I had the privilege to be selected for the wicked acceleration labs. In this case Wicked doesn’t mean morally evil, but refers to really complex problems, ones with multiple moving parts, where the solution isn’t obvious. Understanding and solving homelessness, disinformation, climate change mitigation or an insurgency are examples of wicked problems. Companies also face Wicked problems. In contrast, designing AI-driven enterprise software or building dating apps are comparatively simple problems.
The class was created by Professor Steve Blank, entrepreneur, educator, author and speaker known for his customer development methodology. A key component of the method is to de-risk new business ventures by involving a customer discovery approach that is proactive and highly responsive. The startup must first recognise the untested hypotheses that form the foundation of their business’s potential to succeed, and then “get out of the building” to test as many of these hypotheses as possible, as early as possible. This way, the startup can iteratively adapt, investing in higher fidelity offerings incrementally, as they establish customer desirability and product-market fit. As Steve puts it, “business plans rarely survive first contact with customers.” This is because they rely on assumptions about how customers will respond, many of which are not validated until after (hence the delay) significant investments of time, effort, and funding have been made.
Every week, we presented our progress to the class, and Steve provided us with valuable feedback. This module was probably one of the toughest I went through at the Royal College of Art, at the time, it felt like my brain has been through a hurricane. Learning from such renowned mentors and being surrounded by a business community definitely pushed me in the uncomfortable.
Click here for a complete presentation of the Wicked Module
The Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) proposed a compelling challenge: developing cost-effective and scalable systems to monitor ocean health and inform climate change policies. At the heart of this challenge lies the [coastal profiling float (CPF)](https://www.mbari.org/news/new-coastal-profiling-floats-for-diagnosing-ocean-health/#:~:text=A float that parks on the seafloor&text=The float then spends less,securely on the muddy bottom.), an innovative tool designed to operate in shallow coastal waters while collecting crucial biogeochemical data.
Ocean health has been referred to as a ‘super wicked’ problem, as it is intertwined, embedded and confounded by, and within, the super wicked problem of climate change and global warming, and requires collaboration on a global scale to address. Some of the problems ocean health struggles with: Ocean Acidification, Sea level rising, Marine Biodiversity Loss, Overfishing, Harmful algae bloom, Plastic & Ghost gear, By catch, Ballast Water, Carbon emissions…and more… Each of these problems are wicked and systemic and require diagnosis, monitoring and communication.
To address the MBARI brief, we embarked on a comprehensive stakeholder engagement process, organising meetings with a diverse array of experts and organisations across the marine and environmental sectors. Our outreach spanned academia, governance bodies, NGOs (including a notable conversation with renowned fisheries scientist Daniel Pauly), coastal businesses, trade logistics professionals, and representatives from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
