1.
Certificate
With an approximate effort of 70 hours
on research and teamwork,
István Barta
successfully completed
the first Massive Open Online Course
at Deutsche Telekom
Magenta MOOC
Share Your Entrepreneurial Spirit
which ran from April 1st
to June 28th
2014.
Prof. (HSG) Dr. Sascha Spoun Dr. Carsten Siebert
President Head of Course
Lüneburg, July 1st
2014

2.
Course curriculum of Magenta MOOC
Transformation challenges and leadership
In international, heterogeneous teams, each of five employees of Deutsche Telekom, participants developed a
common understanding of the transformation challenge within information and communication technology (ICT), its
implication for the telecommunications industry in general and Deutsche Telekom in particular. They reflected on
the most important trends – social, technological, and also organizational – and their impact on industry business
models. Each team then developed a vision of how these trends will effect products, services and processes in the
year 2020 as well as DT’s role in the future of telecommunications and considered the role of Leadership as a key
aspect of transformational change.
Focus on the user
Participants reflected on customer needs in 2020 and consumer trends that are driven, enabled or affected by the
scenarios they developed in the first module. They explored the main tenets of Design Thinking / Human-Centered
Design in order to understand the logic of making design decisions regarding specific customer wants and needs.
Along the lines of a typical day in the life of a detailed, specific persona, each team identified particular use cases
and outlined potential innovations.
Keep your innovation simple
While deepening the practical application of the Design Thinking methodology, a second critical criterion was
introduced and discussed: simplicity as a paradigm for finding workable solutions for complex issues and paying the
utmost attention to customer needs, organizational capabilities and resources. Additionally, participants gained
fluency with tried-and-tested approaches to entrepreneurialism such as the Lean Start-Up paradigm. After
generating a large number of ideas in a brainstorming process, simplicity criteria were used to narrow down the list
of possible innovations to one concrete idea within each team.
Develop, iterate, improve
In a continuation of the entrepreneurial methods discussed in earlier modules and based on the central customer
insights, each team designed a prototype for their innovative product, process or service. Participants received (and
gave) feedback on the prototypes thus developed and iteratively refined them.
Connect the dots systematically
Having arrived at detailed descriptions of their entrepreneurial innovation, the teams used their prototype as subject
of a first approach to business planning. Through completing the Business Model Canvas, the teams visualized
various strategies in order to turn their innovation into a successful product.
Lead towards action
In an echo of some topics discussed in the first module, leadership once again assumes critical importance in the
entrepreneurial process. Teams designed formats to communicate their idea to all stakeholders with decisive say on
the means to make it happen, using specific storytelling approaches as well as other structural tools for effective
communication.