The bright minds of four students of the Griffith Business School have taken out the $5,000 top prize in the inaugural Deloitte Brisbane Innovation Fastrack Challenge.
Team Lewbecca Madrian developed a corporate wellness program with the potential to make Deloitte $50 million during the next five to 10 years.
The program, called Deloitte Vital, focused on the health of employees.
“We targeted productivity through the treatment of employee health,” winning team member Rebecca McQueen said.
“We encouraged the development of a program to improve employment health and address absenteeism and the emerging phenomenon of presenteeism.”
Business student Rebecca was joined on the team by Adrian Rodriques, Marlene Skjaeveland and Llewelin Tatenda Gwekwete, bringing together a mix of accounting, finance, international relations, and human resources and employment relations.
As well as its enterprising inclination, the team also had an international taste with natives of Australia, Zimbabwe, Norway and New Zealand.
Twenty-four Griffith University students from a range of disciplines including business, law, psychology, criminology, education, commerce, and IT formed six teams to take part in the 10-week challenge.
All participating students gained 10 credit points towards their degree program, as well as having had a chance to explore recruitment opportunities with Deloitte.
Teams worked alongside mentors and coaches from Deloitte to develop ideas and concepts.
“It’s crazy for students not to take the opportunity to be involved. This was the best experience I’ve ever had. It opened so many doors. We got to meet so many important people,” Rebecca McQueen said.
Griffith University Vice Chancellor and President, Professor Ian O’Connor, said the Fastrack program provided an exceptional opportunity and predicted it would prove to be a defining learning experience.
“One of the great advantages of an activity like this is that it brings together students from across the University community with the very best from the best professional services firm in Australia,” Professor O’Connor said.
“For me, innovation is really what this university is about,” he said
A proposal by Team Fastrack Fever for paper-lite hospitals took out second place, and third spot went to Team Fresh Horizon for their idea on paperless e-invoicing.
Applications to enrol in the course (3100GIH Innovation Practicum) for Semester 2, 2012 are now welcome and have been extended to close on Sunday, June 17.
More information can be found at http://www.griffith.edu.au/gihe/resources-support/work-integrated-learning/deloitte-work-placement