The seven elements of social innovation of methodology

On the framework of social innovation, there have been many excellent research.Since we Amani Institute innovation of social management project, 25 years, we are always looking for consistent with their own experiences and observations of theoretical framework.

The most popular with our is made"The innovator's DNA"Put forward the five steps of framework, but this kind of framework to focus on technology and business innovators, social innovation front line can be difficult to fully take into consideration.At the same time, we also found that from the design thought, system change and adaptive leadership ideas can learn useful elements.Therefore, we reconstructed Framework for Social Innovation education, and added some other point of view, and to create the Framework, we need for Social Innovation teaching, called Amani Social Innovation Framework (Amani Social Innovation Framework, ASIF)

The following is the detailed content of ASIF seven elements, with a case at that time I in Ashoka period, I was in el Salvador the marginalization of extreme violence community has launched a named Avancemos Youth social enterprise training program.This case clearly shows how to use ASIF framework in practice.

1, combustion (Buring) : need to solve a problem you had a good idea for their own motivation.It requires you to coordinate well with the relationship between the work, enthusiasm and motivation.

I come from a family education workers, because Argentina unable to get quasi birth at home, I was born in venezuela a penal colony.Since the age of 14, I began to deal with various youth problems in Latin America.A few years later, when Ashoka asked me to go to el Salvador this unfamiliar place to start an office, I agreed not to ask salary and working conditions.In the day of the highest suicide rates to lead a youth entrepreneurship programs, which mixed with many I really faith: youth, education, social entrepreneurship, and to build peace.I am full enthusiasm.

2, perception (Sensing) : reference design thinking, social innovation requires us to take advantage of all feeling to find the problem.

Arrived in SAN Salvador central city two hours later, I let a taxi driver to take me around, so I can see the city.He should bring the family!The next day, I met with a local organization leaders good understanding of what happened in this country.In less than 24 hours, I began to live in the city have the feeling of a kind of el Salvador.I spoke with more local people, including parents and government officials, I visited the school, met with the representatives of international institutions, read any books about youth and gang and literature.

3, ask questions (Questioning) : an innovator is one of the most outstanding performance of problem - do not ask others questions.

In SAN Salvador, I heard that many times "youth is the violence, because they are poor. They have no choice, only to participate in the gang."Even so, many organizations also provide economic opportunities in developing good for teenagers, but enterprises failed to reduce violence.The problem is not just poverty.

One afternoon, I met a young man.He told me that his life could end - like his brother killed by the gang.Our conversation was just five minutes, but lasted two hours, I kept asking questions, told me he thought you'd like to know everything.I finally understand the root cause of youth violence is not just poverty.I asked a lot of "why" and "how", also listen to a lot of talk.He told me that he is going to take part in the gang, only to see a lot of children in breakdance, he realized that he like street dance very much.He found the enthusiasm and the road of making a living, and help him network (through this he found our project).He said that saved him.

It's not easy to find the root cause of the problem (and whether you are always in think you really find the root cause), but to ask question, refactoring is a great way to looking for other answers.

4, the conception of network (Idea Networking) : this is the beginning of Idea generation, including share your problem, loosely formed ideas around it and set up the network, it is not just your personal brainwave, brainstorming is not only limited to your organization.

Normally, we use the web to access other resources to serve their own or work, but had the idea of network, the key is free to share your problems and see what other people think, in order to hunt.

El Salvador non-profit ecosystem is still not cooperation.Like many other regions in the world, organizations must compete for resources.We want to reach the goal, to promote teenagers become a change agent, the only way to stop them to participate in the gang is put them in the center of the project, and our organization.In other words, these young people's growth, rather than the development of our organization is our mission.With this new field of vision, we have attracted the attention of the whole system: schools, universities, local government, government, parents, youth, non-governmental organizations and international donors.We ask people to participate in a career, not to join our team.

5, joint (Associating) : this is a joint various ideas, create new opportunities and leading position of cognitive skills.

Before going off to el Salvador, in Washington, d.c., I happened to be a second-hand bookstore visited eastern market, found Robert putnam on an outreach work of social capital "single bowling" (Bowling Alone).At that time, I don't know how important this book, I just see it as an informative book, want to understand the ideas of the author.A world bank report, is described as the glue of society, social capital in this soon after, I again remind of the idea.Combine these ideas in el Salvador, I began to think about social capital may be able to stop the violence, how does it do that?And so this will give me very fresh element into the original idea.I found in el Salvador after other projects are also active in promoting social capital, but no one in the social enterprise business.

6, test (Experimenting) : similar to design thinking of the "prototype", test means in the real world to test your innovation, and use user feedback to improve your ideas.

Although it is difficult to accept for the practitioners of the traditional Chinese education, innovation in a high probability of failure and flawed, however, see failure as feedback is an important skill for innovators.

We first at a local organization called ASAPROSAR tested our new model "the use of social capital for social enterprise business", the model focuses on training to reduce child labor and young dropout rates.With the help of the group, we adopted the method adapt to the local environment Salvador, also learned a lot in the process.For example, at first we set up a teaching class to bring in the harvest season, at that time young people go to their home, went to the farm to help.When only five people (we plan to have 50 people), we are aware of the error.

We also learned something else, some of these issues is more dangerous.If you didn't test, you lost is not only of time and money.In social innovation work, mistakes can be fatal.

7, influence (Impacting) : social innovation is based on vision to the end of the performance.

It has to be an impact.Every innovator knows execution idea is far more difficult than to generate ideas.Impact means on the basis of more user feedback to improve idea, to create a baseline and assessment mechanism in response to this feedback and try to measure what is play a role.

Today,Avancemos Project not only affects the adolescents' life, more influence in el Salvador, Honduras today of the whole community.The project with more than 12 27 local organizations and government agencies, has trained more than 1500 teenagers.Other important cooperation, such as the cooperation between the national youth council, will influence spread to thousands of people.

Armani social innovation framework is a semi-finished products.We are so desperate to feedback and Suggestions to promote the development.Left is to consider the complexity of the system and the organization.Under the certain system and organization, how to implement your ideas, and through the social and political interactions to control idea.Successfully managing the process may need to have both settlement and struggle, and certainly need a smaller specific innovation to make room for the main innovation.

We will continue to deepen the framework, and use it as a tool of social innovation teaching, would love to hear your thoughts!

this article from the interesting and useful information of public information platform and thought the guest (thinker360.com), translators/authors Lin "-