The Broad View of Innovation: #GoodReads from the i-teams

The Broad View of Innovation: #GoodReads from the i-teams

This week, we bring you another edition of #GoodReads shared by the Innovation Teams (i-teams), a cohort of in-house innovation consultants in cities across the United States and Israel that are developing and deploying bold ideas to tackle the biggest issues facing city governments.

The Innovation Teams have a broad view of what it means to at the cutting edge of innovation in the public sector. As the teams apply the Innovation Delivery approach in their cities, they meet with hundreds of residents, experts, stakeholders, and others with unique perspectives on what it will take to move the needle on issues as diverse as residential displacement and economic development. They also scan the field constantly for new ideas, many of which they share with colleagues across the cohort of i-teams.

Living Cities curates the very best articles, reports, resources, and videos that i-teams shared in real time. Here are some of the #GoodReads that teams shared over the past several weeks:

Find Innovation Where You Least Expect It – Tony McCaffrey and Jim Pearson, Harvard Business Review

An i-team member in Syracuse, NY shared this insight:

  • “I really enjoyed this article that focuses on finding innovation where you least expect it. The difficulty for executives or teams when approaching problems that need innovative ideas is that they are limited by how they normally use a product or see an issue. An example the article gives is that potentially, after the Titanic hit the iceberg, it could have navigated its way closer to another iceberg and had get off the ship and sit on the iceberg waiting for rescue. Icebergs, though, are seen as threats, so that technique wasn’t used. In our work, it is so important to break down any task, product, or function into its individual parts to see where it can be more useful, or changed for the better. I’ll look forward to using more of these techniques in the future!”

Report: Innovation that Matters – 1776

An i-team member in Long Beach, CA shared this insight:

  • “In their report “Innovation that Matters”, the firm 1776 studied the civic innovation ecosystems of (8) cities. The full report is attached below, which includes more detail about the index and data sources they used; including a number of Bloomberg cities! Very interesting findings for cities that are looking for recommendations to attract and grow businesses.“

10 Predictions for 2016 – Nesta

An i-team member in Tel Aviv, Israel shared this insight:

  • “I particularly found interesting the food hacking revolution coming our way and how universities will drive their students to solve global problems in an innovative way. But they’re all quite exciting to read. If you have the time, check to see how they did on their 2015 predictions.”

Cashing In on the Public Right of Way – Stephen Goldsmith, Governing

An i-team member in Peoria, IL shared this insight:

  • “This is probably the most exciting innovation I have discovered recently. Alternative delivery models encourage the private sector to improve efficiency while reducing the risk to the public sector. Michigan is turning its public liabilities into assets.”
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