Innovation and entrepreneurship

Postgraduate course

Course description

Objectives and Content

Goal:The main goal is to inspire and prepare graduate students for potential careers as innovators and entrepreneurs in the medical space.

Course content:The proposed course is to inspire and equip the students with advanced skills and knowledge to approach multiple professional challenges with the mindset and toolkit of creativity and human-centered innovation. The resulting value creation is at the core of national directives promoted by the Ministry of Research and Education.

The course will A) introduce concepts of innovation and early-stage entrepreneurship, B) share the experiences of med-tech founders and innovators, and C) include practical tasks in which students will be asked to tackle a real-life innovation challenge as a multi-disciplinary team.

Learning Outcomes

After completion of this course, the student has/can:

Knowledge

  • Advanced knowledge about human-centered and design-driven innovation and early-stage entrepreneurship
  • Thorough understanding of how empathy drives innovation and entrepreneurship processes
  • Extensive knowledge about how problems are discovered, ideas are shaped, and prototypes are developed and tested

Skills

  • Put herself/himself in the shoes of others and adopt an empathic perspective by observing and immersing in the user¿s experience
  • Interview all kinds of potential users and stakeholders to elicit meaningful responses
  • Craft a strong Point of View, which will synthesize empathy research and give it direction
  • Come up with creative ideas that will serve as solutions to complex, ambiguous challenges
  • Use many different ideation tools like brainstorming, bodystorming, brainwriting, and quick sketching
  • Build all sorts of rapid and rough prototypes that tests ideas quickly and cheaply
  • Expose prototypes to the world, ask the relevant questions, receive good feedback, learn, and iterate repeatedly

General competencies

  • Collaborate with people with different backgrounds, and tap into the creative potential of diversity
  • Play, have fun, laugh, and not take herself/himself too seriously, while taking her/his creative work extremely seriously
  • Concoct innovative solutions to important human challenges in a real-life context
  • Learn and innovate under conditions of extreme volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (VUCA)

ECTS Credits

3 credits (ECTS)

Level of Study

Master

Semester of Instruction

Spring

Place of Instruction

University of Bergen
Required Previous Knowledge
None
Access to the Course
  • Medical student
  • Master students at the Faculty of Medicine
  • Master students at the master program for Medical Technology
  • Master students at UiB and other universities can take the course if they apply for it. For more information please send an e-mail to elektiv.med@uib.no
Teaching and learning methods

The course will include both theoretical and practical approaches.  However, it will have a strong bias towards the practical components to innovation the creation of early-stage startup companies.

We will address these practical lessons through a real-life, team-based innovation challenge, which will serve as the content for most of the students¿ learning journey.

We will meet in class for several engaged, active, hands-on workshops.  Team will then use the mindsets, tools, and methods learned during these workshops to tackle the innovation challenge out in the "real world" of the clinic and industry.

They will then come back to the classroom to share experiences and continue to solidify their skills through deep reflection and iterations.

Compulsory Assignments and Attendance
80% presence required. 
Forms of Assessment
The students will develop a four-page, final-reflection essay as a team.  This should include their main learnings, important practical and theoretical take aways, and personal reflections throughout the entire course. 
Grading Scale
Pass/ fail
Assessment Semester
Spring
Reading List
The reading list will be available from 01.12
Course Evaluation
Every 3rd year
Examination Support Material
Except of plagiarism, all supporting materials are allowed.
Programme Committee
PUM
Course Coordinator
Federico Lozano, UiB
Course Administrator
Department of Global Public Health and Primary Care