How Speed Dating And World Café Methodologies Helped Shape Our Startup Idea
Last week, during our Ad Discovery and Creativity Lab, we participated in the process of “Speed Dating” and “World Café”, two widely known methods aiming to further help startuppers with their ideas. Through rotation, all team members served as both pitcher, commentator and observer.
In our case, we brought to the table the idea of our team ‘’Youth Unity’’, an internet platform whose goal is to connect university students on a global scale and provide all the communicative tools needed to do so.
As a pitcher, I briefly distributed the theoretical aspect of our idea, providing insight of its business model, marketing channels and the way it will operate. From time-management skills to clear, understandable communication, the process of pitching an entire idea in just 3 minutes showed me the struggle of keeping the audience interested and conveying the most vital aspects of an idea effectively.
During the Q&A that followed up with each ‘’date’’ , our idea was mostly met with positive feedback and enthusiasm from fellow students who even proposed innovative ways to expand the services of ‘’Youth Unity’’. A slight concern that was expressed during this stage of speed dating regarded the safety of users on such a hoping-to-be wide platform, a concern not taken into consideration until now.
Playing the role of the commentator, I found myself listening to smart ideas by other startuppers and their surprisingly holistic approaches. And that was the challenge of it: finding gaps to fill and ideas to propose in a concept that on the surface seems ready to go.
Last but not least, I also served as the observer while the rest of the team pitched our idea. A task which was seemingly ‘’boring’’ at first, deemed itself in the process as an exceptional way to observe how an idea and all of its aspects can be conveyed differently through different pitchers. More specifically, I witnessed the idea of ‘’Youth Unity’’ that I had previously pitched being approached from a different perspective.
When the rest members and I regrouped at the end of our lab, the variety of approaches taken as well as all the comments and proposals from other start uppers proved the necessity and effectiveness of “Speed Dating”. Needless to say, the said method was utilized on a much bigger scale thanks to the complementary nature of ‘’World Café”, which broadened our perspective and made us communicate our work to more like minded people.
