HOW MIGHT WE SPREAD AND SCALE LEADING EDGE URBAN INNOVATION TO ADDRESS WICKED PROBLEMS IN CITIES ACROSS THE WORLD? Final Report | 1
UBUNTU IS A STRATEGIC DESIGN STUDIO. We address social + business challenges through a process of experiential design. We are 12 associates in 6 countries across 4 continents. We are a global collective of storytellers, strategists, innovators, intrapreneurs, CX specialists, economists, digital designers and technologists.
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OUR ASSOCIATES
ANNA PATERAS
Based in Toronto, Canada Established Market Research Team, Workshop Lead
ANNE STAKE
Based in New York, US Emerging Markets Research and Paper Team, Growth Hacking Strategy Team
ANNE-MARIE DWYER
Based in Virginia, US Lead Designer, Website & Hub Design Team
BEATA GIERMASIŃSKA-SULE
Based in Europe Established Market Research Team, Website & Hub Developer
JAIME HORAK
Based in Ohio, US Established Market Research Team, Website & Hub Developer
JIN YING LAW
Based in New York, US Project Manager
KATHARINA LEPAK
Based in New York, US Designer, Workshop Developer
KATHERINE JOHNSTON
Based in Indiana, US Established Market Research Team, Workshop Developer
MARCO MARIA PEDRAZZO
Based in Torino, Italy Client Manager, Website & Hub Developer
MEGAN GEYER
Based in New Jersey, US Established Market Research Lead, Website & Hub Developer
TERENCE BEHAN
Based in Johannesburg, South Africa Emerging Markets Research and Paper Lead, Growth Hacking Strategy Team
WEN TEO
Based in Asia Emerging Markets Research and Paper Team, Growth Hacking Strategy Team Final Report | 4
TA B L E O F C O N T E N T S SECTION 1: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
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A summary of why CityThink hired Ubuntu, our approach and the impact of our deliverables.
SECTION 2: DESIGN RESEARCH
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Featured data from our research process, including highlights from interviews, survey results, and competitive landscape benchmarking.
SECTION 3: BRAINSTORMING AND SYNTHESIS
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The distillation of key research insights into themes, understanding pivots in our original thinking, and transitioning our design process from inspiration to ideation of prototype concepts.
SECTION 4: WORKSHOPS AND CO CREATION
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How Team Ubuntu worked with the San Francisco Parks Alliance to co-create and rapidly prototype a tool for CityThink.
SECTION 5: PROTOTYPE DEVELOPMENT
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The scope and methods for developing prototypes of the CityThink Website and Hub, designing the Workshop tools, and imagining a strategy to accelerate growth.
SECTION 6: TESTING AND ITERATION
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A summary of our approach to prototype testing, our findings, and the refinements and pivots made to the prototypes.
SECTION 7: PROTOTYPE DELIVERABLES
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A high-level overview of each prototype deliverable and their unique purpose.
CONCLUSION SECTION 8: SUMMARY DECK
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A summary deck describing the Ubuntu design process to create the final deliverables.
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“IN 2008, THE WORLD REACHES AN INVISIBLE BUT MOMENTOUS MILESTONE; FOR THE FIRST TIME IN HISTORY MORE THAN HALF ITS HUMAN POPULATION, 3.3 BILLION PEOPLE WILL BE LIVING IN URBAN AREAS. BY 2030, THIS IS EXPECTED TO SWELL TO ALMOST 5 BILLION” — UNITED NATIONS POPULATION FUND 200
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SECTION 1
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The world is currently in a state of profound flux: the climate is changing, the geopolitical landscape is shifting and leadership is more fractious than ever before. Against this backdrop of profound VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous) style uncertainty, cities can stand steadfast as drivers of creativity and catalyzers of progress, or become irrelevant baggage of the industrial era. Furthermore, by 2020, it is estimated that over two thirds of the world population will live in urban environments. This rapid urbanization brings with it wicked challenges across the globe and amplifies the need for proactive design-led government innovation. Cities and, by extension, city management, are more important than ever before in defining how life is lived and experienced for the majority of humankind. While every city is a unique mixture of history, culture, industry, and infrastructure, what is common across the world is the mission to serve the citizenry. The mission to serve people. Cities shape how we move, how we work, how we play, how we connect, and how we think. Yet, even if cities have to serve as centers for innovation, policymakers often face constraints — both internal and external — that limit their potential. In the face of uncertainty and growing urbanization, how can cities become places and spaces where humanity thrives? In the words of design guru, John Maeda, “How do we slow down what matters the most and speed up what benefits change and progress? We don’t want to impede progress, but we are seeking reconnection to ourselves to each other and with our world.” It is in this context that CityThink was conceptualized. CityThink is a 501c3 non-profit organization that seeks to identify, catalyze and spread meaningful urban innovation through a global network and Hub to catalyze, showcase and share the best thinking in city innovation. It seeks to become a resource for cities to access case studies, tools, and best practices, as well as a platform to connect urban change-makers. CityThink seeks to create an ecosystem of city-centric design teams whom are equipped with the resources and intellectual property to catalyze innovative solutions to wicked problems. CityThink, in partnership with The Parsons School of Design at The New School, has commissioned Ubuntu to provide strategic input and design research to create a platform where this mission can come to life. We have crystallized the challenge through design research, synthesized insights to develop concepts, built and tested a series of prototypes, and ultimately set CityThink on an accelerated path towards achieving its strategic objectives..
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SECTION 1
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Ubuntu tackled the challenge head on, leveraging its global reach, diverse skill-sets and iterative design methodology. Through our research, we developed a deeper understanding of the problem at hand, both confirming and strengthening our understanding of the challenges that cities and city officials are facing. Through interviews, surveys, and secondary research, we learned that while city governments are important in spurring innovation, the role of the private sectors and civil society cannot be overlooked and are important partners for CityThink. We also learned that while context might create problems that are unique to cities, there are also many similarities, common verticals like transportation, water, and sanitation, which cut across cities and might catalyze inspiration for new practices rather than simply replication of ‘best practices’. These insights have shaped how we developed our final recommendation and re-imagined CityThink as a customized web platform to share innovation success stories and a digital Hub to foster connections between people and silos, fueled by a growth hack strategy to amplify impact. We have developed and validated our prototypes and based on our market tests, we believe CityThink can help city officials save time and become more innovative.
Ubuntu is both proud of the work created and humbled by the immensity of the challenge ahead. In the near future, CityThink will launch in selected incubator cities including New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Austin, Toronto, Seattle, Washington D.C. and Beirut. With a solid foundation, it is our hope that CityThink, re-imagined, will drive a new wave of innovation in transportation, urban design, parks and open space, housing, and social programming across the globe.
