of studying the M.A in International Business Management with Entrepreneurship is to build on his existing knowledge base, increase his career prospects & experience the practicality of running of a business enterprise. His passion for experiencing different cultures and customs was the primary motivation for coming to study in the United Kingdom. His role in the Innovate Group was of Financial Adviser.

1. Description of Company’s Product/Service and what made it unique compared to its competitors.

Innovate Group provides a networking platform for Kingston University, especially for its students, Alumni and faculty members. The platform is available on the Internet anywhere at anytime. It can be found at the URL www.kingstonuni.biz and the official name is BizBoard (BB). The inspiration for this business comes from observing Kingston University lifestyle and trying to understand what is missing. Moreover, in todays economic environment, that is still dealing with the recession, it is very difficult to find a suitable job, so the idea that the Innovate Group is forwarding is “if you can’t find a job that suits you, invent it!” The aim is to help students find each other, work on projects or run businesses together, and seek assistance where required. This would hopefully create a 360° experience university life.

The initial page of the platform will look very similarly to this one:

Image 1: Initial Page (index) of kingstonuni.biz

Browse Calendar will be useful to keep yourself updated with what is happening in the University.

Use the Job Board is useful to find interesting job opportunities in order to pimp up the students CV, to share skills or make a little extra money.

Get Advice from entrepreneurial professionals that can help students to set up and run their own business. The world is full of people who can inspire and give advice, like mentors.

Get credit or training in order to find out about other modules and workshops that are available from other faculties within the university.

Find Funding can help students to set up their businesses.

Be social will help students to look for interesting clubs; students can read stories from other students and professionals who have become successful in their industry; competitions and opportunities will be available for students.

The service that Innovate is providing is unique because it is designed to bring Kingston University creative people together, by providing an environment where students, lecturers and Alumni of the university can meet others with similar passions or interests. Moreover, members can take advantage of job opportunities and various resources. It differs from all the other social networks today available because is specifically for Kingston University students and since it is exclusively for them, this will make them feel special and unique. 

From our observations and surveys to Kingston University students and lecturers we realised that the university has a problem: Kingston University Campuses are all scattered around Kingston town and there is no space for students to find each other and share their knowledge, passions and interests outside the classroom environment. Right now it is very difficult for students to identify potential key partners in ambitious projects, help in academic work, job or internships opportunity, or just new friends. We are offering a solution with the BB online networking platform where students can find each other, create their own business, meet new people to work with, and stay updated with entrepreneurial events, competition and job opportunities.

2. Describe your customer segment and how you researched their needs. What was your value proposition to them?

Target Audience

There are over 21 000 students, and over 2 000 professors at Kingston University. In fact, the primary target audience are Kingston University students who are interested in entrepreneurial skills and events, but above all, it is for students who want to challenge themselves to set up and run their own business. Professors, who can also post requests for research or project assistants, are our secondary target audience.

Moreover, there is a tertiary target audience who are Alumni’s, who can post job opportunities that are available in their industries so that students are aware and can make use of the opportunities, or just keep updated with what is happening at the University even if they have left.

In a few words, the Innovate Group is targeting a market niche that requires special needs.

Moreover, the platform can benefit the University by improving its reputation thanks to the student relationships and the entrepreneurial skills that can be created and developed through the platform.

Research Techniques

Innovate Group main research technique was of observing and talking to students about their university experience. In addition to this, we felt empathy with our end users, since we are students just like them. Our perception of things can be altered simply by the angle we choose to look at something and creativity arises from our ability to see things from a different angles.

We did different types of market research, which include questionnaires and brief one to one interviews and we found that:

• 85% of the Kingston university students we spoke to considered themselves to be creative individuals.
• 65% felt there were not enough opportunities for creative individuals to share their work and interests.
• 80% said that if there is an opportunity made available for creative networking and learn how to set up and run a business, they would participate.

 

Value Proposition

We, as creative students, have found that there is a need in the Kingston University student experience: an opportunity for creative and passionate students to communicate, network and develop ideas into real businesses together. The value proposition is the unique value a business offers to its customers, and networking is the wave of web 2.0 and it will continue to be in web 3.0 and mobile web. In general, social networks are “connections with other people” and for Kingston University students BB will be a way to find partners and network if they want to set up their own business or just develop entrepreneurial skills.

3. What were your key activities? Key partners? Key resources?

As apart of coming up with the idea to create an entrepreneurial platform for students and faculty at our university we had some obvious tasks that we had to undertake.

Activities

Designing the website

Our whole idea and service is based on a website so this was obviously a fundamental part of the Innovate Group activities. We were involved in designing the website and orchestrating how it would look and the content that would be included in it.

