Our Curriculum
1. The Power of People
Social Emotional Skills For Equitable Change-Making
Have you ever wondered why some entrepreneurs achieve massive success, while others struggle? In many cases, the difference is rooted in the entrepreneur’s own understanding of their personal abilities and limitations. Success is most often achieved through radical collaboration, especially with a diversity of perspectives. By exploring the social and emotional skills that drive equitable change.making, participants learn to design with difference in mind, practice active listening and inclusive communication, build cultural awareness, and grow the confidence needed to overcome unconscious and uneducated biases that otherwise limit success.
2. The Power of Social Movements
Building an Entrepreneurial Mindset for Adaptability
Social movements and market trends are intricately connected. They expose patterns of exclusion by revealing what people want, need, and value. Building an entrepreneurial mindset for adaptability requires heightened awareness of systemic failures. Participants practice researching lived experiences and identifying unmet needs as well as design gaps rooted in exclusion. Using tools like storyboarding, participants will visualize user journeys, test assumptions, and gain fluency in failure analysis.
3. The Power of Technology
Strategies for Equitable Business Practices
Participants explore the relationship between humanity and innovation. As artificial intelligence becomes more deeply embedded in products, services, and financial decision-making, participants examine the tradeoff entrepreneurs face when balancing speed, scale, data use, and impact. Through real-world examples, these insights are applied to financial and human resource models that determine who has access, who is excluded and how to take accountability by addressing the varied ethical challenges that exist within a business.
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4. The Power of Laws
Turning Compliance Into Opportunity Through Inclusive Design
What begins as a protest can quickly become a policy and eventually a law that reshapes markets and directly impacts innovation. Section 508 of the Americans for Disabilities Act is a powerful example. For entrepreneurs, understanding legal and regulatory frameworks is not only important for compliance, it’s key to unlocking opportunity and competitive advantage. Participants analyze real world examples to distinguish between minimum compliance and inclusive design,
5. The Power of Stakeholder Engagement
Identifying Problems from Diverse Perspectives
Entrepreneurs are often advised to “fall in love with the problem, not the solution.” This is because ego-driven founders are prone to defending their ideas instead of testing them, ignoring user feedback and feeling personally attacked when their idea is critiqued. The best way to overcome this conundrum is to build disciplined feedback loops through stakeholder engagement, empathy-mapping, persona development and ongoing documentation. In this module, participants clarify their leadership strengths, redesign their résumés and identify the skills and perspectives they need on their team.
6. The Power of Failing Forward
Turning Setbacks Into Accessible Solutions
Failure is a critical part of innovation. In this module, participants use brainstorming and affinity mapping to organize a wide range of ideas for real-world problems. They then evaluate the potential for adoption through tools like SWOT analysis, industry research, and market assessment. By examining real-world case studies of products that failed, pivoted, and succeeded, participants also learn how overlooked users, flawed assumptions, and market-timing directly impact solution outcomes. Ultimately, they learn that iteration is not just a response to failure, it’s a proven strategy for strengthening product-fit, ensuring user trust and securing long-term viability.
7. The Power of Testing
Prototyping and Testing Universal Design Concepts
A minimum viable product (MVP) is the smallest version of a solution that entrepreneurs can use to validate whether their solution is ready to go into production. In this module, participants will design and test MVPs to gather feedback, challenge assumptions, and make informed decisions about what to refine, adapt, or remove in their proposed solution. Participants who’ve been awarded “Innovating Inclusion” mentorship will also receive personalized guidance.
8. The Power of Money
Financial Planning & Strategic Development for Diversity-Focused Enterprises
How much entrepreneurs are able to raise — and from whom — can substantially impact the trajectory of a solution. In this module, participants explore how business structure and funding strategies open or close doors to certain types of capital, partnerships, and growth paths. Through sales forecasting and break-even analysis exercises, participants evaluate how much capital they actually need to support the launch of their solution. Through this process, participants will also develop financial and operational plans, executive summaries, and most importantly, articulate how their chosen structure supports long-term viability and impact.
9. The Power of Media
Leveraging Inclusion for Unique Market Advantage
What turns a logo, message, or pitch into a brand people remember and trust? In this module, participants learn to develop a strong brand identity by creating inclusive branding strategies and effective elevator pitches. They will detail unique value propositions, identify target markets, and understand different company formations. Participants learn the 4 P’s of marketing which includes various pricing models and strategies, customer engagement channels, and diverse marketing strategies such as online, guerrilla, cause, and word-of-mouth. They will also create effective public messaging through PSAs and commercials, and storyboard impactful brand messages.
10. #MySuperPower
How To Pitch & Win by Embedding Inclusion & Accessibility
What makes a pitch stand-out? In this module, participants learn how effective storytelling, user testimony and market insight collectively communicate a solution’s value. Learners may choose to engage in hands-on pitching workshops and/or work with their mentors to refine their pitch deliverables, inclusive of a 10-slide deck. The focus is not just on how to pitch, but on why inclusive innovation is a differentiator in your solution’s design.