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Friday, November 29, 2013
[Minnesota Rising Dispatch] November 2013
Thursday, November 28, 2013
Words of appreciation
Thank you, Minnesota Rising network, for your inspired and imaginative commitment to Minnesota and our shared future. We couldn't ask for better partners in this work. Happy Thanksgiving!
“Our lives are filled with meeting wonderful people. Make sure those that have become a part of your life hear your words of appreciation.”
-Ace Antonio Hall
Wednesday, November 27, 2013
2013 Un/Conference Content Curation | Leading through New Models of Social Change: A Look at Social Entrepreneurship and Cooperatives
The Minnesota Rising 2013 Un/Conference: Cultivating Capacity for Collective Leadership was held on Saturday, November 16, 2013 from 10:00AM – 4:30PM at DLR Group offices in Minneapolis, MN. Hosted by and for emerging leaders, the Un/Conference engaged emerging leaders across Minnesota in an energizing day of innovative learning and dialogue, skill-building, and network-building with their peers!
Photos by: Jon Reynolds Photography | jtreynolds.com
One of the breakout sessions entitled “Leading through New Models of Social Change: A Look at Social Entrepreneurship and Cooperatives” explored the challenges of our current economy which encourages cost externalization to the detriment of our environment, incentivizes the exploitation of vulnerable workers, and imparts legal requirements for publicly owned corporations to maximize profits to shareholders.
Minnesota Rising is pleased to curate feature the content of our insightful and engaging breakout session speakers and presenters. In our Content Curation series, we highlight the ideas and materials of our 2013 Un/Conference presenters!
Photos by: Jon Reynolds Photography | jtreynolds.com
Young professionals in Minnesota are getting behind the
values of social entrepreneurship: investment in long-term social,
environmental, and fiscal value while working in a career with meaning. On November 14th the Social Enterprise
Alliance co-sponsored the Minnesota Rising Un/Conference with emerging leaders
filling up the DLR Group space in downtown Minneapolis to discuss Cultivating
Capacity for Collective Leadership.
Photos by: Jon Reynolds Photography | jtreynolds.com
One of the breakout sessions entitled “Leading through New Models of Social Change: A Look at Social Entrepreneurship and Cooperatives” explored the challenges of our current economy which encourages cost externalization to the detriment of our environment, incentivizes the exploitation of vulnerable workers, and imparts legal requirements for publicly owned corporations to maximize profits to shareholders.
The session focused on social entrepreneurship as an
enterprise level (rather than individual or systems-level) tool to inspire our
current market system. Leaders that create social enterprises can create
compelling success stories to ultimately inspire market systems (reallocation
of capital, engagement with new vendors, commitment to sustainable practices
etc.). Cooperatives were highlighted as a specific, well-developed business
model that employs social enterprise principles.
Minnesota emerging leaders explored the values
and principles of the cooperative business model and generated a robust
list of local cooperative examples. Cooperatives are designed for democratic
leadership, an excellent model for the Unconference's 2013 theme of collective
leadership.
It turns out the attendees were quite knowledgeable about
social enterprise and cooperatives! Jenny and Emily would like to ramp up the
conversation to the next level: participants interested in getting engaged with
local programming with the Social Enterprise Alliance can contact Jenny Kramm
(Co-Committee chair of the Social Enterprise Alliance and Grants Associate at
the Lutheran Community Foundation) at Jennifer.kramm@gmail.com,
and folks wanting to advance the cooperative movement should reach out to Emily
M. Lippold Cheney (Cooperative Organizer) at e.m.lippold.cheney@gmail.com.
Photos by: Jon Reynolds Photography | jtreynolds.com
Tuesday, November 26, 2013
Network Partner Notes 2013: Alzheimer's Association Young Champions
The Minnesota Rising 2013 Un/Conference: Cultivating Capacity for Collective Leadership was held on Saturday, November 16, 2013 from 10:00AM – 4:30PM at DLR Group offices in Minneapolis, MN. Hosted by and for emerging leaders, the Un/Conference engaged emerging leaders across Minnesota in an energizing day of innovative learning and dialogue, skill-building, and network-building with their peers!
The Alzheimer's Association Young Champions is a diverse group of emerging leaders who are dedicated to changing the face of Alzheimer's disease and related dementias by engaging our peers and raising awareness across generations.
The Young Champions educate future generations about Alzheimer's and related dementias, raise funds to provide help and hope to those affected, and advocate for change at the state and federal levels.
This year the Young Champions had its inaugural signature fundraising event called Blondes vs. Brunettes® The Alzheimer's Association Young Champions host other special events, educational, advocacy and volunteer opportunities throughout the year that help promote the awareness of Alzheimer's disease and start changing the face of Alzheimer's. Like us on Facebook to learn more. https://www.facebook.com/ALZyoungchampions
Minnesota Rising is pleased to collaborate with Network Partners, emerging leader group organizations, to help cross-promote our parallel efforts to provide leadership development and community-building. In our Network Partner Notes, we highlight our 2013 Un/Conference Network Partners and their events in their own words!
