Community Innovation Programs

The Grant Funding Wake-Up Call In 20 years, I’ve never seen the situation this tough. In the past 12 months alone, over 100 trusts in the UK have spent out, paused, or closed altogether and competition for funding has intensified. To put it into perspective, the Health Lottery Foundation recently received 2,400 applications for just 30 awards. That’s not a queue, that’s a stampede. This should be a wake-up call for the sector. There simply isn’t enough money to go around, and someone always misses out. Grants have their place, but they should never be your only income stream. They’re short-term by design, not a foundation for sustainability. So what’s the alternative? We need to think more entrepreneurially. Two routes stand out: 1. Digital fundraising and corporate partnerships: In 2024, the UK public donated £15 billion and 48% of that came through digital platforms. Fundraising today requires the same mindset as marketing: build awareness, engagement, and trust before the ask. Partnerships with corporates can also open doors through social value, sponsorship, and platforms like Work for Good. 2. Consultancy and service delivery: Turn your expertise into value others will pay for. When I was made redundant, I shifted from community practitioner to consultant overnight - being commissioned to help public services design and deliver better community engagement. If I can do it, so can you. Start by identifying your strengths and matching them to the “pain points” of potential clients. And with the new UK procurement laws now making contracts more accessible to the third sector, there’s never been a better time to explore this. The Asset-Based Way Forward: If you work from an Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD) approach, this mindset shift should feel familiar. Start by mapping what you already have - your people, skills, connections, and physical or digital assets. Then ask: • Who could we partner with? • What problems could our strengths help others solve? • What services or ventures could generate value while staying true to our mission? Financial sustainability doesn’t come from chasing every pot of money, it comes from knowing your value and using it differently. What other creative ways have you found to build financial resilience beyond grants? Share your experience below - it might just help another organisation survive the storm. #CommunityPower #ABCD #CoProduction #SharedPower #DoingWithNotTo #PaulStepczak

I've seen my fair share of product development processes. JPD's approach stands out as particularly principled and well thought out. Here are the five most important things about how they build product: 𝗙𝗮𝗰𝗲𝘁 𝗢𝗻𝗲 - 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗟𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁𝗵𝗼𝘂𝘀𝗲 𝗣𝗵𝗶𝗹𝗼𝘀𝗼𝗽𝗵𝘆 As Catalin Bridinel, Head of Design, explains: "The product is a ship, and the user is a lighthouse that gives you direction." This is more than a cute metaphor - it's a fundamental operating principle that multiple interviewees brought up. It manifested, for instance, in the early access program stages: Step 1 - Deep dive with 10 carefully selected customers Step 2 - Expand to 100 customers for broader validation Step 3 - Then 1000 and GA And it does in a million little other ways. 𝗙𝗮𝗰𝗲𝘁 𝗧𝘄𝗼 - 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗧𝗲𝗮𝗺 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝘂𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲 They have Five Autonomous Squads: 1. PM Experience Squad: Focused on core product manager workflows 2. Admin Experience Squad: Handling the critical but often overlooked admin experience 3. Cross-flow Integration Squad: Making JPD play well with the broader Jira ecosystem 4. Infrastructure Squad: Ensuring performance at scale 5. Growth Squad: Driving adoption and expansion Having each squad own specific components end-to-end has transformed their development process. As Edouard Kaiser, Head of Engineering, put it: "Before, everyone owned everything - which meant no one owned anything." JPD operates with a surprisingly lean team of about 50 people, including just 3 PMs (plus Tanguy). 𝗙𝗮𝗰𝗲𝘁 𝗧𝗵𝗿𝗲𝗲 - 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗣𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗖𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 Instead of rigid quarterly planning, they've adopted a "nested timeframe" approach: 1. Strategic Planning (Every 6 Months): - Create opportunity solution trees - Define key strategic bets - Align on major initiatives 2. Weekly Rhythm: - Monday: PM Loom updates (3-5 minutes each) - Wednesday: PM sparring sessions - Friday: "Dojo" sessions for deep dives 𝗙𝗮𝗰𝗲𝘁 𝗙𝗼𝘂𝗿 - 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗖𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝗻𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗘𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲 They stay connected. 1. Weekly PM Rotation: - One PM owns all feedback channels - Monitors community posts - Reviews support tickets - Catalogues sales feedback 2. Video-First Customer Understanding: - Every product decision includes customer video clips - Regular customer interview reels - Visual evidence over written summaries This allows PMs to have a near-Tanguy level knowledge and understanding of the product. 𝗙𝗮𝗰𝗲𝘁 𝗙𝗶𝘃𝗲 - 𝗕𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻 𝗣𝘂𝗯𝗹𝗶𝗰 In a delightful bit of dogfooding, JPD uses their own product to manage their development process. Their public roadmap isn't just a marketing tool - it's their actual working document. This transparency creates an interesting dynamic: they're building a product management tool while publicly showing how they manage their own product. It's a level of authenticity that I find refreshing.

