Creativity, Problem Solving and Design Thinking

BUSINESS ESSENTIALS

Creativity, Problem Solving and Design Thinking

Contents Why Cambridge Advance Online?

03

Course summary

05

What you will learn on the course?

06

The learning journey

08

Learning breakdown

10

Course modules

11

Meet your tutor

13

Technical requirements

14

Course certification

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We are delighted to offer this exciting programme of short online courses for professionals, giving you the opportunity to harness the latest research, innovation and thinking that the University of Cambridge has to offer.

Cambridge Advance Online brings together the academic strength of the University, and the publishing and assessment strengths of Cambridge University Press and Cambridge Assessment, allowing you to develop your skills and specialise in emerging areas that address global challenges.

Our certificated courses will reflect the Cambridge experience and values, with low student to tutor ratios and academically rigorous standards. They will allow you to engage directly with academics at Cambridge and are centred on rich interaction between students and subject experts. Each course will offer you the opportunity to join live sessions with academics and interact in collaborative exercises with learners worldwide.

The University of Cambridge is committed to supporting lifelong learning and, through Cambridge Advance Online, has invested in the latest education technology to provide professionals with the very best experience wherever they are in the world and at any stage of their career.

We look forward to welcoming you onto one of our courses and to our global community of learners.

Professor Graham Virgo

Senior Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Education)

advanceonline.cam.ac.uk

03 BUSINESS ESSENTIALS

04 Welcome to Creativity, Problem Solving and Design Thinking

Why Cambridge Advance Online?

CREATIVITY, PROBLEM SOLVING AND DESIGN THINKING

Welcome to Creativity, Problem Solving and Design Thinking In recent years there has been increasing recognition of the importance of creativity in the workplace. It is cited as the most valuable skill required of employees and leaders, and as a key determinant of organisational performance and staff satisfaction.

Timetable:

Despite its importance, creativity can often be a difficult subject to approach because of the many ways in which it has been defined, the many processes that are described and the many tools that have been promoted and debated over decades. One way to cut through this confusion is to recognise that creativity is the application of thinking to produce new and useful ideas. This is facilitated by the use of various thinking skills and inhibited by various biases that afflict unstructured thinking. Creative processes and creative tools are designed to exploit these skills while counteracting the biases.

Format and length:

This course introduces the relevant thinking skills and biases that render creative processes and tools easier to understand, distinguish, apply, and manage. Building on this, you will have the opportunity to progress a project related to your own work context: – identifying, defining and framing a problem; – generating a wide range of ideas to address that problem; – selecting and refining ideas to develop a solution; and – planning how that solution should be communicated to relevant stakeholders.

All this is designed to enhance your creative skills, your confidence in developing those skills further, and your ability to represent those skills to others.

Nathan Crilly Professor of Design

advanceonline.cam.ac.uk

September | January | April | June

Subject area:

Business Essentials 6 weeks | 8 hours per week

Price:

£1,800

Learn about the role of creativity in problem solving and the application of design thinking.

Discover the characteristics of difficult problems, the thinking skills that are used to address them and the thinking biases that need to be overcome. Apply a general creative problem-solving process and discover the specific creative tools that can be used at each stage.

This course will help you to recognise and develop your creative skills, gaining confidence in them and in the capacity to develop them further. You will apply a structured process to identifying problems and generating wide-ranging ideas for solutions before selecting and developing one (or more) for communication and implementation. The course will be highly interactive, and you will be encouraged, through individual and collaborative work, to apply and manage a selection of evidencebased creative approaches.

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04

Course summary

CREATIVITY, PROBLEM SOLVING AND DESIGN THINKING

What you will learn on the course?

By the end of the course, you will have a broad understanding of the application of creative approaches, processes and tools, including how to: – Articulate the components of creative work, and the skills (and biases) that are involved.

– Apply creative processes and tools yourself.

– Manage the application of creative processes and tools by others.

– Develop confidence in your creative skills, and in your ability to improve those skills.

– Represent your own creative skills and experiences, and promote and elicit those of others.

