(Part 3 of 3 in the Architects, Inventors and Collaborators Blog series.)
It’s no secret that our world has become increasingly social. I wonder, however, if those outside the technology industry have paid mind to the way in which technology has become intrinsically linked with collaboration.
Whether crowdstorming, crowdsourcing or crowdfunding, hackathons or strategic alliances, technology has become a vehicle for our world’s brain trust, and a way to tackle the most pressing issues of our time. Organizations and individuals can utilize these frameworks to problem solve, create usable software, discover new ideas and prototypes, pool money to fund initiatives, outsource tasks and even to save lives.
Technology paired with our collective intelligence is the ultimate recipe for impact and success.
Speaker Tonya Surman embodies this collaborative ethos. The founding executive director and current CEO of the Centre for Social Innovation, Tonya’s work revolves around building shared spaces and fostering cooperation among networks of social innovators. Her latest book, The Community Bond: An Innovation in Social Finance, is a testament to the efficacy of this approach, as CSI renovated its Annex location by raising $2 million dollars through community bonds.
Not just allowing, but pushing for open innovation and alliance building is critical to our future. As is incentivizing the Architects, Inventors and Collaborators that are rethinking traditional structures and developing new frameworks, manifesting their ingenuity and facilitating partnerships for impact, respectively.
One person who does this brilliantly is speaker and Quirky Founder & CEO, Ben Kaufman. To date, Quirky has developed 288 products with the help of 188 retail partners and 328,000 investors. By removing barriers for inventors, he has been able to bring two new consumer products to market each week, and share revenue with the people who helped to inform and produce them.
Essentially, Ben architected a new way of producing by connecting inventors with a larger community of collaborators: everything this year’s theme stands for.
Join Tonya, Ben and a number of other speakers at our Global HQ on Thursday, February 21st, when we continue the discussion on how to create and embody a more open, connected and collaborative world. We look forward to seeing you there.