Can we stop saying research has been co produced with communities when the only engagement was a one hour session at the end for a £27.50 voucher? Because that is not co production. Words matter in research. When we blur the lines between consultation, PPIE and true co production, we are not just mislabelling a process. We are misrepresenting communities, their labour and their expertise. Co production means communities shaping the work from the beginning. It means being involved in defining the questions, shaping the design, influencing the methods and helping interpret what the findings actually mean. It means power is shared, not borrowed for an hour. Consultation is different. PPIE is different. Both are valuable and necessary parts of research. But they are not the same as co production, and pretending they are risks eroding trust with the very communities research claims to serve. Many of the communities I work with have experienced extractive research for decades. They have been asked to share their stories, their pain and their time, often for very little in return. When institutions then publish papers saying the work was “co produced”, it can feel like another form of erasure. Honesty matters here. If a project consulted people at the end, say that. If a project included a PPIE group that reviewed materials, say that. If a community genuinely shaped the research from start to finish, then absolutely call it co production. None of these approaches are lesser. They are simply different. But integrity in how we describe them is critical if we want to rebuild trust between researchers and communities. Good PPIE is not a tick box exercise. Co production is not a buzzword. & communities deserve more than being written into a methodology section after the work is already done. If we want research to be equitable, inclusive and impactful, we need to start by being honest about how we do it. ----- Hey, I’m Neelam, CEO and Founder of Cysters, est 11 years ago. We specialise in community research, health inequalities and justice based, intersectional care, working alongside communities to shape systems that truly listen and respond. Follow me, connect with me, or catch me over a hot chocolate to explore how we can work together ❤️

Standing in a bustling Seoul street last year, I watched something remarkable unfold. What started as a typical city block transformed into a canvas for environmental change, vibrant artwork surrounding drains, turning potential litter spots into visual reminders of our shared responsibility. This wasn't just street art. It was community engagement in action. In #SouthKorea 🇰🇷, our Philip Morris International Korea team partnered with local government, the Korea Green Foundation, and local artists to tackle cigarette butt litter differently. Instead of just organizing clean-ups, they created an ecosystem of change: 400+ volunteers collecting 300 bags of waste, students creating anti-littering artwork, and entire neighborhoods becoming part of the solution. What struck me most was the ripple effect. One clean-up event in Yangsan evolved into a year-round sustainability hub. By September, 666 volunteers had collected over 18,000 cigarette butts, but more importantly, sparked conversations that are changing behaviors. Meanwhile in #Tunisia 🇹🇳, a different challenge led to equally innovative collaboration. Young entrepreneurs at startup Wayout developed "Zigofiltres"—simple cages for drains that prevent flooding by capturing cigarette butt litter before it blocks waterways. 246 of these devices now protect one of Tunisia's most flood-prone municipalities. Two countries. Two different ways of addressing a same challenge. One powerful lesson: when business, government, local innovators, and communities work together, environmental problems become opportunities for creative solutions. #Sustainability isn't just about corporate initiatives—it's about creating platforms where local ingenuity can flourish. 🌱 ♥️ Link to full case study here ➡️ https://lnkd.in/ePU_Bwkt #CommunityEngagement Cc: Borhann Rachdi, Abla Benslimane, Hannah Yun, Miguel Coleta, Maria V Agelvis, Kelly Lavender, Euigyum Hong

The 𝐏𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐑𝐨𝐨𝐦 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐅𝐮𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞 (𝐏𝐑𝐨𝐅) teaching case shows how a large healthcare consortium and a small group of manufacturers collaborated to rethink innovation in a highly regulated sector. At its core, the case demonstrates how PRoF turned the interaction between two very different communities into its main innovation engine. The large consortium represents the healthcare user community: nurses, doctors, caregivers, patients, and hospital managers who express the lived reality of care. Their contribution is experiential and value-based. Through structured “brainwave sessions,” they surface latent needs and convert them into broad keywords such as comfort, privacy, dignity, or anti-loneliness. These keywords form a shared language that avoids technical jargon and allows hundreds of users with diverse perspectives to converge around common priorities. The small consortium consists of manufacturers, architects, and designers who have the capabilities to transform these user insights into concrete room concepts. Their commercial goals are kept strictly outside the creative process, allowing trust to grow between the groups. Once the user community defines the keywords, the producer community develops prototypes, after which the large consortium returns to evaluate and refine them. This modular sequencing keeps tensions low, ensures rapid progress, and prevents commercial logic from dominating user needs. The interaction between these two communities solves a longstanding problem in healthcare innovation: suppliers often misunderstand user needs, while users lack the means to innovate. PRoF bridges this gap by letting users drive ideation and letting producers translate that insight into solutions. What emerges is a genuinely user-oriented innovation ecosystem in which neither community could succeed alone, but together they generate concepts that reshape expectations of care design. You can find the case study at HBSP: https://lnkd.in/e6nxTFM7 #UserCentricInnovation #Collaboration #OpenInnovation #CrossCommunityCollaboration #HealthcareEcosystems #CoCreation #Ideation

