It’s Time for Philanthropy to Open the Door to Open Source

Posted on May 30, 2018October 25, 2018 by Case Foundation

Innovation is driving technology and change faster than ever before. Yet, when I am asked about technological innovations that have the best chance to make an impact in the future of philanthropy, I often cite a collaborative approach that is closely aligned with the technology world, but can no longer be considered cutting edge: open source.

This may not be the answer that many are expecting, but open source’s collaborative and transparent nature is well suited for philanthropy and its ability to leverage the power of many to do good at minimal cost lends itself to being one of the keys to the next phase in the evolution of philanthropy.

Open source software allows anyone to read, study, modify and redistribute a software’s source code with little restriction other than that free access is maintained. It is often developed in a highly collaborative manner with many people contributing pieces of code and it is found in a wide variety of places – the overwhelming majority of consumer devices include some open source code.

For many philanthropies and non-profits, open source provides the opportunity to save money and time. There is a growing community of coders experimenting openly and sharing ideas and software covering everything from website and app development to artificial intelligence and blockchain. By embracing open source, foundations and nonprofits can tap into this space of bright technologists and innovators for free. In doing so, they will gain access to battle-tested code and ideas, allowing them to focus on their core missions.

For others, it is an opportunity to leverage the time and money they have put into building software and programs so others in the field can use them. In our network of changemakers, we see many organizations producing innovative platforms and technologies that are used to create social change. Why not further that effort by open sourcing that work so that many more can use, improve and share it? Our experience shows that by including open source from the outset of a plan, you reap the benefits of including a community in your work and have a product that can be shared with the larger community with minimal effort. And, frankly, isn’t the act of open sourcing software in line with most philanthropic missions?

Open source has other benefits as well. The collaborative nature of open source can encourage philanthropies to engage with new audiences and to connect technical and nontechnical participants. We have seen that reaching beyond your bubble and forging unlikely alliances between those working to solve the same problem can yield impressive and transformational results.

We’re already seeing philanthropies embrace open source. For example, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation developed an open source platform to drive the adoption of digital financial services in developing countries. Mojaloop, the platform’s name, creates a standard system for banks and other financial service providers to communicate and execute transactions at a lower cost than competitors for the nearly two billion unbanked people in developing regions.

Throughout the Case Foundation’s history, we’ve recognized the value of open source software by both using it in our work and supporting others who are a part of the community. Some of our greatest efforts such as Make It Your Own and America’s Giving Challenge succeeded because open source software enabled us to move quickly and experiment with new ideas without having to start from scratch. We were also early supporters of groups such as Code for America which produces open source software and organizes communities of citizens to also create and contribute open source solutions for their towns and cities.

And we are now building all the software we produce for specific campaigns with an eye on making them open sourced as well. For example, we have provided the open sourcing code from our #FacesofFounders campaign allowing any organization to launch a similar campaign focusing on user-generated content. And this year, we plan to release even more open source projects produced through our broader work here at the Case Foundation. We hope that–along with many others–we can help the social sector see the benefits of open source, spark innovation, accelerate social good and ultimately help change the world.

We hope you will join us.

Getting In The Arena: The Importance of Going Local and Getting Personal

Posted on July 25, 2017October 25, 2018 by Case Foundation

Over the past twenty years, the Case Foundation has created, implemented and led a wide variety of initiatives, nearly all together with a vast portfolio of partners. In our efforts to “invest in people and ideas that can change the world,” we’ve brought a desire for scale and impact in everything we do. As we celebrate our twenty-year history and look back on the lessons we have learned, we realize that while our focus has been on making big bets, we have seen transformative power in “going local and getting personal” as an approach to addressing daunting challenges.

What do I mean by this? In my earliest days in philanthropy, I knew I had much to learn (I still do, by the way). I was struck by the passion and commitment of those working in the social sector—the public, nonprofit and philanthropic arenas. But I was also struck by how often new solutions being proposed for communities didn’t have the voice of a local, or the personal voice of the very people whose problems the solutions were aiming to address. We saw many examples of solutions drawn up by professionals sitting under fluorescent lights too often removed from the realities of those living the problems.

In 2006, we commissioned research that resulted in a report called “Citizens at the Center: A New Approach to Civic Engagement.” The research found that individuals often felt disconnected from public leaders and civil society organizations. It promoted an approach that included engaging those being served to more effectively solve problems and improve lives in their communities. This approach puts the community and stakeholders at the center of any program, problem to be solved or decision-making process and, I think, shines through in all of our work over the past twenty years.

