Design Sprint School

I recently completed the Design Thinking online course with the Design Sprint School! It was an extremely valuable experience because it gave me a set of tools and step-by-step case-based exposure to Design Thinking in just 4 weeks. I have already started to apply the sprints to my business and volunteer work. Its an easy, inexpensive and practical way to drive innovation and solve issues in a very short period of time. The coach and support team were excellent to work with. And the team based structure and forum setup enriched the experience exponentially given all the diverse background of the student involved.

The Design Sprint School inspired me a lot with practical agile methods and theory on service design approach. At the same time, it gave me insights in many innovation opportunities and challenges yet to exploit. I also learned how powerful the role of service design sprint has become and how impactful it could be to drive Co-Innovation faster with customers in various vertical markets as well as accelerating Solution Co-Development with eco-system partners as we design solutions as service. I really look forward to leverage this experience for my day-to-day and lifetime work.

The Hivelab Design Sprint School is a great way to learn design thinking using either the Minimum Valuable Service (MVS) or Google Ventures model for design sprints. You will learn when to use each model and how to lead a team through a sprint. Along the way, you get insights about the history of design methods, how designers approach problems and real-life examples of design thinking in action.
Using a pre-built case study, you will be paired up with a fellow student who will give you feedback and role-play the customer throughout the course. Typically, design thinking works better in person and with a team, but this is obviously very difficult to deliver online, so assigning a dedicated partner is the next best thing. Hivelab mentors provide oversight and answer any questions you mi...

Pros:
1. Flexible to be completed at own pace
2. Able to interact with participants from around the world while saving on travelling costs
3. Going through both GV model and MVS model in 1 certification
4. Feedback was quite fast
5. Rich content, engaging discussions
6. Exposed to new prototyping methods - using paper to prototype apps

Cons:
1. Online will still never replace face to face interaction
2. Comparatively, GV model was given less emphasis

The Design Sprint School is an excellent course to equip you to understand, design and run sprints that are best suited for your organization. If you are in charge of innovation initiatives within a company, or if you run a team that creates products and services. You will be able to empower your people to run the efficient and user-driven innovation by facilitating the right kind of sprint. By the end of the course, you will be strong in the principles and practice of running MVS and GV Sprints, so you can guide teams, and remix the techniques in both and adjust them as necessary to maximize the benefit for your team, organization, and clients.

After I read the book "Service Startup", I wanted to gain opportunity to practice it.
I thought that I already understood the method and process, but I found there were gap between "understand" and "can do" while I took this course.
This is very practical course, even if it is online. I need to do some works such as user interview, ideation or prototyping. (That's what I wanted, but much harder than I thought.)
Sometimes, when I got stuck, I was able to ask mentors any time on slack. As for the output, I was able to obtain feedback as soon as I submitted.
Mentor was truly excellent, never offering answers, but navigating the direction to think and take actions to help me understand.
It was not easy for me to finish this course (I worked 5 to 6 hours per week...), but it was really...

This is a very practical programme to immerse yourself in either GV or MVS practice. You get taught in both methodologies but you select mainly one to practice with with a real case-study. I loved the interaction with my mentor and peer, which enabled me to be fully accountable. It's important to create some space in your week for the study and practical assignments because the pace is quite high. Finally, the fact that the other participants also share their questions, findings, insights and very useful resource, makes the course a very enjoyable experience. Warmly recommended. (PS I chose the mentor path, so i still have more fun ahead of me!)