In the late afternoon, we hit a hitch: the judges seemed unimpressed. Their favorite twist was to change the sponsor. What if it wasn’t the corporation who sponsored a hackathon, but shareholders looking to shake things up instead?
We were disappointed that they didn’t halt the event and give us the prize at that moment, but we regrouped. We took a retreat (see how meta?) to South Park, just a couple of blocks from the frog office to decide where to go next. After some soul searching, we settled on a new idea: busting through the “clay layer” of middle management to let employees develop ideas without the support of bosses. It evolved into a glassdoor.com sort of website only focused on making improvements rather than griping.
With a glimmer of hope, we retired to the happy hour at Thirsty Bear.
Day 2 – June 10
The last day was mostly slide engineering. We came up with an amusing story featuring a frustrated sales guy with great ideas. With no idea what to expect, the presentations began. Each team had three minutes to present.
It turns out that two other teams developed a product similar to ours, and another two or three did related idea collection and refinement engines. I was very impressed with the team that incorporated an SNL-like song (complete with guitar) into their presentation. Gotta remember to brainstorm more creative ways to present.
In short: Great event, great people. Thanks to frog and LRN for organizing.
