Sarah Kirk, a program assistant at the National Association of Community Economic Development Associations, reflects upon her experience at the October 29th Innovation Summit:

The Summit, Creating the Future of Economic Opportunity, brought together innovators dedicated to improving financial literacy, asset building and small business development.  I previously had only a basic understanding of asset building programs, and was excited to learn more about new advances in the field.  The Innovation Exchange offered a unique forum for innovators to present their ideas and receive input from other conference attendees, including non-profit, government and social enterprise leaders.  Each participant received a personalized "mission dossier" based on their background, interests and responses to a set of registration questions. Rather than restrict myself to my three assigned "missions", I was able to move from station to station to familiarize myself with the innovators and their programs.  Janie Barrera, with ACCION Texas, presented her work using technology and proven capacity to extend microloans to American small business owners.  Mr. Najib Jammal showcased his plan to open a high school that includes a curriculum fostering entrepreneurship and community revitalization.  These and several other innovations caught my interest, in their creativity and vision as well as in their possible applications for community development.  Many innovators reported successes helping small business owners or low-income families and were looking for ways to bring their programs to a larger scale. 

 

Geeta Rao Gupta, who delivered the keynote address, spoke to the importance of recognizing valuable innovation, and of the role social networks can play in developing and distributing innovative ideas.  She also stressed that innovation and development must be responsive to the needs of the population, and must solicit input from those it hopes to benefit.  Using the networks and expertise provided by Community Development Corporations (CDCs), innovators may easily locate businesses or families and effectively test and develop their ideas at the local level.  As a national partner for CDCs, the National Alliance of Community Economic Development Associations (NACEDA) is enthusiastic about the innovation featured at the Summit. I hope that the other conference attendees will continue to share and collaborate, and find ways to partner with CDCs and other local organizations to deliver the benefits of their innovations.

 

April's Innovation in Changing Times community development conference, sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, featured a great set of tools, an audience hungry for solutions to local challenges and several dynamic personalities to address matters of innovation. Kathie Thomas of Fleishman Hillard provided methods and tools for dynamic brainstorming as well as a system for understanding innovation styles (hint: there are four "styles": modifying, exploring, experimenting and visioning). The Thursday plenary was organized by Julia Young of Facilitate.com, who led the group in a "Question Circle Process" (also called an "Inquiry Circle") that generated the largest set of questions I have ever heard posed to a panel discussion, and yet brought organization and coherence to the resulting reflections.

I was fortunate to lead a large group through an interactive brainstorming process that covered the history of financial innovation (products, services and policy), and its potential future.

Langdon Morris of InnovationLabs provided a half-day seminar on "Creating a Culture of Innovation in Community Development Organizations." We've enjoyed an association with ave Langdon as a consultant to CFED and also as a Strategic Advisor to innovation@cfed. I find that I get something new out of Langdon's work every time I make the mental space to process it. At the very least, it helps make me think through my assumptions and the rigor with which I approach innovation. There's a lot of intellectual capital invested in his materials. Many are available on the InnovationLabs Web site for free, so it's well worth a visit. (Disclaimer: since Langdon is one of innovation@cfed's strategic advisors, we're obviously a bit biased).

Finally, Bill Strickland, president and CEO of Manchester Bidwell Corporation in Pittsburgh, brought the crowd to its feet in a final presentation that stressed the tremendous human potential that can be unlocked with respect, high expectations and high-quality environments and content. In a moving slideshow and speech, he outlined the programs that have flourished at Manchester Bidwell, and brought jobs, dynamic and modern businesses (commercial orchid growing in the inner city anyone?), as well as art, culture and the full promise of human potential. He is a moving speaker, and would be an excellent host; he encouraged all to visit him in Pittsburgh, and you can bet that I'll be looking for a chance to do so.

All in all, a worthwhile couple of days. I encourage others to look for these conferences in the future. If you attended this conference or can share similar experiences from other innovation meetings, please share your thoughts in the comments section!

Michael Torrens

CFED's Director, Development Finance and member of the innovation@cfed Team

Through our first Innovators-in-Residence and Innovative Ideas submissions processes, we are excited to hear from friends both old and new. In fact, 44% of all online responses came from individuals who were not previously in CFED's orbit! We appreciate hearing from old friends--including policy, SEED, microenterprise and Assets Learning Conference partners and many others--who are sharing their innovative approaches. And we are gratified that our friends and our outreach have introduced us to so many new potential collaborators.

