In today’s world — where divisiveness is at an all-time high and the social gap continues to widen — is it still possible to become a change agent and improve people’s lives? Absolutely, says Beth Simone Noveck, Professor at Northeastern University and Director of the Governance Lab. In this riveting talk, Noveck shares the 7 skills and methods you need to help make significant public change. When used together, along with the newest advancements in technology and working with those who you are trying to help, you can say goodbye to cumbersome bureaucracy and policies, and welcome a more-nimble way to take public-interest projects from ideas to implementation.

With the introduction of more intelligent machines into the workplace, economic output could double every three months, say some economists: we will all come to do more meaningful work and Alexa, Siri and Watson will do the rest! Yet by other accounts, technology will render almost half of all jobs in the U.S. obsolete by 2030: we will lose our jobs to robots and get paid less as automation depresses wages. No one really knows the future but Beth Noveck’s talk will help you get smarter about how technologies such as AI, automation, and collective intelligence will change occupations, prices, productivity levels, and participation in the new economy. She explores who will move forward thanks to technological progress and who will be left behind and the broader political and social trends compounding the dangers of inequality. Noveck will offer answers to how we can prepare for the challenges of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Drawing on developments from around the world, she will lay out creative approaches to using data and technology to deepen our understanding, develop effective new strategies for learning and training by individuals, companies and universities. She will illuminate the best of cutting-edge AI and automation policies and government responses designed to spur innovation while protecting workers. In addition to recommendations around the need for reforming universities, investing in training programs, and safeguarding informational transparency, she will, above all, argue that we need to reinvent how we regulate new technologies creating new forms of optimal decision-making that are agile, data-driven and participatory. She will inspire you to start making changes for yourselves and your companies in the present to prepare yourself for the future of work.

No previous generation has had the tackle the complex challenges society will confront in the coming decades, from combatting terrorism to safeguarding the future of the planet. To succeed, we have to run our institutions differently. Getting ideas from the outside — often called open innovation or crowdsourcing — should be as vital to the performance of public institutions as it has been to commerce and science. In this presentation, Beth Simone Noveck explores how new data tools hold the potential to transform how we govern, making it possible to pinpoint more diverse expertise in solving hard problems. Through "technologies of expertise" — and crowd-sourcing widely — we can create innovative institutions, active citizenship and innovative politicians.

A common term in the startup world indicating the difficulty of covering negative cash flow in the early stages of a venture is the "valley of death." But there are more common deathtraps than cash flow. In this presentation, Beth Simone Noveck draws from her years of experience as the founder of GovLab and coach and mentor to thousands of professionals to show how we can foster more impactful entrepreneurs, change-makers and startups — by tackling the hard problems up front and leading responsibly and effectively in order to change the world for the better. She offers tips on navigating bureaucracies, legal regimes and institutions, developing compelling materials, and identifying what works and what doesn't in building stronger public entrepreneurship.

Survey data reveals that the public has become increasingly dissatisfied with government. According to recent Gallup Poll data, only 54% of people worldwide report having confidence in their national governments. In the U.S., only 20% of citizens say they trust the federal government to do what is right and "[n]o more than about 30% have expressed trust in the government in Washington to do the right thing at any point over the last decade." Clearly, we need something better and more legitimate than going to the polls once a year to elect politicians few people trust and who accomplish less and less because of bitter partisan wrangling. Noveck will talk about how technology is already transforming how governing happens and what we can do to accelerate the change.