Best Free MOOCs in Business In March

Design Thinking for Business Innovation

School: University of Virginia (Darden)

Platform: Coursera

Registration Link: REGISTER HERE

Start Date: February 27, 2017 (4 Weeks Long)

Workload: 2-4 Hours Per Week

Instructor: Dr. Jeanne M. Liedtka

Credentials: Professor Liedtka has taught at Darden for nearly 25 years. Her teaching focuses on design thinking, innovation, and organic growth – and she has published four books on those topics. During her tenure, she has also served as Darden’s Associate Dean.

Graded: Not Specified

Description: Design thinking, which starts with a solution and works backwards, has grown increasingly popular in business circles. In this course, students will work off a four step model: What is; What if; What wows; and What works? Using this model, students will review case studies on organizations ranging from start ups like MeYouHealth to established companies like IBM on how to innovate in their markets and grow their businesses. Students will also examine how their own mindsets and assumptions can undermine the development process and inhibit the outcomes they seek. The course will be taught through a series of videos and online discussions. Students will also apply this four question model – and its accompanying toolkit – to a business challenge in their lives.

Review: “This is a pretty good course, but it feels sometimes that what they really are trying to do is to encourage and force you to buy a book by the professor Liedtka. So it doesn’t really feels like you study a lot of materials, it feels more like you are talking about just one book by the professsor. When it just began there was no Statement of Accomplishment but participants kinda asked for it so they came up with the final exam idea which is super simple.”