Uncommon sense: the role of risk-taking in innovation

 Heather Sim, the founder and chief executive of Space Unlimited, will be giving a lunchtime seminar on the topic of risk-taking and innovation.

Space Unlimited is a pioneering social enterprise and recent addition to the Young Foundation family as a new member of the Learning Launchpad portfolio.

Space Unlimited gives young people and businesses an unusual experience of creativity and innovation. Teenage pupils take on the role of consultants, applying their skills and ideas to pressing issues facing real clients. Risk and uncertainty are explicit ingredients in the Space Unlimited methodology.

Heather will be reflecting on the insights and surprises from her journey so far and sharing her views about why the skills for innovation are so relevant today, which skills are important and yet less developed, about the experiences that help develop these skills and about the varied ways in which young people, educators and business-people tend to approach uncertainty.

Heather created Space Unlimited after working for nearly 20 years in economic development. During that time she became increasingly interested in learning about the conditions that encourage innovation, and, especially, what holds us back when human beings are, by nature, creative. She has led the company since it was set up in September 2006, as a spin out from Scottish Enterprise, the lead economic development agency for Scotland.

www.spaceunlimited.org

 Lunchtime seminars, held at the Young Foundation's Bethnal Green offices, are open to the public and free of charge. If you would like to attend, please contact Sarah Hewes.