An article I co-authored with Kendra Smith appears in the September/October Issue of EDUCASE Review. The article was the cover feature for the issue. You can access the article here.
With predictive analytics, colleges and universities are able to “nudge” individuals toward making better decisions and exercising rational behavior to enhance their probabilities of success.
I will be attending the BIG Ideas Conference hosted by the Alliance for Innovation in Fort Lauderdale. I co-authored one of the discussion papers for the conference with Kendra Smith. The paper takes a critical look at what it takes to build cities and communities that are economically resilient.
Economic Resilience: No Big Ideas Needed!
Resilience is one of the most bastardized terms when it comes to planning and management jargon. We all want resilience, yet it means drastically different things to many people. To some, resilience is the ability to respond to shocks and abrasions in the environment, while others think of resilience as the ability to continuously innovate and stay ahead of the curve so as not to become obsolete. Economic vulnerability and economic resilience play a strong role in cities’ resilience. Economic vulnerability is an entities proneness to exogenous shocks coming from economic features such as economic openness, export concentration, and dependence on strategic imports. Economic resilience is the ability of an organization, whether it is a business or a city or even a country, to withstand the impacts of financial and economic shocks and to bounce back quickly, or to avoid shocks through proactive planning and interventions. In this paper, we will explore the many facets of economic resilience, drivers of economic resilience, investing in resilience, and the risks of resilience planning. Additionally, we will offer domestic and international examples of cities that have experience with resilience planning, either through risk reduction or after-the-fact resilience planning. Finally, we will conclude with a discussion on the realities of economic resilience.
Please email me if you would like a copy of the paper.
I also serve on the Board of Directors for the Alliance for Innovation and am looking forward to engaging discussions during our board meetings.
My article on Leveraging the Wisdom of Crowds through Participatory Platforms was published on Planetizen. The future of design and planning is certain to be around participatory platforms, designers and planners should embrace these platforms and leverage their potential towards designing smart(er) cities through open, inclusive, and collaborative approaches.Planners need to learn how to orchestrate participation on these platforms so as to arrive at plans that are representative of community needs and within scope, budget, and resource constraints. Failure to achieve this will result in plans that fall prey to the foolishness or the rowdiness of crowds. I outline five simple guidelines to consider. To read more, click here - LINK
Playing football has taught me a lot beyond the pitch. It has provided me a framework by which to assemble a team, lead a group of players, deal with adversity, and win. Sir Alex Ferguson, in particular, is a manager, leader, coach, and visionary who inspires my approach to building organizations. He recently completed 25 years at Manchester United and has won more than 30 trophies during this period.
Yes, like all great leaders, Sir Alex Ferguson has been known to have a controversial (unique) style of leadership and management. But where others find controversies, I see the brilliance of his approach.
As the year wraps up, I have been taking time to relax, reflect, and plan for 2012. I have been always intrigued by the questions we ask ourselves when we reflect. Questions, and our ability to engaging in the questioning process, both introspectively and with others, is critical for the development of our cognitive, emotional, and spiritual capacities.
Over the next few months, I will be working with a team of researchers, graduate students, and practitioners to study the resiliency of local networks to crises (and catastrophic disasters) using a journalistic lens. Through interviewing subjects, we hope to collect a series of videos that can be used for traditional research analysis, but can also make for interesting teaching material, weblogs, etc.