As we look at our divided nation today, we know there is a great desire among many segments of society to feel both included and heard on matters affecting their lives and their future. Indeed, there is plenty of data to suggest that the divide itself has been driven by a sense of disenfranchisement from sectors of society across the nation. By ensuring communities and individuals are at the heart of programs and initiatives designed to address their needs, new “onramps” and opportunities can be created for more robust citizen engagement, which in turn should lead to more effective impact across society.

In our own work at the Case Foundation, we have been intensely focused on engaging stakeholders across our initiatives, and we have promoted platforms and programs that better enable citizen engagement. For example:

- When we sought to address the digital divide through one of our earliest initiatives, PowerUp, we did so with a wide range of partners, including the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, local faith-based organizations, the YMCA and community centers. We enabled each locality to craft their own venues and programs to meet the specific needs of their community. The result? A web of diverse after-school technology centers in 1000 communities across the nation. The key was standardizing elements that enabled scale, while not losing the ability of communities to make it their own.

- In 2007, we launched The Make It Your Own Awards, challenging people from all walks of life to discuss what matters most to them, decide what kind of community they want, and then take action together. With more than 4,600 applicants, the program drew a diverse set of both individuals and small community based organizations, many of whom had never applied for foundation funding to support their work. What’s more, the program involved the public in nearly every aspect of the decision-making process and design—and as one of the first grant programs decided by public vote, more than 15,000 votes were cast to help name the Top 20 projects. Make It Your Own was also an opportunity to help all 4,600+ applicants understand the latest (at the time) social media tools to help empower them to raise funds and rally supporters whether or not they were successful in receiving funding from the Foundation. The impact was impressive as we found that more than half of the grantees had achieved concrete and significant outcomes at the two-year mark.

- Even campaigns that were based in Washington, DC, such as the White House Summit on Innovation that we co-hosted, were grounded in the idea that innovative ideas from local communities and audiences were needed to improve government performance. The program pushed 35 U.S. government agencies to use contests and grand challenges to tap “entrepreneurial spirit” across the nation in finding solutions to major challenges faced by government agencies. And it was innovators from the private sector and citizens from communities across the country that responded with great ideas from new perspectives. Since its launch in 2010, 740 challenges have been run on Challenge.gov—the site that grew out of that initial effort—eliciting entries from 250,000+ citizens from all 50 states.

Even in the realm of science and exploration, we are seeing an explosion of citizen engagement. A new generation of scientists and explorers are tying their work and data collection to local communities, often looking to non-scientists for inputs. Whether it is tracking radiation levels in oceans near nuclear plants, high school science classes transmitting their daily environmental observations, communities working together to track wild animal migrations so both wild and domesticated animals can coexist or citizens setting aside one day a year to count birds for the Great Backyard Bird Count, the data collected by non-scientists about their communities is integral to much of the scientific work taking place today. And the scientists see value in grounding that data in the human experience. This connection provides context, but also democratizes science so that anyone, anywhere can be part of the scientific process. The scientists and explorers I know see this as a wonderful development that, they hope, will lead to more broad-based support both for science and for exploration.

Some believe that to move past the stalemates in Washington, we need to go local and follow the lead of cities and states who are engaging their citizens and finding innovative approaches to daunting challenges. Mayors can’t grow detached from the citizens they serve, nor can a Governor survive by ignoring the priorities of his/her state. No matter where leaders sit, failure to engage citizens and think about local impact, undermines even the best-intentioned initiatives. By more actively engaging citizens to build a better world, we will accelerate and expand opportunities for lasting impact. At the Case Foundation, we are committed to continuing to keeping “citizens at the center” in all we do.

Citizens at the Center: How Technology is Unleashing a new Public Commons

Posted on May 31, 2016March 10, 2024 by Case Foundation

Putting people at the center of the solutions to their own problems might seem obvious—and yet time and time again, whether in business, government or the social sector (including nonprofits and philanthropy), we see well-intentioned professionals engage in program planning in conference rooms under fluorescent lights with little or no input from the very citizens the programs they create aim to serve.

At the recent New America Annual conference, I had the opportunity to sit down with the organization’s CEO, Anne-Marie Slaughter, to discuss the role that citizen-centered ideation and innovation must play in solving our most pressing social problems. And what role can technology play to better engage citizens and create a new kind of “public commons”? As we’re witnessing more and more, technology’s power to encourage, facilitate and increase citizen-centered dialogue, deliberation, organizing and action might be exactly what we need to make sure people living the problem are given the opportunities to define and solve problems for themselves.

