Tag Archives | Design Thinking

Communication Design + Social Innovation

By on February 20, 2013 in Community Building, Design, Education, Sector, Social Entrepreneurship, Social Intrapreneurship

Communication is the most important determinant of whether or not you will succeed in achieving your vision (see my previous post on the use of language in Intrapreneurship). Great leaders have it, and there’s a way to get it. I speak at many conferences, including the recent Social Enterprise Boot Camp, and receive many requests [...]

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You’re So Sleek, But I’m Not Interested

By on December 14, 2012 in Design, Energy / Enviornment, Poverty, Stories of Impact, Water, Women's Empowerment

In college, I was enamored by all the savvy products that were being created by first world designers for pressing world issues. Buzz words like humanitarian design and design for bottom of the pyramid began forming. Interdisciplinary design was becoming more experimental and addressing bigger problems. Incredibly imaginative solutions were being produced for basic needs [...]

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Unlocking Intrapreneurship with Language

By on December 5, 2012 in Design, Featured, Social Intrapreneurship

If it is true, as has been said, that all change begins with language, then it is equally true that the inability to change begins with language as well. The wealth of jargon used to describe intrapreneurship (itself a bit of jargon), innovation and corporate social responsibility is more exhausting than enriching, and as their [...]

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Launching a Successful Non-Profit: Four Crucial Lessons

By on November 2, 2012 in Education, Non-Profits, Social Entrepreneurship

In the 8 months it took to launch our tech non-profit, StudentDonate.com, my team and I learned a ton of critical lessons along the way.  Below are the top 4 lessons we’ve learned that will help any burgeoning or even established social entrepreneur. Your Website Needs to Rock – Face it, in the 21st century [...]

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Design + Social Change

By on September 26, 2012 in Social Entrepreneurship

Fields that have traditionally dealt with social change such as International Development and Non-Profit Management are changing. They are adapting to a competitive environment that has forced social leaders to adopt new approaches, new measurement tools, and new models. Because of this sea change, many professionals who have otherwise been absent to this space are [...]

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Dynamic Innovation

By on September 13, 2012 in Social Entrepreneurship

When working with a designer to produce your marketing material, the most dangerous thing you can say is  “I’ll know it when I see it.” True innovation comes from taking risks – it is impossible to “know it when you see it.” In fact, most ideas that are truly new often times lack a lot [...]

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Design, Capacity and Change

By on August 7, 2012 in Featured, Social Entrepreneurship, Starting the Journey

In the early winter of 2007 my partner, Kate Hanisian, and I would recap our work days over a glass of wine in the window of our apartment in the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood of Cincinnati. She was working as the Development Director at a local non-profit that focused on criminal justice reform and I was working [...]

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The Story of verynice

By on August 7, 2012 in Featured, Social Entrepreneurship, Stories of Impact

If there is one thing I’ve learned from the past 5 or so years of working with hundreds of social entrepreneurs and non-profit founders, it is this: Social enterprises have wonderful stories to tell. I’m talking truly inspiring, honest, stories. Stories that make you want to get out of the cubicle and make something. But [...]

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