Postgraduate Course: CodeBase: Playbooks for Building Startups (fusion online) (EFIE11311)
Course Outline
| School | Edinburgh Futures Institute |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
| Course type | Online Distance Learning |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 10 |
ECTS Credits | 5 |
| Summary | This is a course for students who want to learn about technology start up thinking, innovation and entrepreneurship. The course is an introduction for students with early-stage start up ideas, or who are just at the beginning of that ideation process. The course focuses on three key things: helping you turn an idea into a sustainable business; breaking down barriers to the start up world by demystifying the jargon around tech entrepreneurship; and sharing toolkits and frameworks of product and service innovation to give students the power to respond to fast change and cultivate resilience in a turbulent world. |
| Course description |
The course will introduce the principles of startup culture through a series of pre-recorded videos from CodeBase member companies and entrepreneurs that have been on the startup journey, articles and other resources. Students will form teams to introduce the Challenge Theme.
Teams will work to explore an opportunity for social innovation. Discussion boards will be available to help students demystify the jargon used and get you ready for the intensive study period.
The intensive study period will be delivered in fusion form, with students remaining in their teams. The sessions will pursue four core concepts:
1) Intro to Startups: This introductory lecture will cover what role startups play in modern economies, how they innovate, what makes them different to other organisations, why most of them fail, and why startup careers have become so viable in the last 30 years. In the workshop section students will focus on defining a 'good' problem, which they will focus on for the rest of the intensive, to explore a social innovation opportunity within the course Challenge Theme.
2) Understanding Markets: Introductory lecture on markets and market research, followed by a challenge-based exercise in defining a social innovation opportunity.
3) Product Discovery will be introduced with a situated example and lecture exploring Jobs-to-Be-Done theory and customer interviewing techniques, followed by group exercises in lean experimentation methods to test business ideas with real customers.
4) Business Models and Pitching will be covered by a lecture followed by an introduction to the role of pitching and Pitch Decks. Teams will work on exploring their business model on one sheet of paper and develop storytelling skills, becoming ready to pitch their hypothetical idea to a variety of stakeholders.
Following the intensive study periid, individuals in each team will choose one particular aspect of the core concepts: markets, product discovery or business models and pitching. Each student will carry out some practical work relating to their chosen concept and develop a response that demonstrates insight and understanding.
This course is created and delivered by CodeBase. CodeBase is a tech ecosystem support organisation that has supported over 500 startups and scaleups, who have collectively raised over £4 billion. CodeBase provides workspace for startups to grow, delivers expert educational programmes and industry accelerators, and fosters connection through mentorship, events, and meetups. Launched in Edinburgh in 2014, further hubs opened in Stirling, in 2017, followed by Aberdeen in 2019, along with popup hubs across the UK. CodeBase now supports startups in 37 hubs across the UK and delivers the Scottish Government's 'Techscaler' platform for supporting tech startups nationwide.
Edinburgh Futures Institute (EFI) - Online Fusion Course Delivery Information:
The Edinburgh Futures Institute will teach this course in a way that enables online and on-campus students to study together. This approach (our 'fusion' teaching model) offers students flexible and inclusive ways to study, and the ability to choose whether to be on-campus or online at the level of the individual course. It also opens up ways for diverse groups of students to study together regardless of geographical location. To enable this, the course will use technologies to record and live-stream student and staff participation during their teaching and learning activities. Students should note that their interactions may be recorded and live-streamed. There will, however, be options to control whether or not your video and audio are enabled.
As part of your course, you will need access to a personal computing device. Unless otherwise stated activities will be web browser based and as a minimum we recommend a device with a physical keyboard and screen that can access the internet.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2024/25, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 10 |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
100
(
Lecture Hours 5,
Seminar/Tutorial Hours 8,
Supervised Practical/Workshop/Studio Hours 3,
Formative Assessment Hours 0.5,
Summative Assessment Hours 0.5,
Other Study Hours 3,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 2,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
78 )
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| Additional Information (Learning and Teaching) |
Other Study: Scheduled Group-work Hours (hybrid online/on-campus) - 3
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Summative Assessment:
The course will be assessed by means of the following components:
Following the intensive study period, individuals in each team will take one particular aspect of the core concepts: markets, product discovery or business models and pitching, and develop a response that demonstrates insight and understanding:
1) Understanding Markets
Market Type Testing: Design and carry out a market type test and write a critically reflective insight report, focusing on existing solutions and potential market positioning strategy. (1000 words)
2) Product Discovery
Find your customers' Jobs-to-be-Done: Design and carry out qualitative customer interviews and write a critically reflective insight report on your findings, based around the four forces and job stories. (1000 words)
3) Business Models and Pitching
Investor Pitch: Create a 9 slide pitch deck and record yourself delivering an investor pitch to raise your first round of funding (5 min max). Write a critically reflective report on your choice of business model, the challenges you came across and the experience of pitching. (1000 words) |
| Feedback |
Feedback on the formative assessment may be provided in various formats, for example, to include written, oral, video, face-to-face, whole class, or individual. The course organiser will decide which format is most appropriate in relation to the nature of the assessment.
