SkillsCourse
Modern business skills
A practical way to find what is really slowing the business down and try a fix next week, with no workshop theater.
Pricing and dates announced soon
Overview
What you'll learn
You learn a practical version of design thinking built for small businesses: see the work clearly, frame the real problem and test a fix in one week.
- Customer and employee journey maps, with collision points circled
- Sharp problem cards and a problem scorecard
- A constrained shortlist of ideas that fit a real Tuesday
- A cheap prototype and a one-week experiment plan
- A 45-minute weekly cadence you can keep
Audience
Who it's for
A good fit for
- Small business owners and operators
- People allergic to workshop theater
- Solo operators who want to map their own day
- Teams who want a weekly habit, not a retreat
Not the right fit for
- People hunting for cute persona templates
- Facilitators selling sticky-note walls
- Anyone who will not name a kill criterion
Outline
Course outline
8 modules. Each one ends with a short exercise you complete on your own work.
- Module 01
Design thinking without the MBA
Why small businesses need design thinking, and the loop on a napkin: empathize, define, ideate, prototype, test.
- Module 02
Customer and employee journeys
Map find, ask, buy, deliver, pay and follow-up, then the employee day. Circle where the two collide. Solo? Map yourself at 8 a.m., noon and 6 p.m.
- Module 03
Problem cards owners actually use
One card, one problem: who, friction, situation and cost. Score impact, ease, risk and learning speed, then write How Might We questions that stay inside your constraints.
- Module 04
Cheap options under real constraints
Name the budget, time and skill limits first, then generate ten ideas. Stress-test them against a busy Tuesday and pick one primary and one backup.
- Module 05
Prototype with paper, scripts and spreadsheets
Build the smallest thing that creates the new behavior in under two hours, then run a pre-mortem on how it fails on a busy day.
- Module 06
One-week experiments
Hypothesis, owner, metric and kill criteria written before day one. Light daily checks, then decide: kill, tweak or make it standard.
- Module 07
Make it a habit
A 45-minute weekly cadence, simple roles and the ethics of experimenting on real customers and staff.
- Module 08
Your next ten hours
A concrete plan for the next ten hours of work, and how to tell when a problem is ready for AI.
Format
How it works
- How it runs
- Self-paced. Short video lessons you can take in any order that suits your week.
- Where
- Online, on any device.
- Materials
- Customer journey map, employee day map, problem cards and scorecard, constrained idea sheet, prototype brief, prototype test card and a weekly cadence template.
- Pricing and dates
- Announced soon. Join the waitlist and we will email you first.
FAQ
Questions
When does it start, and what does it cost?
Pricing and dates will be announced soon. Join the waitlist and we will email you first.
I run the business on my own. Will this work?
Yes. Every exercise has a solo version, such as mapping your own day at 8 a.m., noon and 6 p.m.
Do I need to know design thinking already?
No. The course starts from zero and avoids jargon.
Where does AI come in?
The last module shows how to spot problems that are ready for AI. From there, AI fundamentals for business picks up the same problems.
Modern business skills
Join the waitlist.
Add your name and we will email you when pricing and dates are announced.
Pricing and dates announced soon. Questions? info@obralearning.com
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