Responding to the challenges of the 21st century requires people to be creative, innovative and adaptable, with the motivation, confidence and skills to use creative thinking purposefully. Every great idea seems obvious. But how can you be the genius who comes up with those ideas? Do you wish you could apply creative and design thinking at work to try things that have never been done before – better meet your customers’ needs, or solve problems holding your company back? 

This interactive session will show you how to look at same information as everyone else, but see something different. It expounds on the idea of innovation with design thinking. Oluwabori will share how his organisation has unleashed creativity and innovation by fostering an organisational culture where people are open to failing fast and learning from it, feedback is desired early as possible, solutions for an important problem are tested repeatedly via experiments before investments are made using data and evidence and not opinion.

Learning Objectives:

• Generate out-of-the box ideas by using proven creative thinking strategies
• Apply Design Thinking to identify and choose opportunities that enable innovation, solving real problems
• Question assumptions and explore alternative solutions that are beyond any preconceived limitations
• Use Lean and Agile to build new ideas into products, measure and learn from them quickly
• Minimise debate around investments by using confident data and evidence as basis for decisions
• Understand reasons why teams may lack creativity in organizations and how to overcome them

At the heart of Design Thinking is the aim to improve and create products by analyzing and understanding users’ interaction with products and their way of utilization. Compared to the traditional software development lifecycle, Design Thinking approach focuses on the needs, expectations and pain points that are derived by employing customer centric techniques such as ‘Customer Journey Maps’ and ‘Empathy Maps’. In addition to these hidden needs and expectations of customers can be identified by utilizing techniques such as ‘Affinity Diagrams’ and ‘Mind Maps’. The outcomes can be used to generate creative ideas and then prioritized ones are presented in terms of prototypes to be evaluated with customers. In each and every phase of Design Thinking collaboration is the main focus to leverage different perspectives and to reach a better solution iteratively.

This presentation explains the Design Thinking approach for business analysis in Agile organizations by focusing on techniques, the way of working and customer-centric viewpoint.

Learning Objectives:

• Design Thinking Explanation and Five Phases
• Presentation and Examples of Design Thinking Techniques
• Design Driven Business Analysis in Agile World
• Design Thinking Workshops and High Level Prototyping

While most people think of technology and IT in terms of The Social Network and Silicon Valley, most of us do not work in early stage startups or in Silicon Valley where inspiration, innovation, or dramatic business decisions can accomplished in less than an hour. For us in Product and Business Analyst roles, innovation and inspiration comes from searching and solving customer problems in new or unorthodox ways. This session will discuss some of the techniques and communications needed to spur creativity not only within yourself and peers, but to managers, directors, and ultimately the C-Suite. Additionally this session will also discuss how Business Analyst, Product Owners, and Product Managers can all work together to move organizations forward. 

Learning Objectives:

• How to Innovate within an “old-school” environment
• Leverage Requirements Gathering & BA Skills to Influence Decision Makers
• How to create a Compelling Business Case when the financial implications are not clear
• How to Align BAs, Product, and Marketing within the innovation process

In February 2018, Republic Bank of Chicago launched their Rethink RBank program to crowdsource employee ideas. Administered by the bank’s Innovation Task Force, the program has been highly successful in generating ideas to increase sales, enhance the customer experience, and improve processes. Most importantly, the program has nurtured a culture of change and innovation in a traditional organization. Learn about the steps taken to get this employee ideation program off the ground and how the team used concepts from behavioral science to fuel its success.

Learn how:

• to successfully plan and launch an ideation program
• behavioral science should influence your incentive decisions
• to maintain program momentum
• about common pitfalls and how to avoid them