What's Your Big Idea? (Coursera)

What's Your Big Idea? (Coursera)

Whether your interest lies in solving the world’s biggest problems, creating the next commercial success or addressing something closer to home, this course will give you a toolbox to vet your ideas and test them in the real world.

Class Deals by MOOC List - Click here and see Coursera's Active Discounts, Deals, and Promo Codes.

Syllabus

WEEK 1
Think
We start at the beginning with your big idea and where it comes from: your everyday experience and known sources of innovation as described by Peter Drucker.

WEEK 2
Listen
This second phase of the entrepreneurial lifecycle encourages you to take the big idea you’ve thought about and solicit feedback from the people whose problems you’re trying to solve.

WEEK 3
Plan
Strategy, the art and science of being different than your competition, is the next element we introduce, based on Michael Porter’s work.

WEEK 4
Clarify
In this module, we coach you on continuing to refine your big idea and beginning to communicate it clearly to a wider audience.

WEEK 5
Support
To make your big idea into a reality, you’ll need the personal, professional, and financial resources we discuss in this module.

WEEK 6
Iterate
This final step of the entrepreneurial lifecycle outlines a method to continue thinking, listening, planning, clarifying, and supporting your big idea.
Peer Assessment (Optional)
Create a pitch for your Big Idea, then give and receive feedback.
Reverse Pitches (Optional)
In these optional videos, experts from UNC Chapel Hill and Washington University in St. Louis offered their insider perspectives on a number of pressing problems that present unprecedented opportunities for meaningful innovation.

Go to Class
MOOC List is learner-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Related Courses

Leadership Through Marketing (Coursera) Coursera
Northwestern University

Leadership Through Marketing (Coursera)

The success of every organization depends on attracting and retaining customers. Although the marketing concepts for doing so are well established, digital technology has empowered customers, while producing massive amounts of data, revolutionizing the processes through which organizations attract and retain customers. In this course, students will learn how to identify new opportunities to create value for empowered consumers, develop strategies that yield an advantage over rivals, and develop the data science skills to lead more effectively, allocate resources, and to confront this very challenging environment with confidence.

Jun 28th 2026
4 Weeks
How to Finance and Grow Your Startup – Without VC (Coursera) Coursera
University of London,London Business School

How to Finance and Grow Your Startup – Without VC (Coursera)

Who? If you’re an entrepreneur at any stage of your journey, or even an aspiring one, and you need money to start or grow your business, this course is for you. What? This course will introduce, and help you put to use in your startup, the five models through which your customers can – and will, if you ask them! – fund your business. These five time-tested models have been put to use by entrepreneurial superstars like Michael Dell, Bill Gates, Richard Branson and more. Sadly, though, the five models are rarely talked about and not widely understood. Until now! The five models will be brought to life by the real-world stories of an inspiring collection of incredibly creative entrepreneurs from around the world – including successes and failures – through a series of captivating no-holds-barred interviews with founders and others, and investors, too.

Jun 23rd 2026
5-12 Weeks
Fundamentals of Management (Coursera) Coursera
University of California, Irvine

Fundamentals of Management (Coursera)

Are you about to enter the workforce? Are you an emerging professional? Are you new to your role in the organization? All prospective new employees benefit from understanding management principles, roles and responsibilities, regardless of position. Now you can acquire an in-depth understanding of the basic concepts and theories of management while exploring the manager's operational role in all types of organizations. Gain insight into the manager's responsibility in planning, organizing, leading, staffing and controlling within the workplace. It’s never too soon to plan your professional path by learning how the best managers manage for success!

Jun 22nd 2026
4 Weeks
Initiating and Planning Projects (Coursera) Coursera
University of California, Irvine

Initiating and Planning Projects (Coursera)

Successful projects require careful upfront planning. In this course, you’ll learn the key roles and responsibilities of the project manager and project team. You’ll also learn to answer some key questions upfront to help you meet project objectives: What will this project accomplish? Why is this project important? Who benefits from this project? How will we plan for successful outcomes?

Jun 22nd 2026
5-12 Weeks
Advanced Business Strategy (Coursera) Coursera
University of Virginia

Advanced Business Strategy (Coursera)

Advance your strategic analysis skills in this follow-up to Foundations of Business Strategy. In this course, developed at the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia, you'll learn the tools to analyze strategy across time (competitive dynamics), industries (corporate strategy), geographies (international strategy), and institutions (non-market strategy). Top-ranked faculty will introduce the tools you need to complete a comprehensive evaluation and understand the strategy dynamics of an industry: Competitive Lifecycle, Internationalization and Stakeholder Analyses, and Diversification Matrices.

Jun 22nd 2026
4 Weeks
The Factors that Influence the Effectiveness of Boards and the Governance Process (Coursera) Coursera
University at Buffalo,The State University of New York

The Factors that Influence the Effectiveness of Boards and the Governance Process (Coursera)

The third course in this Specialization introduces you to the factors that influence how effective boards of directors will be in carrying out their roles and responsibilities and hence the impact they have in shaping the success of the organization they govern. While this course has been developed with North American culture in mind, we do appreciate that, in other parts of the world, the nature of the factors that influence the effectiveness of nonprofit boards of directors may vary. Nevertheless,it is our hope that much of the course content will still be of value to those in other parts of the world.

Jun 22nd 2026
5-12 Weeks
Applying Data Analytics in Marketing (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Applying Data Analytics in Marketing (Coursera)

This course introduces students to the science of business analytics while casting a keen eye toward the artful use of numbers found in the digital space. The goal is to provide businesses and managers with the foundation needed to apply data analytics to real-world challenges they confront daily in their professional lives.

Jun 27th 2026
4 Weeks
Grow to Greatness: Smart Growth for Private Businesses, Part I (Coursera) Coursera
University of Virginia

Grow to Greatness: Smart Growth for Private Businesses, Part I (Coursera)

This course focuses on the common growth challenges faced by existing private businesses when they attempt to grow substantially. What you will learn: common myths and truths about growth in business; growth readiness assessment; the 4 P's of growing a business: planning, prioritization, pace and process; four ways to grow your business: scale and CVP, innovating, outsourcing and strategic acquisitions.

Jun 22nd 2026
5-12 Weeks
Designing the Future of Work (Coursera) Coursera
UNSW Sydney - University of New South Wales

Designing the Future of Work (Coursera)

The workplace of tomorrow is an uncertain place. We live in a rapidly changing world, and design innovations such as artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, and big data are rapidly changing the fundamental nature of how we live and work. As these technologies continue to evolve at an exponential rate - it is becoming critical to understand their impact on contemporary work practices, and for businesses and employees to understand how to design a secure future amidst this disruption.

Jun 23rd 2026
4 Weeks
The Economics of Agro-Food Value Chains (Coursera) Coursera
Technische Universität München - TUM

The Economics of Agro-Food Value Chains (Coursera)

In this course, you learn how the agro-food value chain approaches the challenge of constantly improving its competitiveness by producing high quality food and products and also aiming to attain greater sustainability. Some of the topics of this course are: the notion of quality for food and agricultural products and consumer value; how to conduct market research in this field; labelling, branding and pricing strategies, as-well as innovation in the agro-food sector; how sustainability can be used as a competitive advantage through corporate social responsibility: the role and different types of industrial standards; the different forms of coordination in the chain, in particular with regard to the retailing and distribution sector.

Jun 24th 2026
5-12 Weeks