Finding and building content

The whole premise of the BizBoard is to provide information that would allow students and faculty to gain access to knowledge and insight that would allow them to sufficiently create and run there own enterprise, so naturally the content of the website would be a very important part. We needed to create and find content that would be beneficial to our users and incorporate that into the website. We were able to do this through reaching out to different faculties, groups and societies around the university, such as Kingston Entrepreneurs, in order to find out what each section can offer to our users in the shape of events, workshops, mentors, contacts etc.

Marketing the website

Image 2: Poster for BB

Innovate Group main task was to find a strategic way to advertise the BizBoard to our potential users. Due to the nature of our service, publicity is crucial to its success because if we cannot create up enough buzz, no one will know about the platform and no one will manage to enjoy and benefit from it. According to our target audience, we used particular marketing strategies that we felt would be the most effective for each audience, i.e. if were targeting students, being attractive a colourful would be our main route. The main messages of the marketing strategies have been sent to the target audience through effective communication channels.

Partners

Kingston Entrepreneurs

We have teamed up with the young entrepreneur society to create this service and they will continue with the service after we leave.  They have been a great resource, allowing us includes some of their events and services into our calendar and site.

Resources

Kingston University

A key resource for the Innovate Group was the Kingston University, which decided to fund the work of the group with £5,031.00. Due to the huge benefit that the platform can bring to students, the university agreed to help us with the development of the service in terms of financial backing. One of the biggest assets of our website is that it allows for the easy communication between faculties and that is a huge benefit to the university reputation and its students.  They provided all necessary funding that the group needed to create and continue to run the site, but above all to market it among the audience.

4. Describe your Branding and Design Strategy (logo, packaging, style, product, etc), what channels did you use to reach your customers? Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of what you did.

Branding and Design

The design of the platform was outsources to a designer, one of the reasons for this was to allow creativity with the design. We decided to outsource it because no one in the group had the skills needed to implement the platform.

However, within the group Ilaria was the designer, and she dealt with the branding side, concentrating more on the Innovate Group, rather than the BizBoard.

The Innovate Logo

Image 3: Innovate Group Logo

The logo is divided up in three different parts. The essential part is the group’s name: Innovate. This name means literally “I am innovation”, “I am change”, but above all, “I want to be part of this innovative network”. The message that we want to send is that the person participating is part of the change process through innovation; you and what you love and know are the innovation.

The letter “i” with the circular blue background emphasises the fact that the group is a sort of information centre. This also sends the message that there is more than the site. The colour of the background shows that the group is connected with Kingston University, since the colour used is very similar, even if not the same, due to copyright policies.

The Slogan Kingston University Networking was originally Innovation by you, This was changed to make the give more clarity about what the business is about. Kingston University Networking is quite straightforward, moreover it leaves many doors open: the group can work on Internet based networks, but also it can deal with networking events and PR that are held at the university.

Kingstonuni.biz

Image 1 shows how the website is. In this case colours are essential and an important part of the branding and design in order to be eye catching and appealing. Another fundamental aspect of the design of the website was its user- friendliness: we decided to make it easy and fast to use. In order to reach our goal we made a few prototypes and tested it out with some students. In addition, we asked students what was missing in the platform and what could be changed to meet more their needs.

Communication Channels

Facebook 

Our biggest target audience are the students and one of the most effective ways in today’s society to reach out to them is through the use of Facebook. We created a Facebook page about our service, in hopes of getting it seen by more people and were also able to get it sent to friends and have friends pass it on and so forth. We also put a link to the Facebook page on the business blog, so that we could see how many of the page visitors actually felt that this was a good idea, so we could better determine if there was a strong enough market for it.  A major strength of using this method is the amount of traffic that Facebook has and its potential to reach a magnitude of people. On the other hand a weakness is that in order to reach the multitudes you need to create a following and that can be difficult when not many people know who you are.

YouTube

We created a video advertisement for the publicity of our service, which was short depiction of what our service does. We put a copy of this video on YouTube, which is used by millions of people everyday. The main strength of the BB advert is its tune: it sticks easily the viewers mind, thus making it memorable and effective. On the other hand, just as with Facebook, reaching the critical mass can be difficult.

Word of mouth

We have on many occasions advertised our service around the university by talking to students and faculty and personally telling them what it involves and the benefits it has, especially through the two fairs in which we participated. This is a good way to advertise because you have the opportunity to personally speak with your potential customers and explain the personal benefits that the site can give to each person. On the downside, word of mouth can be limiting in terms of how many people it can actually reach.

Faculty email

We wanted to personally let the different faculties know about our website, so we wrote a short letter explaining the service and highlighting the uses that it has for each faculty. We felt this would be a great idea because by letting the heads of each faculty know about our service, they would be able to let there faculties know how they can correctly use our service.

