Design Challenges & Activate Innovators Like a Pro

An innovation challenge is a structured and time-bound invitation to solve a well-defined problem. It incentivizes people, inside and/or outside your organization, to contribute new ideas, prototypes, or ready-to-use solutions. It’s not just about collecting ideas; it’s about turning them into real outcomes that matter.

Because innovation can’t wait. Whether your organization is aiming to grow, solve persistent challenges, or stay competitive, knowing how to activate ideas and innovators through a challenge is a must-have skill for today’s leaders. There is rising demand across industries for professionals with innovation management capabilities. It's quickly becoming a core leadership skill and one that complements your subject matter expertise, rather than replaces it. While innovation can be pursued through many methods, innovation challenges offer a practical, action-driven approach. They allow you to learn by doing and cultivate innovation in a way that’s uniquely aligned with your organization’s needs and ambitions. There’s no better time to start.

AI is powerful, but people innovate. Innovation challenges are how you activate human creativity and use tools like AI to solve meaningful problems. You don’t have to choose between the two—they work better together. By learning how to run innovation challenges, you’ll be able to harness both to accelerate change in your organization.

It focuses creative energy around a shared goal. A challenge creates urgency and a safe space to think differently. It shifts people from passive observers to active solvers, sparks collaboration, and provides a platform for ideas to be tested and evolved into real solutions. It also builds innovation confidence across your organization.

Anywhere new thinking and doing is needed. Innovation challenges are used in companies, nonprofits, universities, and governments. They're great for developing products, improving services, addressing social issues, shaping policy—you name it. Internally with employees, externally with startups, or to engage customers—they’re flexible and powerful.

Not necessarily. Many innovation challenges start small and grow over time. You can begin with modest resources, such as partnerships, in-kind contributions, or even external grants and sponsorships to support your initiative. In fact, it is highly recommended to start small using tools you already have within your organization. As you build confidence and experience, you can take on more complex problems that require greater resources and eventually benefit from investing in idea or innovation management technology to support end-to-end execution. What matters most is having a clearly defined problem, strong leadership and stakeholder support, relevance to your business or mission, and a thoughtfully designed experience for the solvers you aim to engage.

Not at all. Innovation challenges are a flexible and cost-effective tool for businesses of any size. In fact, smaller companies often benefit even more because they can move faster, involve their teams directly, and solve pressing problems without needing large R&D budgets. You do not need a big team or a large budget to get started. All you need is a clear problem and a willingness to engage others in finding solutions. This course shows you exactly how.

You’ll be able to confidently design and run an innovation challenge, starting from defining the problem all to supporting idea implementation. You’ll walk away with a practical framework you can apply immediately.

This experience is for managers, team leads, innovation champions, and anyone ready to lead change, regardless of title. It’s especially valuable for middle managers or new innovation leads who’ve been tasked with activating innovation but aren’t sure how to start. No prior innovation experience required—just curiosity and drive.

From operational inefficiencies to breakthrough product ideas, from culture shifts to sustainability goals—challenges can tackle nearly any type of organizational or societal issue that requires fresh thinking.

No. All you need is curiosity, open mind, a problem worth solving, and a willingness to engage others. Innovation is a team sport and this course will guide you through it.

It’s an 8-week experience with weekly 90-minute live sessions. Optional 45-minute coaching sessions are available for those who sign up for personalized support.

Yes. The modules are interactive and designed for peer learning and feedback. You’ll engage with case studies, group sessions, and guest lectures from experienced challenge practitioners. If you opt into coaching, you’ll receive weekly 1:1 feedback to develop your challenge as you go and launch it upon completion. After the course, you’ll join a supportive alumni network.

Absolutely. The course is designed to be practical. You’ll leave with a ready-to-use plan, and if you choose to design your challenge during the course, you can launch it as soon as you’re done.

That’s perfectly fine. We’ll guide you step-by-step to uncover a meaningful challenge idea aligned with your organization’s needs.

Yes. You can join to build your capacity, learn from peers, and be part of the alumni network. The knowledge and tools you gain will be ready for when the opportunity arises.