4.7
stars
3,260 ratings

Alex Cowan

152,705 already enrolled

Offered By

University of Virginia

About this Course

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Despite everyone's good intentions, hard work and solid ideas, too many teams end up creating products that no one wants, no one can use, and no one buys. But it doesn't have to be this way. Agile and design thinking offer a different--and effective--approach to product development, one that results in valuable solutions to meaningful problems. In this course, you’ll learn how to determine what's valuable to a user early in the process--to frontload value--by focusing your team on testable narratives about the user and creating a strong shared perspective. 
This course is supported by the Batten Institute at UVA’s Darden School of Business. The Batten Institute’s mission is to improve the world through entrepreneurship and innovation: www.batteninstitute.org.

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Shareable Certificate

Earn a Certificate upon completion

100% online

Start instantly and learn at your own schedule.

Beginner Level

Some familiarity with software development is helpful, but not required.

Approx. 9 hours to complete

English

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What you will learn

How to evaluate and explain the relevance of concepts and practices from the agile development methodologies
How to create a strong shared perspective and drive to value using design methods like personas and problem scenarios
How to diagnose what software will be valuable to the user and how to test your ideas using agile user stories and prototypes
How to facilitate narrative collaboration with user stories and prototypes

Skills you will gain

agile user stories
User Experience Design (UXD)
Agile Software Development
Product Management
Software Development

Flexible deadlines

Reset deadlines in accordance to your schedule.

Shareable Certificate

Earn a Certificate upon completion

100% online

Start instantly and learn at your own schedule.

Beginner Level

Some familiarity with software development is helpful, but not required.

Approx. 9 hours to complete

English

Could your company benefit from training employees on in-demand skills?

Try Coursera for Business

Instructor

Instructor rating

4.81/5 (661 Ratings)

Alex Cowan

Faculty & Batten Fellow

Darden School of Business

418,210 Learners

20 Courses

Offered by

University of Virginia

A premier institution of higher education, The University of Virginia offers outstanding academics, world-class faculty, and an inspiring, supportive environment. Founded by Thomas Jefferson in 1819, the University is guided by his vision of discovery, innovation, and development of the full potential of students from all walks of life. Through these courses, global learners have an opportunity to study with renowned scholars and thought leaders.

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Syllabus - What you will learn from this course

Content Rating94%(13,480 ratings)

Week

Week 1

2 hours to complete

Problems Agile Solves

The agile practices that deliver excellent product are well understood, but they take focus, energy, and confidence to apply. This week, we’ll identify what’s hard about creating excellent products and how agile can help. We'll begin with a discussion of the Agile Manifesto- what motivated it and how it defines agile. Then we’ll get into the practical part- the problems agile solves, how to focus your time and energy, and how you’ll know if your practice of agile is working.

2 hours to complete

17 videos (Total 104 min), 2 readings, 1 quiz

17 videos

Agile Specialization Intro4m

Welcome to the Agile Specialization (Spanish)7m

Welcome to the Agile Specialization (Chinese)6m

What Is Agile?5m

Agile for Managers4m

Agile for Specialists4m

Agile 1017m

Today's Best Practices9m

Scale Friendly vs. Innovation Friendly4m

What Makes Agile Hard5m

The Blue Button Moment7m

Culture of Experimentation5m

The Manifesto in Practice6m

A Hypothesis-Driven Approach to Agile4m

Greg Cohen on Getting Started with Agile6m

Bill Wake on Getting Started with Agile10m

How We Learn3m

2 readings

Course Overview & Requirements10m

Get to Know Your Classmates in Discussion Forums10m

1 practice exercise

Week 1 Quiz15m

Week

Week 2

2 hours to complete

Focusing Your Agile with Personas, Jobs-to-be-Done, and Alternatives

The best way to avoid building something nobody wants is to start with somebody in mind. In the design world, we talk about that "somebody" through a ‘persona’. Personas and problem scenarios (aka 'jobs-to-be-done') focus development on driving toward a valuable outcome for your user vs. just generating output. In this module, you’ll learn to focus your work by developing personas, problem scenarios, and alternatives using best practices from design thinking.