 Trade fair

The trade fair gave us a chance to set up a stall and “sell” our ideas to students and members of the public. The trade fair is a great way of practically demonstrating our service to potential customers and we were able to gain a lot of interest from students who gave us there details so we could contact them with further information. Though, trade fairs cant be done every week, so its not a regular advertisement method.

Business Blog

We also keep a business blog (http://kuinnovate.wordpress.com), which we regularly update, in order to keep our customers and potential consumers updated about what is going on with our business and its content. This is good resource for our customers so that they can be kept updated about the service and how we are nurturing it.

5. What were your company policies, IP and other legal considerations?

Innovate Policies:

·               The Data Protection Act (1998) applies to all users of this social network.

·               Offensive or unauthorised comments or materials are not allowed on this site.

·               No illegal activities or businesses are allowed to trade via this network.

·               Innovate reserves the right to carry out regular security check on Kingstonuni.biz to monitor the activities being carried out on it.

·               A member’s account will be disabled once the member has made a request to be removed from the social network.

·               We always appreciate your feedback or other suggestions about Kingstonuni.biz.

Disciplinary Procedures:

·               Failure to comply with these conditions of use for this site may result in the withdrawal of access to the social network site.

·               Any breaches of the policy may result in disciplinary action being taken. In cases where criminal law may have been breached the Police will be notified.

6. Describe your cost structure, listing expenses and Income (includes number of sales or contracts, uses YE worksheet of Profit & Loss Statement and a photo of your product/service with details of how it was costed for each element)

The service provided by the Innovate Group, is free to its customers who are Kingston University students, lecturers and alumni.

However, Innovate Group was able to secure funding of £5,031.00 from Kingston University to design a central, social website that would encourage cross faculty collaboration between students looking to start their own business.

Corrine Beaumont, (University Lecturer) is an associated partner who worked closely with the company in networking, design & branding stages of the service development.

Below is a brief financial summary of the costs incurred.

Revenue

Contract from Kingston University  = £5031

Company Fund = £400

Total Revenue = £5431.00

Expenses

Website Installation

Website Design = £49.40

Website contents  = £98.80

Website Hosting= £25 per year

 

Marketing & Advertising Cost

Promotional Video Design = £197.60

Leaflets = £80 (800 copies)

Posters x 25(A3) = £40.00

T- shirts x 4 = £40.00

Pop up x 1 = £89.00

Prize Draw

Winning team = £500.00

2x Second prizes of =  £250.00

 

Labour Cost

Trade Fairs = £98.80

Branding/design of website & Content added to the website = £1002.00

Wages for the directors of the company = £494

Future website developments= £2,216.40

Includes wages for animation, graphic and marketing students, and materials.

Total Trading Expense = £5,431.00

Innovate Group achieved break even during the trading period. Innovate Group will not have to pay the required 20% corporation ax as the company did not make any profit during the trading period.

7. What were the key challenges that you faced and how did you overcome them?

Time Management

Managing and optimizing time has posed some challenges to the Innovate Group, as most of the directors have work and academic schedules. Allocating sufficient time to the business especially toward the beginning of the year has being somewhat problematic. This is largely due to other factors that compete with the directors time, these factors include – family matters, course work, dissertation, work commitment, social life and religious obligations.

Covey’s time management matrix has been applied by Innovate directors, to help identity and organise tasks according to their level of importance and urgency. This has produced some improvement in the company’s effective use of time.

Gaining critical mass 

Gaining the critical mass necessary for the website has been a key challenge. Although the company was able to create awareness about the service and sign up interested students at the trade fairs, much work still needs to be done to get the required amount of traffic.

Critical mass will determine if Innovate, will get future funding from the University for further development of the business. This shows the importance of creating awareness and getting a large number of students to use the website. Getting the heads of departments and lecturers interested in the service could help alleviate the problem. They could make Biz Board part of the curriculum, were lecturers could post relevant information on the website that students are required to access. This should help overcome the challenge of getting critical mass.

Kingston University Bureaucracy

The Universities bureaucracy and administration had an impact on the group’s creativity. Since Kingston University was our main and only client, it was important to keep to the regulations of the university and their and needs. The university gave the team essential funding, but the group had to give enough time to allow for their ideas to be processed inline with the Universities regulations. This made the process of delivery slow.

8. What would you have done differently?

First of all, the Innovate Group would have done the market research in a different and deeper way in order to understand what the target audience really wanted. These could have been through questionnaires, interviews or focus groups to gain better understanding of the end users needs.

Firstly, the marketing strategies could have been more intense, in order to create awareness about the BizBoard and easily reach the critical mass. Secondly, a deeper market research would have helped us to create our marketing strategies around the end user, to demonstrate how BizBoard solves the problem of networking and how finding a business partner within the University can be of benefit to them.

