With the excitement and suspense of the television show “Shark Tank,” Knowledge SUCCESS last week announced four knowledge innovation winners from a field of 80 contestants in “The Pitch,” a global competition to find and fund creative knowledge management ideas for family planning.
The 10 semifinalists made their pitches to a set of six judges from non-governmental organizations, donors, and academia, who asked probing questions to determine which four projects should receive up to $50,000 each in seed funding.
“I want to say this was a very stiff competition,” said judge Tara Sullivan (director of Knowledge SUCCESS and of the Knowledge Management Unit at the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs). “These semifinalists were all very strong, with innovative knowledge management solutions for pressing family planning and reproductive health problems.”
With the understanding that community can be as important in our work lives as in our personal lives, Jhpiego India pitched an idea for creating an online family planning and reproductive health community across India through “FPKonet.” FPKonet would be a centralized knowledge management system where information can be collected, organized, and housed electronically.
Most importantly, Jhipego’s Priti Chaudhary told the judges, it would be available to everyone in the country. It would also provide a unique space for members to share experiences, coordinate activities, and discuss important developments in the sector. Networking would be a key feature and people could join smaller, thematic groups of interest to them, she said.
“Even today when we seem to be so well-connected by technology, we are still unaware of what the other organizations and professionals are doing,” Chaudary said. “If you know something very important, let’s share it with each other … FPKonet is going to do exactly that in India.”