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SECTION 2
DESIGN RESEARCH
We began this project with a wealth of research made available by CityThink, ranging from surveys with city officials to market research about what is happening to and in cities. This research provided us with the foundational hypothesis for CityThink: Cities were developing solutions to some of the world’s greatest and most complex problems but innovation was constrained because cities governments are built on a foundation of stability, not change. THIS UNDERSTANDING WAS THE FOUNDATION FOR OUR RESEARCH OBJECTIVES: 1. A rticulate the day-to-day challenges that civil servants and urban partners/agencies encounter in their jobs and discover the potential opportunities to enable them to be more innovative and successful 2. Assess if the challenges facing cities today in both established cities and emerging markets are similar 3. Understand the competitive landscape of CityThink, and discover potential opportunities for further engagement in both emerging and established markets In addition to testing the original hypothesis, we wanted to expand on the original research of CityThink to understand what changes, if any, would be required to be relevant in emerging markets. We also expanded the research to understand the potential for city innovation through partnerships with non-governmental entities. In our five key research questions, we worked to both validate existing research through a broader, more global network as well as explore new opportunities.
THE FIVE RESEARCH QUESTIONS ARE: 1. W hat is a global city? What are their common or differentiating structures? 2. W hat are the current barriers to innovation in global cities and how are they overcome? 3. What does successful innovation look like in those cities? 4. What is the connection between planning and successful innovation? 5. I s cross-city sharing valuable for these cities? If so, what motivates them to seek out information and to share information?
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DESIGN RESEARCH
To tackle these questions, we embarked on a research journey consisting of both primary and secondary research. In our primary research, we endeavored to connect with a diverse group of people across the world, including all the different stakeholders, who are involved in problem-solving processes within the urban context, including city officials, urban planners, city planners, city strategists, private sector employees, and users of city services in both established and emerging markets. Through interviews, we directly engaged with city officials from markets as diverse as Nairobi, New York, Singapore, Johannesburg, San Francisco and Toronto. We also collected survey results from 35 city officials and 100 city dwellers for additional feedback and insights. In secondary research, we concentrated on understanding the competitive landscape of CityThink. We found there were a tremendous number of third-party entities, ranging from for-profit corporations to design firms to university research teams and non-profits, focused on documenting, facilitating, and sharing city innovations. We also conducted literature reviews and desktop research to reinforce our understanding of the issues facing cities.
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“WE NEED TO BE QUICK TO ADAPT TO DIFFERENT PROBLEMS AND CULTURES. THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE IS HOW TO SHARE THE INFORMATION.” — CITY OFFICIAL, BEIRUT, LEBANON
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SECTION 2
DESIGN RESEARCH
David Aimen, Assistant Director of Planning & Technical Assistance, Edward J Bloustein School of P lanning & Public Policy (Rutgers University)
Jeff Ortega, Assistant Director Department of Public Service,City of Columbus, OH; Communications Lead for Smart Columbus
Russ Antonucci, Assistant Commissioner Innovation and Performance Management, NYC Parks and Recreation Department
Emily Osgood, Director of Operations, NYC Housing Preservation & Development (HPD)
Corrado Carbonaro, Researcher at Politecnico di Torino Wendy Feuer, Assistant Commissioner Urban Design + Art + Wayfinding,NYC DOT Andrew Harrison, Financial Analyst, San Francisco International Airport
L in Rui Li, Financial Analyst, City of Austin Esther Younan, Executive Director, CityThink Darby Watson, SDOT Director of Project Development Division at City of Seattle
INTERVIEWS
Abdul Hammed Abubakar, Senior Consultant and Partner at Africa Practise r. Koh Chan Ghee, D Professor, National University of Singapore Centre for Hazards Research, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Wlodzimierz Giermasiński, Real Estate Specialist, Poland Sebastian Šukasiekwicz, City Planning, Lublin, Poland Edward Muiruri, City Strategist in Kenya Koh Chan Tia, General Manager at ST Electronics (Taiwan) Limited Final Report | 12
SECTION 2
DESIGN RESEARCH
INTERVIEWS
INTERVIEWS Our interviews helped us to understand the challenges facing cities and city innovators in both public and private sectors. Despite the diverse slate of interviewees, we found that interesting patterns emerged. The issues facing cities were generally universal, with the rapid growth of cities causing concern over transportation, inequality, and access to basic needs like housing, food, water, and healthcare. We learned that city officials already collaborate and look for information, but that they do it sporadically. Many of them work with civilians, non-profit organizations, or consulting groups to develop and implement ideas. The biggest challenge they had here was to sort through the noise — there were many sources of information but knowing how to filter the right information and how to connect with the right people was a challenge. The interviews also revealed a deep concern for capacity. City officials, in many cases, felt stressed and overworked. While they wanted to share information and saw the value of collaboration, they were concerned with having the time to generate the content and wondered how they would be able to execute a great idea within their organizations.
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“BEING INNOVATIVE AND COMING UP WITH IDEAS IS DEFINITELY NOT THE ISSUE, THE ISSUE IS THE EXECUTION OF THESE INNOVATIVE PROJECTS.” — CITY OFFICIAL, OLUMBUS, OH
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DESIGN RESEARCH
INTERVIEWS
OUR INTERVIEWS ALSO CONFIRMED THE PERSONAS FOR GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS ORIGINALLY IDENTIFIED BY CITYTHINK.
THE FIRST PERSONA IS CATEGORIZED AS A PROCESS ARCHETYPE. He/she believes in process steps and regulations - if you don't follow the steps, you are jeopardizing the possibility of getting the correct results. For example, we spoke with Jeff Ortega, Assistant Director Department of Public Service in Columbus, Ohio. He believes in the system of the Government and knows it is slow, but it works. He feels when working on a project, you must go through all the correct steps in order to gain approval from every area involved or the project will not be successful. He says patience is key and to trust the process.
THE SECOND ARCHETYPE IS EMOTIONAL. These people represent those who want to “do good” and are the most human centered in their thinking and motivations. He/she will compromise process and principles in order to get things done. He/she is focused on making people feel good and on the wants/needs of the end user. An example of an emotional archetype from our interviews is Susan Ryan, who is a Parks Policy Council Member in San Francisco. She is very passionate about transforming unused open space into an area people can gather and enjoy. She feels the user’s of the parks and spaces (her community) are the most important people to keep happy and will do whatever she needs to in order to be successful and execute a project.
THE THIRD PERSONA IS THE PRINCIPLE ARCHETYPE. This person feels that there is a better way to accomplish goals. He/she is open to innovation and want to seek solutions that will refine processes and implement change. His/her core motivation is to do the best possible job in the best possible way. Russ Antonucci, the Assistant Commissioner of Innovation and Performance Management at NYC Parks and Recreation department is an example of the principle persona. Russ feels frustrated by the current process he is encouraged to follow to get projects approved and funded. He says there is a lot of internal pushback from people stuck in their ways and simple projects that could get done in a few months turn into a much longer ordeal. He knows there is a better way to go about executing a project and works frivolously with his innovation team to come up with solutions to share with the current administration. Final Report | 15
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DESIGN RESEARCH
SURVEY
SURVEY To corroborate the findings of our one-on-one interviews, we also issued two online surveys. The first survey was aimed at broad range of city servants and their partners to enable us to understand how they perceive their role in the process of innovation. Our respondents spanned across multiple continents but largely concentrated into large cities in the United States.
