The Context:
“Software Design Experiences” is a unique class offered to graduate students by the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford (affectionately known as the “d.school”). The class will be offered from April through June, 2009. SAP co-founder, Hasso Plattner, along with Professor Terry Winograd, and SAP Executive Vice President, Zia Yusuf will bring their vast experiences and diverse perspectives to the class. Interdisciplinary student teams will work on real-world problems and apply human-centered methodologies to address software systems from a big-picture perspective, including its construction, distribution, and the social and organizational implementation.
A Call for Design Challenges:
In previous classes, student teams have worked on topics like environmental sustainability and community engagement in the context of city government. This year, we are reaching out to local companies to engage with the class by sponsoring design challenges for the student teams. The class will have approximately 6 teams of 4 students. We are currently seeking 3 corporate sponsors to provide 2 topics each.
General Expectations from Corporate Sponsors:
As a project sponsor, the biggest commitment we ask is for your active engagement with the students. Typically, it helps if the topic is something that is close to your heart. We ask project sponsor to articulate the challenge or opportunity as they see it today, and then maintain an open mind as the student teams discover and reframe the problem as they explore and prototype solutions.
We aren't asking you to direct the work, but rather to be responsive to questions, provide access to end users, and provide feedback on prototypes from a stakeholder perspective. The faculty will be responsible for setting the goals and monitoring the progress of the students. At times, there may be tensions between things that the sponsor would like and things that will provide the best educational experience. We see this as a constructive tension and will work with you to make it win-win, but when there is a question, our top priority is serving the learning of the students.
The students need to be able to work directly with relevant stakeholders and users in the San Francisco Bay area. Students can make use of electronic communication tools, though there should be periodic face-to-face contact.
How to Define Your Project Challenge:
-  Who: Clearly identify internal stakeholders willing to engage with the students as well as end-consumers of the product or service. Challenges involving multiple end-users of the solutions tend to be more interesting.
-  What: Articulate a business challenge/opportunity where a software system could play a role in supporting a potential solution. The challenge should be sufficiently scoped so students can complete their project in the span of a 10-week course.
-  Where: Corporate liaisons should be available for periodic meetings in the San Francisco Bay Area, in particular the first day of class to present the challenge in person, a mid-term touch point, and the final presentation at the end of the quarter.
-  When: The course will take place from April – June of 2009.
-  How: Students will follow a “design thinking” approach where stakeholders and end-users will provide insight to their solutions. Feedback from a rapid and iterative series of prototypes will guide direction.
Outcomes and Intellectual Property:
No specific deliverable is promised as a result of this engagement. If the students come up with interesting ideas, the company is welcome to make use of those ideas freely.
Students aren't required to sign NDAs for the work they are doing, unless there are specific documents you wish to keep confidential. The challenge topic, research results, and resulting student prototypes are all public and will be presented in class and to others in the d.school.
Contact Information:
For more information, please reach out to: Sam Yen • 650.276.0297 (mobile) • or
Link to last year’s class: http://dsoftware.stanford.edu