Doing business differently, at UNIGE

As part of the University of Geneva's Entrepreneurship Week, Alter Start is offering a day in two parts. In the morning, the “Doing business differently” workshop inspires. In the afternoon, the Alter Start hackathon puts it into action on real projects.

The Alter Start hackathon: 3 hours, 3 challenges, 3 teams

• 3 hours: an intensive afternoon, from 1 to 4 pm, from the challenge pitches to the final presentations.
• 3 real challenges, brought by entrepreneurs supported by Alter Start.
• 3 mixed teams of 6 to 8 people: 4 to 6 participants, an entrepreneur and an Alter Start mentor.
• 18 to 24 participants: students and participants of the Entrepreneurship Week, by registration.

The goals

• Give participants a hands-on entrepreneurial experience
• Provide actionable ideas to 3 entrepreneurs supported by Alter Start
• Build connections between participants, entrepreneurs and the Alter Start team
• Put the morning workshop into practice: doing business differently

The 3 challenges

• Scaling a project: how do you grow a project to a larger scale?
• From B2C to B2B: how do you move from private customers to business customers?
• Doing business together: how do you build win-win commercial collaborations?

To illustrate each challenge, we will draw on real assignments from entrepreneurs supported by Alter Start.

Mixed teams

• The participants: students and participants of the Entrepreneurship Week.
• The entrepreneur: presents their challenge, answers the team's questions and leaves with concrete ideas.
• The Alter Start mentor: facilitates, challenges ideas, helps structure the work and keeps an eye on timing.

How we work

• Understand (30 min): question the entrepreneur, reframe the challenge, pin down the constraints.
• Explore (30 min): generate as many ideas as possible, then group them.
• Build (25 min): choose 2 or 3 ideas and build the action plan.
• Pitch (5 + 5 min): present the recommendations.

In each team: a timekeeper, a note-taker and one or two spokespeople for the pitch.

The afternoon programme

• 1:00 – 1:40 pm · Kick-off: welcome and rules, the entrepreneurs pitch the 3 challenges, teams are formed.
• 1:40 – 3:25 pm · Team sprint: working on the expected deliverables.
• 3:25 – 4:00 pm · Presentations: 3 five-minute pitches, each followed by 5 minutes of discussion, then wrap-up.

What happens next?

• For the entrepreneurs: a written summary, putting the action plan into practice with their Alter Start mentor, and a check-in after 3 months on the ideas they tested.
• For the participants: staying involved with the projects that inspired them, volunteering or internship opportunities, and introductions to the Alter Start network.