The Private Side of Public Work | Exploring How to Make Cities Happier, Government More Innovative, & Science More Accessible

The court system is by nature designed to be slow to change, dependable, predictable. Yet the courts are charged with tackling challenges that don't stand still. Courts have evolved tremendously over the centuries to adapt, even as we think of them as relatively stable and un-moving. Today, William DeLisio provides us a window into how he has effected positive change within the court systems by introducing risk and growth, in fair measure of course.

All of us must work our way through the empty page, the blank screen, writer's block, confusion, chaos, and doubt. Although each instance of creativity is singular and specific, the creative process is universal. Artists, architects, poets, inventors, scientists, and others all navigate the same stages of the process in order to discover something that does not yet exist. Like a storm, the creative process slowly begins to gather and take form until it overtakes us—if we are willing to let it.

"From pulp magazine origins to recent cinematic triumphs, superheroes mirror our culture. Uniquely American and reflecting enduring values, these characters are a window on inspiration and aspiration defining our society."

Today, Dr. Julian Chambliss of Rollins College explores the real and imagined city through superheroes and the pages of comic books over the course of the last century.

Water is in every cell of our body. Factories, cities, and forests all depend on it. Practically invisible when we have it, yet catastrophic when we don't.

We humans have a long history of fighting over water. Joe Whitworth sees a better way than idealism and finger pointing. His approach - quantified conservation - blends environmental and economic metrics to produce transaction-based strategies to realize environmental, social, and economic gains.

Hip-hop architecture. Is it a paradox? Or is it inevitable? On the one side: structured formality by necessity. On the other: a powerful counterculture defying formality. It seems that hip-hop doesn't want to be architecture; and architecture doesn't want to be hip-hop...yet. Sekou Cooke puts hip-hop within the historical context of other cultural movements and their influence on architecture. He suggests that as a dominant cultural movement of our generation, hip-hop is poised to produce its own architecture.

Collaborative Innovation. I know I know I know. You've heard it all before. The words are used and abused. Like so many important concepts, they have earned a plot in the graveyard of ubiquity. Eli MacLaren of The Business Innovation Factory is here to resurrect collaboration and innovation and to discuss why they are indispensable and inseparable.

What is the end-goal of all of university research? Academic journal articles are great as a record of scientific achievement, but if those articles are the last stop, what is the point? How can research move from the ivory tower into the real world?

Brian Demers works at the sweet spot between scientific invention and commercial viability. Brian is Director of Business Development in the Office of Industry Engagement and Commercial Venturing at Brown University. He builds the bridge between university research and commercial markets. Brian assists faculty in identifying and developing inventions that can become viable products and services. He establishes partnerships between the university and commercial entities, and he helps get start-ups off the ground.

Today's Private Side Challenge is keeping your wits about you when confronted with a Public Private Partnership deal.

Last week we discussed issues that arises with private financing of public infrastructure.

One of the things that struck me was that the in the worst of these deals, governments are throwing away their best capabilities – the ability to do strategic and long term planning in favor of a pseudo wall-street hack….

Aaron Renn discusses ways that public commons are constrained through private investment. Private infusions of capital can completely derail innovation within city planning. If this sounds counterintuitive or antithetical to popular rhetoric, it is because Aaron Renn pays attention to the nuance behind these public-private partnerships. Aaron gives incredible advice on what to pay attention to when it comes to financing public infrastructure.

You may be aware of bottlenecks in your work environment, but did you know that even plants have bottlenecks? What if there was a productivity coach for plants? Someone who could give them all of the secrets to being faster, greener and more productive? Someone who could whisper secrets into plant DNA so that they could transform sunlight into a bigger, better plant self…to be eaten by humans of course. Katherine Meacham is the real deal, boots-in-the-mud scientist, heck-bent on changing the world. She seeks to resolve bottlenecks in photosynthesis to increase crop yields…

Go to profitside.work to find the Profit Side Challenge or to work with Ingrid.