CITY SURVEY
Our city survey had 35 respondents, over 70% of which have worked in or for cities for more than 5 years, with 26% having been in their line of work for over 20 years. Despite this depth of experience, many officials collaborated with others outside their divisions (60%) on a daily basis and with external agencies, consultants, or non-profits at least several times a week (62%). The survey also revealed that city officials already share information, usually upon request, on new solutions that were implemented, for feedback on new ideas, and to share challenges. In fact, this ability to ideate with colleagues and learn from cities were the two leading sources of inspiration for innovative ideas within their own city (83% and 77% of respondents respectively). Constituent feedback was the other source of inspiration (72%). We also found the officials were most concerned and looking for innovations to address a variety of challenges, in particular economic inequality (82%), transportation (79%), and housing (73%). The results from the survey also highlighted the lack of consistency for idea implementation, ranging from cities with well documented planning methods (25%) to cities that use more ad-hoc methodologies depending on circumstances (30%). The survey also raised the same barriers to innovation, namely lack of funding (61%), lack of resources (time) to execute a solution (44%), and lack of cross-departmental collaboration (39%).
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“LARGE CITIES ARE SMART BUT NOT NIMBLE. OUR PROBLEM IS NOT EMBRACING INNOVATION, OUR ISSUES IS ENACTING INNOVATION…” — CITY OFFICIAL, SURVEY RESPONDENT
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SECTION 2
DESIGN RESEARCH
CITIZEN SURVEY
CITIZENS SURVEY
Our citizens survey had 67 respondents, primarily from North America. This group was diverse in terms of age, time having lived in a city, and size of city, but their sentiments on government engagement were quite consistent. Nearly 70% of respondents felt they were “not very” or “not at all” engaged with their local governments and 39% of the same respondents felt that government officials have not tried to engage them. About 20% of respondents have contacted their local officials through letters, calls, email, or social media and only 17% have attended a town hall or open forum. The survey indicated that while many respondents were not engaged, they wanted to be more engaged with their cities (59%) and working with both the government and other citizens would be the most effective way to influence change (82%). Over 50% indicated they would be likely to help solve a problem in their city. We did not see broad consensus among citizens in our survey on the biggest challenges facing their cities, but concerns with the economy generally was cited frequently with 17% of respondents citing economic inequality and a number of write-in responses concerning the economy and jobs. Generally, we found the survey highlighted a gap in communication between cities and their constituents. Over 76% of people were unaware if their town had an innovation program or committee and 34% were unaware of any steps cities were taking to address problems.
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“CITY OFFICIALS DO NOT ACTIVELY ENCOURAGE PARTICIPATION IN DECISION MAKING PROCESS” — CITIZEN, SURVEY RESPONDENT Final Report | 19
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DESIGN RESEARCH
C O M P E T I T O R A N A LY S I S
COMPETITOR ANALYSIS: As the primary focus of our secondary research, our team reviewed 18 potential CityThink competitors in the US to understand best practices, trends and potential opportunities for disruption. These competitors are leaders in fostering city innovation and have a presence in CityThink’s identified incubator cities. Competitors to CityThink existed in many forms and have various business models. Many of the competitors researched received mixed funding from sources including membership dues, private foundations, NGOs, and corporate sponsors. Most organizations also make some information publicly available on their website, but more than half of the companies we researched also require members or invitation to fully access all the data. Competitors tended to mobilize around a set of key challenges, with some, like ITSA, focusing only on transportation. We also found that many competitors’ primary job was to facilitate information exchange, usually through case studies, conferences, or academic research papers.
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C O M P E T I T O R A N A LY S I S H I G H L I G H T S COMPETITOR
A competitor that A competitor that provides information provides tools and resources The encompassment A curated suite of all charitable of resilienceWHO ARE THEY giving initiatives of building tools and Michael R. services, provided Bloomberg by partners from the private, public, academic, and non-profit sectors, giving cities access to the resources they need to become more resilient. Public health City Resilience Environment against shocks (e.g. Education earthquakes) and AREAS OF FOCUS Government every day stresses innovation (e.g. endemic Arts & Culture violence, high unemployment) Bring together ideas, Provide members people, funding, guidance resources from and expert support WHAT DO THEY DO across sectors to plan and execute toward a common resiliency efforts. purpose. An online Hub Opportunity to have with case studies city projects funded of successful city’s as sponsored WHAT THEY OFFER experiences within projects of Rockemajor issues feller Philanthropy Advisors (RPA) ARTICIPATING P CITIES
BUSINESS MODEL
Varies by project around the world 501C3 Non-profit Organization funded by Michael R. Bloomberg
100 cities from all over the globe have been chosen; intend to scale to 10,000 cities Financially supported by The Rockefeller Foundation
A competitor that creates a network
A competitor that co-creates across sectors
Learning network among American mayors committed to “high road” policy and governance.
Nation’s leading advocate for technological modernization of transportation
Shared prosperity Environmental sustainability Efficient democratic government
Focus on advancing research and development and implementation of intelligent transportation systems
Facilitate networking and information exchange among cities
Facilitate collaboration between private companies, public agencies, research institutions, and academia
Networking for American municipal officials through conferences and forums and access to case studies from around the world More than 100 cities have attended events.
Co-created policies for the next generation of mobility
Representatives from 43 U.S. states.
Membership-based Membership-based non-profit. Over half fees. of funding comes from grants.
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DESIGN RESEARCH
C O M PA R I S O N F R A M E W O R K
OUR CITY COMPARISON FRAMEWORK As we moved through the research process, we increasingly were faced with the difficulty and the limitations of comparing cities globally on a single dimension. The developing versus developed world paradigm might prevent cities with common challenges from reaching out to each other for assistance. We found that despite being grouped into different arbitrary, first- world-third-world buckets, cities from Bangalore to San Francisco and from Cape Town to London might actually have a lot to share.
WE DEFINE AN EMERGING MARKET ECONOMY AS A NATION WHOSE ECONOMY IS PROGRESSING TOWARD BECOMING MORE ADVANCED USUALLY BY MEANS OF RAPID GROWTH AND INDUSTRIALIZATION. Final Report | 22
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DESIGN RESEARCH
C O M PA R I S O N F R A M E W O R K
BASED ON THIS INSIGHT, WE DEVELOPED A TWO-PART FRAMEWORK TO UNDERSTAND AND COMPARE CITIES. First, we mapped cities based on their budgets and populations. Then we use a 6-point matrix to find potential commonality across financing, demographics, poverty and inequality, private sector role, city priorities, and governance. This framework provides an alternative way to group case studies and projects and provided a foundation for us to move forward into prototyping stages with a single platform that could fit the needs of all cities.
NEW YORK CITY POP: 8.5 M BUD: $82.2 B
SAN FRANCISCO POP: .864 M BUD: $8.9 B
POP: 1 M BUD: $47.5 M
SAO PAULO
KIGALI
POP: 11 M BUD: $13 B
BUENOS AIRES POP: 2.9 M BUD: $7.2 B
BUDGET
BUDGET
San Francisco has fewer people than Kigali but 187x the budget per year. NAIROBI
POP: 4.5 M BUD: $279 M
SINGAPORE POP: 5.4 M BUD: $6.0 B
New York has fewer people than Jakarta, but 20x the budget per year.