Nearly a decade ago, the Case Foundation commissioned a report to look at this opportunity—drawing out challenges and opportunities for a deeper level of civic engagement—in which citizens are invited into the process of developing solutions in their own communities and creating ongoing feedback loops to ensure continued dialog over time. The report, entitled “Citizens at the Center,” laid out a framework for action—a path for engaging the people who have lived the problem to identify solutions—through business, government and the social sector. The idea caught on—since that time we’ve seen a range of organizations, initiatives and governments embrace this approach.

Not surprisingly, technology has played a huge role in advancing this mindset—with the ubiquity of the internet and the increasing access to mobile devices, everyday citizens can now reimagine how best to access healthcare services, find and qualify for jobs, access markets and supply chains, and yes, find paths to capital that can enable them to build their new enterprises—benefits once reserved for the elite. And they are speaking up and connecting with government to improve quality of existing services, or suggesting needed new programs and services. The increasing demand for improving transparency and reducing government bureaucracy, combined with the evolution of digital technologies, has opened the door for the creation of programs that can successfully engage the public and encourage their direct involvement in driving innovation and improving how government serves them. At its core, this is an opportunity for government to return to the roots of democracy—a government that is for the people, and more significantly, by the people.

One example is Boston’s Citizen’s Connect—a mobile app that gives citizens a way to communicate and collaborate on the issues they are seeing and experiencing at the municipal level—providing the city government with real time feedback on everything ranging from bad potholes to missed garbage pickups. Steve Goldsmith highlighted this example and others like it in his book The Responsive City.

Here at the Case Foundation, we’ve been passionate about the potential for technology to ignite civic engagement in a variety of ways. For instance, our first foray into the space was with our Make It Your Own Awards in 2007, a platform that enabled citizens to champion their best ideas for working with others to bring solutions in their own communities. Then, in 2008, our Change Begins With Me campaign, brought the best thinking forward from thousands of citizens across the nation who made a pledge to personally make a difference in big or small ways in their home communities. These programs were followed by some of the earliest work in crowdfunding social media campaigns when we introduced America’s Giving Challenge, together with our partners PARADE Magazine, Network for Good, GlobalGiving and Causes on Facebook. All in all, more than 200,000 citizens came together to champion causes they cared about and encourage others to join in. All in all, nearly $4 million was raised for great causes, most of them local, small and previously unheard of—with average donations of about $25.

As these approaches continued to pick up steam, we partnered with the White House in 2010 and 2012 to co-host The Summit on Innovation, which brought together more than 35 agencies for two daylong public-private strategy sessions focused on promoting innovation through the use of prizes, challenges and open grantmaking. An outcome of this work was Challenge.gov, a platform that provides opportunities for government agencies to tap into the innovative ideas of its citizens through the use of prizes and challenges competitions. On any given day, this platform enables citizens to engage in meaningful efforts of federal agencies as they seek to better serve those they represent.

In the years since, President Obama has gone to great lengths to express the importance of employing a way of governing that gives citizens a voice and empowers them to solve big problems. In his own words (spoken at this year’s SXSW Interactive Conference), President Obama asked, “How can we start coming up with new platforms, new ideas, new approaches across disciplines and across skill sets to solve some of the big problems that we’re facing today? (evercoach.com) Because, I’ve said this before, I said this at the State of the Union, the most important office in a democracy is the office of citizen.”

Innovation and technology is increasingly becoming a democratizing force as citizens from all walks of life are given the opportunity to more fully engage in the process of solution-seeking. The cloud-based platform Akvo FLOW places the needs of community members at the center of local and regional governance. Through its sophisticated data collection technology, citizens themselves can monitor and report on water, sanitation and hygiene programs in real-time; the result is reliable information that better informs policy planning and infrastructure management. Another example of technology being developed with citizen engagement in mind is MobiSAM. This mobile app is aimed at promoting dialogue and facilitating interaction between citizens and local government in South Africa around the provision of basic services.

Even with all of these incredible advances, we still have a long way to go before we fully realize the benefits of deploying all of the arrows in our quiver when it comes to fully unleashing technology in ways that engage those who have lived the problems we are trying to solve. But given how far we’ve come in a decade, I have no doubt that with the rapid advances in technology we are closer than ever to realizing a democracy where all citizens are fully engaged and firmly at the center of decisions that matter the most.

