Charlette Smith BUS 374 Social Innovation

           This week we learned all about Solution & Impact Evaluation. We started with the Theory of Change, it is very useful. It is basically how an organization's day-to-day activities relate to its mission and overall goals and outcomes. Once we know this, we can measure how successful they are. We were also introduced to an amazing organization that is making a great impact: The Rooftop Garden, where they use disabled people to learn new skills, be in the sun, and socialize.     We also learned how to analyze our results through, outputs, outcomes, and impact. These are useful when trying to understand the results of a nonprofit. Outputs are easy to count, outcomes can be difficult to measure and impact is actually very difficult to measure. Kevin Starr's Lasting Impact helps me understand how to measure a non-profit's success in a deeper way. He utilized specific questions and taught us how to look at a successful mission statement. Hi...

     This week we learned all about Design Thinking. What is it? It's a great technique that has been proven to achieve extraordinary results. It consists of four key elements: Define the problem, create and consider many options, refine selected directions, Repeat and Pick the winner, and execute. The process is repeatable, utilizes creative techniques and yields guaranteed results. We also learned about Human-centered Design, a creative approach to problem-solving it focuses on the people you're designing for.      The David Kelley Ted Talk 'How to Build Your Creative Confidence' sparked my interest. Many of us share a common story where we encountered someone that may have crushed our dreams or inspiration that we take into adulthood. However, this video mentioned that if we stick with the process we will be surprised at how innovative and creative we really are. Most of us are afraid of judgment and it can stop us from doing certain things.   ...

     This week we were introduced to two new concepts: Addressing Big Problems and Root Cause Analysis. We learned how to study and understand the problems that social innovation addresses. Solutions must not only address a legitimate social issue but they must also be determined by the root cause analysis. We took a deep dive into understanding more of what the root cause analysis means and we learned more about the tie between the gospel and social innovation.           My favorite resource we studied this week was the Ted Talk "Wicked Problems", it was pretty moving. This talk was introduced to us in 2014 when there was a large political unrest going on in the United States and many people were divided politically. There were many questions on how people consumed their information and the resources on how they consumed their information. The speakers in this talk did an amazing of helping us understand how we can become more unbiased in th...