 

 

Whether you've had a relationship with CFED for years or just found out about us through the recent application and submission processes, please stay in touch through e-mail or this blog and share your thoughts on innovation. Stay tuned for announcements of the first group of Innovators-in-Residence and Innovative Ideas, coming in mid June! And don't forget to follow this space closely for updates on our Innovation Summit, to be held in D.C. in October. It will be a great opportunity for many of us to connect, share ideas and be inspired!

Please share your thoughts on innovative pursuits in this space--we look forward to getting to know you!

As the innovation@cfed community continues to grow, we are pleased to receive feedback on our programs and online presence. Charlene Poe, founder and executive director of Totally Gas Community Outreach Program in New Castle, Delaware, recently wrote to tell us how the Innovative Idea submission process inspired her:

To the innovation@cfed Team:

I wanted to thank you for your consideration of my application and the opportunity to be included in such a wonderful and exciting program. I first learned about CFED through my association with the La Salle University Nonprofit Center in Philadelphia. I visited the Web site and learned about CFED's mission, vision and work. I was excited to see that there was an organization out there doing what you do. It takes vision to see vision!

The programs created and supported by CFED and its collaborators and the progress being achieved is an inspiration to me. I am greatly motivated and inspired by your vision to serve, to change, to influence and to be part of a generation of visionaries ushering in a new era of prosperity for those in our country who have not experienced even a low level of prosperity.
I am inspired and greatly influenced by your passion. Thank you so much for such a platform. This is an opportunity for great ideas to be pulled out of obscurity.

Charlene Poe

Thank you to Charlene and all who have engaged with us. How did the Innovators-in-Residence and Innovative Ideas application and submission processes inspire you? What are other ways in which you are engaging with innovation right now?

It's very interesting to note that our Innovators-in-Residence applications and Innovative Ideas submissions have come from all parts of the country, with the South as the most active source region in both categories. As a result of innovation@cfed's international outreach, we were excited to receive some Innovative Idea submissions from abroad.

We are working with a small number of applicants on the next stage of the Innovator-in-Residence process and are continuing to evaluate the pool of Innovative Ideas. We recently met with our distinguished Strategic Advisors, who were impressed by the scope and breadth of the Innovator-in-Residence and Innovative Idea applicant pools.

We look forward to meeting with many of you at the 2009 Innovation Summit!

In the meantime, please share your thoughts and ideas in this space. Is your region represented well in our applicant pool? How will you encourage innovation and engagment in your region?  

Thanks to many of you, our Innovators-in-Residence and Innovative Ideas programs received an overwhelmingly positive response. We received more than 200 applications, submissions and nominations. Our team truly appreciates the high level of participation and interest in these exciting programs.

We are reviewing all applications and are thrilled to see innovations of great diversity, both in the problems and opportunities addressed and their creative approaches. Many of these innovations will be featured on our Web site, this blog and at our 2009 Innovation Summit, October 29 in Washington, DC. Mark your calendars now and plan to be there!

During the coming weeks, we will share with the innovation@cfed community more information about the innovative people who responded to our online opportunities and their creative solutions. Sign up now to become part of the community, if you haven't already!

We'd love to hear your thoughts on the application and nomination processes. Please leave a comment below or contact us at innovation@cfed.org.

We are excited to work with so many enthusiastic innovators. One community member wrote in to say thank you to our innovation@cfed team "for opening a door of opportunity giving birth  to the dreams and visions of many Americans!" We thank you for sharing those dreams and visions.

Even as many Americans continue to feel discouraged and powerless amid the current economic downturn, innovators among community development leaders are growing increasingly energized and inspired to help bring about real and lasting positive change.

 

CFED is working with the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis to plan and host Innovation in Changing Times, a conference on community development. The event, held in St. Louis April 22-24, brings together leaders from across to country to discuss and illustrate how innovation can positively impact communities. The conference aims to offer a comprehensive view of community development with a focus on resiliency, sustainability and innovations that will help organizations and communities thrive during challenging times.

 

CFED's Michael Torrens and Kim Pate will present at the conference, and Michael also serves on the event's planning committee. They will share their reflections on the conference, so check back with innovation@cfed and its blog for their observations.

 

You can visit www.exploringinnovation.org to learn more about the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis's conference and to register. We also encourage you to reflect on the conference's charge: to think beyond how communities can survive tough times and imagine how they can grow and shape the future.

