What happens when you combine numerous cancelled conferences, a requirement for social distancing, and a desire for innovation…?!

As organizers of major conferences began cancelling events in March due to the growing spread of COVID-19, the opportunities to meet new people and exchange new ideas was looking increasingly slim. Serendipity and creative collisions are crucial for innovation, so the lack of in-person opportunities was especially disappointing for our innovation community.

What started off as a question (“Is anyone interested in doing something online?”) evolved into a challenge statement (“How might we meet new people and exchange ideas in a time of social distancing?”) and grew into a rapid, 2-week experiment to lightly curate a virtual collaboration event across the Innovation Ecosystem: Innovation Resiliency 2020.

We were blown away by the response, and we were thrilled to feature 30 presentations on 13 different content-sharing platforms for topics spanning defense, healthcare, gaming, and more. Our Innovators came from government and industry, bringing a diversity of thinking (and format!) that was refreshing and informative as we collectively find our way using new tools and methods in this time of virtual collaboration.

Not only that, what was also inspiring was the cooperative spirit and willingness to experiment. We were so impressed by each of our presenters, who were all willing to quickly develop a virtual talk with less than two week’s notice. Not only that, partner organizations were willing to co-sponsor and/or help promote each other’s virtual events in order to help connect our communities (shout out to Defense Innovation Network, NatSecGirlSquad, and Public Spend Forum!).

So thank you, Innovators, for proving our hypothesis that our community IS resilient and that it IS possible to meet new people and exchange new ideas in this time of social distancing. We are so stoked to be in this together with you!

ICYMI, check out the recordings and sign up for next time here!

Team Toolkit talks:

• Jessica and Stephanie led Reframing Failure to Fuel Innovation
• Dan led Book Discussion and Meet the Author – Dan Ward’s LIFT
• Jen led AMA: What’s the buzz about… Innovation Workshops?!

#InnovationResiliency2020

Team Toolkit recently did an experiment. We observed, we learned, and were humbled. We want to do it again, and in this story we’d like to share it with you.

As we mentioned in an earlier blog post, our team celebrates unsuccessful endeavors with Failure Cakes. A week ago we were sitting around a table for an idea jam session with some really brilliant individuals and one of them asked “Why don’t you share a failure cake outside of the team?”

Sounded like a good idea to us, so seven days later we set up a great big cake on a table in our corporate cafeteria. The cake said “Congratulations on Failing” in big cursive letters. We also set up a giant whiteboard and invited our colleagues to share a story of their failure in exchange for a slice of cake. Three of us each put a failure sticky on the whiteboard to get things started.

Sitting behind the untouched sheet cake we couldn’t help but wonder – would sharing our failure cake be a failure?

It was not. What it was: scary, fun, interesting, emotional, & worthwhile.

We connected with so many people that day. Heard so many stories. It was fantastic to have people laugh when we said, “failure cake” and amazing to observe the thoughtfulness and courage demonstrated by those who did share a failure. Most touching was to see people standing in front of the whiteboard, carefully reading through the stickies, shaking their heads in recognition or reading one aloud and sympathizing. We talked with people who themselves were touched, and genuinely thanked us for reframing failures with cake. And believe it or not – we heard from a project leader who read Jessica’s blog post and shared a failure cake with his team following a recent project failure.

So, what did we discover from this experiment?

MITRE employees are not afraid to fail. They recognize the growth and learning that comes with – one employee said, “if not for this failure, I wouldn’t be here at MITRE”.

MITRE employees are also not afraid to share their failures, at least if cake is involved. This vulnerability and transparency is essential for building an environment that fosters innovation – so keep it up!

To each and every one of you who shared, thank you. We can’t wait to eat another cake with you.

To everyone who said you never failed, weird flex but we’ll save you a slice.