We should have networked more with Kingston University administration and other companies outside the university. This would have helped a lot in order to understand exactly what we had to do, in terms of running a business and implementing the website.

Another thing that we could have done differently was to fake the networking platform more through prototypes, so that we could have the clearest idea possible for the website.

9. What was the most successful part of your business?

The idea of setting up a business network that forges collaboration between the four campuses, alumni’s and an other entrepreneurial bodies within the university is in itself a successful venture based on its relevance to the University.

The most successful part of our business was the creativity within the team. The ability to make something exciting and different without holding back played a key role in the formation of the Kingston University Business Network.

Our idea started off as a social network for students to advertise their skills as well as network but a few weeks into the into the project, we found out that another team had a similar business idea which pushed us as team to come up with something new and different.

Another successful aspect of the business was getting Kingston University to fund the project. These funds have made it easier for the team to explore various ideas that would other wise have been a limitation due to financial resources.

10. How did running a business prepare you for future entrepreneurship?

As a team, the setting up and running of a business was relatively new to us individually. It has been an exciting venture for us, and the wealth of knowledge and expertise that we have acquired through this experience is priceless.

Through the setting up and running of Innovate, we have gained more insight and understanding into the dynamics of how a successful and sustainable business is setup and run. The various processes involved that act as boundaries to ensure sustainability and the crucial role that the consumer plays in the creation and sustainability of a business idea. The emotional, cognitive and physical aspect of meeting the needs of the consumer has been very insightful and enlightening.

Looking at the Kingstonuni.biz social network project, there are a few main points that we all agreed was a learning curve for us towards our future aspirations. These points are listed below.

·               Thinking but also doing something about those thoughts. Putting ourselves and our ideas out there.

·               Dealing with real life scenarios and having to apply practical steps to those scenarios. Coming to terms with last minute changes that made need to occur for the success of the business.

·               The importance of teamwork and the dynamics of working within a team of people with different personalities and views. Learning how to manage each other’s expectations. Showing consideration for each other and the business project.

·               Being open to other people’s ideas and to be willing to take risks by trying something new and different.

·               The importance of creating the right image and perception of a business when branding.

·               The awareness that a business idea can change and take a different form from what it started off as. As a team, we had to modify our initial ideas slightly to meet the needs of Kingston University. We started off with the idea of providing a social network for students to advertise their skills as well as network but the end product has been the Kingston University Business Social network that forges collaboration between the four campuses, alumni’s and other entrepreneurial bodies within the university.

Through exposure and networking, we met and communicated with various members of out partnering companies and we wouldn’t have ordinarily met or made contact with due to the difference in faculties and areas of study and professionalism. We met with members of young enterprise and communicated with the deans of faculties within the university. We also got to meet a diverse number of students through the fairs.

Thank you very much to the other members of the Innovate Group for this year great work: Arinola, Camilla and Jide

Compassion2One

Compassion2One is a non-profit organisation that rescue lives of children and young people from sex trafficking. A few Fridays ago we had the chance to meet Jerry Leisure the regional director for the United Kingdom of the organisation.

He asked for our innovative and creative ideas in order to raise the awareness about this important and unethical issue during the Olympics period in July – August 2012. I am really proud to say that me and my team, composed by Juliet, David and Arinola (a really international team) managed to win, even if all the ideas were amazing! We are a really thoughtful and creative class :). As you can see from the video we had many ideas, in order to try to reach EVERYBODY, from the student, to parents and old people.

I feel strongly about this issue, probably because I am a woman, and since I was a little kid, my parents always told me to not trust adults that I didn’t know… and I have been very lucky, no one ever payed attention to me! But thinking about these young girls, and boys, and thinking that it could have been me, or my little sister or my future kids, it really breaks my heart. I can’t understand how some people have the courage to these things. First, how can someone, who is him/herself  a son or daughter, or maybe he or she has kids of its own, do something like this to innocent children, meaning taking them away from their family, but above all abuse them sexually and pay for it. You people really disgust me. The only thing that you deserve is that they would do it to you in your next life, and lets see how you feel.

I just think that this is one of the most horrible things that are happening in our modern world. I do not know if this ever happened in the past eras, but now the world is really crap from this point of view. When I think about these things the idea of one day having my own children, just does not feel right. I would just be a mean and selfish person to give birth to a child in this dangerous and crappy world. People say we should see the positive side of things, but when child sex trafficking or issues like this come up, there is really nothing positive about it.

I will state Jerry Leisure himself, in order to give us hope:

I genuinely believe the intellectual horsepower of tomorrows generation is going to make the difference today and onwards. I am committed to taking all of your ideas and put them into action in the UK and globally.  I am really excited about what each of us can do to save “one child at a time!”

Advertising Love Chapter 3

For an assignment for Advertising Strategy and Planning we have to create a one year campaign for functional yoghurt.