MUMBAI
POP: 21 M BUD: $5.4 B
JAKARTA
POP: 9 M BUD: $4.55 B
San Fr fewer p Kigali budget POP: 2.9 M BUD: $7.2
BUENOS
LAGOS
POP: 16 M BUD: $1.9 B
KIGALI
POP: 1 M BUD: $47.5 M
POPULATION
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POP: .864 M BUD: $8.9 B
SAN FRANCISCO
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DESIGN RESEARCH
C O M PA R I S O N F R A M E W O R K
The city comparison framework involves scoring each metric from 1-5 based on sources like the world bank and IMF. The composite score will be an average. The scores are plotted on a radar chart to identify potential alignment and commonalities.
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DESIGN RESEARCH
SUMMARY
SUMMARY While each city is unique in its own right, our research uncovered universal themes and common problems that all cities face, regardless of if they are emerging or established. Key themes that emerged include transportation and mobility, economic inequality, housing and homelessness, natural resource management, waste management, big data applications, policing and crime, and bureaucratic efficiency. Cutting across all of these themes, we also found growing concerns with inequity in respect to access of city services. However, despite common themes across challenges, cities differ dramatically in terms of issue prioritization and resource allocation. In addition to differences in the “what” to focus on, our research also found variation the “how” to address a challenge. Civil Servants expressed that the methodology, tools, and processes to prioritize which challenges to address differed across departments, and occasionally even between civil servants in the same department. In the absence of communication and a common foundation of resources, innovation can be challenging. As our team explored the landscape further, we uncovered critical pain points leading to the observed inconsistency in addressing core city problems.
1. CONNECTION While city officials tap numerous sources of information to aid in identifying and solving ground level problems, none of these sources help facilitate connections between cities that may have valuable, but unpublished experience. Many city officials attend conferences that relate to their government silo or a specific project where they typically receive information and meet subject matter experts. However, they often leave without a way to maintain those connection. Furthermore, while conferences have their place, many critical global players and those closest to a given problem are inevitably excluded. Finally, while subject matter expertise is important, understanding connections across issue areas to unpack the problem at a systems level is equally critical.
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DESIGN RESEARCH
SUMMARY
2. TIME PRESSURE Even when city officials have built or experimented with solutions to a particular problem in the past, they don’t have time to package and share this information. Time and time again, city officials explained that time was a critical limitation. According to our interviewees and survey respondents, there is not enough time to document and create content and there is not enough time to find the right channels through which to share information effectively.
RECOMMENDATIONS ON ADDITIONAL RESEARCH: While outside the scope of work of this collaboration, an interesting additional phase of the research should focus on citizen engagement. Our city official survey respondents indicated that citizen feedback was one of the main sources of inspiration for innovation. This result was surprising given the results of our civilian survey, which showed that many people want to be engaged but don’t know how to properly interact
3. KNOWLEDGE ADAPTATION While city officials work with outside companies, non-profit organizations, consultants and urban planners to help find solutions to their challenges, there are often information silos that are inaccessible or difficult to navigate. One city official in New York stated “It is hard to find other cities that have found the “right” solution to a problem that we also have.” He explained that New York is unique due to its size and complexity. While the official could reach out to other cities, it would be difficult to find a solution that would fit the needs of New York. In order to gain useful insights, cities would need to access a wide range of case studies and resources from different cities to appropriately adapt pieces from each project to fine-tune a solution that works for a specific context.
with their government. We believe there could be tremendous value from a research focused specifically on how to get citizens to be more engaged with their government, through a platform like CityThink. Questions to explore include: 1. What is the current process for citizens to engage with their local governments? 2. Is this process effective? What can be improved? What should be made consistent? 3. To what extent can engaging the public have an impact on city innovation? While it is clear from a human centered design perspective that city officials need constructive input from their citizens to understand the most pertinent issues to address, the practice seems to vary greatly depending on city and department. CityThink may be able to play a role in facilitating this interaction as the
4. POPULATION GROWTH CATALYZER Especially in emerging economies, cities are severely challenged with rapidly expanding populations, resulting in increased demand for basic municipal services coupled with the rise of squatter cities. Such trends amplify problems in the face of shrinking government coffers. In this context, finding useful information and resources becomes difficult. Even if there were a solution, the likelihood of finding a context appropriate solution as a publicly
platform expands. A preferred method to explore citizen engagement is through ethnographic design research. Holistically understanding the different psychographic segments would be fundamental to CityThink as the organization explores its value proposition in cities. Ultimately, impact will be realized at the citizen level, so understanding and engaging with the end user will be central to any exploration of city innovation.
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DESIGN RESEARCH
SUMMARY
IN SUMMARY Our research demonstrated that city and city officials need more than a place to simply find information. They are looking for a way to find easily digestible information appropriate to their specific context. They need a way to connect with experts in those respective areas whether they be other city officials, non-profits, or from the private sector. They need guidance on tools tactics, not just the results and a way to fund innovation. Last, but not least, they need a way to productively connect with their citizens to get feedback and share information without adding to their already intense and overwhelming workloads.
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B R A I N S TO R M I N G + S Y N T H E S I S
OUR RESEARCH CONFIRMED THE INITIAL HYPOTHESIS OF CITYTHINK: Cities are developing solutions to some of the world’s greatest and most complex problems but innovation was constrained because cities governments are built on a foundation of stability, not change. We found tremendous evidence of innovation in cities around the world and city officials recognized the need to change to meet new demands. They were simply limited in the resources that would enable effective innovation — namely, time, money, tools and sufficient skilled resource.
Our research also confirmed there were universal problems facing cities, regardless of if they were emerging or established. This meant the platform could immediately reach cities globally, not just those in the U.S. Cities don’t reinvent the wheel — they often look to colleagues for solutions to similar problems. CityThink can act uniquely as a facilitator to connect people based on similar challenges.
We also recognize that although challenges are similar, the context each city exists within is unique. City officials have access to a multitude of resources, especially case studies, but they are limited in their ability to filter all the materials and cherry-pick those most relevant to their cities. CityThink can differentiate itself from within a crowded field of information exchange platforms by highlighting innovation within the context of the city’s own cultural, economic, and social history and traditions and putting a face to the case study. Our research also confirmed city officials were over capacity and had concerns with any platforms that might create an additional workload. To engage active users, the CityThink platform must leverage content that is already being produced and make every interaction easy. The platform should be a faster and easier way to collaborate with other city officials. We were surprised to discover the breadth of collaboration between city officials with partners in the non-profit, for profit, and academic space. This insight led to a key pivot from the original hypothesis — CityThink is by cities, for cities, collectively, and not just by and for city officials. Facilitating partnerships with the right third parties can play a pivotal role in the success and differentiation of CityThink from other city official networks.
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B R A I N S TO R M I N G + S Y N T H E S I S
Further, we found that having access to ideas was not enough — city officials needed the tools to implement that idea in their own cities. CityThink could be more than just a source of information, it could also be a place of resources for things such as workshop guides and templates that city officials could download and use within their own organizations. HAVING DISTILLED OUR LARGE BODY OF RESEARCH INTO THESE KEY INSIGHTS, OUR TEAM IDEATED AROUND A KEY SET OF PROTOTYPES AND PROPOSALS TO ADDRESS THESE NEEDS.
