Growing, Organically

My mother purchased this plant as a gift for the ELISE office opening in October 2007 in Philadelphia. At the time, it was so small, it barely looked appropriate on the floor, perhaps more appropriate as a desk plant. My mom actually apologized for its size upon handing it to me, but I knew it would grow.

Around that time, we had just signed Paul Polak as a client and were helping him prepare to launch Out of Poverty. The book was focused on market-based approaches and treating individuals at the bottom of the pyramid as customers rather than recipients of charitable donations. We were reading Sachs and Easterly, helping Paul shape his personal image, brand and messaging.

Now, I find myself still looking at the plant daily: it has flourished, consuming most of the floor space under the window. It reminds me of our growth as a marketing and strategic communications practice, and the increasing scale of our client network.

Our clients are focused on social innovation and entrepreneurship, and they include The Lemelson Foundation, the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Games for Health Project. Because of these related social missions, this collaborative knowledge creation generates tremendous leverage. Our choice to focus on this niche has created a valuable knowledge base and network.

We depend on deeply engaged, inspiring clients to continue to help us grow and today we are honored to announce a new client, the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE), a network of like-minded social enterprises.

Specifically, ANDE is a non-profit, non-partisan policy program of the Aspen Institute. It is a global network of organizations with a common commitment to build entrepreneurship in the developing world. Since the official launch in March 2009, ANDE has grown to include over 90 organizations, including the Citi Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Shell Foundation and the Acumen Fund.

We welcome them to ELISE and are excited to be working with this organization.

We might just buy a plant to commemorate the occasion!

And Now for Something Completely Different

Here’s something that surprises people who might think of me as more of the writerly type: I actually have a bit of a science background. As an undergraduate, I minored in psychology and filled as many requirements as I could with classes in cognitive neuroscience. I also spent a summer working in a sleep lab at the university hospital, screwing up my own circadian rhythms while monitoring the behavioral and intellectual effects of too much or too little sleep, with or without various prescription medication. As disinterested as I was in my high school science classes, in college I developed a fascination teetering on obsession concerning the science of the brain.

Maybe that’s why, when I started working at ELISE, I was so excited to have the opportunity to work with Games for Health. To be fair, GFH isn’t just focused on cognitive health—games showcased every year run the gamut from fitness oriented exergames to games that help doctors learn new surgical techniques—but as someone who has no gift for playing video games, I was most attracted to the benefits that playing these games can have on neurological development. It’s like a light went off when I was researching some of the people who would be attending that first Games for Health Conference I worked on: “Yes! I get it! Why can’t video games be used for brain development?”

A few days ago, after receiving information about GFH that included mention of an autism-focused panel at this year’s conference, a reporter wrote the ELISE team to get clarification: he knows that gaming is compelling to autism patients, especially children and teens, but how can it be beneficial? Suddenly, the cobwebs that had formed over my cog neuro studies were swept away, and I set to putting together a little page-long mini research paper on the subject. Because I am a big nerd.

The gist of my research project, which we sent back to said reporter, is this: many, but not all patients on the autism spectrum have what’s called a right-brain delay, which, among other things, makes them especially attentive to small, precise or repetitive tasks—like video games. And because these particular autistic patients naturally gravitate toward gaming, video games can be modified or developed that can actually have a therapeutic value to the patients while also appealing to them. Gaming systems like the Wii, for example, encourage movement mimicry, and use a very simple interface (with a minimum of buttons), which both makes the system easy to use and encourages the player to focus on physical tasks that require balance and motor skills. Similarly, a special game called EASe Off-Road has been developed specifically for autistic children with hypersensitivity to sound. The game employs sound-based therapy by training autistic children to develop the visual systems responsible for balance and body awareness and encourages concentration.

Perhaps my favorite example of video games helping to treat autism is Space Race, developed by researchers at the University of Missouri to help retrain the parts of the brain that improve focus and concentration using a neurofeedback system. According to a 2008 article about Space Race: “The result of the training is that pathways in the brain which may have been damaged, or just switched off from lack of use, can be repaired and reactivated”—essentially, the right side of the brain can eventually be turned on and used for cognitive processing and everyday tasks, all with the help of a relatively simple video game.

And really, how cool is that?

Learn more about video games for autism therapy, as well as games for medical education, health awareness and more at the 2010 Games for Health Conference, May 26-27 in Boston. Visit gamesforhealth.org for more information.