2 hours to complete

10 videos (Total 67 min)

10 videos

Design Thinking for Agile User Stories9m

Meet the Companies: HVAC in a Hurry and Enable Quiz3m

Creating and Using Personas8m

Focusing Your Persona: Think, See, Feel, Do7m

Demo: Using the Hypothesis-Driven Development Template (UPDATE)2m

Demo: Drafting Personas12m

Demo: Drafting Think, See, Feel, Do7m

Creating User Stories that Matter7m

Skit: Meet the HVAC in a Hurry Team5m

Skit: Dani's Meeting with the CEO2m

1 practice exercise

Week 2 Quiz15m

Week

Week 3

1 hour to complete

Getting to Great Agile User Stories

Now we’re going to transition from drafting personas and hypothesizing user needs to testing those assumptions and translating what you’ve learned into agile user stories. We’ll step through how you create an interview guide to ask your users the right questions and then we’ll dive into agile user stories. User stories are a standard feature of agile and serve as a day-to-day focal point for driving to value.

1 hour to complete

14 videos (Total 67 min)

14 videos

User Research for Busy People7m

Researching Personas9m

Demo: Creating an Interview Guide: Personas7m

Demo: Creating an Interview Guide: JTBD5m

Skit: Interviewing Trent the Technician5m

Demo: Designing Google AdWords3m

Demo: Drafting Jobs-to-be-Done, Alternatives, and Value Propositions (UPDATE)3m

Preparing for Great User Stories3m

Writing Great User Stories6m

Adding Test Cases to User Stories4m

Skit: From Problem Scenarios to Epic User Stories2m

Demo: Drafting Epic User Stories1m

Demo: Storyboarding an Epic3m

Demo: Drafting Child Stories3m

Week

Week 4

4 hours to complete

Focusing on Customer Value with User Stories

4 hours to complete

12 videos (Total 47 min)

12 videos

Better Narrative, Better Story6m

Investable Stories2m

Bill Wake on INVEST7m

Coaching for Better User Stories5m

A Prototype Is Worth a Thousand Meetings5m

From Design Thinking to Agile Analytics1m

Designing a Meeting with User Stories6m

Using "Day in the Life" to Drive Empathy4m

Skit: Drafting Epics from Problem Scenarios1m

Skit: Storyboarding an Epic1m

Skit: Child Stories and Test Cases2m

And on to Course 2!1m

1 practice exercise

Quiz on User Stories15m

Reviews

4.7

922 reviews

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3 stars
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TOP REVIEWS FROM AGILE MEETS DESIGN THINKING

by NOOct 27, 2018

Excellent course to immerse me into this new world of Agile. Appreciated the details and consistency of examples to build my understanding. Enjoying this journey to new understanding.

by DMMar 18, 2021

I really enjoyed the material and the instructor. The course was well organized and the instructor offered great insights and expanded on the "why" in addition to the "how". Thanks!

by AASep 8, 2020

I absolutely recommend this course for everyone who really wants to develop their skill or want to learn new skills. this amazing course will assist you to understand the user in a more strategic way.

by OTFeb 23, 2017

This course was an excellent introduction to Agile, particularly for a 'newbie'. Having heard about Agile I've been interested in learning more and found this course to be exactly what I needed.

View all reviews

Frequently Asked Questions

When will I have access to the lectures and assignments?
Access to lectures and assignments depends on your type of enrollment. If you take a course in audit mode, you will be able to see most course materials for free. To access graded assignments and to earn a Certificate, you will need to purchase the Certificate experience, during or after your audit. If you don't see the audit option:
The course may not offer an audit option. You can try a Free Trial instead, or apply for Financial Aid.
The course may offer 'Full Course, No Certificate' instead. This option lets you see all course materials, submit required assessments, and get a final grade. This also means that you will not be able to purchase a Certificate experience.
What will I get if I subscribe to this Specialization?
When you enroll in the course, you get access to all of the courses in the Specialization, and you earn a certificate when you complete the work. Your electronic Certificate will be added to your Accomplishments page - from there, you can print your Certificate or add it to your LinkedIn profile. If you only want to read and view the course content, you can audit the course for free.
Is financial aid available?
Yes. In select learning programs, you can apply for financial aid or a scholarship if you can’t afford the enrollment fee. If fin aid or scholarship is available for your learning program selection, you’ll find a link to apply on the description page.

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Agile Meets Design Thinking

About this Course

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Skills you will gain