What is a hackathon and what is Design Thinking?
Hackathons are a staple of the startup world. Several teams, one challenge, a weekend to make something real. Along the way — coaches, experts, and pitch doctors circling to push the thinking further. The method holding it all together is Design Thinking: a structured way to turn creative energy into something that actually works.
- They walk away with creativity methods and techniques for sharpening ideas — from rough spark to something solid.
- They understand what makes a business model actually work.
- They practice collaborating under pressure: resolving conflict, making decisions, moving forward as a group.
- And they meet people worth knowing — the kind you follow up with. If everything clicks, the next unicorn – or zebra – is born.
Design Thinking is an agile practice built around one idea: start with the customer and work backwards. It’s an industry standard in software development — but the method travels well. From Silicon Valley to the rest of the world, tech companies follow the same steps:
How do we do it?
Design Thinking is Brigitte’s natural habitat. She finds a way to work at least one of its tools into almost every consulting project she touches. Together with Wang Man, she has also taken it somewhere less expected — into the room with kids, for some genuinely out-of-the-box innovation with kids.
How does it work?
The product idea makes or breaks it. In our experience, “do whatever you like” hackathons tend to go nowhere — too much freedom, too little traction. But a brief that’s too narrow kills the spark just as fast. “How do we increase profit for X” is a management meeting, not a hackathon.
The sweet spot? The UN Sustainability Goals. They’re big enough to inspire, specific enough to focus — and they never disappoint as a source of topics to chew on:
Take “water” as the theme for a weekend. One team might tackle plastic bottle consumption. Another starts with water, drifts to flow, and lands on a meditation app for teenagers. Both are valid. That’s the point.
Once the theme is set, the logistics are straightforward: Get 20 to 40 people willing to stretch their thinking for a long weekend, provide a space, basic catering and enough coffee. We handle everything else.
What do you need?
- People: 30 to 40 participants works well — curious, open-minded, and happy to have their assumptions challenged for a weekend.
- Space: Teams can work side by side in one room or spread out and only come together for the opening evening and the final pitch.
- Inspiration: Experts drop in for an hour — entrepreneurs, industry insiders, communication specialists. They don’t hand out answers. They ask the questions that push teams to the next level.
- Food: Nutritious, tasty meals and snacks. Sustained thinking needs sustained fuel.
- Optional: Branded give-aways to mark the occasion.
- Optional: Prizes for the winners — cash, access to consultancy, or whatever feels right for the crowd.
In practice, organizing a Design Thinking Hackathon is simpler than it sounds. We bring the materials, the props, and the experience. You bring the people. There will be one official winner — but everyone walks away with something: sharper skills, a broader toolkit, and a clearer sense of how to think for the century ahead.
Interested? Let’s start with your idea and your audience and take it from there. We love building something bespoke.
And if you’re a non-profit, a school, or an organization with an outsized vision and a modest budget — reach out anyway. We’re genuinely happy to find a way.