When Freedom Talks, People Listen

Two weeks ago, a book that could change your life was released. Sound like a hefty claim? Not according to J. Kirk Boyd, author of 2048: Humanity’s Agreement to Live Together. Kirk’s claim, precisely, is that your life and the lives of every human being on the planet will change by the year 2048.  This is the year that, according to the book, mankind will implement an International Bill of Human Rights, designed to fully realize the freedoms we are born with. And apparently, Kirk isn’t the only one who believes this is possible—far from it. Last week, 2048, Kirk’s debut book, climbed all the way to an impressive #2 on the San Francisco Chronicle’s NCIBA/IndieBound Bestseller List.

The exciting announcement comes on the heels of a weeklong tour through the Bay Area, during which Kirk conversed with attendees and sought input on the document he feels can be a reality by the year 2048, the 100^th anniversary of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a major inspiration behind the book. Through 2048, Kirk hopes to fulfill the dreams of Eleanor Roosevelt and many others who imagined a world in which human rights are globally protected.

Kirk recently returned from a mini-tour of Canada, and plans are in the works for an extensive East Coast tour in the fall. In the meantime, he encourages people to visit the website of the 2048 Project and contribute their insights and feedback on the current draft of the Bill. For Kirk, the key to successfully creating a more just society is the participation of as many people, from as many walks of life as possible.

We at ELISE extend our heartfelt congratulations to Kirk, who is changing the world one book at a time.

Games for Health: Video Games, That Is.

Here in Philadelphia, spring has sprung. The weather is warming up, and people are out and about—jogging, walking their dogs and getting some good old-fashioned exercise. But there is more than one way to get in shape these days. Forget soccer games. Try video games. Organizations like Games for Health are bridging the gap between the indoors and outdoors by applying outside activities to inside games.

Co-founded in 2004 by Ben Sawyer, the Games for Health Project brings together researchers, health professionals and game developers to share information about the impact games and game technologies can have on health, health care and policy. Supported by The Pioneer Portfolio of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Games for Health is produced by the Serious Games Initiative, an effort of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars that applies cutting-edge games and game technologies to a range of public and private policy, leadership and management issues.

Each year, the efforts of the GFH Project culminate in the Games for Health Conference, a comprehensive three-day meeting that provides attendees with the opportunity to develop new projects and improve existing efforts in the health and health care fields. Spanning topics such as exergaming/active games, health training games, disease management efforts and more, this year’s sixth annual conference will be held in Boston from May 25 to 27 and will feature an array of 40 sessions led by 60+ industry-leading speakers.

ELISE will be in attendance, and we are looking forward to getting the inside scoop on the innovations and advances made over the past year in the health gaming space. More from us as the event draws closer.

Social Media … Done Right

Image credit: Flickr user raphaelle_ridarch

Team ELISE spent five days last week in San Francisco for the NCIIA’s annual March Madness for the Mind showcase of student invention. As always, the event was a roaring success, and we met some really engaged collegiate entrepreneurs who we’re sure you’ll be hearing more from in the future.

But this year’s event still managed to be unique in many ways: it was the first time that March Madness for the Mind was held in San Francisco; the first year that an actual head-to-head element was added to the programming, in the form of an all-team video competition; and the first year that the NCIIA collaborated with Inventors Digest magazine to promote the event. In many ways, this looked like your standard media partnership: Inventors Digest featured NCIIA-supported inventors and NCIIA staffers in its pages (including a gorgeous cover story), and the NCIIA in turn made sure that Inventors Digest’s logo appeared on the March Madness for the Mind Web site and throughout the annual conference and at the public event. But the partnership took a turn into the experimental, incorporating an ambitious social media campaign surrounding the video competition.

At first, the social media integration was simple: NCIIA and Inventors Digest announced the partnership on their respective Web sites, then repeated the announcement, briefly, to their Facebook fans and Twitter followers. This enabled both organizations not only to get the word out about the video competition, but also to strengthen their connection through the use of hypertext—which is to say that every time Inventors Digest was mentioned on the NCIIA’s site, if even in passing, NCIIA provided a link back to Inventors Digest, and vice-versa. And a few weeks later, when Inventors Digest announced its own competition, to launch officially the day of March Madness for the Mind, the relationship between the two organizations was further solidified as it became the NCIIA’s turn to post about Inventors Digest’s activities.

