StartupWeekend KW looking for UX mentors

Startup Weekend returns to KW on September 20-22, 2013 at the Communitech Hub. If you missed it last year, here’s your chance to get involved with a fun weekend-long, hands-on experience in which new startup ideas take form and come to life.

Communitech is looking for some UXers to participate as mentors during the event. Lend your expertise to the participating teams, make new friends and connections, and help create something awesome. Mentoring doesn’t necessarily require a commitment of the entire weekend. For more information or to express your interest, please email KW (at) startupweekend (dot) org.

About Startup Weekend

Startup Weekend is a global grassroots movement of active and empowered entrepreneurs who are learning the basics of founding startups and launching successful ventures. It is the largest community of passionate entrepreneurs with over 400 past events in 100 countries around the world in 2011.

The non-profit organization is headquartered in Seattle, Washington but Startup Weekend organizers and facilitators can be found in over 200 cities around the world. From Mongolia to South Africa to London to Brazil, people around the globe are coming together for weekend-long workshops to pitch ideas, form teams, and start companies.

All Startup Weekend events follow the same basic model: anyone is welcome to pitch their startup idea and receive feedback from their peers. Teams organically form around the top ideas (as determined by popular vote) and then it’s a 54 hour frenzy of business model creation, coding, designing, and market validation. The weekends culminate with presentations in front of local entrepreneurial leaders with another opportunity for critical feedback.

Whether entrepreneurs found companies, find a cofounder, meet someone new, or learn a skill far outside their usual 9-to-5, everyone is guaranteed to leave the event better prepared to navigate the chaotic but fun world of startups. If you want to put yourself in the shoes of an entrepreneur, register now for the best weekend of your life!

(September 2009) Design Interactionary: Get hands-on and have crazy fun with a series of extreme design challenges!

Thursday September 17, 2009
5:30 to 7:00 pm
Accelerator Centre
Meeting Room #2
295 Hagey Blvd., Waterloo
[Map]

In February of this year, we enjoyed a visit from Scott Berkun, who filled the RIM Theatre for a lively discussion of the myths of innovation. This month, Scott’s with us again in spirit as we kick off the 2009-2010 season with a fun event that he first imagined almost 10 years ago: the design interactionary.

What is a design interactionary?

In a design interactionary, small teams of typically 4 people work together on solving a design problem. The catch? You have only 10 minutes. The pressure of producing a completed design concept in only 10 minutes is, as you might guess, quite insane. But it’s also insanely fun!

This event was originally designed to take place on-stage during large conferences. Audience members could witness design teams work through their challenges live, one team after another. Judges would score each team’s efforts and declare a winner. If you’re curious to learn more, check out this essay on Scott’s website.

How we’re adapting the interactionary format

We’re changing the event format slightly, to make it more suitable for a smaller group in which everyone can participate. Our plan is to form teams of 3 or 4 people. We’ll still get only 10 minutes per design challenge, but the teams will work simultaneously. There’ll be no scoring and we’ll have no judges aside from other participants, since we’ll be presenting our final work to each other.

We hope to complete at least 3 design challenges. They’ll be fun and won’t require any specialized knowledge, so everyone is welcome to participate!

Want to suggest a design challenge?

If you’ve got a great idea for a design challenge, please email it to uxgroup (at) gmail (dot) com. We’ll keep the challenges secret until the last minute!

RSVPs requested

If you’re hoping to attend, please help us anticipate numbers by RSVP’ing to Wanda Eby at Communitech. Thanks!

Video of Scott Berkun's February 2009 talk in Waterloo

Last February Scott Berkun was in Waterloo and gave an entertaining talk to a full house of designers, developers, and anyone else interested in hearing about Scott’s experiences. The result was a talk in which the audience engaged in a wide-ranging discussion with the speaker. UX Group stalwart Henry Chen has uploaded a video of the event. Enjoy! (Sorry about the lack of embedding. Couldn’t seem to make it work!)

[Vimeo http://vimeo.com/6249357]