What is an Innovation Incubator?
E2E believes strongly that the best solutions to the challenges facing post-quake Haiti will come from those that experience these problems firsthand. Through the Innovation Incubator program now running in Léogâne, E2E has developed an effective platform to source these solutions directly from the community by building on the principle of Human Centered Design.
Our Innovation Incubator is a three-stage process that first develops an Innovator Profile specific to a given problem and uses it to recruit an Innovator Pool. To begin the process of finding the most creative minds in the community, we present an Initial Challenge -- a structured activity that allows members of this pool to compete to represent their neighborhood in the next stage (as shown by the video above). These finalists then advance to the Main Challenge where they engage in guided, collective problem solving focused on the problem at hand.
E2E has used this approach to community-source solutions for three challenges related to the E2E housing model and its financing program, identifying in the process, the individuals in the community best suited to join E2E in its implementation. You can learn more in E2E's November 2013 newsletter.
How can I help accelerate this innovation revolution in Haiti?
E2E maintains and continually updates a list of problems focused on housing and other tangential technologies and services that are ripe and waiting for a partner to bring them into the incubator. As an Innovation Partner, you can select one of these topics and sponsor it at one of two levels:
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An Initial Challenge in one of E2E's targeted communities: $1000 gift
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The entire three stage Innovation Incubator: $5000 gift
These gifts not only support E2E's housing program, but more importantly the continued investment in the Haitian people. As such, we welcome both individual and corporate sponsors to truly partner in this process, beyond just a monetary gift. Through direct mentorship of incubator participants or partnering with E2E in the design and execution of the incubator challenges themselves, you can give the added gift of your talents and experiences. These partnerships can be the spring board for long-term relationships that can be the driver of lasting change for this country. Just click on the button below to get started!
Why are the incubators so important?
By design, E2E Innovation Incubators yield true ownership of development solutions, creating impact in a number of dimensions:
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By sourcing innovation from the community itself, there is greater likelihood of successful implementation, particularly since the architect of that innovation can continue to serve as its powerful advocate within the community.
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Incubators help breed a culture of innovation: community members discover they have the capacity to solve their own problems, leading to inventions in other development sectors beyond housing, like the cookstoves shown here.
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By building recruitment activities and the initial challenges around each neighborhood, the process helps to galvanize the community around the problem and its own empowerment.
Even better, the framework for the incubators is suitable for application to a wide range of development challenges and the creation of entrepreneurship opportunities.
Be an Innovation Partner
Learn more about how you can accelerate the Innovation Revolution in Haiti
Our Incubators have ignited a new culture of innovation in the neighborhoods of Léogâne. Before this program, such opportunities for collective problem solving that builds local capacity and reveals the creative potential of its participants were unheard of. With your help, we can continue to offer a program that, in the words of E2E Community Representative Lamarre Presuma, is not only "important, but crucial" to the recovery of this nation, as this powerful video demonstrates.
