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This week, we distill insights around Let's Move! Cities, Towns and Counties - a collaboration of government departments, local leaders, non profits and philanthropists to combat childhood obesity. 100+ thinkers and planners within MSLGROUP share and discuss inspiring projects on social data, crowdsourcing, storytelling and citizenship on the MSLGROUP Insights Network. Every week, we pick up one project and do a deep dive into conversations around it -- on the MSLGROUP Insights Network itself but also on the broader social web -- to distill insights and foresights. We share these insights and foresights with you on our People’s Insights blog and compile the best insights from the network and the blog in the iPad-friendly People’s Lab Quarterly Magazine, as a showcase of our capabilities. For more, see: http://peopleslab.mslgroup.com
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crowdsourcing | storytelling | citizenship | social data
Let’s Move! Cities, Towns and Counties
People’s Insights Volume 2, Issue 2
Volume 2, Issue 2, January - March, 2013
Future of Citizenship
Let’s Move! Cities, Towns and Counties
100+ thinkers and planners within MSL-GROUP share and discuss inspiring proj-ects on social data, crowdsourcing, story-telling and citizenship on the MSLGROUP Insights Network. Every week, we pick up one project and curate the conversations around it — on the MSLGROUP Insights Network itself but also on the broader social web — into a weekly insights report. Every quarter, we compile these insights, along with original research and insights from the MSLGROUP global network, into the People’s Insights Quarterly Magazine.
We have synthesized the insights from our year-long endeavor throughout 2012 to provide foresights for business leaders and changemakers — in the ten-part People’s Insights Annual Report titled Now & Next: Ten Frontiers for the Future of Engage-ment.
People’s InsightsIn 2013, we continue to track inspiring projects at the intersection of social data, crowdsourcing and storytelling, with a fo-cus on projects that are shaping the Future of Citizenship.
Do subscribe to receive our weekly insights reports, quarterly magazines, and annual reports, and do share your tips and com-ments with us at @PeoplesLab on Twitter.
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People’s Insightsquarterly magazines
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What is Let’s Move! Cities, Towns and Counties?Let’s Move! Cities, Towns and Counties is a part of Michelle Obama’s national Let’s Move! initiative to combat obesity in children. LMCTC encourag-es collaboration among various U.S. government departments, elected officials, non-profits and private foundations to bring about change at the grassroots level.
To date, 205 local elected leaders have joined the program.
How does it work?The program was initially launched in 2010 as Let’s Move! Cities and Towns and focused on creating awareness and gathering support from
Source: healthycommunitieshealthyfuture.org
Source: healthycommunitieshealthyfuture.org
local leaders. It was re-launched in July 2012 with a new framework, specific goals, guidelines for measuring progress, and the inclusion of Coun-ties.
Leaders can sign up for the program online and must commit to meeting five goals that promote healthy eating in and out of schools, and creation of play spaces.
Rachel White, a reader of the Chicago Sun-Times, commented:
“I think what gives this program its great proten-tial (sic) is that it take (sic) a holistic approach. In other words, it just doesn’t focus on school lunches, although school lunches are a huge problem.”
The National League of Cities spearheads the initiative and offers local leaders resources such as an LMCTC toolkit, monthly seminars and access to technical partners and philanthropists at national conferences. Innovation and problem solving occurs at the local level.
As Michelle Obama said:
“What we know we need to do is give parents, com-munities and families the tools and information they need to make choices that are right for them. And there’s no one size fits all solution.”
Volume 2, Issue 2, January - March, 2013
Future of Citizenship
Let’s Move! Cities, Towns and Counties
Incentivizing participationLMCTC uses elements of gamification, such as challenges, badges and leader boards, to encourage a spirit of competition and to award successful leaders with recognition.
Kelly Liyakasa, associate editor at CRM magazine, points out the benefits of gamification strategies in organizations:
“Introducing game techniques into the enterprise can motivate employees to perform specific behaviors, but it can also improve morale and excitement around tasks, projects, and even job roles.”
LMCTC’s five goals or challenges ensure that leaders are focusing their efforts in meaningful areas. Leaders share their progress on these goals regularly via an online survey. When they meet specified benchmarks, they are awarded bronze, silver or gold medals. These medals – and the absence thereof – are visible on the LMCTC website – Healthy Communities for a Healthy Future, along with details of the local leader. People can look up the progress of all participating cities, towns and counties and also see the overall medal standings.
