Our Impact Studio hosted a workshop and expo on the subject of “Creating Equitable Enterprises in Detroit.” Led by Cat Johnson and Jerry Davis, the event began with a hands-on design exercise for researching customer needs, defining opportunities, brainstorming solutions, prototyping a business model, and testing its feasibility. Then expert overviews of new business opportunities in Detroit were provided, followed by a resource fair to help with the startup process.

In a session run by Keesa V Johnson (MDes), students learned how to use prototyping as a tool to generate ideas, validate concepts, or explore technologies using Food Futuring to cultivate imagination. They came to see that in our complex world, there is a need to develop and test ideas without causing harm to others, by using an equity lens.

What do a world-famous jazz musician and a design jam have in common?  When it comes to +Impact Studio techniques, far more than you might imagine! During the middle of the day, the University Musical Society and the Ross School of Business +Impact Studio invited Wynton Marsalis to join a design jam on innovative uses of new tools and design methods to generate new formats and equitable access to the arts. The event was planned to coincide with a weeklong UMS residency with Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, and was sponsored by the William Davidson Foundation Director Discretionary Philanthropic Fund of the United Jewish Foundation.

See the full results of this event on this special website >

In one of the final public Ross events before its closure to the coronavirus pandemic, the Impact Studio brought together faculty director Jeffrey Sanchez-Burks and Marcus Collins for a lively discussion about the ironically named “Cultural Contagion” that forms the basis of Collins latest research.  The event took place at Ross School of Business on Wednesday, March 12th from 5-7 pm, and was live streamed.

Why do some things catch on and others don’t? How do ideas get adopted and become a part of culture? The interactive conversation focused on how brands propagate and become ingrained within cultures. He shared insight on how we can use these same levers to influence people to do good and have a positive impact on society.

Mr. Collins is parttime U-M LEO professor in Marketing and Chief Consumer Connections Officer at Doner. Previously, he led the Social Engagement practice across Steve Stoute’s New York advertising agency, Translation. There, Marcus leveraged the psychological motivators that drive what we do, say, and share to create contagious marketing programs that extend across both the online and offline world of ‘social.’

Impact Studio faculty director Jeffrey Sanchez-Burks was on hand to engage Adrienne Harris in a lively discussion about her work in governmental and corporate strategy around financial inclusion and fintech availability to the underserved. Ms. Harris is a U-M Ford School Professor and Gates Foundation Senior Research Fellow, and also advises fintech companies, incumbent financial institutions, and large venture capital firms.  Sanchez-Burks and Harris were joined by student Gabrielle Alves, VP of Diversity and Inclusition for the Ross MBA Finance Club.

During the presentation, Ms. Harris described fintech and how it is different from simply “finance with computers.”  She clarified the challenges of the financially underserved and considered ways to bring financial inclusion to them. Given her experience working in the Obama administration and with various financial companies, her breadth of vision included levers to nudge policymakers, influencers, and government in the work of alleviating mistrust. 

Harris said, “(Finance) is emotional, it’s personal, it’s stressful, it’s all of these things and you’re basically expected to just hand it over, whether it’s the money itself or it’s our login,” Harris said. “When fintech first came along they were like, ‘We’re not the big financial institutions.’ … But that also used to be the case, sort of, with Google and Facebook, so we’ll see how this changes. I think we start off feeling trustworthy and become less so over time.” She concluded with advise to future graduates from law school or business school.