Conference Proceedings Report - Final Draft - National Federation ...

After Ed Bernacki, a break was taken to absorb all the information that the participants
had received. Once the break was over Dr. John O’Brien gave his keynote address to the
conference.
Dr. John O’Brien
Where does Innovation come from?
Dr. John O’Brien learns about building more just and
inclusive communities from people with disabilities, their
families, and their allies. He uses what he learns to advise
people with disabilities and their families, advocacy groups,
service providers, and governments and to spread the news
among people interested in change by writing and through
workshops. He works in partnership with Connie Lyle
O’Brien and a group of friends from 12 countries. He is
affiliated with the Centre on Human Policy (US) and the
Marsha Forest Centre: Inclusion. Family Community
(Canada)
A common way to think about innovation is to see it as a result of a ‘push’ approach to
allocating resources: A push for products and a push for policies; A push for products
involves R&D or a lone genius. It is a model optimised for manufacture of a ready market
and an adoption of that product to the available market. A push for policies involves
representation and consultation. It involves laws, policies and rules, leading to
implementation and correction, and finally implementation. In fact mountain bikes
emerged from a group of passionate bike riders who wanted the challenge of riding in
Northern Californian mountain trails. They built clunkers for one another adapting old
bike frames experimenting with tyres and brakes. As these prototypes grew more refined
one of their numbers saw a commercial opportunity and began to manufacture them.
These qualities of mountain bikers efforts provide us with some guidance for an
important area of innovation: creating new ways to generate deep changes. Passion to
ride is what drove the mountain bikers. Their desire was for experience, not for planning
or building or manufacturing perfect bikes. They were co-produced by a loosely coupled
network of builder riders who were free and willing to try test and tell.
They put themselves at risk.
They used loose parts and had the freedom to reshape and adapt them.
They also performed rapid testing and used lots of variations which generated learning.
Innovation in generating deep change may also come from Pull: the creation of active
platforms that call together a network around an irresistible desire to create and draw
needed resources. We can learn by acting and thus build know-how and shift
expectations. We can call them a networked desire to create. It begins in desire. What do
we feel drawn to create to connect our work to our highest purpose?
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