14/8/2023
Hacking Health Amsterdam: 3 days, 13 solutions
"What is your name and your T-shirt size?" With a black Hacking Health Amsterdam T-shirt, a name badge, and a new orange Dopper in my hand, I check on a list to see which team I've been assigned to. For the next three days, I'm in team 1. Challenger Jannike Oltmans and Problem Solvers Robbin Munter, Kymo van Blokland, and I are going to work on the challenge "How can we support children in Special Education in grade 8 to find suitable transportation to and from school?" Yes, we've started!
Hacking Health Amsterdam 2023
From Thursday, May 11 to Saturday, May 13, Hacking Health Amsterdam took place. During this annual hackathon, thirteen teams worked for three days to solve various problems in Amsterdam's healthcare industry. The teams consist not only of healthcare professionals; all ages, professions, cultures, and experiences are welcome.
MakerLab has been a partner of Hacking Health Amsterdam for several years. This year, like before, our experiment designers are coaching the teams from good ideas to prototypes. As a marketer at MakerLab, I enjoy participating in events like these to capture some moments for our social media. However, for this fifth anniversary edition, I am a participant and will personally experience how a hackathon like this works.
Challenges in healthcare
Unfortunately, healthcare faces many challenges. This is evident again this year from all the submissions for the hackathon. For this edition, challenges have been chosen within three different themes: equal opportunities in healthcare, healthy and happy professionals, and the further development of challenges or solutions from previous HHA editions.
This presented a variety of challenges: from the continued development of the LightupCane (a white/luminous cane for the blind and visually impaired), to reaching young people with mental health issues, or supporting care workers who have difficulty reading and writing.
All challenges have two things in common: the problem affects (too) many people and the solution will be impactful for all involved. But that's where the similarities end. Whereas with one challenge it is already clear how big the problem is, with another the size of the target group involved is not yet clear. And where one team deals with a minimal number of stakeholders, another struggles with a huge number of stakeholders.
Problem exploration: without the right problem you will not get to the right solution
A hackathon lasts two and a half days. That's not long when you consider that in that short time, significant steps are made: from challenge to solution, tested with a prototype, summarized in a short pitch video, with which a 'jury' must be convinced that the chosen direction is the right one. Quite a task, indeed.
Therefore, identifying the core question is crucial. Without a clear problem statement, your innovation is (possibly) only going to solve symptoms and the problem will remain. By having conversations with involved parties and stakeholders, you will get to the heart of the problem.
Business designer and MakerLabber Maarten van Hoogdalem is guiding our team during the hackathon. He explains that identifying the problem is the first crucial step in the innovation process. It is an immediate significant challenge. "Discussing one problem often opens a new can of worms. As a result, it can be difficult to select just one. Ideally, you want to solve everything."
Challenge Team 1: How can we support Special Education children in grade 8 to find appropriate transportation to and from school?
For our team, this means that we spend both Thursday afternoon and Friday morning doing problem exploration. We speak to several parents of Special Education children who rely on substitute transportation, as well as a teacher and a busdriver.
Ultimately, we've got the problem statement right: 'How can we reduce the stress experienced by users of the special education school bus?' We're ready to brainstorm possible solutions.
Diverging and converging
The entire process of such a hackathon can best be described as a wave-like motion. From gathering a wealth of information to formulating the most concrete problem statement possible. And from generating as many ideas for solutions to a small selection of potential contenders. In other words: diverging and converging.
All ideas are welcome, all ideas are allowed. I have learned this from my colleagues at MakerLab. It is important that each team member feels they can say anything. This leads to creative out-of-the-box solutions (and in our case, a lot of hearty laughter!).
We choose to sketch the school bus in which these children are transported on a large sheet of paper. We identify the problem areas in the bus and then out our proposed solutions there. Making it visible helps us to get a little more detached. In no time, we have a bus full of great ideas.
Just as in determining the problem statement, you need to make choices in the direction of the solution. How do you choose the best solution from all these ideas? "You do that by looking at the effort and impact for each idea," explains Maarten. "How feasible is the idea? And how much impact does it have on the problem statement? Also, take into account the expertise present in the team, especially in a hackathon. Some ideas are easier to implement with the skills and experience available than others."
With Maarten's advice, our team is left with three solutions. Choice overload again! Maarten comes to our aid: "What is the most exciting thing to build on and learn about for the rest of this hackathon?" A challenging step, as the other directions are valuable too. But during a hackathon, you need to let go; it's just a starting point.
Prototyping: what do you want to measure and learn?
An important step in the accelerated innovation process of a hackathon is building a prototype. Of course, you want to bring your idea to life, but that is not the purpose of a prototype.
The goal is, in fact, to (in)validate the most critical assumption(s). Put simply: what you MUST know to proceed with your solution. Are we on the right track? The outcomes continuously determine the next steps.
Meanwhile, the hackathon clock keeps ticking. That's why, during the prototyping workshop, the teams receive an important tip: don't focus on creating a perfect or beautiful prototype; instead, ensure it measures what you need to know to progress. For instance, you can quickly build a physical prototype using sturdy cardboard.
In order to make our prototype, I quickly bike home on Friday night to get my sewing kit, an old apron, patches of fabric and some fun toys and frills. When I return to my team, a Hacking Health T-shirt has already been made into the first prototype.
With my team, I crafted the rest of the prototype: a simplified version of the "SpaceCape. The SpaceCape is a handy and retractable organizer for the bus that kids fill themselves with things important to them, such as toys, photos and fidget spinners. In addition, the SpaceCape has a hoodie that allows you to shut yourself off from the outside world.
On Saturday, we test our prototype with the target audience. Are these children less overstimulated by using the SpaceCape?
From good idea to pitch video in two and a half days
For many teams, the final morning of the hackathon is dedicated to an experiment or research. Additionally, for all teams, there is a tight deadline for submitting the pitch video.
Such a final presentation or pitch is an important component of a hackathon and other innovation processes, for example a design sprint. Through a pitch, you convince people that your concept or solution is sound. You generate support from colleagues and management, enthusiasm from key stakeholders, or interest from potential investors or partners with whom you wish to collaborate.
Not insignificant, in other words! This realization caused most teams visible stress in the final hours of the hackathon. Fortunately, Maarten was able to give us some useful tips even at this stage:
- Focus on the problem and make it urgent. The listener must feel the pain of the problem.
- What are you solving with your product? Describe what the impact is on the various stakeholders.
- Choose your numbers tactically. Percentages sometimes work better than absolute numbers, or vice versa. Visualize the pain points using the right numbers.
- Dare to stand for your concept! It's the best idea ever, right?
Our pitch video is finished just in time. We conclude the hackathon by watching all the pitch videos together and voting for our favorite concept. And what do you know? The SpaceCape wins our category!
A successful hackathon
A hackathon flies by. What all these people achieve together in such a short period is incredibly impressive. The number of challenges in healthcare is substantial, but what you can accomplish together is even greater!
That being said, the success of a hackathon depends on a number of things:
- A tight organization that provides clear logistics, lots of energy, inspiration, experts on location and delicious catering.
- Good coaches who guide the various teams through the innovation process, intuitively understand what is needed, and provide a nudge at the right moment.
- A diverse group of enthusiastic participants.
Need help with your hackathon or have other innovation questions? Contact us or find out how we can work together.
