Mick Brougham from Enterprise Ireland was our guest speaker on April 9th.
Mick spoke about design thinking which is an approach that uses the designer’s sensibility and methods for problem solving to meet people’s needs in a technologically feasible and commercially viable way.
Design thinking is human-centered innovation and was pioneered by IDEO (a global design and innovation firm) who use the methodology to do everything from stimulate customer savings at Bank of America to revamp nursing shifts at Kaiser Permanente.
Over the past 30 years, the firm has tackled the challenge of delivering a needle-free vaccine for Intercell, building a better Pringle for Procter & Gamble, revitalising the bicycling experience for Shimano, and rethinking airport-security checkpoints for the TSA. It has racked up more than 1,000 patents since 1978 and won 346 design awards since 1991, more than any other firm. IDEO has become the go-to firm for both American and foreign companies looking to cure their innovation anemia
Mick also talked about Guy Kawasaki’s 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint and how this approach is necessary to make an effective pitch. This rule is applicable for any presentation to reach agreement: for example, raising capital, making a sale, forming a partnership, etc. Formerly an Apple Fellow, Guy is now a venture capitalist and founded the angel matchmaking investor service called Garage Technology Ventures.
Mick Brougham is a graduate of NUIGalway with a PhD in Biochemistry. He has worked in Enterprise Ireland and its progenitor organisations since 1991.
Over the last number of years Mick has been working on the development of Enterprise Ireland’s approach to helping startup entrepreneurs. In this he works closely with the Third level system in terms of the provision of such training programmes and Enterprise Ireland supports the entrepreneur through the provision of the CORD grant.
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I really appreciated this presentation: most of my professional roles have involved understanding what the REAL problem is, as a basis for working out the people, process and systems changes are needed to solve it.
ReplyDeleteIt was fascinating to see how the same basic activity (really, truly understanding the problem) is a core part of any new business venture. (And it has me wondering if my analysis and systems thinking skills can be applied in ways I hadn't considered before!)