As AI weaves itself into the fabric of our lives, we have a tendency to assume that all of us want the same things from AI. A recent study from Stanford HAI reveals that our cultural background significantly influences our desires and expectations from AI technologies. European Americans, deeply rooted in an independent cultural model, tend to seek control over AI. They want systems that empower individual autonomy and decision-making. In contrast, Chinese participants, influenced by an interdependent cultural model, favour a connection with AI, valuing harmony and collective well-being over individual control. Interestingly, African Americans navigate both these cultural models, reflecting a nuanced balance between control and connection in their AI preferences. The importance of embracing cultural diversity in AI development cannot be understated. As we build technologies that are increasingly global, understanding and integrating these diverse cultural perspectives is essential. The AI we create today will shape the world of tomorrow, and ensuring that it resonates with the values and needs of a global population is the key to its success. When designing technology solutions, we must think beyond our immediate cultural contexts and strive to create systems that are inclusive, adaptable, and culturally aware. If OpenAI wants to benefit humanity, then that needs to be humanity with all our different world views. The key takeaways from the study can apply to all kinds of product development: 1. Cultural Awareness: recognise that preferences vary across cultures, and these differences should inform design and implementation strategies. 2. Inclusive Design: incorporate diverse perspectives from the outset to create products that resonate globally. 3. Global Leadership: lead with an understanding that what works in one cultural context might not in another—adaptability is key. By embedding these principles into our product development efforts, we can ensure that the technology and products we develop are culturally attuned to the needs of a diverse world. I would love to see deeper analysis of this cultural lens as it should inform the way we work with technology for good. There is always a danger that as we seek to break one set of biases, we introduce our own. How do you think leaders should adapt their AI approaches or precut development on the basis of this research? #AI #product #research #techforgood #responsibleAI Enjoy this? ♻️ Repost it to your network and follow me Holly Joint 🙌🏻 I write about navigating a tech-driven future: how it impacts strategy, leadership, culture and women 🙌🏻 All views are my own.

Innovation for the sake of innovation is boring. True innovation when you can build products with purpose and impact. Building purposeful products that address the toughest social impact challenges in the world is hard but can be the most interesting to Product Managers who love solving tough problems. They also set themselves apart from the rest. 📣 How can PMs differentiate themselves as purposeful PMs? ➡️ Deeply engage with your customers to understand their needs, challenges, and aspirations. Understand the context they live in and the broader social impact needs of the community. ➡️ Ensure your product goals align with broader social impacts. Consider how your product can contribute to societal well-being. ➡️ Design for diversity by making sure your products are accessible and usable by people of all backgrounds and abilities. ➡️Go beyond traditional metrics and measure impact. Evaluate the social and environmental impact of your products alongside business performance. ➡️ Work closely with teams across the organization to integrate purpose into every aspect of the product lifecycle. ➡️ Continuously learn about new technologies and methodologies that can enhance your product's positive impact. ➡️ Champion ethical practices in product development, from data privacy to fair labor practices, ensuring integrity in your process. ➡️ Foster a culture of purpose across the team to embrace a purpose-driven mindset, making it a core part of your company culture and daily operations. ➡️ Build relationships with communities and stakeholders to understand their perspectives and incorporate their feedback into your product development. ➡️ Promote sustainable development by creating products that contribute to environmental sustainability, reducing waste, and promoting responsible use of resources. ➡️ Incorporate long-term thinking by assessing the long-term impact of your products, considering how they will evolve and continue to provide value over time for your customers, business, and the communities we operate in. #productmanagement #purposefulproductmanagement #socialinnovation #productleadership

