Master the art of urban smartness with Lawrence Grodeska, who has helped propel San Francisco beyond the smart city hype, and Mads Thimmer, founder of Innovation Lab.
For almost a decade, creating “Smart Cities” has been an imperative for cities around the world. It is even a solid element in the strategic solutions portfolio of tech companies like IBM and Tesla. Most city leaders agree that effective communication with citizens is a crucial success factor not only to make their city smart but for the basic for well-functioning of cities. However, many municipalities still communicate with the public in the same way as they did a decade ago, despite dramatic changes over the same period in how people communicate, consume information and form opinions.
The result? A paradox between what city staff and officials say they want to do and what they actually do. In many cities, “smartness” is at a halt as top down smart city approaches driven by large corporations aren’t working and citizens feel alienated and therefore, they don’t engage.
How do you break this paradox and create a civic society in which the public sector engages citizens in the ongoing, iterative design of the government services that power their city? How do community engagement and public participation adapt to the evolving landscape of government innovation in which tech sector practices like user research, human-centered design, and lean principles are increasingly being integrated? In other words: how do you create the smart city of tomorrow by using urban innovation, without having to wait years for the positive results?
In the capable hands of international speaker Lawrence Grodeska, founder of CivicMakers, and Mads Thimmer, CEO and founder of Innovation Lab, this Masterclass takes a close look at how cities successfully communicate and connect with their citizens to inform and educate, design better public services, and deepen engagement. By exploring innovative programs such as civic user testing, Startup in Residence , participatory budgeting and Public Impact Design through case studies around the world, this masterclass will give you the much-needed hands-on opportunity to learn some best practices and innovative techniques to enhance your community engagement practices. You will also gain valuable insight into proven concepts of urban innovation.
Agenda:
- “Cities as innovation eco-systems” – introduction by Mads Thimmer, CEO Innovation Lab
- “Human-centered urban Innovation – how to enhance community engagement practice with human-centered design” – keynote by Lawrence Grodeska, founder of CivicMakers
- Easy tools for effective community engagement – interactive exercise facilitated by Lawrence Grodeska
- Sum-up and Q&A
Practical information:
Price: free for Innovation Lab members – for non-members 995,- DKK
Please note that this Masterclass will be held in english.
For sign-ups, write kia@ilab.dk – please note we have limited seats for this event, so first come first take.
Lawrence Grodeska is a maker, communicator and civic geek who uses technology to help civic leaders in the public and private sector engage key audiences. He is the founder of CivicMakers, an innovation studio using human-centered design and lean principles to solve pressing public challenges. Lawrence helps citizens, communities, businesses, and governments listen to and collaborate effectively with each other. He released the government of San Francisco‘s first mobile app based on open data, built the B2B content marketing program at Change.org, and launched Accela’s Contractor Central app to facilitate municipal licensing and permitting. He has hosted 50+ civic networking events and spoken at SXSW Interactive, SXSW Eco, Personal Democracy Forum, Code for America Summit and the Nonprofit Technology Conference.
Mads cofounded Innovation Lab with Nordic computer pioneer Preben Mejer in 2001 and is the mind behind the organism today, working mostly in strategy, concept development and organisational redesign. Mads has worked for governments and Fortune 500s on making sense of the new digital conditions, making massive change a friend rather than a foe. Mads puts culture over structure, merits over titles, passions over functions and believes that a strong personality can outperform an MBA any day. He has a background from University of Cambridge in Comparative Literature. An international keynote speaker on digital transformation, Mads is featured in world media from BBC and Business Week to Engadget and TechCrunch.