Objective: Create awareness among a target audience (25-34 ABC1 male and female) of the new functional yoghurt HEA.

Advertising Strategy

Key Message

The strategy that will be used for this advertising campaign is cartoons and fairy tales. The main message that will be sent to the audience, and that it will be underlined in all adverts, is that HEA Yoghurt is tasty, satisfying, a healthy meal substitute. Throughout the campaign it will use four different stories extracted from fairy tales that would help to send a clear message to the audience. The campaign will use cartoons, so an illustrator and an animator will be needed.

Creative Strategy

A carton execution has been chosen because is less expensive and can be considered more memorable and creative. Moreover, it can be argued that a cartoon style is in coherence with the fairy tales that are executed throughout the campaign.

It is supposed that the audience are aware of these stories and that are part of their childhood traditions, so it is easy for them to comprehend and associate. Moreover, fairy tales have the function to entertain, inspire, and enlighten the audience. In these narratives the main characters are usually humans who often follow a typical pattern that is resolved partly by magic, in this case HEA yoghurt. The fact that these wonder tales still appeal confirms their richness and effectiveness as a symbolic communication. As said, these tales are all familiar to our target audience and this will help them to ‘get’ the humour of the parody in the advert.

What is more, the ads will also all underline that the product is 100% British and they will all take place in the London area, since is where our target audience lives, so that they could identify themselves in the adverts.

In addition to this, it has been thought to do a campaign also in supermarkets, such as Tesco and Sainsbury where poster can be placed near the shelves where the yoghurts will be situated. This is to attract the attention and create awareness among the people who did not have the chance to see the online videos or billboards around London and Greater London.

Mood

The mood of the advertising can be summed up with three words: humorous, nostalgic and joyful. Humorous because the cartoons proposed are a parody of the real ones; nostalgic because the audience will be reminded of their childhood when they see it; and joyful due to cartoon execution that would take place.

Execution and Action

The adverts of this one year campaign will begin with a voice over saying “Once upon a time…”, engaging the audience into the story and will end with the strap line “Healthily Ever After”. This is to give to the campaign consistency.

Stage 1: September to December 2011

Little Red Riding Hood

The advert that will launch the campaign will be based on the Brothers Grimm’s story of “Little Red Riding Hood”. There is this girl with a red hood that is going to bring a basket of HEA to her grandmother. On her way, she meets a terrible wolf that asks what she has in her basket. She explains that the yoghurt is very satisfying and tasty and can be a perfect substitute of a meal. The wolf is curious, so he tries it and he is surprised for how gratifying and delicious it is. He feels so full and happy that he leaves without trying to eat nor the grandmother, nor Little Red Riding Hood, and everyone lives healthily ever after.

Example: Script for Red Riding Hood

[Voice Over]

Once upon a time…

[Red Riding Hood (RRH) walking happily through Hyde Park, happy music in the background. A scary wolf approaches her.]

[Voice Over]

There was Red Riding Hood skipping through Hyde Park.

Wolf: Hello Red Riding Hood! What do you have in your fancy basket?

RRH: Hello freighting wolf… Oh, in my basket I have something very special for my granny! Its HEA yoghurt and it is very good, so tasty! The best part is that if you eat it you would be so satisfied that you will not need anything else, just this. Mmm, its a perfect meal substitute!

Wolf: It looks so yummy. Can I have one?

RRH: Yes, sure, take one!

[The Wolf takes a pot, opens it and eats a big spoon of it.]

Wolf: This is really tasty and I feel already gratified! I feel like I will not eat you… today.

[RRH looks weirdly at the wolf leaving happily with his HEA yoghurt pot].

[Voice Over]

HEA, healthily ever after! The End!

Stage 2: January 2012

A Christmas Carol

Immediately after the Christmas and New Years food binging, HEA will launch a new advert based on Dicken’s “A Christmas Carol”. Briefly, there will be past Christmases ghost that will bring the main character to see what he has eaten throughout the years during the Christmas period. This will make the oddly nice Uncle Scrooge realise that after the Christmas 2011 he has to put himself on a diet in order to be healthier. He will find HEA satisfying, tasty and a perfect substitute for a meal and will help him to lose useless weight and living healthily ever after.

Stage 3: March to May 2012

Goldilocks and the Three Bears

During the spring period of 2012, HEA will launch a new advert based on Robert Southey’s “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” story. This advert will feature Goldilocks entering the house of the three bears and finding three different pots of yoghurt from three different brands. She tries the first two pots, but they are not delicious enough, but when she tries the third pot (HEA) of the baby bear, she loves it and eats it all up. After eating it she will be so full and satisfied that she will fall asleep anywhere, leaving untouched the bears’ beds and all will live healthily ever after.

