ENGAGE.EU Bootcamp – few days to brainstorm first solutions and business cases

Challenge: How can people from various professional backgrounds and age groups draft solutions for the Josefbus project of the Caritas and at the same time enhance their own skill set? 

Implemented for: Engage.EU & Caritas Wien

The 4 days programme was carried out with more than 20 participants covering a broad range of professions and age group. Throughout the bootcamp the participants could enhance their personal innopreneurial competences and further career-relevant insights while improving the performance and impact of a non-profit project of the Caritas.

To do so, the participants initiallly received theoretical inputs from professors of the Dutch University of Tilburg, followed by the in person bootcamp at the Ankerbrotfabrik Vienna, which was designed and moderated by the Innovation Office team. Here, sustainable solutions and new business models for three concrete challenges were developed by using design thinking and other innovation approaches. The developed results were then presented to the Caritas team.

Curious? You can find more information here.

University of the future - the development of multifunctional spaces

Challenge: How will future learning, teaching and meeting spaces at the university look like? Which kind of new offerings are needed? How can several interest groups share the facilities?

Implemented for: Birgit Seltenhammer and Christoph Kecht (Campus Management)

As an initial step, a comprehensive survey was carried out, followed by the realization of 30 interviews covering various insights and expertise of internal and external stakeholders alike. Based on these findings, a workshop with 11 participants from all over the WU took place in September 2022 to dive even deeper into the topic and to consider spatial as well as organizational requirements for a shared usage of future university spaces. For further inspiration and food for thought, there was also a tour through the Social Hub, a playfully designed co-working and living space for students as well as companies.

IT meets innovation – why, what, how?  

Challenge: Development of an innovation training for the new Product & Service Owners of the IT Service (as part of the IT Service Training)

Implemented for: Ramiza Mehidic, Project Manager (IT Services)

For one day, the Innovation Office offered the participants of the IT Service Training the setting and space to deal with the big question of where and when innovations are needed within their work and field of activities and how these innovations must be developed and designed to deliver solutions that meet the needs of the users.

After a brief theoretical introduction, the session moved directly to the practical part where the participants first got best practice insights into several methodological approaches and then were also given the time and space to try them out directly within the context of topics that are currently relevant for their daily work. 

WU4Juniors goes Innovation Office – how to use innovation as a superpower

Challenge: How can you get students excited about the topic of innovation and train them innovation tools for their everyday life?

Implemented for: Kristin Seidler, Project Coordinator WU4Juniors 

For several hours in July 2022, the Innovation Office became a field of play and discovery for the participants of the WU4Juniors Summer School on the topic of innovation(s), innovative thinking and skills. Exploring various 'stations', the students were able to try out teambuilding exercises and pitch training as well as approaches to utopian thinking and the "jobs to be done" method. 

Rarely before has the Innovation Office been filled with so much enthusiasm and curiosity, and even at the end of the evening, when pizza was served, ideas were still being discussed. No surprise that a sequel for 2023 is already being planned.

Curious about the event? You can find more information here.

ENGAGE.EU – from narrative development to implementation and reapplication

Implemented for: Rectorate WU Vienna & Engage.EU

Since the beginning of 2021, the Innovation Office has repeatedly accompanied the Engage.EU alliance, where 9 European universities have currently joined forces to address the major societal challenges of our time with new teaching, learning and collaboration formats.

The Innovation Office was involved in the development of a common narrative for internal and external communication and hereby developed a slogan for the internal communication in a workshop series with stakeholders from all universities. In addition, the Innovation Office team facilitated several strategy workshops with the rectors of all participating universities at the beginning of 2022, which provided a comprehensive overall picture of the project and the common goals and thus laid the foundation for the upcoming reapplication.

We are looking forward to the further journey of the project and keep our fingers crossed for the reapplication.

Curious? More information about Engage.EU can be found here.

An app for students - based on the findings from a hackathon with participants from all over the world

Challenge: How does the ideal app for students look like to help them organize their everyday student life?

Implemented for: Peter Frech, Project Manager of the Mobile First for Students App (IT Services)

Based on the given challenge, the Innovation Office organized a 2-day hackathon in November 2020 with over 50 participants from 10 universities as well as from the private sector, where 10 teams 'hacked' a variety of solutions and solution features. Thanks to the hackathon, the 'Mobile First for Students' team was able to gain precious insights in the actual desired features of their users* and could take them into account when developing the app.

Curious? Find out more here.