Announcing our Future Shocks Case Study Grant Competition Recipients

The IBM Center for The Business of Government is pleased to announce the winners of our challenge grant award competition that focuses on future shocks case studies.

Published 04 December 2024
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By

Dan Chenok

Executive Director

IBM Center for The Business of Government chenokd@us.ibm.com

Earlier this year, our Center welcomed proposals to learn of real-world examples of where government organizations have implemented strategies and capabilities that have improved their mission resilience to be “future ready” and prepared to respond to disruptive events. We sought out case studies within five key domain areas: emergency preparedness and response, cybersecurity, supply chain, climate sustainability, and workforce development. (Learn more about our future shocks initiative). Case studies could be international, U.S. federal, state, or local and examples were piloted or implemented between 2022 and 2024.

Our first compendium, “Resilience in action: Crisis leadership through innovation, collaboration, and human-centered solutions,” includes four case studies:

  • Breaking the cycle in Norway: How the Agder Health Community rewrote the crisis preparedness playbook after a global pandemic by Colin Eden, University of Stratchclyde, Sigurd Paulsen, Kristiansand Municipality, and Jose Julio Gonzalez, University of Agder
  • Simulating resilience: How Synthetic Nashville is redefining energy security in the face of climate threats by Myrna Bittner, RUNWITHIT Synthetics
  • Crisis as catalyst: How Moldova’s digital platform transformed refugee support in response to the Ukraine war by Luke Cavanaugh, interweave.gov
  • Speed, simplicity, survival: How a low-code solution transformed cross-border healthcare by European hospitals during a global pandemic by Vincent R. Hofbauer, M.D., University Hospital Münster

Additional case studies will be released in early 2025 and include:

  • “Activating & Assembling” a Decentralized Non-Partisan, Non-Attribution, Non-Absolutist Network-As-A-Community by David Bray, Stimson Center.
  • Pioneering a web-based platform for emergency response and disaster management in Asia by Wendy Chen, Texas Tech University
  • The National Intelligence Council and its unclassified look into the future by Dr. Gregory Treverton, University of Southern California
  • Enhancing resilience: co-creating communicative capacity in Fort Hancock, Texas by Samanta Varela Castro & Keri K. Stephens, The University of Texas at Austin
  • Integrating Land Use and Water Planning in Colorado by Dr. Jongeun You, Northern Michigan University

In 2025, we plan to launch another challenge grant competition to discover more practical government examples of strategies enhancing mission resilience for future disruptions.