Once the details of the partnership were solidified, ELISE created a social media release via PitchEngine that allowed us to streamline the process when we were actually doing the pitching: we could send a link to the release instead of needing to copy-paste or send an attachment; low-res photos were downloadable directly from the release’s slide show and high-res photos were linked at the bottom of the page; and compelling video could be viewed and linked to without any need to leave PitchEngine and visit YouTube. The release received several hundred views within the first days of being posted and began getting traction on its own: when doing our final round of short-lead pitching, we found that some bloggers had found the release on their own and were familiar with March Madness for the Mind before they heard from us. And at least one story about March Madness for the Mind appeared when an intrepid blogger stumbled across the release without receiving a pitch from our office at all.

The social media release was also dynamic, allowing for even the tiniest updates as they happened. So when the NCIIA/Inventors Digest video competition finally went live on the Inventors Digest Web site, we were able to seamlessly integrate the updated information into the release’s links section. We’d like to think that updating this link had at least a little something to do with the 109% Web traffic increase that Inventors Digest experienced during the run of the competition—but we’re well aware that, in reality, this highly successful component of the March Madness for the Mind social media campaign was only partly because of our stellar social media release.

Mostly, it was because the video competition went viral—and that’s the true mark of a successful social media campaign, because, as Peter Shankman will tell you, “viral” isn’t something you can force. If you have good content, internet users the whole world over will want to share it. You still need your communications team to help create this content and get it posted, but it’s up to the rest of the world to decide if it’s worth sharing.

And when they do? That’s how you know you ran your campaign right.

ELISE Heads to San Francisco for NCIIA’s March Madness for the Mind

Starting tomorrow, Team ELISE will be in San Francisco for the NCIIA’s annual March Madness for Mind, a showcase of collegiate invention and innovation held this year at the Exploratorium. During the event, Excellence and Entrepreneurship Teams (E-Teams)—collaborating groups of college students, faculty members and industry mentors who have received NCIIA grants—from all over the country will unveil their inventions to the public, many for the first time. This year, sixteen E-Teams from Brown (see above) to Stanford and all points in between will display their state-of-the-art medical, agricultural and environmental innovations during the exhibit.

The NCIIA has partnered with Inventors Digest, the nation’s longest running publication for the inventing culture, to host a video competition for participating E-Teams. Public voting ended last week, but the videos are still available on the Inventors Digest Web site. The winners of the competition will be announced at the event on Saturday March 27 after the top three videos are screened.

We’re excited to see which teams received the most votes and to get an up-close look at the work these dedicated and creative students and their professors have put in over the past year. More on our trip when we’re all back east!

Hives for Lives Competes in @15 Community Impact Challenge

When George Bernard Shaw said, “Youth is wasted on the young,” he couldn’t possibly have imagined the likes of Molly and Carly Houlalan, two teenage girls who are generating quite the buzz, literally. The Devon, Pennsylvania sisters are the masterminds behind Hives for Lives, a social enterprise that jars and sells honey and other bee products to raise money for cancer research. The girls founded Hives for Lives in 2004, in honor of their grandfather who lost a battle with esophageal cancer. Since then, they have remained dedicated to the cause and their work has paid off, as now we are happy to announce that Hives for Lives has been selected as one of fifteen finalists in the @15 Community Impact Challenge.

The national competition, sponsored by Ashoka’s Youth Venture and presented by the Best Buy Children’s Foundation, recognizes and supports youth-led organizations making a difference in their communities. The young social entrepreneur finalists were selected for their potential for community impact and long-term sustainability. Grants of up to $5,000 will be awarded to the finalists who receive the most votes on the challenges website. If it wins, Hives for Lives will use the prize money to build new hives at the Elmwood Park Zoo in Norristown, Pa., to help grow their business and educate children about bees.

To date, Molly, Carly and their “helper bees”—friends and classmates at their school—have donated over $160,000 to cancer research through their Local Honey Local Money program. Their honey is now carried in Whole Foods throughout the country, and has been sold in more than 30 states, England and Puerto Rico. Hives for Lives’ profits have gone to the Penn Abramson Cancer Center, the Fox Chase Center, Stanford Hospital and the Susan G. Komen for a Cure Foundation.

Voting for the competition will be open through April 2. To view Hives for Lives’ video profile or to vote, please visit the @15 Web site. Best of luck to Molly, Carly and the rest of the Hives for Lives team! You’ve got the ELISE vote locked down.

New Client, Health & Development International, Engages ELISE in Women’s Health Event at Carter Center

At ELISE, we make it our business to stay on top of what is happening in the world. Whether it is local Philadelphia news or a larger, global issue, we feel it is important to be aware and engaged. Perhaps because we are currently an all female outfit, we are particularly attuned to issues that affect the lives of women, worldwide.

