Photo courtesy of UN Foundation.
This weekend I had the opportunity to attend the Social Good Summit (SGS) in New York City, a gathering of some of the most active leaders in the global philanthropy and advocacy space, presented by Mashable, the United Nations Foundation, and the 92Y (with support from UNDP, the Gates Foundation, and Ericsson).
In its third year, attendees can expect to hobnob with the likes of U.S.-UN Ambassador Susan Rice, artist and UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador Forest Whitaker, U.S. Chief Technology Officer Todd Park, and author Nick Kristof. But while a packed auditorium was tweeting and typing away on their laptops, another group of folks were at a hackathon across town developing the next apps for social good, and gatherings around the world were being streamed in from Beijing, Mogadishu, and Nairobi — it was literally a global conversation.
As a former employee of the UN Foundation, it was interesting being on the outside looking in — in its inaugural year, I had been behind the lines in DC tweeting the livestream. This year I was focused on how the SGS’s themes tie into the Case Foundation’s mission — and there were a few takeaways that really resonated with me.
The Moment is Mobile
Nearly every single session on Saturday and Sunday (and as it continues today) emphasized the importance of mobile phones in the social change movement. If more than 75 percent of the world has access to a mobile phone, just think of the good we can do if we maximize its potential. More people have phones than have electricity, shoes, or toothbrushes. Larry Irving, co-founder of the Mobile Alliance for Global Good, asked everyone who had a cell phone in the room to hold them up – everyone. Then he whittled down to those of us who work for a nonprofit or organization doing good (most everyone still), and then finally, asked us to keep our hands up if we thought our organizations were making the most of mobile. Three people kept their hands up. As Larry told me and some friends afterwards, “This isn’t about apps. That’s the moment. This is bigger.” Others agreed.
Actress and women’s rights activist Maria Bello told us of women in Haiti using text messaging to support each other after being sexually assaulted, or to connect to the right services after a natural disaster. Our own Social Citizens Ambassador and CEO of Medic Mobile Josh Nesbit told us how even on his travels in rural Nepal, he had full cell service: “Problem solvers have cell phones as part of their toolkit for the first time.”
Millennials are Leaders Now
We talk of grooming youth to be leaders when they’re older, but why not now? Fourteen-year-old Adora Svitak has organized a TEDx with friends for the last three years with an emphasis on social change. Charles Ray, former U.S. ambassador to Zimbabwe, worked directly with the country’s youth through social media to have a dialogue about how they could be active citizens, and advocates for the causes they believed in. And as some of the UN Foundation campaigns like Nothing But Nets and Girl Up have shown us, youth are some of the most enthusiastic, proactive, and dedicated voices in the movement for progress on the Millennium Development Goals.
Data is Everything
It was a pleasure to see U.S. CTO Todd Park give a rousing talk on the importance of open data in government to spur innovation and to engage our citizens in solving tough problems. (Watch Case Foundation CEO Jean Case’s recent interview of Park at the White House Summit on Collaborative Innovation.) “Data is useless unless you apply it for public benefit,” Park said. “And you need entrepreneurs who know what to do with the data.” He points us to Challenge.gov, where hundreds of open data contests have led to groundbreaking solutions in federal government, and announced the Equal Futures App Challenge to use civic data to support women and girls, launching tonight.
We also heard from Rebecca Moore, a Google Earth engineer, who gave us a whirlwind tour of our world via Google Maps, and explained how indigenous communities are using technology to protect their lands and wildlife.
I would be remiss if I didn’t note that a lot of the conversations were applicable to our Be Fearless theme at the Case Foundation. As more and more people are being connected by technology, the risks grow, and transparency on social media makes it more obvious to see failure, but it also makes it easier to make big bets, to experiment, to make failure matter, to reach beyond our bubble, and to let urgency conquer fear. So many of the people on the stage have embraced the spirit of Be Fearless in their journey to do good, and we hope that you will be inspired to do the same. Keep up with the action from the Social Good Summit on Twitter following the #sgsglobal hashtag, and on their website, where you can watch the livestream and read their blog.