The medals also reflect well on the cities, as the editorial team at online newspaper Record-Journal, pointed out:
“As part of Let’s Move! rewards, Meriden now has its own page on the National League of Cities website. When young families consider moving into the area and Google this city, they will come upon this site which speaks well of the community. Thus, recognitions by Let’s Move! and KaBOOM! could appeal to potential homebuyers, who bring in new business and neighborhood interaction.”
The National League of Cities has awarded 669 medals to date.
Source: healthycommunitieshealthyfuture.org
Source: peopleslab.mslgroup.com
Collaboration and Knowledge sharingElected officials collaborate with early care and education providers, and schools to identify local problems and find relevant solutions. For instance, Beaumont City in Texas is enlisting the help of athletes to encourage more students to participate in school breakfast and lunch pro-grams. As The Examiner’s Kevin King reports:
“One of the plans that the city is considering is starting a public service announcement program using local athletes and through the medium of the Lamar University communication department.”
Leaders are also encouraged to reach out to other leaders in similar neighborhoods for guidance, and to share their own learning among the LMCTC community. Leaders can use a com-parison tool on the Healthy Communities for a Healthy Future website to identify similar cities, towns and counties (based on population, race breakup, age, land and income) and compare performances. The National League of Cities also organizes blog posts, webinars and conferences to showcase success stories.
Nidhi Makhija, member of the MSLGROUP Insights Network, commented that the initiative could benefit from being more social in nature.
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Paul Wohlleben, a columnist at FedTech Mag-azine, believes that “Big Data Is a Big Deal for Government” and can help result in more effec-tive governance:
“Government can use big data to gain the same benefits as for-profit firms. Government would be improved by better understanding the discrete needs of its constituents, by improving the efficien-cies of its processes, by understanding performance and results, by preventing fraud, by preventing loss — the possibilities are endless.”
Other collaboration modelsThe Let’s Move! Cities, Towns and Counties initia-tive resembles an early-stage collaborative social innovation ecosystem. More mature innovation ecosystems, like the Ashoka Changemakers platform, facilitate online collaboration and idea sharing, and direct access to funding. Others, like Sygenta’s Thought For Food Challenge and Mahindra’s Spark the Rise use innovation challenges to attract and build a community of changemakers.
We are also seeing collaboration emerge in “de-sign-led innovation” in which people collaborate on platforms like OpenIDEO, and governments set up innovation units like Denmark’s MindLab, or work with non-profits like Code for America, to co-create new public solutions.
The grassroots factorIn addition to energizing stakeholders at the grassroots level, the LMCTC initiative also attracts plenty of local coverage – especially when medals are awarded to cities, towns and counties.
Source: eyeonannapolis.net, downtownstpete.ilovetheburg.com, columbiamissourian.com
Source: healthycommunitieshealthyfuture.org
Measuring success with dataAnother unique aspect of the LMCTC initiative is its use of data. The National League of Cities aggregates data provided by local leaders through online surveys to track progress over time and identify technical assistance opportunities.
For instance, data shared by participating leaders indicates they are unfamiliar with the USDA MyPlate nutrition guidelines – a requirement that makes up Goal II. The distribution of medals too indicates this is an area in which local leaders could use more assistance from the National League of Cities.
People’s Lab is MSLGROUP’s proprietary crowdsourcing platform and approach that helps organizations tap into people’s insights for innovation, storytelling and change.
The People’s Lab crowdsourcing platform helps organizations build and nurture public or private, web or mobile, hosted or white label communities around four pre-configured application areas: Expertise Request Network, Innovation Challenge Network, Research & Insights Network and Contest & Activation Network. Our community and gaming features encourage people to share rich content, vote/
comment on other people’s content and collaborate to find innovative solutions.
The People’s Lab crowdsourcing platform and approach forms the core of our distinctive insights and foresight approach, which consists of four elements: organic conversation analysis, MSLGROUP’s own insight communities, client-specific insights communities, and ethnographic deep dives into these communities. The People’s Insights Quarterly Magazines showcase our capability in crowdsourcing and analyzing insights from conversations and communities.
People’s Lab: Crowdsourcing Innovation & Insights
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