MDPM 900/910
Digital Product Capstone Project
Master of Digital Product Management
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The Digital Product Capstone project is a unique opportunity for organizations to access top talent to advance a digitalization initiative. Student teams dedicate 1,260 hours to clarify the problem and create a product vision, design a prototype, and develop a comprehensive roadmap to guide implementation.
Capstone Project Description
This is an 8-month comprehensive industry practicum that will match teams comprised of 6-7 students with a partner organization to design, build, and optimize a digital product prototype. Projects are to be lightweight digital solutions that can be prototyped or developed using low-code/no-code tools (e.g. Figma) and must integrate with existing IT infrastructure (e.g. website, enterprise system etc.). Previous capstone clients have leveraged this experience to incubate real digital products and services as well as develop their own digital product management practices.
Capstone project clients benefit directly from the 900+ hours of work completed by experienced, professional student teams. Each student team will be supported by faculty and a dedicated client advisor. This “learn by doing” approach will empower students to apply knowledge and application learning outcomes to the discovery, design, build, evaluation, and scale phases of a digital product management lifecycle.
To sponsor a capstone project, the organization must assign two dedicated client advisors who will work with the team for four hours each month. To ensure client interactions are meaningful and professional, student teams are formed with a range of expertise and supported by faculty advisors and a dedicated team coach.
Capstone Project Criteria
Capstone projects must:
- Be structured around a clear business problem that requires technology in order to be solved.
- Be able to be completed within an 8-month time frame and require roughly 120 hours of work per student.
- Focus on a non-urgent business opportunity that is relatively low risk and suitable for technology to solve.
- Integrate into backend technology and provide students with relevant details about existing infrastructure and security.
Preferred capstone projects will:
- Develop products and services that aim to serve external users (e.g., consumers, customers).
- Business-to-business and internal-facing (employee) products will only be considered if companies agree to secure contacts required for usability testing.
Process & Timeline
Jan 31Submit a capstone project proposal
- Interested organizations are asked to submit an online project proposal by January 31.
Capstone project matching process
- Follow-up interviews will be conducted with MDPM academic advisors and a final decision on participating partner organizations will be made by the end of March.
- A ranked matching process will be used to connect student teams to the partner organization’s project.
Legal agreements
- Work with Queen’s legal to established legal agreements that will be used to govern intellectual property and confidentiality.
Capstone project kick-off event
- A kick-off event will take place the beginning of August that will include the partner organization and student team. This will be a 2-hour virtual meeting for all interest groups to discuss the project goals and objectives.
Opportunity Analysis
- During this phase student teams will work on navigating the problem space by examining the client problem from business, user, and technical perspectives as well analyzing system and ethical considerations.
- Partner organizations will:
- Work with student teams to connect with current or potential consumers to participate in interviews.
- The Digital Product Opportunity will be presented to the partner organization in early September.
Interaction Design
- During this phase student teams will create a product vision, preliminary business plan, design a high concept, low fidelity prototype, and conduct an usability evaluation.
- Partner organizations will:
- Help students identify and recruit potential users to participate in usability testing. Providing funding to support a small honorarium (e.g. $25-50 gift card) for each usability tester is the program norm.
- The Product Vision and Prototype will be presented to the partner organization in mid-November.
Technical Design
- During this phase student teams will turn their attention to internal design and complete an architecture and security plan. They will also update their prototype and conduct a heuristic evaluation to further improve the prototype design.
- Partner organizations will:
- Connect student teams with internal employees who can share information about technical architecture and security policies and guidelines.
- Student teams will deliver a Technical Feasibility Report and 2nd iteration of the prototype by early February.
Product Marketing and Implementation
- During this phase student teams will develop a product marketing and scaling plan, design an experiment to evaluate the potential impact of the digital product, develop the implementation plan, and develop the prototype to high fidelity.
- Partner organizations will help students identify and recruit internal employees who can evaluate and identify barriers associated with the business model change.
Final presentation
- Student teams will present their Digital Product Roadmap and final prototype, and transfer ownership of work to the partner organizations.
Partner Benefits
- Access top talent from Smith's MDPM program, the first program of its kind in Canada
- Leverage student knowledge and expertise to design, build, and optimize a digital prototype or simple solution
- Strengthen relationships with Smith students and faculty
- Raise your organization's visibility at Smith
- Access to an expert industry advisor to provide students with guidance and support of consulting services
- The project is a possible audition for a career opportunity with the partner organization
- No required financial commitment from corporate partners. However, as described in Phase 1, it is recommended that corporate partners provide funding to support a small honorarium for each usability tester.
Partner Requirements
- The ideal partners are companies or community organizations that have access to a broader team of resources (marketing, architecture, IT, security) to support the MDPM student team.
- Be willing to help students identify and recruit potential users, internal employees, and business partners to participate in usability testing, technical and business assessments, and product market analysis.
- Donation of small honoraria (e.g., $25-50 gift card) for users that participate in product testing.
- Commit to a maximum of 4 hours/month to support information gathering and meetings. It is important to note that some meetings may be scheduled on Saturdays as students in the program work full-time.
- Attend all practicum presentations and support program-related events when possible.
- Provide timely and detailed response to team inquiries and requests.
Ready to get involved?
Complete and submit the following project proposal. If you have any questions or would like more information, please contact the Experiential Learning Team.