The Alzheimer's Association Young Champions is a diverse group of emerging leaders who are dedicated to changing the face of Alzheimer's disease and related dementias by engaging our peers and raising awareness across generations.
The Young Champions educate future generations about Alzheimer's and related dementias, raise funds to provide help and hope to those affected, and advocate for change at the state and federal levels.
This year the Young Champions had its inaugural signature fundraising event called Blondes vs. Brunettes® The Alzheimer's Association Young Champions host other special events, educational, advocacy and volunteer opportunities throughout the year that help promote the awareness of Alzheimer's disease and start changing the face of Alzheimer's. Like us on Facebook to learn more. https://www.facebook.com/ALZyoungchampions
Monday, November 25, 2013
Solitude
"Solitude does not necessarily mean living apart from others; rather, it means never living apart from one's self."
-Parker Palmer
Friday, November 22, 2013
[Blog Buddies] Collaborators Across Borders
Many of you know I had the incredible fortune of serving as a 2013 American Marshall Memorial Fellow. This honor afforded me 24 days of travel in October across 5 European countries and myriad opportunities to understand how the United States and Europe compare and more importantly, how we relate. Read on for my final analysis of how we can strengthen transatlantic cooperation!
Collaborators Across Borders
Posted on 20 November 2013.
On day four of the U.S. government shutdown, I and fourteen other American fellows flew across the Atlantic Ocean and began our Marshall Memorial Fellowship program. While questions related to the cause for the shutdown and analysis about its global impact varied, it was clear to the Europeans we met with during our travels that the shutdown was a poignant example of the inability of United States political leaders to compromise and develop solutions.
With the question of working across parties at the back of my mind, I noted three particular examples of enduring partnership and innovative collaborations based in Europe that I’m hopeful we might take a lesson from in the United States:
The Schengen Area. Despite having traveled to Belgium, Sweden, Portugal, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Germany during my fellowship, thanks to the Schengen Area, my passport only bears stamps for the first and latter two countries. The Schengen Area is comprised of 26 European countries that have eliminated passport and immigration controls at their common borders. It effectively functions as a single country for international travel purposes, with a common visa policy. Whereas citizens of Schengen member nations previously had to go through passport control and other customs protocols when moving across borders equivalent to traveling across three or four U.S. states, they can now travel freely throughout the Schengen zone, an area of 4,312,099 square kilometers. Covering a population of over 400 million people, the Schengen agreement reduces costs of internal border control with other Schengen members and promotes ease of movement, tourism, business, and cross-cultural exchange. This international travel policy provides economic and social benefits for all member nations and represents impressive political cooperation between diverse nations.
NATO. At the Brussels headquarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), we were briefed on the history of this political alliance. NATO’s essential purpose continues to be to safeguard the freedom and security of its members through political and military means. While its military origins were borne out of events of the Cold War, its work today on behalf of its 28 member countries (including the U.S.) remains highly relevant as contemporary global threats of terrorism, cyber security, and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) loom large. A “NATO decision” is the expression of the collective will of all 28 member countries since all decisions are taken by consensus. Our NATO hosts remarked upon this unique aspect of decision-making and suggested that the member representatives’ ability to come to consensus is strengthened because they all work together in the same building. This allows them to take lunch together, drop into each other’s offices when they have a question or to exchange information, and to know each other as individuals as well as professional colleagues. Being available and spending time together in this way allows them to develop relationships that facilitate the difficult conversations and decisions they face. This transatlantic entity improves the security of and deepens the political partnership of member countries.
Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown. While in Portugal, we visited the Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown to understand better their unique mission and competencies. Founded by a single wealthy benefactor whose will indicated only that the foundation should improve health, the leadership has established specialties in the area of oncology and cancer treatment as well as neuroscience. While touring the beautiful facility, which melded aesthetic beauty with world-class medical technology, we spoke with a world-renowned brain surgeon. His insightful words demonstrated passion for science and the human brain, but also for the way in which working together could enable more discovery. He showed us their open lab, where researchers and investigators share instruments and materials across projects as opposed to each lab maintaining their own. In this way, they encourage working together in a shared space, being available to one another and what each team member wants to learn about and improve at, and collectively deepening the field of research. He remarked that it was good to learn about the brain but asserted that if they could also develop a process to improve the way in which brain research is done, that would be even better. This perspective points to how internal collaboration in a physical workspace can set a tone for improving health and vitality across the globe.
