The lean startup is the fast-growing movement in the business world that is driving unprecedented innovation and scale in startups and large organizations. Its key components include:

• radically faster feedback,

• more granular measures of effectiveness, and

• a methodology that optimizes for both impact and scale.

Its methods hold equal promise for non-profits and government, and key social sector organizations are starting to adopt the lean startup as a way to drive more change, faster. The National Science Foundation, for example, is mandating that principal investigators in the biological sciences and education research learn the method as part of all grants aimed at going to market with NSF-funded innovations. (A good overview of this movement in business is available at bit.do/leanhbr; Lean Startups for Social Change, a new book due out in early November, documents this movement in depth. Preview galleys are available online temporarily at bit.do/lean_galley)

Lean Philanthropy: A Workshop for Learning, Sharing, and Prototyping

Please join leaders from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation for a workshop aimed at exploring how to do “lean philanthropy” – that is how to create the space for, reward, and be responsive to short-cycle learning in grant-making. The workshop will be held at the Palo Alto offices of Pivotal Labs (a global lean and agile product development company) on Friday, November 20^th, 2015 from 8:30am to 3pm.

The workshop will be led by Michel Gelobter (the author of Lean Startups for Social Change) and Janice Fraser (Director of Innovation Practice at Pivotal Labs) and have three components:

1. A hands-on introduction to lean practice where you will get the chance to apply it to an issue you’re currently grappling with;

2. An in-depth exploration and of the challenges and opportunities posed by the lean startup for philanthropy, with guest “vignettes” from non-profits and government (invitees include TechSoup, Accelerate Change, the White House Digital Service, among others); and

3. A prototyping session to develop potential experiments that could raise the bar on speed, impact, scale, and learning for philanthropy and the social sector as a whole.

We encourage you to invite other key members of your team and other colleagues from within philanthropy. Please RSVP as soon as possible as space is somewhat limited. To RSVP, or if you have any questions, please contact Michel Gelobter (michel@leanchange.net).

We hope you can join us for a day of exploration, learning, and lean!