Stage 4: June to August 2012

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

The last ad of our campaign will be based on the Brother Grimm’s story of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” and will run in the summer of 2012. It will feature an undecided Snow White that has two chose from two different healthy snacks: the classic apple and HEA yoghurt. After hearing a voice over that comes from her unconscious, that lists all the benefits of HEA, she will go for the yoghurt, saving her life, her slender body figure and living healthily ever after.

Many thanks to Juliet, Bernardo and Alma for helping out in this project!

Advertising Love Chapter 1

Everytime I talk about advertising I get excited. I don’t love ALL adverts, but some of them enclose some short stories that make me laugh, turn up my nose or make me shiver with emotions.

Advertising is my specialism, and I have always been fascinated by it, since I was a little kid. I remember that when I was about 6 or 7 years old, on Sunday night there were the TV replicas of the Carosello. Carosello was a very famous ten-minute advertising program broadcasted every evening from 8:50 to 9:00 PM on Italian national TV, and it ran for twenty years straight from the late Fifties until the late Seventies. It was a huge success and, for generations of Italian kids, the end of a Carosello episode marked the time to go to bed (I saw the replicas because I was born at the end of the 1980s).

This is Susanna Tutta Panna, and she was my favourite character from the Invernizzi (dairy products company) ads.

“Everything is better with Coca-Cola”

For example, this is the Coca-Cola ad in the Carosello: it is interesting to see how they built short stories around the brand, this one is even in rime, I am sorry that it doesn’t have sub title.In brief, it tells a story of a man who goes to space to defeat an evil man in order to save the Earth.

Emotional: after saving the world from evil, you need refresh with Coca- Cola (and a nice girl).
Physical: Its refreshing and it comes in a nice bottle.
Cognitive: Buy Coca- Cola, because everything tastes better with it.

However, above all, it is interesting to see how advertising was not avoided during that period of history. Why isn’t anymore like this? What did it change?

fortunately there are still some great ads nowadays, and there are several that I really like. However, to extend my learning, I looked for new ads that have just been made for the Super Bowl 2011. I have watched many of them, and I can’t choose!

The mini Darth Vader in “The Force”

Emotional: Perseverance pays after all, maybe with some help from dad.
Physical: The new Volkswagen has the force, the power.
Cognitive: The new passat will be soon available, in the mean time check the website.

Doritos

Emotional: the best part is licking you fingers or the crumbles left behind.
Physical: Doritos with cheese are even better than the normal ones.
Cognitive: Doritos make these chips, just go and buy them.

Emotional: Doritos are so good that dogs would pull down doors in order to have them.
Physical: Doritos are so good.
Cognitive: Doritos make these chips, just go and buy them.

And if you are really into Super Bowl Adverting, don’t miss this:

and this:

Last minute add: A few months ago I saw at the cinema this really cool ad. Today I was at the gym and so it again on TV and I thought I would share it with you!

Emotional: imagination meets engineering.
Physical: great sports car.
Cognitive: feel the sporty soul of this car.

Check out also this ad for Virgin airlines!

Emotional: stylish and sexy airline.
Physical: fly comfortably with Virgin.
Cognitive: Virgin has got it all.

The Start Up Tool Kit

Here we are at the fist stage of our business: filling up the start-up tool kit that kindly Rob Fitzpatrick developed for us new creatives. The Startup Toolkit is an web-based collaboration tool, where founders can write, revise, and share their business plans and ideas.

“My core belief for the product is that by writing down your business hypotheses (or leaps of faith or risks or whatever you call them), you focus yourself on the correct questions, which is how to validate the big mysteries as quickly and cheaply as possible. That with just that tiny touch of scaffolding, we can make smarter decisions and be more successful.” [Source: Rob Fitzpatrick @ http://www.readwriteweb.com/start/2010/06/the-startup-toolkit-a-canvas-f.php%5D

Me and my I-NNOVATE Group had to rethink of our business, since there had been some misunderstanding with another team, but for sure this will not stop us!

We decided, with the help of Corinne, to create a network for KU students: something similar to facebook, but for a smaller niche. However, after the very useful lecture that Fitzpatrick taught us last friday, me and my group tried to fill in our first canvas.

I found filling up the canvas very useful because it helped us to make our minds up for certain things and made us think about other aspects that we just did not think about. I noticed that all our ideas found the exact place and they made actually sense!

Now, the next step will be to create a cheap prototype and some questionnaires so that we can explain, in the best way possible, our project to the dragon den.

As Mr Fitzpatrick said, we need to find a way to “fake” our project so that we can test it in a fast and cheap way. He told us mainly to focus on these points if we want to succeed in the first steps of your business:

This week we have to finish to develop our prototypes and decide to which platforms rely to create our own network.

