Blog Post #1 - Introduction

Introduction

My name is Maya Sardar, and I am a senior studying marketing and psychology. 

I am taking Customer Insights for Innovation because I want to understand how to keep customers' needs at the center of my business so they trust and respect my product. I am looking forward to having a group project where we get to practice our market research skills and use the Design Thinking process. I took Professor Luchs' Sustainability Inspired Innovation & Design class where I got familiar with the Design Thinking process. In Professor Luchs' class, we were specifically focused on how sustainability needs to be at the forefront of innovation. In our semester-long project, my group selected a company, created a persona, and took steps to create a sustainable and innovative end product. Our company was Dove and the end product was "Simply Dove," a body wash concentrate to reduce waste and save time. It truly changed the way I thought about innovation and the definition of sustainability, as I learned sustainability did not just have to do with the environment but with people, culture, and economics as well.  

I think this course's content will be similar to what I did with Professor Luchs, but that is a positive for me because I wanted to take this class specifically to continue my practice of Design Thinking and to apply what I learn in the classroom to a creative project. I am excited that this class will allow me to really combine my interdisciplinary knowledge of marketing and psychology because I am consistently studying the underlying motivations, behaviors, and needs of my customers. In my future career, my goal is to combine my knowledge of psychology and marketing to make products or services that customers truly need, and I think the strategies I learn in this course allow me to do that. 

I think the concepts we have learned so far have already challenged my pre-existing notions. For instance, with Jobs to be Done Theory, the idea that people "hire" a product based on the outcome they want, showed me how innovators have to always keep the customers' outcome at the center of their minds. The reason this challenged me is because sometimes I tend to jump straight to a solution without thinking thoroughly through the innovation steps first, such as defining our problem and discussing our target market.  I think I will really enjoy collaborating and creative thinking, and I am looking forward to the experimental nature of this course. I get stressed when there is one right answer to a problem, and I think the nature of the course allows for exploration and multiple solutions to a problem. 

In all, I welcome this class to challenge me and teach me more about innovation. As Professor Manuli said in class today, "Innovation is creating value from ideas," and I am looking forward to learning more.




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