What’s So Wrong with Nonprofits Playing by Market Rules?

Posted on March 27, 2015October 31, 2018 by Case Foundation

Here’s the thing about markets – they have this uncanny way of being candid, sending demand signals that companies need to pay attention and adapt to in order to thrive, if not survive.

So why is it that the nonprofit sector is uncomfortable with embracing more market-based approaches to its work? This week’s feeding frenzy of articles criticizing the Council on Foundations for its experiment to host a $40,000 pitch competition to identify new organizations and approaches to drive social change is an example of this discomfort. In fact, the frenzy was so severe, that the Council decided to cancel the pitch competition and instead host a discussion on the merits and drawbacks of new approaches to grantmaking.

One of the pillars of our work at the Case Foundation is “revolutionizing philanthropy.” We believe that the practice of mobilizing private capital for public good is in need of a major reboot. In order to keep up with the pace and scope of major social challenges, the resources and tactics going into addressing these challenges and the organizations managing those resources need to be more efficient and effective. And as a sector, we need more catalytic, collaborative and creative solutions.

That’s why we’ve tested programs like the Make It Your Own Awards, the first campaign to open up a part of the grantmaking process to an online public vote. Or the America’s Giving Challenges (in 2007 and 2009), which mobilized over 150,000 donors to give $3.8M to over 14,000 causes, most of which were small and scrappy. That’s why we created the Be Fearless campaign – because we believe that in order to create more innovation in our approaches to social change, we must all take risks, embrace and learn from failure and make big bets. And that’s why we consistently provide catalytic funding to partners that are experimenting with new approaches and hoping to find breakthrough solutions and collaborations.

We’ve long championed the potential for prize and challenge programs – including initiatives like pitch competitions – to discover breakthrough innovations. We know that sometimes the people with the most innovative solutions to big problems will be found in unlikely places – just take the wedding dress designer who played a critical role in helping to dramatically improve the design of the Ebola Protective Suit worn by health care workers treating the disease, thanks to a challenge hosted by USAID’s Global Development Lab. The U.S. government has broadly embraced the use of prizes and challenges, which kicked off with the Summit on Innovation that we co-hosted with the White House in 2010, leading to the creation of Challenge.gov, which hosts hundreds of prize and challenge competitions across 50 federal agencies. And we were proud to join some of the philanthropic sector’s leading innovators – Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Joyce Foundation, the Knight Foundation, the Kresge Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation – in publishing a 2014 report on the ways in which incentive prizes are transforming the innovation landscape.

We love to see new practices for crowdsourcing ideas, pooling resources, disrupting old ways of doing business, testing new approaches and massively publicizing – if not competing – new programs. Why? Because, quite frankly, despite a massive amount of good accomplished with billions of nonprofit dollars, the evidence base for impact remains unsatisfying. We’re not saying that we should swing the pendulum completely toward prizes, challenges and other experimental approaches – but deploying tactics that can help us discover new ideas from unlikely places is desperately needed.

We have a saying at the Case Foundation based on an old African proverb – if you want to go fast, go alone; if you want to go far, go together. What if, instead of trashing the Council on Foundations for trying something new, we embraced it as a fearless attempt to disrupt the status quo with the hope of finding a better way? Sure, we might each have our tweaks on how to make it better (e.g., having a panel of judges, not the audience, vote on the winner). But as a tactic, it brings a fresh market-based approach and has the potential to expose innovative people and ideas to a broad community of funders, who just might decide it’s worth pooling their resources for greater and faster impact.

We look forward to the discussion on the merits of new grantmaking approaches at the Council’s conference, but we’ll wistfully be wondering what it would be like with the pitch competition in full swing, tapping into the “wisdom of the crowd” and fully embracing of the idea of democratizing philanthropy, making it easier for anyone to participate in the efforts to solve big, hairy problems.

Want to continue the conversation? Tweet us @CaseFoundation with the hashtag #CFBlog!

Milken Global Conference Recap: Impact Investing Gains Steam

Posted on May 6, 2014October 31, 2018 by Case Foundation

Last week, the Case Foundation team, including our founders, Steve and Jean Case, had the pleasure of participating in the 17th Annual Milken Institute Global Conference with more than 3,000 investors, policymakers philanthropists, and thought leaders from around the globe.

