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No course is perfect, and that's certainly true of Widgets Inc. as well. Below, we hope to outline some of the pitfalls we've experienced in teaching the course so that other teachers may consider and avoid them. Please feel free to add your own.

Stage 2 - How many product proposals?

One of the crucial points in the course is that students need to submit a different product proposal and a different elevator pitch each at the end of Stage 2. That is, if there are four students in a team, then that team submits four different product ideas. This is very important because the different ideas will be evaluated and the best one selected in Stage 3.

Stage 2 - Teamwork or individual work?

Another important point to keep in mind about Stage 2 is that students are working within a team, yet must produce several "individual" product proposals and elevator pitches. In fact, the task shouldn't be seen as individual submissions, but as the product of the whole team brainstorming together and helping each member to do the best work possible. If this means that they share the work in other ways. For example, if one student prepares more than one proposal form, while another helps more with the video production, then that should be fine. In fact, it should be part of the project manager's job to help organize this. Remind students that the team will get a joint grade that is proportional to how the whole team achieves the task of jointly submitting a number of product proposals and elevator pitches.