Concerning prototype and usability testing, I found these very interesting ways that could be developed in our project:

We will  let you know by the next weeks how it goes! 😉

I-NNOVATE innovation by you

Finally, me and my business group have taken something very interesting out of their hats! I am glad to stert presenting:

I-NNOVATE

innovation by you

Our aim it to create an event that will take place at a campus of Kingston University that engages studends to perform their passion in any art. Such will be used to create a 360° I-NNOVATE EXPERIENCE. It is an event that will involve all the use of all our sense, divided it up in different areas: I-MOVE, involving dance and any body language performances; I-SOUND, involving any performances connected to music; I-FEEL, performances dedicated to touching, feeling with your hands, such as touchable art or feel emotions through your eyes like art and photography…even with your mouth (this is still a question mark!); I-SENSE, a sense that not al people think about: our smell.

The message that we want to send to our target is that they can finally present their ideas of beign innovative in their own discipline or passion. Our is also an idea of sharing: sharing experiences, knowledge and passion. All student who want to show their innovative talent are invited to join. We will ask student who want to participate to the performance to give a “donation” that still have to be decided to improve the next possible similar events and to cover our initial costs, and maybe, to create a small profit.Moreover, we though to invite all the Design Thinking class to join us, and moreover the Dragon Den and the faculty!

We decided to to something university based beacause we noticed that at KH capus there are not many social events dedicated to student having fun. There are no interactive events created by students for students. Uni life should be more fun, its not only about assignments, group work, lectures, talks… but a moment of our life. So we thought about an event that engaes all students to participate to make it good.

The value that we would like to send is the possibility to meet new people, contacts, freinds. The possibility to learn something from these performances, maybe something new. Above all, is an opportunity for passionate people to show their skills, what they can give to society and the university.

We just enede our meeting, and this is what we came up with: VIDEO (this is just trying out a new program that I downloaded… I am not very happy with it, the video should be improved, a lot!)

Banging my head in and on this

Researching, observing, analysing, thinking…. I am literally banging my head on the wall to think about a business for Design Thinking Project. I should say that I have a few ideas in my head, but if someone asks me to write 100 words about my business I would write:

Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business Business

This is what I have now in my hands and the dragons are coming…. they will literally eat me if I don’t find a drastic solution as soon as possible.

For reading week I went back home in Milan, and when I was coming back with the plane i bought one of my favourite magazines: WIRED. In here, I found a very interesting article about a portal, a search engine, dedicated especially to health care. When I read the article I thought that it was a great idea, because it would accomplish the specific needs of specific patients. Instead of looking all over the web for an address or phone number, a patient can easily look up on this website and find all he or she needs. Moreover, patients have the opportunity to leave comments about the service they received in that specific clinic or whatever, so this would also be useful to doctors because they have some sort of feed back. In the UK the website is http://www.patientopinion.org.uk (includes also a blog) and they just open a similar web site for an Italian public: http://www.pazienti.org.

However, just looking at the design, I feel that both of these can be improved. They can be more interactive, more colourful, more dynamic, offer different services, divide it up in different categories… there could be loads of stuff that can be improved. I would like to keep the idea of a very user-friendly website, but it would also be good to have it a bit  prettier. Who said that something concerning health care that is easy to use have to be dull and sad? Maybe we can start doing this within the Kingston borders, working in partner with the City Council and the official website of Kingston Upon Thames (yes, right now I am thinking on top of my head!) This has also still to be discussed within my group, but I think we will find a way around it!

Where are we really going?

I’m so sorry for my belated blog posts. Very busy days just passed, and busier weeks are ahead.

MY PERSONA

On Friday 22^nd October, we learned what is story telling and how does it work. I found it very fascinating how you can use technology or simple words to express a problem and think about a solution.

For my persona, I chose someone very differetent from me, because I wanted to learn something about someone who has a totally different background/culture from mine. I chose a student because it is mainly us that do not have the possibility to have our own car or motorbike, so we have to use public transport.

Christophine is a 19-year-old British born Indian girl, studying nursery. She loves travelling, Italian food, animals and children. Her dream is to travel the world doing a nurse and then settling down in her favourite place and open a hospital with her boyfriend, who studies med school in Nottingham. Christophine takes the bus every morning to go to university and for social or personal purposes since she does not have a car. She said that the bus service is ok, but feels that it can be improved and less expensive, even if she has her personal student oyster card.

VIDEO REFLECTIONS

Tim Brown- Innovation Through design Thinking

First of all, the video briefly recaps what we have learned until now during Design Thinking class in a very dynamic way. In this way, I had the chance to have a broader look at what exactly Corinne is teaching us and what we should do if we want to be successful in the Creative Economies.