07 Is this course right for you?

Key learning objectives

You will benefit from this course if you are a:

– Articulate the components of creative work, and the skills (and biases) that are involved

– Use design thinking to evaluate the human components of a given situation

– Apply creative processes and tools yourself

– Rewrite your own job description to emphasise creativity

– Manage the application of creative processes and tools by others

– Evaluate your own creative knowledge and self-efficacy

– Early- to mid-career professional – Work in a non-‘creative’ field – You manage or deal with people – Team Lead – Manager – Work in a senior role

– Develop confidence in your creative skills, and in your ability to improve those skills – Represent your own creative skills and experiences, and promote and elicit those of others – Understand the context for creativity within the wider world

advanceonline.cam.ac.uk

BUSINESS ESSENTIALS

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CREATIVITY, PROBLEM SOLVING AND DESIGN THINKING

The learning journey 09 BUSINESS ESSENTIALS

08

Cambridge Advance Online courses are delivered over 6 to 8 consecutive weeks (dependent on the programme), with each week’s content following a clear, deliverable path to help facilitate learning.

Week 4

Week 5

Week 6

Orientation

You will get access to familiarise yourself with our learning platform, Canvas, start networking with peers and hear from your course leader.

Week 7*

Week 8*

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3 Join our Alumni network

*The duration of the programme is dependent on the course. Please check the course summary for information regarding course length

advanceonline.cam.ac.uk

CREATIVITY, PROBLEM SOLVING AND DESIGN THINKING

Learning breakdown

Thinking approaches

Module 4

Problem definition

Become familiar with cognitive abilities and biases, and how creative processes and tools exploit these abilities while mitigating these biases.

Module 2

Creativity

Module 3

2-3hrs

Module 1

Our online courses combine several different elements to create a balanced blend of learning. Participants will be able to learn at their own pace during the week, viewing content, engaging in discussions and completing any assignments. On average, our courses take 8 to 10 hours per week.

11

Idea generation

1-2hrs

Built content

Discussion

(e.g. videos, animations, quizzes, case studies, worked experiments)

1-2hrs

1hr

Research

(e.g. reading, looking for info online etc.)

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Live session

Practise identifying, defining and framing problems using the three thinking approaches and other tools.

Learn how to understand and communicate about a situation by applying three thinking approaches: visual thinking, systems thinking and design thinking.

Practise generating ideas and exploring them further with ideation tools; learn how to manage group idea generation sessions.

BUSINESS ESSENTIALS

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Course modules

CREATIVITY, PROBLEM SOLVING AND DESIGN THINKING

Course modules

Meet your tutor

(Continued)

13 Practise selecting ideas and developing them for communication and implementation.

Module 6

Module 5

Solution development

Creativity in context Learn to articulate your own creative capabilities and experiences, and how to identify them in others.

Nathan Crilly Professor of Design

Nathan Crilly is Professor of Design at the University of Cambridge. He conducts research into how products, systems and services are designed and developed, focussing on designers’ creativity and users’ experiences.

Nathan combines a variety of research approaches in his work, including experimental and qualitative methods of empirical investigation, and scholarly methods for conceptual development. This work is interdisciplinary in nature, connecting ideas, methods and findings from different research traditions.

In addition to his individual research, he has collaborated with researchers specialising in engineering, product design, psychology, computer science, complexity science, education, anthropology and philosophy.

Nathan is a member of the Editorial Boards for Design Studies and the International Journal of Design Creativity & Innovation. Before joining Cambridge University, Nathan held technical roles in the aerospace, software and consulting industries.

He continues to consult on product development and user research issues for multi-national organisations, SMEs and startups.

At Cambridge, Nathan has developed and delivered courses focussing on engineering design, user-centred design, systems thinking, creativity, problem solving, sketching, visual representation, and verbal communication. He is an external examiner for the ‘Innovation Design Engineering’ double Masters programme run jointly by Imperial College London and the Royal College of Art. Nathan also delivers talks and training internationally on his research topics (e.g. creativity, problem-solving), the research methods he uses (e.g. interview techniques, literature review) and various aspects of research communication (e.g. writing, presenting).

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CREATIVITY, PROBLEM SOLVING AND DESIGN THINKING

Technical requirements

Course certification

– Sufficient internet speed and stability for video streaming (2 Mbps up/down)

You’ll be assessed using a range of modalities that emphasize realworld application of course material.

On completion of your Cambridge Advance Online course, you will be eligible for a Certificate of Achievement and digital badge.

– Please see our recommendations on web browsers: https://bit.ly/2S4Qhh4

To get your Certificate you must achieve a minimum grade of 70% on course activities and your final tutor-marked project.

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If you have any questions or would like more information about our online courses, please contact our Enrolment Advisors at

advanceonlinesales@cambridge.org