Creating an Environment for Creativity & Empowerment. The Value of Visualization | Data Visualization. There Aren't Enough Female Angel Investors, But This Bootcamp Is Making More. A cursory glance at the world of venture capital can feel a bit like staring at one of those framed group portraits that hang on fraternity walls: all too often, you’re just looking at a bunch of white dudes. But thanks to the efforts of folks like Natalia Oberti Noguera, the investment landscape is changing. Her Pipeline Fellowship is an angel investing bootcamp for women philanthropists, and it’s yielding real-world results. Back in 2008, Ms. Oberti Noguera--who was recently named one of Business Insider's "30 Most Important Women in Tech Under 30"--started meeting with six women entrepreneurs in New York. Two years later, her network had grown to include 1,200, but they kept running up against the same hurdle.
"How hard it was to secure funding as a for-profit social venture," says Oberti Noguera, the daughter of a U.N. employee who traveled the world as a child and now lives in New York City. So she established The Pipeline Fellowship to create capital for women social entrepreneurs. 25 Startups in Unlikely Places Around the Globe. The world’s cities are all trying to emulate Silicon Valley’s example and become the next global hub. Leading cities such as London, New York, Tel Aviv, Beijing and Berlin are all creating friendly conditions for startups to thrive, but other incipient companies in more unlikely places are also prospering.
Below, we've rounded up 25 startups Russia to New Zealand, Lagos to the Himalayas and Krakow to Uruguay to show that innovation is not about being in the right place — it’s about doing the right thing. 1. VisibleNation — Moscow, Russia VisibleNation is an Anglo-Russian startup that offers a social data comparison service so users can share accurate information and data. Its free service allows people to access categories such as travel, career, education, finance, health and family to make lifestyle decisions. 2. Image courtesy of Iroko Partners Iroko is the world’s largest distributor of African entertainment, including Nigeria’s huge Nollywood film industry. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. The Insight Point, @juanisaza. “Anthropology-amateur, trend-searcher, fledgling Art-collector, compulsive blogger and advertising-skeptical”, así se autodescribe Juan Isaza, quien, actualmente es una de las voces latinas más influyentes dentro del marketing, la publicidad, el estudio de consumidores y las tendencias.
−Director de Planeación Estratégica en DDB Latina, Miembro del comité global de planning de DDB Worldwide y Director del Social Media Lab− «un espacio de investigación para entender a los consumidores y su interacción en las redes sociales para los mercados latinos, incluyendo América Latina, España y el mercado hispano de Estados Unidos», hace de su labor una referencia para quienes quieren y buscan entender la manera de ver los nuevos consumidores y mercados.
Este nos podría servir para cultura. 18 Keys to Engaging Mentors and Funders. Why Give a Damn: Building relationships isn’t just about charisma and polish and heart. It’s about discipline. This post breaks down what to do before, during, and after a meeting with a prospective mentor or funder to dramatically increase the chances of creating a long-lasting, mutually valuable relationship. The author of this post, Teju Ravilochan, is the CEO of the Unreasonable Institute. Every single year, one of the biggest criticisms I hear from our mentors is this: “Your entrepreneurs don’t follow up.” It’s not just our mentors. WHAT ON EARTH IS GOING ON? What I’ve learned over the past three years of hearing this feedback is you can’t take follow-up for a given. I now know that one of our biggest failures as an organization that trains entrepreneurs is that we haven’t done nearly enough in supporting our entrepreneurs to engage with mentors and funders who can really help them.
Well that ends now. Be with the right person. Understand what you want. Incline Them in Your Favor. 10 Reasons to Design a Better Corporate Culture. By James L. Heskett, W. Earl Sasser, and Joe Wheeler Editor's Note— Why is it that many of the same companies appear repeatedly on lists of the best places to work, the best providers of customer service, and the most profitable in their industries? In their new book, The Ownership Quotient, HBS professors Jim Heskett and Earl Sasser and coauthor Joe Wheeler assert the answer lies in recognizing that strong, adaptive cultures can foster innovation, productivity, and a sense of ownership among employees and customers. They also outlast any individual charismatic leader. But how can you as a manager create and nurture that special culture? We can learn a great deal from organizations whose strong and adaptive ownership cultures give them a powerful competitive edge.