Feedback on both formative and summative in-course assessed work will be provided in time to be of use in subsequent assessments within the course.
Feedback on the summative assessment will be provided in written form via Learn, the University of Edinburgh's Virtual Learning Environment (VLE).
Following the presentation of the pitch decks at the end of each intensive day, tutors and peers will provide instant feedback that highlight strengths and weaknesses in the ideas.
Groups will be formed around each of the core concepts associated with the development of new products and services: markets, Jobs To Be Done, Build-Measure-Learn and business models/ investment. These groups will provide peer support and feedback toward the production of the final individual summative submission. |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate a critical understanding for the principal theories, concepts and principles within start-up culture.
- Critically review, consolidate and extend knowledge and thinking across an aspect of entrepreneurship derived from exposure to 'real world' start-up companies.
- Communicate with peers, more senior colleagues and specialists, using key terminology to explain a core concept within start-up culture.
- Demonstrate the ability to explain with coherence and critical insight the opportunities and limitations that a particular concept will allow a start-up company to succeed.
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Reading List
Indicative Reading List:
Essential Reading:
Article: Why is Software Eating the World, Mark Andreessen; 2011. Web link: https://a16z.com/why-software-is-eating-the-world/
Article: What is a startup?, Ries, Eric; 2010. Web link: http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2010/06/what-is-startup.html
Article: How to Think for Yourself, Paul Graham; 2020. Web link: http://paulgraham.com/think.html
Article: Do Things that Don't Scale, Paul Graham; 2013. Web link: http://paulgraham.com/ds.html
Article: The Soul of a Start-Up, Ranjay Gulati; 2019. Web link: https://hbr.org/2019/07/the-soul-of-a-start-up
Recommended Reading:
The Lean Startup; Eric Reis; Board Book; 2011.
Disciplined entrepreneurship: 24 steps to a successful startup; Bill Aulet. Hoboken, NJ : Wiley; 2013.
The Startup Playbook: Secrets of the Fastest-Growing Startups from their Founding Entrepreneurs; David S. Kidder. Chronicle Books LLC; 2012.
Continuous Discovery Habits: Discover Products that Create Customer Value and Business Value; Teresa Torres. Product Talk LLC.
Obviously Awesome: How to Nail Product Positioning so Customers Get It, Buy It, Love It; April Dunford. London: Ambient Press.
Running Lean: Iterate from Plan A to a Plan That Works; Ash Maurya. London, O'Reilly Media, 2012.
The Lean Product Playbook; Olsen, Dan. Wiley, 2015.
Further Paul Graham essays: http://paulgraham.com/articles.html
Further Reading:
This Is Service Design Methods: A Companion to This Is Service Design Doing / Marc Stinkdorn and Markus Edgar Hormess. London, O'Reilly, 2018.
Sense & respond: how successful organisations listen to customers and create new products continuously. Jeff Gothelf and Josh Seiden. American Library Association CHOICE: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries, 2017-06-01, Vol.54 (10), p.1541.
The hard thing about hard things: building a business when there are no easy answers / Ben Horowitz. Horowitz, Ben, author. HarperCollins Publishers, New York, NY; 2014.
Gödel, Escher, Bach: an eternal golden braid / Douglas R. Hofstadter. Hofstadter, Douglas R., 1945-London: Penguin; 2000. |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
1) Students will develop a critical awareness of theories, concepts and principles that support the development of new products and services within the contemporary culture of entrepreneurship and technology start ups (SQ Characteristic 1).
2) Students will apply knowledge, skills and understanding gained from lectures and activities provided by entrepreneurs who have had direct experience of starting their own technology business, into the speculative development of their own company (SQ Characteristic 2).
3) Students will gain cognitive skills by applying the one or more core concepts that underpin the development of a successful product or service to their own speculative company (SQ Characteristic 3).
4) Students will develop communication, ICT and analytic skills through the presentation of ideas and principles within their teams and to other teams through the use of 'pitch decks', and through a summative essay (SQ Characteristic 4).
5) Students will gain autonomy, accountability and learn to work with others by collaborating in small groups to develop a speculative company, including the development of a shared discussion boards and through the design of a new product or service (SQ Characteristic 5). |
| Keywords | CodeBase,Tech Startup,Entrepreneurship,PG,Level 11,EFI,Startups,Business |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Alessandro Rosiello
Tel: (0131 6)50 8246
Email: Alessandro.Rosiello@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Mr David Murphy
Tel:
Email: dmurphy7@ed.ac.uk |
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