News
How can local governments ‘fail forward’? We’re not sure, but we’re working on it.
The US Centre for Public Impact believes that:
Regardless of where each team’s change efforts sits on the innovation spectrum, from run-of-the-mill process improvement to engaging in moonshot experiments, it’s become clear that a government team’s ability to fail forward (defined as identifying, analyzing, and taking action on failures) is at the root of innovation.
But they admit, they don’t know how teams create cultures of innovation that embrace failing forward. But they are trying to find out. They’ve set up a website to share research, insights and experiences. They’ve run ‘Failure Foundries’ in Washington, DC; Kansas City, MO; Little Rock, AR; Seattle, WA; and King County, WA.
In these day-long workshops, participants identify the unique barriers to learning from failure in their organization and develop action plans to overcome them, which the team is responsible for implementing.
They are also calling for people to contribute to their research. If you want to get involved you can do so here.