We were particularly struck by the momentum and buzz around impact investing at the conference. Jean and Steve joined CNBC live for a short discussion on the topic, and shared their thoughts into the potential for impact investing to move from a niche concept to a mainstream investing strategy. The room was packed for the panel, “Investing for Impact: What’s in Your Portfolio?” featuring Jean Case, and moderated by Matthew Bishop from the Economist. Double bottom-line innovators, including Tracy Palandjian (Social Finance), En Lee (LGT Venture Philanthropy), and Michael Schlein (Accion), also joined the panel the growth of social capital and shared more on their efforts and early successes. Impact Investing was also the source of great conversations in a number of other forums, from hallway discussions to formal dinners, and the growing interest in the space from this important group of conference-goers was apparent.

While at the conference, we also released a draft of our Short Guide to Impact Investing, under the leadership of our Entrepreneur in Residence, Sean Greene. The guide is designed to help investors – including high-net-worth individuals, foundations, family offices and others – explore the impact investing market and help guide their decisions as they hope to move towards investing that incorporates intent, measurement and transparency when it comes to generating both financial and social returns. We’re currently accepting public comments on the draft, and we thank the many of you who have already given us tremendous feedback that will help sharpen and improve the guide before we publish the final version in the coming months.

In addition to impact investing, Jean and Steve had the opportunity to take the stage to discuss other topics they’re passionate about. Jean joined some of the world’s most innovative philanthropists for the panel discussion, “Philanthropy Now: Prizes, Purpose, and People.” Moderated by the Templeton Foundation’s Jim Pitkofsky and also featuring Australian philanthropist Andrew Forrest, Tsitsi Masiyiwa of Zimbabwe’s Higher Life Foundation, Dick Merkin of the Heritage Provider Network and Faster Cures, and George Weiss, the panelists shared their own experiences on innovating in philanthropy through a number of approaches, including prizes and challenges. The Case Foundation was an early experimenter in prizes and competitions in philanthropy, beginning with the Make It Your Own Awards, which was widely acknowledged as the first time a foundation has allowed the public to play a role in grantmaking decisions. The panel also featured a lively discussion on incorporating the principles that made one successful in business to their philanthropic endeavors.

Our chairman, Steve Case, joined Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff and tech entrepreneur and academic Vivek Wadhwa for a panel on “Adjusting to the Tech Revolution: Surfing the Wave or Swept Away?” moderated by Dennis Kneale. In a spirited conversation, they examined how industries and consumers navigate the tech revolution as it snowballs through all aspects of society, from our personal lives to business and banking, health, education, transportation and communication.

Steve also joined Bonin Bough (Mondelez International), Ryan Kavanaugh (Relativity Media) and Lynn Tilton (Patriarch Partners) to guest judge a fast pitch competition, hosted by Daniel Gorfine of the Milken Institute. Companies judged included Nightingale, Immudicon, VirtualU, Sension, and Skip. In this first-ever Milken Institute-Kairos Society pitch competition, student entrepreneurs from each company pitched their concepts in front of a packed, pressure-filled theater. Congratulations to Catalin Voss, selected by the audience as the winner of the competition.

Watch Jean and Steve’s panels and the pitch competition from the Milken Global Conference online at the links below. Check out more from the Milken Institute online HERE.

Public-Private Strategy Session with White House Takes Citizen Participation to the Next Level

Posted on April 30, 2010November 1, 2018 by Case Foundation

This morning, I have the honor of kicking off the public-private strategy session we’re hosting with the White House on driving innovation and civic dialogue through the use of prizes, challenges and open grantmaking.

I feel a great sense of excitement as we head into this dialogue that focuses largely on new, breakthrough opportunities to more fully engage citizens in our public sector efforts. Here at the Case Foundation, we began to see the potential in these types of approaches to ignite civic participation, especially when combined with new interactive technologies, when we launched the Make It Your Own Awards in 2007. Since then, we have seen that potential grow as both the philanthropic and corporate sectors have continued to experiment through programs that incent the public to participate in decision-making.

Now, we have the opportunity to take lessons we’ve learned – and those of peers – from these early innovations and apply them to a sector where they have the potential to make the most impact on the public – in the federal government. Through the early experimentation, we’ve seen that there is a clear appetite from the public to have a more active role in making decisions that affect their daily lives and their communities, and now it’s time to capitalize on that appetite by creating opportunities and moments that capture the best ideas and move them forward.

Earlier this week, I was asked “why now?” when it comes to the government’s adoption of prizes and challenges. Frankly, I don’t think it was possible until now – the merging of the movement toward improving transparency and reducing bureaucracy at the federal level, with the evolution of Web 2.0 technologies has opened the door for the creation of programs that can successfully engage the public and encourage their direct involvement in driving innovation and improving how government serves them. At its core, this is an opportunity for government to return to the roots of democracy – a government that is for the people, and more significantly by the people.