For this reason among others, we are very pleased to be collaborating on an event with Health & Development International (HDI) at The Carter Center.

HDI will host its second global meeting on the prevention of obstetric fistula, a problem that plagues millions of women in developing countries. The event is taking place on March 9 & 10 at the Carter Center in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1982 by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, The Carter Center is committed to advancing human rights and creating a world in which every man, woman and child has the opportunity to live peacefully and enjoy good health.

HDI’s mission is to advance global public health and human dignity, particularly the health and socio-economic situation of under-served populations, which are especially vulnerable to and constrained by preventable, degrading disease.

In particular, HDI is devoted to the prevention of obstetric fistula, a humiliating, yet easily preventable complication of childbirth, that now exists almost only in the poorest developing countries.  HDI started the world’s first community-based rapid obstetric fistula prevention program in Bankilare, Niger. As a result, new obstetric fistula cases are down markedly in the project area, and deaths from obstructed labor are down 100 percent.  The once-silenced and shamed condition is now being addressed on the global stage. In his columns, as well as his new book, Half the Sky, Nicholas Kristof spotlights the unnecessary suffering of these women and advocates for initiatives to fund medical facilities and provide care so these women may be cured.

ELISE is honored to support the efforts of organizations that address such critical needs as the right to good health—needs that go un-met for far too many. Thanks to organizations such as HDI and other like-minded groups wrestling with how best to scale up their efforts, this is changing.

ELISE Welcomes New Client, SNV Netherlands Development Organization

The recent earthquake in Haiti directed the world’s attention to the needs and suffering of a country that has long experienced dire poverty. Fortunately, there are organizations on the ground in Haiti and elsewhere that work daily to solve the world’s most pressing problems. At ELISE, we support clients who do just that. Through social innovation, education and entrepreneurship, our clients make the world a better place.

Today we continue that theme as we welcome the newest member of the ELISE family—SNV Netherlands Development Organization, an international development organization of Dutch origin currently at work in 32 countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Balkans.

SNV works to implement local solutions to social and economic development challenges by supporting national and local actors within government, civil and private sectors. By providing support for local organizations, SNV sets the framework for the poor to strengthen their capacities and bring themselves out of poverty.

Its strategy is to alleviate poverty by focusing on increasing people’s income and employment opportunities in specific productive sectors, as well as improving access to basic services including water and sanitation, education and renewable energy. Above all, SNV is dedicated to a society in which all people enjoy freedom to pursue their own sustainable development.

Stay tuned to our blog for more information and updates on SNV. We are very excited to be working with an organization that shares our commitment to innovation and positive change.

Where in the World is … ELISE communications?

Happy New Year! We hope all of you are as excited for 2010 as we are here at ELISE. This is proving to be a fantastic year, chock-full of many new events and experiences. Over the next few months ELISE will be on the go, East Coast to West Coast and everywhere in between.

Here is just a sampling of some of our exciting work to come:

February 11-13, 2010: Tech4Society, an Ashoka-Lemelson celebration, will be held in Hyderabad, India. Tech4Society is a three-day conference that is expected to draw over 250 social entrepreneurs, innovators, business leaders and movers and shakers who will explore how technology can drive social change.

March 5, 2010: Opening of the Marvels and Ciphers exhibit at the museum at the Chemical Heritage Foundation in Old City, Philadelphia. The world premiere exhibition examines the dichotomy that exists between scientist and citizen: the first group trying to understand the universe, and the second trying to understand the scientist.

March 8, 2010: Richard Holmes will be hosting a lecture and reading at CHF. Holmes is a biographer, whose latest book, The Age of Wonder (2008), was recently named the best nonfiction book of 2009 by TIME.  The Age of Wonder focuses on the life and work of the Romantic-age scientists who laid the foundation for modern science.

March 25-27, 2010: NCIIA’s annual March Madness for the Mind 2010 will be held at the Exploratorium in San Francisco, California. The event showcases the nation’s top “E-Teams”—collaborating groups of college students, faculty and industry mentors who have received NCIIA grants—unveiling their inventions to the public, many for the first time.

Week of April 12, 2010: Launch of Kirk Boyd’s book, 2048: Humanity’s Agreement to Live Together, in San Francisco, California. The University of California, Berkeley Law Professor’s book focuses on an enforceable international agreement that will create a social order based upon human rights.

We are looking forward to all that 2010 has to offer.  Let us know if we will see you at any of these events and be sure to visit us on this blog and our Facebook and Twitter pages for updates.