Online collaboration getting results in Business Dalyell

Bachelor of Commerce and Bachelor of Laws student Michelle Zhu shares her experience collaborating online for the Business Dalyell Innovation in Organisations unit of study.

During the Innovation in Organisations Dalyell unit of study, I had the opportunity to work in an incredibly diverse, interdisciplinary team. Each team member came from an entirely different discipline – a mix of Law/Commerce, Arts (Media and Communications) and Science, and we were even located in different parts of the world (either in Sydney, or in Singapore)!

Michelle Zhu

The task

As a part of the project, we were expected to find a solution that assisted Salesforce in working with educational institutions targeting students to elevate student participation rates in Salesforce technology training and certification. 

Working across disciplines

My group met every day via Zoom for the duration of the course and narrowed down our task, investigating how we would engage students and educational institutions to develop an innovative, appealing program.

It was interesting to see how everyone applied their own disciplines and experience in other University courses when we were in the ‘forming’ and ‘storming’ phases of our teamwork. Phoebe and I previously worked together in another interdisciplinary unit, and we were able to bring our experience as fourth year students to the group. Mina, as a first-year student, was able to bring her creativity and fresh ideas as a younger student to the table.

The interdisciplinary nature of our group really helped us strengthen our ideas as we consistently evaluated and questioned our approaches and adopted the ‘devil’s advocate’ technique when building upon each other’s suggestions. It also helped that we were all equally enthusiastic and motivated by the idea of working with each other. We were very open to new ideas, having compiled a large amount during our brainstorms, having an open dialogue and deliberating on what would work best for both the client and the customer. 

Overcoming online obstacles

Of course, due to time differences and other work commitments, there were some struggles with balancing our schedules. However, we were all able to pull our weight and help out if another team member had any difficulties. We always made sure to check in with each other via a group Messenger chat, set tasks and deadlines at the end of Zoom meetings and had a communal ‘Google Drive’ with multiple subfolders and documents to ensure that everyone had access to our ideas, research and work. 

The top 3 teams of the competition

We also delegated points of research, such as drawing inspiration from case studies, delving into the science of how to increase learning – these were based on our disciplines, as it allowed us to explore more into our own areas of expertise. We also explored pitching techniques such as using a character profile, which ended up in our final pitch video. This aspect was supported by my study of the Management major, having to consistently present and compile videos to engage audiences throughout my degree.

Phoebe was also able to harness her skills in social media and provide a prototype for our idea – this really helped us visualise what our idea would look like in practice. Mina was able to connect with her high school, as she was a more recent graduate, to help us obtain data from school-age students and strengthen our idea. 

Overall experience

I think what I found most enjoyable about working in an interdisciplinary team during Innovation in Organisations was the dynamic of the people in our team and the lightbulb moment when we finally formed an idea. By being able to input each and every team member’s ideas, we were able to develop a collective identity and group pride for our proposal.

It was amazing to see that we could come up with an idea that we believed to be unique, creative, innovative and ultimately, something that we were proud of and passionate about. In retrospect, I am able to say that this was really a group effort, where everyone was equally enthusiastic in idea generation and contribution, and without such a diverse team, we would not have been able to create such a successful proposal. 

It was also an unexpected but amazing opportunity to be able to pitch to the industry partner, Salesforce, at the end of the unit. Not only did this opportunity come as a surprise, it was a more practical application of learning than other units. It allowed us to get first-hand feedback from the client and encouraged us to think more critically about our proposal. Although the whole unit was delivered online, my team still felt very connected and proud of our proposal - which ultimately materialised in our win of the Business Dalyell Wicked Forum.

Learn more about the Business Dalyell program.