Social innovation's secret to success is the "bird in the hand" method of progress, in my opinion. For that reason, I chose this secret from the list as the most important:
What you have matters more than what you lack (If you’ve got a
bicycle, consider what you can
build based on that, rather than worrying about not having a car, a truck, a metal shop.
The old saying that "a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" reminds social innovators that too often what we need is right under our noses.
While we take inventory of what we feel we don't have, we miss opportunities to push beyond our limits with what we do have. Creative people see old stuff in new light; they look at two unrelated concepts and relate them; they ask what if I flipped it over, turned it upside down, or inside out or...they then apply those ideas to achieve innovation. Creative people don't like "no;" they like control over tasks and generally don't quit.
This reminds me of and article I read recently about an MIT student who invented a wound cleansing tool that costs under $5, simple and is made of plastic. It is being rushed to Haiti, where the current, heavier $100 tool is awkward and unavailable.
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