We needed a platform that could create
We also recognized a need to create a
a network, allow for collaboration and
CityThink WEBSITE that could generate
co-creation on specific challenges, and
interest for non-members and showcase
help city official implement new ideas.
key accomplishments as a supplement to
Our mash-up exercise proposed a platform
the Hub platform.
that would contain elements of LinkedIn, OpenIDEO Challenge, a library, and the UN conference. This was the beginning of the CITYTHINK HUB concept.
As identified in our synthesis, CityThink
Our brainstorm also generated ideas
can differentiate itself from competi-
that could spur growth in CityThink.
tors by helping city officials implement
We selected a subset of these ideas to
new ideas through proprietary tools. We began to build this resource repository by prototyping a WORKSHOP TOOL for the San Francisco Parks Alliance Policy Council that could be used more broadly to help cities develop a work breakdown structure.
explore further in the GROWTH HACK STRATEGY. This proposal accelerates the ability for CityThink to expand into new markets through partnerships, crowdfunding, and innovation competitions.
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W O R K S H O P + C O-C R E AT I O N
OVERVIEW
As part of the research validation and solution prototyping, the San Francisco Parks Alliance Policy Council has been a key partner acting as a pilot project for the CityThink concept. Our team worked with the policy council to understand the need for implementation resources and to prototype tools that could be shared more broadly through CityThink. Our tool was informed by 13 Policy Council members, 8 through interviews and 5 through survey responses. Chris Guillard, Parks Policy Council Member
Angelica Rocha, Parks Policy Council Member
Lizzy Hirsch, Parks Policy Council Member
Susan Ryan, Parks Policy Council Member
Lainie Motamedi, Parks Policy Council Member
Bear Silber, Parks Policy Council Member
Rachel Norton, Former CEO, San Francisco Park Alliance
Zahra Kelly, Parks Policy Council Member
The objectives of this co-creation was to explore the members’ role on the policy council, their strengths and weaknesses in accomplishing tasks as a team, and their views on how to approach the implementation of their Recreation and Open Space Element (ROSE) initiative. The ROSE is a San Francisco General Plan updated in April 2014, with the goal to continue the City’s legacy of fine parks and recreational opportunities and to guide the City’s future decisions to improve that open space system for the benefit of everyone. The long-range document covers 6 objectives and 41 policies that provide ideas for innovation, does not include a plan for execution. Looking at the ROSE as a small scale implementation of the CityThink minimum viable concept, the goal of the workshop was to test, gain insights, receive feedback and prove the following concepts: If city officials are provided the right set of tools, are they able to engage with them? How are these tools helping them solving their problems? How are they feeling along the process?
The workshop acted as proof of concept and to test the prototyped solution in order to fine-tune what implementation tools to include within CityThink. Final Report | 30
“THE CLEARER FRAMEWORK AND EXPECTATIONS ARE FOR A PROJECT, THE EASIER IT IS TO KEEP IT ON TRACK.” — POLICY COUNCIL MEMBER
Final Report | 31
SECTION 4
W O R K S H O P + C O-C R E AT I O N
BACKGROUND While volunteers for the San Francisco Parks Alliance (SFPA) Policy Council are passionate advocates for parks, recreation and open space, the majority are also experienced professionals working in government agencies and private business. Through individual interviews and survey responses, we found volunteers wanted to “get things done” and had ideas about to accomplish their work with the ROSE based on professional experiences. However, as a volunteer group, they faced several challenges: Difference in individual commitments led to members feeling disconnected from each other Meeting were sporadically attended and disorganized A lack of leadership and time to work on priorities THE POLICY COUNCIL MEMBERS WE SPOKE TO GENERALLY EXPRESSED A DESIRE FOR MORE ORGANIZATION AND A NEED FOR A PLAN OR ROADMAP TO TACKLE THE ROSE. Although the ROSE has been recently updated, very little progress has been made to start moving forward on the implementation of any of the objectives laid out within the plan. Through our interviews, several themes and insights about how the policy council works have been identified confirming and expanding the key insights of our broader research. Policy council members expressed barriers to innovation including:
A LACK OF TIME
A LACK OF ENERGY
A LACK OF
TO COMPLETE
TO TAKE ON ANOTHER
INCENTIVE TO TRY
THE WORK.
JOB ON TOP OF
NEW APPROACHES.
WHAT THEY ALREADY HAVE TO DO.
Final Report | 32
SECTION 4
W O R K S H O P + C O-C R E AT I O N
DESIGN Our initial prototype proposed to the Policy Council, in accordance with the test user base and the key insights of the interviews, focused on helping the policy council become more organized and cohesive. In addition, a set of tools and methods to assist in prioritizing areas of ROSE focus was proposed. The refinement of the final workshop design was a process of co-creation with the policy council, in which we actively engaged in conversation around what their needs were and what the best ways we could meet those needs.
A diagram illustrating the role of the policy council and workshop within the bigger context of CityThink
The policy council expressed the need for help in breaking down and assigning tasks, right-sized in respect to each volunteer’s limited time capacity. As one member said, “We need to get some quick wins.� Keeping the idea of quick wins to gain momentum in mind, the workshop was designed to focus on taking small steps to develop process and prioritize ideas, rather than develop objectives, in order to build momentum and cohesiveness needed to get the ROSE off the ground. However, once this framework was developed and proposed to the steering committee, the policy council realized that they were not in the place that they initially thought they were and we needed to take a step back. It was imperative to ensure they had clearly defined objectives and teams before attempting to tackle specific tasks. In the end, a two hour long workshop was developed with the goal of helping the policy council identify which objectives they need to address to start work on the ROSE as well as to divide the policy council into teams to research those objectives to develop next steps. By engaging the policy council in conversation over the past 16 weeks, we were able to identify pain points and areas to intervene within the implementation processes. This process lead us to develop several workshop prototypes that they will be testing in the upcoming months that will also serve as the first materials within the CityThink toolkit to help government officials tackle the implementation of innovation using their existing resources.
Final Report | 33
SECTION 5
P R OTOT Y P E D E V E LO P M E N T
The brief from our client focused around developing a platform to foster best practices in innovation across global cities because it is absolutely crucial for innovation that ideas be critiqued and shared. We had discovered a number of platforms in the city innovation sector but we did not find any global platforms that welcome professionals working in the city innovation from both public and private sector. This insight was the basis for our Hub solution. We also recognized city officials were stressed for time and many available resources were disparate and lengthy. To address this challenge, we would need to design the Hub content to be synthesized and easy to grasp. Our case studies needed to be differentiated with high-level summaries with easy access to author contact information. Furthermore, city workers both from private and public sector expressed an interest in our interviews for a platform that would allow them to connect to subject matter experts within their area of interests. While numerous blogs, websites and platforms showcase innovative solutions, they do not allow for connection. This insight led us to shift our primary goal for the CityThink Hub from information sharing to network creation. The Hub would need to be a communication platform, a space that focuses on connecting city officials with detailed profiles of the users organized around subjects of experience and interest.