Leadership is critical in codifying and maintaining an organizational purpose, values, and vision. 1. Why We Collaborate. TED Radio Hour: Why We Collaborate. 18 Ways to Earn Money From Crowdworking. With the rapid rise of crowdsourcing over the last five years since the term was coined by Jeff Howe in Wired, there has been a lot of coverage on how individuals, organizations and businesses can implement the concept into their work. Last year there was a new conference (CrowdConf), a new consortium (Crowdsortium) and a myriad of companies that offered sites, tools and platforms to get more out of the Internet masses.
But what about the worker? Since crowdsourcing is making such a visible impact on the way work is done, how can professionals and creatives benefit from the crowdsourcing model? Here are 18 ideas for participating on crowdsourcing sites for perks, prizes, and, yes, even income. 1. Mechanical Turk If you’re up for doing small tasks that other people might find tedious, this site may be a fit for you. Clickworker This is a Germany-based crowd labor site, but there is also an English version available. Cloudcrowd CastingWords Can you type quickly and accurately? 2. Blur Group 3. Designing For Growth - Apple Does It, So Can You. Airbnb's Design Talks: Designing Big Solutions in Cleverly Designed Rooms with Deliciously Designed Food.
By LYDIA LAURENSON Airbnb is one of the city's most fashionable startups right now, and it's riding the design wave. On Wednesday the 18th, I headed over to one of their free monthly Design Talks, a mixer/lecture at their current office in the Design District. The speaker was Patrice Martin of Ideo.org, whose tagline is "Let's Design A Better World With Everyone.
" Martin's presentation included one slide that said "Design As A Way Of Seeing The World"; she spoke about "design thinking" and how Ideo addresses social issues in "places where design can't reach. " The presentation outlined one of Ideo's initiatives, a crowdsourced mapping project to improve sanitation in Ghana.
Of course, the slides were beautifully designed. Equally attractive was the Airbnb office -- and Airbnb's intentions for this lecture series. Maggie explained that the goal of the Design Talks is to help "bring the design community together," which is interesting, given the current state of art in San Francisco. What every designer working in a startup needs to know. At the core of any startup is a passion to satisfy unmet needs. At the core of a designer there’s a passion to craft a bold vision for the future. But being a designer and being a designer in a startup are two very different things. After working at IDEO for about five years, I took the leap into a startup. Here are the three most surprising things I’ve learned from the past year about design and the role a designer plays in a startup.
User research doesn’t produce user-centered design. At IDEO, a team conducts “unfocus groups” where consumers were given a buffet of prototyping materials to build their perfect running shoe Traditional quantitative user research does not help you envision the future. User-centered design is something entirely different. Steve Jobs introduces the iMac, or “what [computers] will look like from today on.”
Steve Jobs was notorious for his belief that good design could create products that anticipate consumer needs. The result? Take Dropbox, for example. ExperienceCurve | Creative Experience Design & Social Business. Latest Trends in Design and Innovation--And Why The Debate Over Design Thinking is Moot. Posted by: Bruce Nussbaum on July 31, 2009 Sorry for the silence but I’ve been in the field observing the practice of Design with a capital “D.” I just returned from observing ZIBA Design’s amazing new headquarters in Portland and before that I visited with Smart Design in NYC and talked with Continuum in Boston.
The good news is that the field of Design is evolving at an amazing clip, moving into new and exciting spaces. And with that, the business model of Design is changing as well. The bad news is that Design education and the conversation about Design Thinking are falling further and further behind the reality of Design. Here’s what I saw in the field: 1- The strongest market demand for Design today from private companies and public organizations is for strategy. Shaping brand strategies and even broader organizational strategies. Public entities are the latest organizations to turn to Design to reshape their organizations and cultures.