 

We'd love to hear your thoughts here.

 

 

We'd like your reactions to an unsolicited e-mail we recently received from a budding entrepreneur. And let us know if you are an entrepreneur, too!

 

HELLO innovation@cfed,

I just want to thank your organization for sending me the "light bulb"postcard in the mail.

 

My curiosity about the website piqued my interest, so I decided to check it out and certainly found it encouraging that you are doing this.

 

I, myself am in the beginning stages of trying to launch a business that would make a difference not only in my own community, but far beyond that.  While I would not be interested in applying at this time, I am very interested in staying involved by watching how everything takes place, from selection of the Innovators-in-Residence to a discussion forum on different ideas.

Your organization hits the "nail on the head" of the economy, exactly where we need it most.  We need great ideas to stimulate this economy and encourage entrepreneurs to start new businesses.  While I am working on ironing out the details in launching my own business, my main goal at the moment is to find full time work to help support our family while I get things going on the side.  (I've been looking for over a year so that gives you an idea of exactly how tough the economy is out there.)  That is why I really applaud your efforts.  My goal is to eventually have a small company that can sustain itself, show a good profit, but most of all, make a difference.   I want to know in some way that I was able to help this tough economy as well.

As an American, I appreciate your innovation in coming up with this idea in the first place, and am really excited that you're doing this.

God bless, best wishes to you, and I hope that you have many successes!

 

I'll be watching.

(Signed) Cyndi G.
Cornelius, Oregon

PS.  Whoever came up with the light bulb postcard was a marketing genius. Good job!  :)

Thanks for writing, Cyndi. Please continue to share your observations with innovation@cfed as you launch your business in our "new economy."

 

What emphasis will incoming President Obama give to America's role in leading innovation?  This was the theme of a day-long symposium called  Supporting Innovation in an Economic Crisis held on December 1^st at the University of California Washington Center. Sponsored by the Economic Policy Institute, Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, Breakthrough Institute, University of California Washington Center, and Ford Foundation, it featured a dozen speakers with much information and a variety of perspectives.

 

A centerpiece was research by Fred Block and Michael Heller (Where do Innovations Come From: Transformations in the U.S. National Innovation System, 1970-2006) that found that a surprising majority (77 out of 88) award-winning technological innovations had received federal funding. The audience, which I'd guess numbered almost 200, was very interested in the significant, but not well known, role of government in funding technological innovation, and listened to speakers who urged the incoming Obama administration to pay attention to this area. Dr. Block used the term "stim-novation" to suggest that promoting innovation should be part of economic stimulus efforts. Other speakers discussed the importance of addressing energy policy priorities (they said "energy policy" overrides "climate change" as the key issue) by promoting innovation.

 

While this program did not directly address innovation@cfed's focus on expanding economic opportunity, it provided much food for thought about urgency felt in so many diverse quarters for promoting, accelerating and investing in innovation.  There is much to learn about how best to do this, but there is great consensus that active and free-ranging exchange and sharing - connections - are essential. Forces that impede idea exchange and connections will be detrimental to innovation. Speakers mentioned the pressure on universities and their faculties to capitalize on commercializable discoveries may in some ways be serving to squelch the free exchange which actually leads to breakthroughs.  Also,  failure to find the resources to invest in all stages of the innovation process, from the very beginning, through pilot-testing and scale-up, and all the iterations along the way (picturesquely called, "the valley of death") will also spell doom for innovation.

 

What can we learn from this?  How can we connect our world of social and economic innovation to the world of technological and business innovation, to our mutual benefit?

 

innovation@cfed is excited to announce that the online form to nominate an Innovative Idea is now available!

You can nominate an Innovative Idea even if you personally have not worked on the idea.  This is your opportunity to raise up that great idea you learned about at the Assets Learning Conference or some other gathering. Perhaps you've been excited about an idea that came up in a conversation, that you know from your community, or that you've read about.

All we ask is that you give us a brief description of the idea, and identify at least one individual associated with it who will be able to describe it and champion it.  We'll take it from there, by contacting the individual or individuals and encouragng them to submit the idea in the Innovative Idea submission process that will open in January 2009.

A number of Innovative Ideas will be selected to be showcased in a publication, on the innovation@cfed website, and at the 2009 Innovation Summit.

There's no limit to the number of ideas that you can nominate (just use a separate online form for each idea).  Start nominating today!  (Nominations close January 24, 2009.)