Based on these insights, the initial CityThink Hub concept created a place to facilitate interactions so that problems can be solved dynamically and inclusively. We envisioned a platform that was: A LINKEDIN FOR CITY OFFICIALS: A way for people to not only get reports, but find ways to contact the experts who implemented or studied the solution. Detailed personal profiles will allow the users to identify the experts within the areas of the interest and contact them. AN OPENIDEO CHALLENGE TYPE FORUM FOR EXPERTS: A way for city officials to discuss tactics and solutions with civilian/private sector experts on posted city problems. In order to encourage more innovative solutions, the platform caters for diversified feedback. A RESOURCE CENTER: A place for cities to find new and collected research as well as resources for/to prioritize funding to implement a solution presented in a synthesized and easy to grasp manner. A UN CONFERENCE FOR CITY OFFICIALS: A physical way for people to connect in person and listen to experts.
Final Report | 34
SECTION 5
P R OTOT Y P E D E V E LO P M E N T
Our research also recognized a need to market CityThink broadly as an available resources and to provide people with a preview of the content, while also balancing a need to maintain a level of privacy. It became evident that an additional tool was needed to complement the Hub, which is where the CityThink Website steps in. The website’s primary function would be to introduce the CityThink organization to all audiences and also feature key achievements to attract new members. It would serve as a marketing tool and an entry point into the Hub acting as: A landing page for city officials who want to understand what CityThink is and how they can get involved A marketing tool to source potential participants (private/non profit sector) in the Hub A showcase of CityThink accomplishments To create this prototype, we first created wireframes to understand the user journey through Sketch. This tool allowed us to quickly design layouts for the webpages and work out the user flows for both the Hub and the website. Outputs from Sketch were used as our initial prototypes to test the flow of information with users. Once the flow was tested and confirmed, we created higher fidelity prototypes using Invision. This working prototype allowed us to share a website with potential users to understand if the layouts, imagery, and content were easy and intuitive. Our co-creation initiative with the Policy Council informed our third prototype. This was the creation of a workshop that could be utilized by city officials to develop an implementation strategy. Our prototype product includes a toolkit complete with materials, agenda, and activities for a two hour workshop. Our final proposal was a strategy for CityThink to hack growth through disruptive engagements with citizens and partnerships with private companies and non-profits in order to attract more users quickly. We shared this with potential users and with CityThink to understand if the scope of the growth hack strategy was appropriate and would be attractive to the target CityThink userbase.
Final Report | 35
SECTION 6
T E S T I N G + I T E R AT I O N
WEBSITE AND HUB
WEBSITE & HUB Our first prototype test for our website and Hub used low fidelity wireframes. These low fidelity options prevented our users from being distracted by details and imagery and allowed our early users to prioritize feedback on the structure and the interaction of the site. Our first test was designed to get feedback specifically on the users’ experience with the site’s actual functionality, usability, and flow only. To test the wireframes, our researches conducted a series of one-on-one online sessions to gather the user behavior during navigation and collect feedback. Each user was given the following scenario:
“A colleague has told you to check out CityThink when they were discussing potential solutions to a problem with transportation in their city.” The users were then prompted to the CityThink website and walked through the landing page and several internal pages including registration and the Hub landing page. Users were not told the intent of pages to prevent researchers from skewing their responses. We then asked a series of questions after each page to collect feedback, including: What are your impressions? What would you do next? Is there anything confusing on this page? Is there anything in particular you like or dislike? The feedback gathered at each testing informed the next iteration of the wireframes. Following this testing, the wireframes were moved to a website prototyping tool called Invision. This tool allowed us to create some low fidelity animation and used hotspots to simulate click through actions on each wireframe page. This allowed the user to experience an website and Hub interface directly on their devices, rather than as a series of static images.
Final Report | 36
SECTION 6
T E S T I N G + I T E R AT I O N
WEBSITE AND HUB
WEBSITE WIREFRAME EXAMPLES
Final Report | 37
SECTION 6
T E S T I N G + I T E R AT I O N
WEBSITE AND HUB
HUB WIREFRAME EXAMPLES
Final Report | 38
SECTION 6
T E S T I N G + I T E R AT I O N
WEBSITE AND HUB
THE WIREFRAMING PROCESS AND THE DIFFERENT ITERATIONS IDENTIFIED BOTTLENECKS AND CUL-DE-SACS: many pages were set to lead the users through a strongly guided, simplified flow, which did not necessarily correspondent with the desire of the users that prefer a less structured browsing experience. This informed a more free and natural flow between the pages was implemented for user interface (UI) design stage. Our research also pivoted our incentive structure from intrinsic to extrinsic rewards. Our original prototype identified intrinsic rewards to be more aligned with the mission and roadmap for growth, that users would contribute because of their expertise and their ability. However, the insights from research about concerns over time were echoed as users raised a desire for recognition through the platform. They suggested solutions like rankings and votes to incentivize contribution and encourage continued participation. The professional gamification of the platform that would reward the most significant contributors and could provide a sense of achievement, valuable to our testers. Users also helped us refine our website to be more user friendly. They raised concerns around the content density on the Hub landing page, preferring instead the clean feel of the website landing pages. We refined the Hub landing page to focus on providing only the most important content for each of user, clarifying the most important value proposition, the Hub, while leaving to further exploration, the CityThink mission, creating a customized, easy experience based on their previous search history and provided preferences. We also added a small feature refinement in the final prototype based on users indicating they would like to be able to like or bookmark topics, projects or discussions they are interested in if they need to leave the website and come back later. Another insight that emerged from testing was the desire to more deeply connect with the entire community. In addition to our features of connecting with authors, users wanted to know who the other users were so they could contact anyone on the CityThink platform. They also wanted features that would allow them to privately message other users. We would suggest further testing by CityThink to understand if the platform could handle this type of direct interaction without compromising user privacy and overwhelming the community before implementing. As we began to build the prototype in Invision, we conducted mix testing, with some pages kept on the wireframing level and others with some creative elements added to test the response of the UI style and capture the user’s reaction and interest on the emotional level via images and layout. One response was “This looks good, but it feels even better”. This emotional response was key in motivating users to register, populate and use the Hub as an actual resource to improve their city. Final Report | 39
SECTION 6
T E S T I N G + I T E R AT I O N
WEBSITE AND HUB
WEBSITE CREATIVE
Final Report | 40
SECTION 6
T E S T I N G + I T E R AT I O N
WEBSITE AND HUB
WEBSITE CREATIVE
Final Report | 41
“THIS LOOKS GOOD BUT IT FEELS BETTER.” — USER TESTING RESPONSE
Final Report | 42
SECTION 6
T E S T I N G + I T E R AT I O N
WEBSITE AND HUB
HUB CREATIVE
Final Report | 43
SECTION 6
T E S T I N G + I T E R AT I O N
WEBSITE AND HUB
HUB CREATIVE
Final Report | 44
SECTION 6
T E S T I N G + I T E R AT I O N
WORKSHOP We had originally designed a workshop to help the policy council break down and assign tasks to each volunteer based on their time capacity based on our research findings. However, once the framework was developed and proposed, the steering committee for the policy council realized they needed to start from the beginning. Our workshop team pivoted the workshop to focus on a workshop that could help the policy council better define their objectives and teams. The policy council will test this final prototype in an upcoming meeting to help them identify the objectives they need to address to start work on the ROSE. GROWTH HACKING Our growth hacking strategy evolved to expand the model of partnerships after seeing feedback and research on the need to better engage the general population into city innovation. The strategy presents three activities to fast-track growth: disruptive engagement, crowdfunding, and partnership development. After further feedback, we also added a phase 0 strategy to grow the initial user base through marketing, social media, and events.
