Irv Katz, President and CEO of NHSA
In a new blog post for the Huffington Post, Irv Katz questions if the notion of innovation has been trivialized. Is it something that we intentionally pursue, or is it treated as a fad; the latest go-to-conference? It’s important to remember that innovation is a means to an end, and not a solution in itself. Irv writes,
“Innovation to what end? Transformation to what end? Those questions are not that hard to answer. People in an industry and the consumers of its products or services know what needs to be improved, replaced or fixed. To pick a personal example, as the adult child of an aging parent, I am getting a pretty darned good sense of where innovation or improvements are needed in our collective approach to helping our loved ones live out their lives–from improvements, like acknowledging that seeing and hearing are so fundamental that Medicare should cover glasses and hearing aids, to innovation, like communities where older people can either live in familiar surroundings or otherwise interact with people of all generations and not just other old people.
So here is my simple suggestion…take innovation out of the realm of the trendy and superficial and consciously weave it into the fabric of all work and be smart about it, focusing on the things that need most to be changed–incrementally or dramatically, but lastingly.“
Human Services Policy Network 