Returning home to a Congress that is back on the job and will continue to struggle with the debt ceiling, the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, and numerous other national challenges, I’m hopeful that these powerful European examples of partnership and collaboration can serve as inspiration to our communities and our community leaders that by working together – across aisles, across viewpoints, and across borders – we can achieve more. It doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure that out.
Diane Tran, Project Manager at Grassroots Solutions, is a Fall 2013 American Marshall Memorial Fellow.
Thursday, November 21, 2013
2013 Un/Conference Sponsor Spotlight: Niche Solutions
The Minnesota Rising 2013 Un/Conference: Cultivating Capacity for Collective Leadership was held on Saturday, November 16, 2013 from 10:00AM – 4:30PM at DLR Group offices in Minneapolis, MN. Hosted by and for emerging leaders, the Un/Conference engaged emerging leaders across Minnesota in an energizing day of innovative learning and dialogue, skill-building, and network-building with their peers!
Minnesota Rising is thankful for our amazing sponsors, without whose support we could not offer sliding-scale admission fees and stellar Un/Conference programming. Below, find a recent announcement from one of our fantastic supporters, Niche Solutions, about the last in their powerful series of Network Buzz events. We look forward to the incredible projects you come up with next, Jean!
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Wednesday, November 20, 2013
2013 Un/Conference Sponsor Spotlight: Wilder Foundation
The Minnesota Rising 2013 Un/Conference: Cultivating Capacity for Collective Leadership was held on Saturday, November 16, 2013 from 10:00AM – 4:30PM at DLR Group offices in Minneapolis, MN. Hosted by and for emerging leaders, the Un/Conference engaged emerging leaders across Minnesota in an energizing day of innovative learning and dialogue, skill-building, and network-building with their peers!
Minnesota Rising is thankful for our amazing sponsors, without whose support we could not offer sliding-scale admission fees and stellar Un/Conference programming. Below, find a recent blog post from one of our fantastic supporters, the Wilder Foundation, about their amazing work to lift up new leadership!
Groundswell…upsurge…rise. These words all evoke very active images of what I see happening around our shared community - especially as it relates to collaborative leadership. These descriptors also outline a strategy continuum that should move us from thinking to action to lifting up all voices and people in our community!
There are a number of challenges we face in our community…challenges that require collaboration among a diverse cross section of leaders across communities. Whether it is opportunity gaps, or homelessness, or affordable housing, or advancing social and economic opportunities for our most underserved and underrepresented communities, we achieve success when we've come together to share resources and leverage wisdom to develop solutions. Cultivating leadership from a variety of experiences – and diverse faces – is critical to effective collaboration, allowing for greater innovation. We see this groundswell turning to a wave as Millennials continue to enter the workforce with passion, energy and wisdom that will serve the community in the next 30+ years. I believe it is critical to recognize not only the collaborative space that we need to create in order to effectively engage with one another, but also the need to be expansive in our thinking and efforts related to who we bring into that space.
I see these things occurring in places like the Minnesota Rising 2013 Un/Conference which is embracing not only new ideas but new ways of imagining how we share them. I see it in the work of Nexus Community Partners in their efforts to prepare and place people from underrepresented communities at some of the decision making tables of the systems that serve our community through the Boards and Commissions Leadership Institute. I see it in the innovation of the Bush Foundation's Philanthropy Fellows program. I see it in the work the Wilder Foundation is doing on many fronts. Internally, there's a focus on organizational leadership development. Externally, service to community through programs such as the Neighborhood Leadership Program strengthens and connects leaders across communities.
Are there more examples? No question!
Are they a part of the solutions to challenges we face as a community? No doubt!
Will we find ways to build effective coalitions, continue cultivating leaders in our community and collaborate for better outcomes for our shared community? We better!
Damon Shoholm is Senior Program Manager of Wilder Center for Communities’ Neighborhood Leadership Programs. Follow him on Twitter @DamonShoholm
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Tuesday, November 19, 2013
2013 Un/Conference Breakout Blog: Reflections from the Generation Now Leadership Visit (Part 2)
The Minnesota Rising 2013 Un/Conference: Cultivating Capacity for Collective Leadership was held on Saturday, November 16, 2013 from 10:00AM – 4:30PM at DLR Group offices in Minneapolis, MN. Hosted by and for emerging leaders, the Un/Conference engaged emerging leaders across Minnesota in an energizing day of innovative learning and dialogue, skill-building, and network-building with their peers!
Thursday, October 31, 2013 at 8:33AM
Minnesota Rising is grateful to our amazing breakout session speakers, whose experiences and insights helped provide amazing Un/Conference programming. Below, find a recent blog from one of our session speakers, Amanda Varley, regarding the Generation Now Leadership Visit and her impressions on a Minneapolis-St. Paul vision!