Innovation and design are important topics in today’s society. Looking at Brown’s video, we learnt that design is everywhere and its trying to give to customers and consumers a 360° experience. However, design is not just about beauty and coolness, but it tackles a whole range of creative business issues. It’s a way to create

-the future

-new strategies

-new brands that have a meaning for people

-and explore new technologies

-a new way to connect to customers through services and technological weapons

-new ideas for improving internal communication in companies.

Design Thinking wants to create value in the world through an innovative approach.

It is important to approach innovation through the “lens of people”, also know as empathy. To do this, there are 3 specific phases:

1)     INSPIRATION– where ideas come from.

To do this, you have to get out into the world, and observe, as Corinne always pushed us to do so. We should learn to use the world as a source of inspiration through LOOKING, LISTENING and TRYING.

2)     IDEATION– having good ideas.

Ideas are built through prototyping: you have to show people that you have arrived somewhere though your inspiration. The key words here are CHEAP and QUICK.

3)     IMPLEMENTATION– doing something good with what you have obtained.

Storytelling is a good way to develop and express your ideas, because sometimes stories can help to join the dots.

However, innovation could also be considered a synonym of technology. Technology connects people all over the world. In fact, we use mediums to receive or send how we or others are feeling. This happens because lives are lived on networks, for example, you can see someone laughing because he or she is checking their facebook or mobile.

With innovation it is meant:

Choose a problem, tell a story, offer a solution.

However, before innovating, you need to know what is behind it or that something. From my book, How to be an explorer of the world, I read that

“Things that seem for the moment meaningless or irrelevant, using the twists and turns of the creative process, lead you back to an important encounter that at first seemed quite neutral or even something that made you feel repelled or exasperated”.

So, something like the bus system, I thought it was stupid at the beginning, but after studying it and analysing it, I realised that is an interesting system where people lives meet and, sometimes, depend on them.

What a Journey…!

This week that is about to end has been a very busy. I have to say that I really gained a lot of empathy about different public systems (and the stress that they can procure to you when using them). My parents were in London this past weekend, so I got the tube more than 100 times for sure; I withdrew money from a cash withdrawal a few times, and I observed how the London public bus service works.

In class we did different exercises to understand what is exactly a system. We had to concentrate to think how we get to class and some colleagues acted it out in a very funny way. We observed the library entrance and looked at the specific movements the students were doing while entering the library. Moreover, I had to remove a pebble from my shoe, so I went to the library receptionist and asked why there is a barrier at the library. Fortunately, the man behind has been very helpful and told me:

Well, there is a barrier just for counting students. It is not for security reasons. It is just for counting the students and check which faculties use more the library.

As said, this week we observed how a SYSTEM works. A system is a set of interacting or interdependent entities forming an integrated whole, in our case creating the User System Model .

By visually mapping out the relationships in this way, it becomes easier to identify which aspects of the system may or may not be included in the solution or considered by the designer.

This ‘USER’ system model acts as a framework that identifies first, the people involved in an activity and secondly, how objects, roles and rules can be adjusted to improve the overall experience for the user and people involved.

©2010 Corrine Beaumont

As a fun part, we also had to act how the Tube entrance works, and I did the ticket inspector: I did not know what to do, so I did a crappy job of my role play, and above all, I have never been a good actress!

This week I observed a system that I think it was quite boring: the system of London’s public transportation, especially busses and I realised that it is not so boring!

This is what I found out while observing busses and stations:

What would happen if there are no rules or roles that observe that the rules are followed? The bus service would not be as accurate and there would be misunderstandings of different types.

What would happen if the people who work at petrol stations were on strike? No petrol, no busses and very agry users. Additionally, no user need would be accomplished because no busses would be around.

What would happen if the cleaners would not clean the bus? The bus would become very disgusting and no one would like to use it.

What if no one has a valid ticket or oyster card to get on the bus, as a rule strictly say? The public company would for sure go bankrupt, leaving everyone by foot.

So, a system that looked boring and  straight forward became more complex and interesting by asking myself the questions above, or at least I tried to make it more interesting.

To analyse in a deeper sense a system, I decided to compare it with Milano’s public transportation called ATM, just to show the differences and give the worst possible example of a system, just like this picture shows:

And this is what I observed:

I have to say that Milano’s public transportation is not really the best of the world, but for sure it can be considered one of the worst in Europe, as a famous video by Bruno Bozzetto shows ( VIDEO) To synthesis the video, we can use this image that discusses  bus transportation.

To conclude, it can be said that the system of public transportation is very important to accomplish user needs, and new ways have to be discovered in order to make it always more efficient and better. Milano’s public transportation have to follow the example of London’s public transportation, and London could find new ways to improve its already good efficient system.

Loads can be still done in order encourage people to use public transport and leave their cars at home, in order to decrease pollution, but this will happen only when the public transportation system will be 100% efficient— if this goal can be achived, the world will be safe.