Better World Project

Part 1 Absorb
Read the Assignment

You will do a project-based assignment.
Read the assignment HERE

In summation, you will go through the entrepreneurial process. You will pick a group of people you want to help or issue/problem/need you think deserves to be solved; you will learn as much as you can about this and then ideate a solution. That solution will be either a nonprofit or for profit entity. You will figure out what resources you would need to move forward with this solution and then pull together your idea in a website to validate it and share your idea. This is called a minimum viable product or MVP.

It is important to keep in mind that we will work on this weekly and together, it is essential that you follow along with the curriculum provided in order to see this to completion successfully.

BUS 130 Semester Project - Make a Better World

Any questions along the way - BIG or small - should be asked in the discussion board.

Video Overview of Project:

Part 2 - Prepare
Learn about the Tools we use for the project

We will use a modified design thinking (review HERE) as the framework of this project.
To get started:

Read about the TOOLS you will use so you are best prepared and know what is expected of you.
Read Research Preparation. Pay careful attention to how you should cite your sources for this project.
Review the Assignment up to Tasks. Once at the Tasks portion of the assignment, you can think of it as a worksheet with checkboxes to help you know when you complete each section. There are checkboxes to help you keep you on track. This worksheet will help you ask the right questions and will also help you to organize your notes.
🚀🚀🚀 The Task portion is divided into 4 Steps (The Modified Design Thinking Framework) and a Wrap Up.

🚀 Step 1 Design Thinking - Define the problem

🚀 Step 2 Design Thinking - Understand the Opportunity

🚀 Step 3 Design Thinking - Identify the Solution

🚀 Step 4 Design Thinking - Resources & What's Next - Resources will include completing a Business Model Canvas

🚀 Wrap Up
***You should fill out the worksheet along the way

***This will be turned in along with any citations and AI chats along the way.

***You will write your research results in the assignment/worksheet in the boxes provided.

Read about Customer Discovery - the act of talking to the customer or user to EMPATHIZE with their problem/issue/need to better understand how to solve it.
***Specifically, there is some info on how to do a survey, which you will be doing on the assignment/worksheet and you will want to go back to that section.
If you want to review more about this project, head HERE.

Part 3 Do

AFTER you have a solution... use a Business Model to help you understand the value your solution provides and how you would go about providing that value were you to launch your idea.

Read about the Business Model
Decide for yourself!

Are you a for-profit? Then use a Business Model Canvas
Are you a nonprofit? Then use a Mission Model Canvas
Are you a social enterprise and a mix of both? Then use a Business Model Canvas

Go here for a modified canvas model that will fit our purposes.
There are two sheets, one is the business model, one is the mission model.

Part 4 Do
Validate the Idea

After completing the Assignment/AI Worksheet and figuring out your business or mission model, you will take your idea and move forward on it enough, to validate the idea itself. Depending on your idea, validation and next steps may include a prototype, a test, a pilot program, and/or launch.

For our class purposes, we will not launch, but instead test out the idea through a Minimum Viable Product - or MVP. Our validation of the idea and concept will be through a website. This will help you to figure out if your solution is viable and something that should be moved forward on.

You may want to take your MVP to the next level by trying to test through a launch or pilot for the Launch Project, in the second half of the semester. This is NOT required, but if interested, please talk with Professor Hargis.

We will validate / prototype / test our idea by doing a minimum viable product or MVP.

Our MVP will be a Google website. We will go over this in class. The video below is the same info from class for reference.

Couple hints for success:

Make sure you are in the Chrome Browser, this is a Google product and will streamline your experience. If you use other browser's, some elements may not work correctly
Watch the video and stop it after each new step
Open up another tab and do the step before coming back to the video to move forward
This is a recording from Spring 2022, if an element has changed and you can't figure out the updated version, please email the Professor ASAP with a description of the step