Inspecting the Innovation Narrative: where it’s been, where it’s headed

As a popular buzzword, innovation has accumulated serious mileage over the years. It has made its way out of the garages of Silicon Valley and into the boardrooms of nearly every modern employment sector (industry, government, academics), and even into our everyday conversations. Interestingly, the word is also accompanied by a lack of consensus on its meaning. One simple definition of innovation is: “the introduction of something new.” However, if we examine a few examples of how the word is being employed, it becomes clear this is not the operational definition...[continue reading]

Everybody's Gotta Eat, Right?

"Unlike some similar organizations, which deliver meals mainly for the sake of ease and convenience, Community Servings is anchored by its belief that food is medicine, and that eating the right things can make an impact on treatment."

If it's helpful to think of food as medicine, then why not throw water and air into the mix too? I mean, we need them to live, right?

Is our society so healthcare-inclined that we can't think of life's essentials other than in medical terms? Air is air, water is water, food is food - they're all made up of atoms. We need these things to live regardless of if we're sick. Medicine has its proper place.

So it makes total sense then that an organization like Community Servings exists (at least in America where publicly funded social services are all but forgotten). They're great - and I recommend to anyone interested, read the article, volunteer your free time. And think about how we can bolster our health system to make being healthy easy!

Re: "Community Servings Delivers Medically Tailored Meals to Chronically Ill Patients"- J. Ducharme, Boston Magazine Blog, 09/10/15

Title inspired by "The Food" by Common featuring Kanye West on the Dave Chappelle Show (2005).

Climbing Blind

Meritocracy is a beautiful idea, but we have to own up to the reality of the situation. People who are cash poor, can't take equity over eating this week. People who give birth (half of the world is capable of this, you know), shouldn't have to opt out of caring for themselves and their offspring in order to climb the professional ladder - though they increasingly do - Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer's recent announcement that she would all but forego taking maternity leave while carrying twins presents itself as the latest symptom of this backwards culture's ailments. And yet we wonder, why are our boardrooms filled with white men? Same goes for tech start-ups...where is the diversity!? Come on now, are we really surprised?

Re: "Inclusion in Tech Entrepreneurship: Meritocracy or Myth?" - J. Siefert Rose, Xconomy, 09/08/15

Refreshing Perspective

"Religious freedom 'does not include liberty to expose the community or the child to communicable disease' (Prince v. Massachusetts, 1944)."

Let us all rejoice! Amen!

Re: "Shifting Vaccination Politics - The End of Personal-Belief Exemptions in California", M.M. Mello, JD, PhD, D.M. Studdert, LLB, ScD, & W.E. Parmet, JD, New England Journal of Medicine, 373:785-787, 08/27/15

Side-Stepping the Smoke and Mirrors

Sign the petition please!

"Tell U.S. Chamber of Commerce: Stop Fighting Anti-Smoking Measures"

"As reported in a major exposé by The New York Times (06/30/15), the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has taken a systematic approach to enriching the world's biggest tobacco companies by fighting life-saving public health policies worldwide. It’s shameful that the face of American business is defending a product projected to kill 1 billion people this century. And we won't stand for it."

Precisely

“Without minimizing the possible gains to clinical care from greater realization of precision medicine’s promise, we worry that an unstinting focus on precision medicine by trusted spokespeople for health is a mistake — and a distraction from the goal of producing a healthier population.” - Dean of Boston University School of Public Health and Professor of Sociomedical Sciences at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health

Re: "Public Health in the Precision-Medicine Era", R. Bayer, PhD & S. Galea, MD, DrPH, New England Journal of Medicine, 373:499-501, 08/06/15

Inside Amazon: All Signs Point to Cult

Learning about the Amazon workplace culture makes me sick to my stomach...

If this isn't a cult, I don't know what is. I feel sorry for these people, and for the many people whose employers emulate this style of dehumanizing their staff.

"[Employees] endure the hardships for the cause of delivering swim goggles and rolls of Scotch tape to customers just a little quicker." Sounds like it's totally worth it...

Re: "Inside Amazon: Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising Workplace", J. Kantor & D. Streitfeld, The New York Times, 08/15/15