Final Report | 45
SECTION 7
P R OTOT Y P E D E L I V E R A B L E S THE WEBSITE The website is a marketing tool designed to provide basic information about CityThink, drive appropriate users to the Hub, and showcase key achievements. The site is designed to be a landing page that introduces a user to CityThink and can be used by anyone interested in city innovation. CityThink should use this website to share important information to a general audience and to foster interest in CityThink. It should feed appropriate users into the Hub.
Final Report | 46
SECTION 7
P R OTOT Y P E D E L I V E R A B L E S
THE WEBSITE
Final Report | 47
SECTION 7
P R OTOT Y P E D E L I V E R A B L E S
THE HUB The CityThink Hub is a resource of people, case studies, tools, and best practices to approach and implement innovation within a city. The Hub is a unique platform that encourages innovation, promotes the sharing of knowledge and resources, and creates a sense of community between cities. The Hub will be membership based and have a number of features to promote networking, including profiles, areas to post information, and a way to collaborate and generate ideas on new challenges. Our initial recommendation is that membership be limited to city experts (both governmental and private sector) to create an initial level of safety for users to test sharing. New members would register using their email and organization and then be able to fill out a profile with their interests and expertise as it pertains to their city. They can also connect their LinkedIn account for more networking opportunities and an autofill option on their profile. A registered member would be able to access the Hub and read other’s information on projects or share their own experiences. If they do not see a topic they need information on they can post their city’s challenge and ask for ideas from the general community. The primary user of the CityThink Hub will be City Officials. They will use the Hub for general networking, to gain recognition for being involved in innovation, to streamline existing research and networking processes and to learn from other people’s mistakes and successes. Through these activities, CityThink Hub will help alleviate some of the frustration felt by city officials who are working in the public sector by providing recognition, time, and resources for innovation. The secondary user of the CityThink Hub will be those working in the private sector, either at non-profits or for profit companies. These individuals will use the Hub for networking with city officials and to learn about government structure and bureaucracy. For-profits would likely focus more on opportunities to sell their services to city officials while non-profits would focus on building a reputation for future funding opportunities and partnerships. This will not only enlarge the user base to help CityThink quickly reach a critical mass, but also connect the public sector with missing resources. The onboarding of private sector partners can also provide CityThink with an opportunity to explore additional revenue sources through potential partnership promotions. THE HUB SHOULD PROMOTE INCREASED COMMUNICATION BETWEEN AND AMONG CITY OFFICIALS AND PRIVATE CITY INNOVATORS, WHICH CAN BE EVALUATED THROUGH MEMBERSHIP, POSTING, AND PROFILE NUMBERS.
Final Report | 48
SECTION 7
P R OTOT Y P E D E L I V E R A B L E S
THE HUB
Final Report | 49
SECTION 7
P R OTOT Y P E D E L I V E R A B L E S
THE HUB
Final Report | 50
SECTION 7
P R OTOT Y P E D E L I V E R A B L E S
GROWTH HACK
DISRUPTIVE ENGAGEMENT
CROWD FUNDING
GROWTH HACK STRATEGY
PARTNERSHIP DEVELOPMENT
The growth hack strategy seeks to identify opportunities to fast track the development of CityThink. We believe an initial foundation for rapid growth can result from a set of three interlinked activities. It is critical for CityThink to launch with a strong user base. Our strategy is to launch a digital and social strategy that work in tangent with a disruptive engagement strategy. The digital and social strategy should aim to optimize search engine results and create content for marketing and engagement, create an integrated social media strategy to promote awareness, and engage and convert people into users of the Hub.
Final Report | 51
SECTION 7
P R OTOT Y P E D E L I V E R A B L E S
GROWTH HACK Once CityThink launches, our strategy outlines three key activities: disruptive engagement crowd funding partnership development. Disruptive engagement is a means of fast tracking growth by deploying disruptive techniques into the market, which will allow the organisation to connect with its stakeholders in a fresh and innovative manner. We propose CityThink run a hackathon to engage a number of key user groups, including city officials, civil servants, industry experts, subject matter specialists, and citizens to solve a specific problem. We brand this concept “Hack My City” and believe it can quickly develop the CityThink brand and recognition as well as establish a positive framework for partnerships and funding. Crowdfunding is another important strategy that opens up possibilities for cities to not only generate funds but also encourages stakeholder engagement and higher levels of civic participation. It empowers the community with the responsibility of deciding what innovation should take place in their local area and ultimately help make it happen. Crowdfunding is also a powerful marketing tool as the funding process is essentially a social media campaign bringing attention to the issue at hand CityThink can become a partner for cities interested in crowdfunding, helping provide clarity in campaign objectives and ethos, creating transparent practices, and providing momentum building strategies. This can inspire thousands of people to become engage in their communities and raise money to turn ideas into reality.
Final Report | 52
SECTION 7
P R OTOT Y P E D E L I V E R A B L E S
GROWTH HACK Our final recommended activity is to develop a partnership ecosystem to grow and maintain relevance across stakeholders. CityThink should target two types of partnerships: Strategic and Ecosystem. Strategic partners drive towards a specific CityThink goal and can help to fill in a gap in the platform’s resources or capabilities. We believe these partnerships can drive, facilitate, inspire, and deliver innovation.
STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIPS: MATCHING CITYTHINK STRATEGY TO PARTNER CAPABILITY
CONNECTING
Digitally connecting city officials with other users to create a virtual city innovators Hub
Connecting partners are potential users, user groups and key champions who will benefit and contribute to CityThink development
EXECUTING
Driving adoption of innovation on the ground to bridge strategy execution gap
IDEATING
Generating or crowd sourcing ideas and solutions for wicked problems facing cities
INSPIRING INNOVATION
Ideating partners should be design firms, city-level innovation labs and open innovation and crowd sourcing platforms
CREATING
Frog Design Urbane New Cities Foundation
CONNECTING Neighborland One Concern Remix City Base
EXECUTING
Smart Columbus SideWalk Labs Tumml
IDEATING
Open IDEO Civic Hall Labs Fast FWD
DELIVERING INNOVATION
CREATING
Creating and curating content to disseminate best practices and latest thinking in city innovation
DRIVING INNOVATION FACILITATING INNOVATION
DRIVING INNOVATION
Executing partners should be government, social enterprises and implementing partners who deliver on specific urban projects
DELIVERING INNOVATION
FACILITATING INNOVATION
Creating partners are content developers, academics, research firms of consulting firms who are seeking dissemination channels
STRATEGIC COMPLEMENTS: PARTNERSHIP RECOMMENDATIONS
INSPIRING INNOVATION
Final Report | 53
SECTION 7
P R OTOT Y P E D E L I V E R A B L E S
Ecosystem partners span sectors and geographies to bridge systemic gaps in city innovation. By partnering across sectors, CityThink can bridge the disconnect and redundancy in order to find areas of shared value. This ensures needed innovation gets to citizens through the most efficient and effective channels.
