To date, the Center for Academic Innovation has developed over a dozen software tools from faculty ideas into full applications, some of which have become commercially available products. With the help of our faculty innovators, we have established an effective process for idea exploration, product planning, software and content development, implementation, and iteration.
Our presentation will focus on four practices of our team that have contributed to our successful software development:
- Collaborating closely with a faculty innovator who has deep knowledge of the problem we’re addressing, while our team works to develop a software solution for it
- Focusing on building an MVP (minimum viable product) and then iterating once we learn from the way users engage with the MVP Drawing on the skill sets and perspectives of a multidisciplinary team to ensure that we build well-designed, user-centered software that solves real problems
- Considering the future commercialization opportunities for a software tool from the beginning of development, so that we build for scale and breadth of applicability
- Through experimentation and iteration, our team continues to hone our approach to evaluating ideas and building software. In this session, we are eager to share what we’ve learned so that others can reflect on our process, pitfalls, and successes in order to inform their own practice.