Minneapolis-Saint Paul vision and the role of young professional groups: Reflections from the Generation Now Leadership Visit (Part 2)
Thursday, October 31, 2013 at 8:33AM
by Amanda Varley Follow me on Twitter: @amandavarley
What does it look like when tens of thousands of young professionals mobilize around a city’s common vision? Just look at Milwaukee.
A few weeks ago I wrote about the value of cross sector, cross industry networking as a part of the Generation Now Leadership Visit. The trip brought over 50 emerging and current leaders from across sectors and industries to Milwaukee for a three-day networking trip.
An epiphany for many of the delegates was Milwaukee’s united front in communicating and exercising a common vision to recruit and retain talent. A colleague said it was like Milwaukee’s mayor looked at the agenda and then went around and whispered to each of the speakers, “here are the talking points on Milwaukee.”
Milwaukee was in tough economic shape and then the recession hit. Community members mobilized to avoid turning into a Detroit. A catalyst for collaborative efforts is the Greater Milwaukee Committee, a long established cross-sector, cross-industry organization with the mission to “make Greater Milwaukee the best place to live, learn, work and play.” The city is working to change from the poorly viewed Rust Belt to the reinvented Fresh Coast by promoting opportunities in industry, arts and culture, green communities and beer.
Most of us aren’t referring to a Fresh Coast when we think of Milwaukee, but messaging is consistent and the city is successfully working to attract new talent. Recruitment efforts discussed via Greater Milwaukee Committee include Teachtown to creatively attract and retain teaching talent and an annual 10-day Flying Car event attracting 1,000s of emerging and established leaders to highlight innovation in Milwaukee through a variety of events and competitions.
Minneapolis-Saint Paul is not in economic turmoil, but we do have an identity crisis. Delegates asked our counterparts in Milwaukee to tell us about the Twin Cities and they skeptically talked about biking, music and breweries in Minneapolis and didn’t mention Saint Paul. MSP must be mindful of its perception and leverage diverse assets in order to successfully attract and retain new talent.
One solution to setting forth a positive image of MSP outside of Minnesota is through collaboration among the many, many young professional groups - each its own cylinder of excellence. Milwaukee does this well through Newaukee which has 40,000 young professional members and counting.
Newaukee’s philosophy is that if the organization provides a venue to promote Milwaukee and members share their experience on social media and by word of mouth, they export the city’s identity as well as attract and retain talent. To do this, the majority of the organization’s events promote community, cause and collaboration. The organization prioritizes meeting in communities that could use more exposure (think the Green Line), promote a cause and collaborate across sector and industry.
Newaukee’s events are also creative. Our tour with Newaukee included riding around on a school bus with beer, visiting an underwear bike rally and seeing the sun set over the city from a small state park with a family of fox on Lake Michigan (it is a miracle everyone returned to MSP!).
Newaukee is only four years old and wildly successful. MSP could benefit by having a united front in communicating and exercising a common vision. As young professionals we can work together to shape and leverage that vision. One venue is through Minnesota Rising, “a network of emerging leaders in Minnesota. Minnesota Rising works to build relationships, trust, and a shared vision for Minnesota, and focuses on developing the collective capacity of this generation for impacting Minnesota’s future.”
To be a part of young professional cross-collaboration, consider registering for Minnesota Rising’s Un/Conference: Cultivating Capacity for Collective Leadership on November 16th where YNPN-TC is a Network Partner. If you do, join an interactive breakout session facilitated by Generation Now Leadership Visit delegates to help transfer lessons learned from the trip to actionable items in MSP. Together, across sectors, industries and young professional groups, we will build upon and promote a strong MSP.
How can we as young professionals work together across our various roles to promote MSP?
GNLV would not have been possible without the generous support of the Bush Foundation, Knight Foundation, Carlson, Comcast, Greater MSP, Saint Paul Port Authority, US Bank, Urban Land Institute, Minneapolis Chamber of Commerce, Saint Paul Chamber of Commerce and MinnPost. Thank you!
Monday, November 18, 2013
The beginning
"There will come a time when you believe everything is finished. That will be the beginning."
-Louis L'Amour
Friday, November 15, 2013
You're Invited: Back to the Future with YNPN-TC
The Minnesota Rising 2013 Un/Conference: Cultivating Capacity for Collective Leadership will be held on Saturday, November 16, 2013 from 10:00AM – 4:30PM at DLR Group offices in Minneapolis, MN. Hosted by and for emerging leaders, the Un/Conference will engage emerging leaders across Minnesota in an energizing day of innovative learning and dialogue, skill-building, and network-building with their peers!
Minnesota Rising is pleased to collaborate with Network Partners, emerging leader group organizations, to help cross-promote our parallel efforts to provide leadership development and community-building. In our Network Partner Notes, we prompt and highlight our 2013 Un/Conference Network Partners in their own words! Below we highlight an exciting upcoming event of the Young Nonprofit Professionals Network - Twin Cities!
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