And since this day-long session is all about reaching new audiences to identify new solutions and engaging all citizens in decision-making, we’re particularly excited about the fact that we’ll be able to bring the day to the public – no matter where they are. We encourage everyone interested in this topic to join our interactive Q&A sessions featuring leading innovators in this space, taking place online and live from the event. The schedule includes an exciting mix of public and private sector experts and practitioners, including Sonal Shah of the White House Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation, Peter Diamandis of the X Prize Foundation, Aneesh Chopra, U.S. CTO, the team from the Pepsi Refresh Project and others. We’ll hope you’ll join us on this exciting day!

Public-Private strategy session with White House takes citizen participation to the next level

Posted on April 30, 2010November 1, 2018 by Case Foundation

And since this day-long session is all about reaching new audiences to identify new solutions and engaging all citizens in decision-making, we’re particularly excited about the fact that we’ll be able to bring the day to the public – no matter where they are. We encourage everyone interested in this topic to join our interactive CaseSoup Q&A sessions featuring leading innovators in this space, taking place online and live from the event. The schedule includes an exciting mix of public and private sector experts and practitioners, including Sonal Shah of the White House Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation, Peter Diamandis of the X Prize Foundation, Aneesh Chopra, U.S. CTO, the team from the Pepsi Refresh Project and others. We’ll hope you’ll join us on this exciting day!

The White House embraces wisdom of the crowds. What do you think?

Posted on April 26, 2010November 1, 2018 by Case Foundation

This post was written by Michael Smith on behalf of the Case Foundation:

On Friday, April 30 we’re teaming up with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and the Domestic Policy Council (where the Office of Social Innovation resides) to bring the private and public sectors together to discuss lessons and strategies from experiments in prizes, challenges and open grantmaking – big and small.

This meeting is part of our continued efforts to encourage citizen involvement in decisions that affect them, and it’s part of the Obama Administration’s Open Government Directive, which requires agencies to tap the expertise and ingenuity of the American people to bring the top talent & best ideas to bear on our nation’s most pressing problems.

As I said in my blog post launching our series on Citizen-Centered Solutions last month, we have been experimenting with programs like this since we launched our Make It Your Own Awards and America’s Giving Challenge in 2007 – and we could not be more excited about the flood of similar programs that have come since then… everything from the American Express Members Project to this year’s Pepsi Refresh Project and now the White House telling agencies to tap into the knowledge and innovation of the people it serves! I may be a bit of a civic engagement nerd, but the possibilities of breaking down barriers and moving beyond the stale and stagnated when we commit to reaching new audiences and democratizing problem solving gives me goose bumps… really.

The meeting on Friday will highlight leading private sector innovators like the X Prize Foundation, American Express, PepsiCo, and the Knight Foundation along with cutting edge federal government innovators from DARPA, NASA, and the Department of Education. More than 100 federal government workers who are charged with implementing these new programs will listen to panels, participate in interactive discussions and Ignite sessions (where select participants will have three minutes to present new ideas) and hear from six senior officials from across the White House.

Prizes and challenges have proven to be effective in mobilizing the masses and identifying brilliant new ideas; however, we will be asking ourselves the tough questions, like…

How do you ensure transparency in decision making?
How do you ensure quality and impact?
How do you determine what problems should be tackled by an in-house team, contracted out, or opened to all through a prize?
And, how do you wade through the bureaucracy that makes innovation and taking new paths seem almost impossible.

We don’t want to take on these questions alone. So, while the capacity of this room may be limited we want to expand this discussion to as many people as possible. That’s why we’re hosting a day long series of live, interactive CaseSoup interviews with speakers from the event giving you a chance to hear from them and ask questions via social media. That’s why all panels and keynotes will be filmed and made available to the public the week of May 3rd. And, that’s why today, we’re asking that you take a look at the agenda and comment on this blog post with any questions that you would ask or any thoughts you have on what we’re trying to accomplish. So, let your voice be heard. What do you think?

Cookie	Duration	Description
cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics	11 months	This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional	11 months	The cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary	11 months	This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others	11 months	This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other.
cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance	11 months	This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance".
viewed_cookie_policy	11 months	The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data.

Build Your BE FEARLESS Style On ReadBeFearless.com