The Mighty Creatives is the young people's creative development agency for the East Midlands. Becky Williamson, Director of Innovation, will use this blog as a platform to share the development of the new Innovation unit and the emerging dialogue with young people, our partners and the world! It will act at a point of communication and engagement for all in building the plan, seek to be reflective and invite reflection.
Friday 20 August 2010
Innovation at TMC is a springboard...
...for young people to support economic recovery in their world....a space to play and venture to develop skills ... a rehearsal for the real world...a place to work on ideas to take action....
We want to work with young people so they are in a position to say...
“...now I can get a job and start in my business...if I need further nourishment, I can go back and discover my skills with The Mighty Creatives.”
To help us get it right, we would love to hear from you in a few words, a story or an image that tells us.......
Where do you want to be in 2020?
How could TMC help you get there?
Who does TMC need to work with?
What skills do young people need to get where they want to be?
Friday 6 August 2010
What do we do with wonderland?
Thinking about these two themes, we talked about the importance of space. It can be hard to find or be given the space to dive into an idea once we decide we have struck gold. The journey of an idea can be difficult and we need to be able to try things out, get things wrong and see things in a new way.
Aha, we thought, just like Alice in Wonderland! Alice is determined to follow the curious white rabbit, not knowing or even thinking about where it would lead. She enters Wonderland and her little world of experience is turned upside down.
Nothing is as it appears to be, or as she thinks it should be. Everything is new and unexpected. Butterflies are bread and butter flies, caterpillars talk, and we celebrate unbirthdays rather than birthdays. It can be daunting and chaotic and there is often no rhyme or reason for why we follow an idea so faithfully. But the wonderland of ideas is also a place where anything is possible and we are given presents of things we already have, but didn’t know we have.
In Alice’s case, the adventure ends in her waking up from a strange dream “wake up Alice!” but you and I know that once we have had such experience, the way we see things and the things we want to do because of what we have seen, will never be the same again.
Sunday 1 August 2010
"it's black and white"...
• Investment
• Commitment
• Leadership
• Collaboration
• Time
• Clarity of vision
• Community engagement
• Material wellbeing
• Job creation
Pat shared three things for consideration in building the plan:
• Business partners (real world connections)
• Learning (the skills)
• Accreditation (qualifications)
Young people have the ideas...the key is who is listening? who is supporting? what’s changing? who is taking action on this?
What we need to understand to develop this approach?
• What do business get?
• What do they offer young people?
• Are we supporting “young people into the framework of working?...”
Friday 30 July 2010
More on panning for gold
Ideas can be tricky. Some of them burn out quickly whilst others will develop beyond imagination. Where do they come from? How do you know when you’ve happened upon an idea that will not only sustain excitement in its creator, but inspire others to be part of it and provide the world with something magical? Not necessarily something entirely new, but something so essential or so captivating that we won’t know how we did without it.
In a discussion about innovation, Becky, Karen and I rested upon the topic of ideas. Trying to get to the bottom of them, we talked about ‘light-bulb’ moments, about the need for focus. As we sat in a classroom in Hardwick, quietly waiting for an idea about ideas (no pressure), the image of an exploring child, sifting pebbles and earth came to us and we moved toward the metaphor of panning for gold.
We are subject to a constant flow of thoughts, dreams, information and moments of inspiration – our own and other people’s. We obsess about some of it and ignore other, less attractive details, but it’s not ‘til we go through the silt and the gravel of these that we get the precious, genuinely sparkling idea we’re after.
From time to time we might get lucky, but gold panning is a craft that might reveal the idea we’ve been waiting for.
Thursday 22 July 2010
Young people in their society, their environment and their business
the thinkUP forum continued on the 15th July to explore the business focus of the unit using the images and our shared definitions as a starting point.
How do young people imagine and realise the possibilities for action in their society, in their environment and in their business?
We discussed the power of telling Stories to unlock NEW IDEAS. Telling stories of their world in different places and spaces to help young people, TMC and our partners understand a child’s eye view of the world.
Young people making their mark on the world, using innovation and creativity, identifying new ways of working and leading challenging action in their lives.
- Footprints (collective action regionally)
- Handprints (collaborative action locally)
- Fingerprints (individual action)
TMC will seek to design an offer where by which we will seek to invest in Young People through providing the space, time, resources, people, and skills to unlock new ideas and grow young entrepreneurs.
How?...
thinkUP Forum 15 July 2010
The thinkUP team discussion explored in detail the answer to this question as a means to begin to scope the business focus of our offer. We captured below a summary of the thoughts we explored and refined during the session.
What do you think?...
WE think innovation is...
• Imagining the possibilities..
• Enabling young people to take new directions...
• Innovation at the heart of TMC to feed Innovation from TMC ...
• Spaces and places for telling stories that nurture new ideas
• Panning for gold, looking for the TMC sparkle
TMC and young people in Wonderland - A place for creating the conditions for innovation at the heart of The Mighty Creatives. A space for using stories that exist to capture the journey and ideas towards new business.
WE think enterprise is...
- the art of business
- making money
- taking action
- realising ideas that are new
Origins - Derives from the old French word meaning meaning business
Quote: "Dérivé de entreprendre, daté de environ 1430-40 dans le sens de prendre entre ses mains. Aux environs de 1480 il prit le concept actuel de prendre un risque, relever un défi, oser un objectif".
Translated - meaning ‘to undertake’ from around 1430 – 40 in the sense of ‘to take between the hands.’ Around 1480, the concept took on its current meaning, which is ‘to take a risk, raise the stakes, dare to have an idea.’
Skills
- investing in labour and the craft
- growing the skills and tools for business
Is enterprise the journey, the pathway, the (ad)venture to creating business that leads to action and change?
The three pillars of enterprise:
• People (Social)
• Planet (Environmental)
• Profit (Economical)
Is it the art of business?
Young entrepreneurs having an idea to meet a need and take challenging action in the real world...
thinkUP is launched
Innovation through telling stories- sharing BIG IDEAS
"it's only stories that gather the world up in unexpected ways" (Tim Parks)
Innovation at the heart of The Mighty Creatives - what is it and what does it mean?
Young people day dreaming in the real world?
Innovation - expanding their imagination for Life!
Innovation at the heart of TMC, innovation at the heart of young people and their lives...
- TOGETHER WE TELL STORIES (Young people and adults)
- UNDERSTAND our world
- PLAY and imagine the possibilities
- PICTURE
- ASK QUESTIONS
- ADD COLOUR
- LEARN IN THE REAL WORLD
- ACT UPON IDEAS
- AND CELEBRATE RESULTS
i-think - schedule of development
What are we doing and when?
Friday 16 July 2010
Welcome
It'll be a tool to create a dialogue between young people, our stakeholders and partners and TMC staff.
They'll be journal entries, videos, photos, conversations and most of all YOUR input.