Changing the Way the VA Innovates

I have had the great pleasure of the last two years to be a part of a team that is working to support the execution of innovation projects for the VA Center for Innovation. The VA Center for Innovation “identifies, tests, and evaluates new approaches to meet the current and future needs of Veterans through innovations rooted in data, design-thinking, and agile development.”

This summer this program is taking a big step out into the public eye as it kicks of the VA Innovation Creation Series (May 15th to July 29th 2015). The VA Innovation Creation Series powered by the VA Center for Innovation aims to facilitate development of personalized technologies to improve care and quality of life for Veterans.

The launch of the Innovation Creation Series will take place at the Palo Alto VA Medical Center this Friday (May 15th). A curated list of challenge areas facing veterans will be posted from May to July on http://www.innovation.va.gov/challenge/ – powered by Innocentive and GrabCad, which are both online open innovation challenge sites.

Designers, engineers, and all other solvers can contribute initial design solutions to the posted challenges. The VA Innovation Creation Series will culminate in a 2-day “make-a-thon” event at the Richmond VA Medical Center where the online designs will be built and tested to showcase how they meet the needs of Veterans and servicemembers.

If you’d like to participate, get more information or learn more about this project please sign up for their mailing list and they will reach out to you with more information.