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A word from the authors > NESTA: The Lab
NESTA: ThE LAb COMMISSIONER To encourage greater innovation, NESTA was a founding sponsor of the Catalyst Awards, community awards for social technology, which aim to raise the profile of communications technologies and recognise the pioneers. NESTA has also helped develop the capacity to bring communities of change agents and technology developers together to accelerate new combinations of ideas through groups like Social Innovation Camp. The Lab was motivated to commission this handbook to build on the practical experience from the Catalyst Awards and Social Innovation Camp. We wanted to identify the lessons of how new technologies can be most effectively applied to deliver positive social impact and help transform the way public services work. By packaging these lessons in an inspirational and practically useful way we hope to release the untapped potential for people to use technology to tackle social and environmental challenges. This handbook aims to involve new people, help those already in this space go further and keep this potential developing into more and more practical examples that have a positive impact.
e pressure on our public services has never been greater. Without bold new approaches, our public services will be over-stretched by the short-term demands of the recession and overwhelmed by the long-term challenges of the future. NESTA created the Lab to meet this need for new ideas that work. e Lab is not a physical space or an institution, it's a series of practical projects, informed by research and delivered in partnership with those who run and use our public services. It brings together experience and ingenuity from across the public, private and third sectors, provides the flexible capital and expertise to undertake radical experiments, shares lessons about what works – and what doesn't – and creates opportunities for people to solve problems together. www.nestalab.org.uk
Follow the links online at www.socialbysocial.com/book/nesta-the-lab 233