#AiDays2025 Round Table : #Community Sourcing for low resource languages In an era where AI is fast shaping the contours of our digital future, VISWAM.AI initiative stands as a timely and transformational one. Their mission to build community-sourced Large Language Models (LLMs), grounded in India’s rich linguistic and cultural diversity, is not just pioneering—it’s redefining how inclusive and ethical AI should be built. By anchoring their work in community participation, linguistic preservation, and ethical co-creation, Viswam.ai offers a people-first approach to AI—moving beyond data extraction to cultural stewardship. Their ambition to mobilize 1 lakh community interns to collect data from underrepresented geographies across India is both bold and brilliant. This isn’t just about building better AI—it’s about building equity, agency, and cultural resilience through AI. 1. Linguistic Equity by Design In India, where linguistic hegemony often privileges English and Hindi, AI systems risk reinforcing this imbalance. The solution? Intentional design. Allocate equal engineering and validation efforts to low-resource languages. Ethical AI must be built on informed consent, community ownership, and fair compensation—because data is not just input, it’s identity and heritage. 2. Decentralized Internship Model By decentralizing AI development, we bridge the urban-rural digital divide. This model should focus on: Capacity building through training in ethics and digital literacy Inclusivity by involving women, Dalit and Adivasi youth Localized platforms using mobile-first tools in native languages Partnerships with Swecha, local NGOs, and institutions serve as trust bridges to ensure mentorship and sustainability. 3. Tools for Low-Resource Languages Many Indian languages are oral-first, with complex dialects and sparse corpora. Community-driven solutions—like collecting voice datasets from folklore, and crowdsourcing annotation—are key. Elders, poets, and storytellers become linguistic technologists, preserving not just language but legacy. 4. Trust & Transparency Bias in AI is structural. To mitigate it: Include diverse dialects and accents in training Conduct bias testing and community validation Promote explainable AI with local language dashboards and storytelling What’s Next? A living white paper on ethics, governance, and technical guidelines A roadmap for the internship program, with toolkits and impact metrics Collaboration with literary and linguistic organizations to enrich model depth VISWAM.AI is planting seeds for an AI movement rooted in language justice, data sovereignty, and community wisdom. Let’s co-create systems that don’t just understand our languages—but respect our voices. DC* Chaitanya Chokkareddy Kiran Chandra Ramesh Loganathan Centific

Queenstown may be the most strategically important region in New Zealand without a university. For decades, its growth model has been tourism. Successful, but narrow. The current push to develop a technology cluster reflects a wider ambition to diversify the regional economy and build a more resilient economy. That shift will not happen through startups alone. Every successful regional innovation ecosystem begins with capability. Education is usually the anchor. The NZ Herald reports that the University of Otago is expanding into Queenstown with new programmes and partnerships with technology firms, with courses being co-designed with industry rather than simply delivered by the university. That approach recognises something important. Universities do not build regional ecosystems by exporting degrees. They do it by embedding themselves in the local capability system. But how this is done will matter. Successful ecosystems are rarely created simply by opening a campus. They emerge when education, industry collaboration, professional learning, and entrepreneurship reinforce each other over time. Executive and professional education often plays a critical early role, helping firms and institutions build capability while research activity and degree programmes mature. Queenstown already has many of the ingredients: global connectivity, entrepreneurial residents, investment capital, and a powerful international brand. What it has lacked is a durable institutional anchor. Otago’s move has the potential to provide exactly that. If developed thoughtfully, the Queenstown presence could become a focal point for capability development that connects regional firms, national networks, and international partners. Queenstown is an important place to watch. If this initiative succeeds, it could become one of the most interesting regional economic development experiments in New Zealand. 👉 https://lnkd.in/eR-Uzqce

"I’ll never forget what one of my first VP of Demand Gen said during a meeting: ‘We’ve hit 4x our pipeline goal—so why do I feel so depressed?’" This isn’t just a one time story—it’s a feeling I’ve had throughout my career at Wandera, Hearsay, and beyond. Marketing would hit the numbers, but we’d still question if we were truly driving quality connections with our audience. At the time, I didn’t think much of it. We were doing all the right things: events, webinars, SDR outreach, dinners—you name it. But deep down, I knew what he meant. Marketing was running full speed ahead, but the pipeline didn’t feel… solid. We never really knew if the leads we worked so hard to generate were the right leads. It wasn’t until I interviewed the founders of Klaus, Kair Käsper, Martin Kõiva, a customer support software company on my podcast, that I finally understood what was missing. Their marketing playbook? Deceptively simple, but incredibly effective: 1️⃣ Be part of the community before you market to it. Before they even had a product, they were active members of a Slack group for support professionals. They weren’t promoting anything—they were just helping. 2️⃣ Build based on trust and understanding. When the time came to build their product, they naturally turned to the community for input. This deep understanding of their audience became the foundation of both their product and their marketing. 3️⃣ Engage with intent. Their community-driven approach meant that by the time they launched, they already had a built-in audience that trusted them. Content, AMAs, beta programs—everything resonated because it was grounded in deeply understanding the needs of their audience. Without spending heavily on marketing, they created awareness, trust, and high-converting leads. It was then I realised that great marketing is about creating deep, meaningful relationships with your audience beyond “building your audience.” And maybe that is the key to not being depressed over the metrics. Do you agree?