ECOSYSTEM BUILDERS: PARTNERSHIP RECOMMENDATIONS
PPPS:
PRIVATE
SOCIAL ENTERPRISES:
CitiBank, New Lab, Parsons, NYU
Blue Ridge Labs
SideWalk Labs
PUBLIC
CITY THINK
Smart Cities India, Shareable City, Seoul
SOCIAL
Rockefeller Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropy
COOPERATIVE MODELS: Community Centers Citizinvest
Final Report | 54
C O N C LU S I O N CONCLUSION Cities are poised to have significant impact on the lives of many people over the next decades. They have a tremendous opportunity to be the centers of innovation and CityThink can play a role in facilitating and inspiring city innovation globally. Through our research, we found the city officials were looking for an easier way to find information and to collaborate with their colleagues and with new partners. CityThink’s Hub is the solution to enabling innovation by cities, for cities. This platform will enable cities to connect with experts, explore new ideas, and be recognized for their innovative work. Further, CityThink Hub will be a platform helping cities with execution, not just idea generation. The tools we prototyped for the SFPA is just one example of how CityThink can create resources to help cities facilitate process challenges. Ubuntu also sees a tremendous opportunity for CityThink to quickly scale through new approaches to engagement and growth. Utilizing social media and digital technology, CityThink can work with cities to engage citizens in new ways through hackathons and crowdfunding. CityThink can also bring together a wide range of partners in the city-innovation space through strategic partnership development.
We believe CityThink, reimagined, will drive a new wave of innovation in cities across the globe.
Final Report | 55
SECTION 8
SUMMARY DECK
Final Report | 56
HOW MIGHT WE SPREAD AND SCALE LEADING EDGE URBAN INNOVATION TO ADDRESS WICKED PROBLEMS IN CITIES ACROSS THE WORLD?
UBUNTU IS A STRATEGIC DESIGN STUDIO. We address social + business challenges through a process of experiential design. We are 12 associates in 6 countries across 4 continents. We are a global collective of storytellers, strategists, innovators, intrapreneurs, CX specialists, economists, digital designers and technologists.
THE TEAM: Anna Pateras Anne Stake Anne-Marie Dwyer Beata Giermasińska-Sule Jaime Horak Jin Ying Law Katharina Lepak Katherine Johnston Marco Maria Pedrazzo Megan Geyer Terence Behan Wen Teo
THE CHALLENGE CITIES ARE AT THE CENTER OF DEVELOPING SOLUTIONS TO SOME OF THE WORLD’S GREATEST AND MOST COMPLEX PROBLEMS. To do this they will have to create innovative services and products which improve and transform the lives of their citizens and experiences of people. While cities around the globe serve as the centers of innovation, policymakers themselves often find themselves constrained in being innovative. CityThink is a non-profit start updesigned to create a global network and hubof the best thinking in City Innovation. It is BY cities, FOR cities. CityThink builds sustainable systems to help organize our cities in a way that they can respond to the most wicked of problems, which will be achieved by creating an ecosystem of civic design teams ready to take on any challenge.
U B U N T U’S
PROJECT GOALS
CREATE A STRATEGY AND FOUNDATION FOR THE LAUNCH OF THE CITYTHINK START-UP, INCLUDING:
U B U N T U’S
APPROACH
U B U N T U’S
APPROACH
DELIVERABLES INTERVIEWS &
INTERVIEW GUIDE
EMERGING
MARKETS PAPER
RESEARCH REPORT
CONCEPT DECKS
CITYTHINK WEBSITE PROTOTYPE CITYTHINK HUB PROTOTYPE WORKSHOP TOOLKIT PROTOTYPE GROWTH HACKING STRATEGY
P R OTOY P E S DELIVERABLES THE WEBSITE The website is a marketing tool designed to provide basic information about CityThink, drive appropriate users to the Hub, and showcase key achievements. The site is designed to be a landing page that introduces a user to CityThink and can be used by anyone interested in city innovation. CityThink should use this website to share important information to a general audience and to foster interest in CityThink. It should feed appropriate users into the Hub.
P R OTOY P E S DELIVERABLES THE WEBSITE
P R OTOY P E S DELIVERABLES THE HUB The CityThink Hub is a resource of people, case studies, tools, and best practices to approach and implement innovation within a city. The Hub is a unique platform that encourages innovation, promotes the sharing of knowledge and resources, and creates a sense of community between cities.
P R OTOY P E S DELIVERABLES THE HUB
P R OTOY P E S DELIVERABLES GROWTH HACKING The growth hack strategy seeks to identify opportunities to fast track the development of CityThink. We believe an initial foundation
DISRUPTIVE ENGAGEMENT
for rapid growth can result from a set of three interlinked activities. It is critical for CityThink to launch with a strong user base. Our strategy is to launch a digital and social strategy that work in tangent with a disruptive engagement strategy. The digital and social strategy should aim to optimize search engine results and create content for marketing and engagement, create an integrated social media strategy to promote awareness, and engage and convert people into users of the Hub.
CROWD FUNDING
GROWTH HACK STRATEGY
PARTNERSHIP DEVELOPMENT
P R OTOY P E S DELIVERABLES GROWTH HACKING STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIPS: MATCHING CITYTHINK STRATEGY TO PARTNER CAPABILITY
CONNECTING
Digitally connecting city officials with other users to create a virtual city innovators Hub
Connecting partners are potential users, user groups and key champions who will benefit and contribute to CityThink development
EXECUTING
Driving adoption of innovation on the ground to bridge strategy execution gap
IDEATING
Generating or crowd sourcing ideas and solutions for wicked problems facing cities
INSPIRING INNOVATION
Ideating partners should be design firms, city-level innovation labs and open innovation and crowd sourcing platforms
CREATING
Frog Design Urbane New Cities Foundation
CONNECTING Neighborland One Concern Remix City Base
EXECUTING
Smart Columbus SideWalk Labs Tumml
IDEATING
Open IDEO Civic Hall Labs Fast FWD
INSPIRING INNOVATION
DELIVERING INNOVATION
CREATING
Creating and curating content to disseminate best practices and latest thinking in city innovation
DRIVING INNOVATION FACILITATING INNOVATION
DRIVING INNOVATION
Executing partners should be government, social enterprises and implementing partners who deliver on specific urban projects
DELIVERING INNOVATION
FACILITATING INNOVATION
Creating partners are content developers, academics, research firms of consulting firms who are seeking dissemination channels
STRATEGIC COMPLEMENTS: PARTNERSHIP RECOMMENDATIONS
P R OTOY P E S DELIVERABLES GROWTH HACKING
CROWDFUNDING
C O N C LU S I O N Cities are poised to have significant impact on the lives of many people over the next decades. They have a tremendous opportunity to be the centers of innovation and CityThink can play a role in facilitating and inspiring city innovation globally.
We believe CityThink, reimagined, will drive a new wave of innovation in cities across the globe.