Businesses today are faced with rapidly changing environments and an unknown level ofuncertainty. Thus, the reliability of traditional knowledge decreases and experimentation and the testing of hypotheses become more crucial. Questions such as „Does the market prefer prototype A or B?“, “How does our next product look like?” or “Which of our numerous product ideas should we pursue?” require hypotheses and tests which on the one hand can be done with relatively low effort but at the same time allow interference to the real world challenges.

This course intends to stress the connection between challenges from the practice and scientific methods by teaching how to consolidate managers’ ideas and scientific rigor incarrying out an innovation challenge. Students will learn how to apply aspecific form of open innovation, namely crowdsourcing, in a real life project. On the basis of one external partners’ current challenge, students will independently draft a crowdsourcing competition. All students will work in sub-teams on one project, which is introducedby the cooperating company. Theoretical input on how to set up and execute crowdsourcing projects as well as appropriate methods to analyze data will beprovided. During the semester the designed crowdsourcing challenge is executed, meaning that primary data is collected and analyzed.

After successfully completing this course, students should be able to

· analyze and assess crowdsourcing initiatives from a theoretical and practical perspective,

· understand the underlying drivers and mechanisms of such initiatives,

· understand selected research methods and thecorresponding scientific rigor,

· design and execute crowdsourcing projects, and

· find a compromise between managerial and scientific considerations in carrying out open innovation challenges.

Moreover,this course will improve the students’ ability to

· efficiently work and communicate in a team,

· work on solutions for innovative practical problems, and

· communicateand present efficiently and effectively.

Course dates and corresponding learning methods are structured along the process of drafting and executing acrowdsourcing challenge. Learning methods include lectures, open class discussions, students’ presentations in class, composing reports and presentations, guest speakers and coaching sessions.

The final grade of the course will depend on:

• In-class presentations (10%)
• Two working papers (10% each)
• Final paper (20%)
• Final presentation (30%)
• Individual participation (20%)