News
Why customer insight is crucial in the fight against HIV: What I shared at AIDS 2018
August 8, 2018
The global development community has long referred to the people and institutions we serve as our beneficiaries. In truth, they’re also our partners and customers. That last word might sound a bit...
Show me the money? Not necessarily: Lessons learned from building an innovation practice at a global nonprofit
June 27, 2018
When Pact, a Washington, D.C.-based global nonprofit founded in 1971, first invested in innovation in fall 2013, we looked to determine whether we could institute a dedicated innovation team to...
The ghosts of user-centered design
August 30, 2017
Sitting in the Cambodian humidity, in an open-air council hall in Pursat with storm clouds rolling in the distance, I had to wonder if I would have found myself here were it not for the concept of...
5 lessons from a conversation with USAID’s chief of design innovation
December 22, 2016
Innovation is a nebulous topic that often means 20 different things to 20 different people. This week, Pact hosted Seema Patel, Chief of Design Innovation at USAID’s Global Development Lab, for an...
At MIT design summit in Zambia, real design with real people
November 22, 2016
What if world-leading organizations teamed up to develop and scale technology and business solutions to end global poverty? This question, currently on the MIT Practical Impact Alliance (PIA)...
Local solutions in action: How Pact is using human-centered design to act on beneficiary feedback
November 2, 2016
One of Pact’s core values is local solutions. In short, this means we believe that true success can only come from solutions created in partnership with the people we serve.
It’s why Pact’s...
100 million ideas for $100 million
October 12, 2016
Like many nonprofits around the world, Pact buzzed with excitement around the release of the MacArthur 100&Change competition in the spring of 2016. The MacArthur Foundation was offering an...
It’s not Design Thinking. It’s Design Doing.
August 11, 2016
Anyone working in international development will tell you that it is critical to make the voice, needs and desires of your beneficiaries the core of every project. Development uses a number of...
Pact wins Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s Living Progress Challenge
August 4, 2016
Pact is proud to announce that it has won Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s Living Progress Challenge.
From more than 400 ideas and 130 proposals from around the world, 20 submissions were chosen to move...
Putting the buzz in the word: Innovation
July 28, 2016
Innovation has long been a part of Pact’s institutional fabric, perhaps best exemplified by our trailblazing work in capacity development over the past couple of decades. But until 2013, innovation...