Geoff's blog

A busy autumn ahead

Geoff Mulgan - 05.09.2012

The autumn began with the very welcome news that Nesta had made a substantial profit through the sale of Sirigen - another hit for our venture investments team, which is steadily growing its role.

We've got a busy autumn ahead, with road shows around the UK, the launch of Plan I our ideas for innovation-led growth, big existing and new programmes, and early next year our main event for 2013, Possible Worlds. 

In an odd way the Olympics, and particularly the opening ceremonies of both the main Olympics and the Paralympics, have made our work a lot easier: showcasing creativity, beating the odds, and the mix of eccentricity and ambition that so often lies behind great achievements.

I'm particularly glad to see Ludwig Guttmann becoming if not a household name, then at least a more recognised hero.  A German brain surgeon who had been exiled to the UK because he was Jewish, he turned medical practice on spine injuries on its head focusing on what people could do rather than what they couldn't. 

He organised the Stoke Mandeville games for disabled people which started on the same day as the 1948 London Olympics and later mutated into the Paralympics.  He's a great example of social innovation founded both on deep knowledge and on a simple insight into humanity. His ethos was to build on strengths rather than dwell on weakness, and the Paralympics have done more to advance that idea, and to advance understanding of disability, than anything I can remember.