Hana Schank
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Articles by Hana Schank
Everything you know about innovation is wrong
By Sara Hudson and Hana Schank10 minute Read This is the first installment in The Government Fix, a new series on redesigning how government works, published in partnership with the nonprofit think tank New America. Read the second installment here. –Eds. We know what happened the last time you had to interact with the government. Most likely you came away feeling pretty bad about it, possibly grumbling about where your tax dollars go. You filled out a form.
The Ambition Decisions
An Elle Best Book to Read This Summer A Washington Post Business Book That Won’t Put You to Sleep at the Beach A HelloGiggles Book That Will Help You Embrace Your Inner #Girlboss at Work and in Life “The goal of The Ambition Decisions is to ‘fill in [the] missing knowledge’ for women trying to navigate work and life options, in part because the choices for women ‘often look radically different from the way those very same decisions played out only a generation earlier.’ . . .
Why the Conference Room Is Always Booked, No Matter What You Do
Photo: 2/Thomas Northcut/Corbis Just a guess, but I bet your process for planning a meeting at work goes something like this: You log on to your company calendar, or spreadsheet, or whatever you use. You pull up the conference-room tab. You look at everyone’s schedules and the schedules of the various always-overbooked rooms, and you’re already exhausted. You finally find a time and a space and send out an invite. Several people email to ask if you can change the time.
Seven business books that won't put you to sleep at the beach
It's summer. A time for light beach reads, juicy tell-alls and comic memoirs. When it comes to poolside reading, business books about team-building, strategy or management metrics written by "thought leaders" or management gurus can hardly compete. But that doesn't mean there aren't books related to business, leadership or careers that aren't worth taking on a summer road trip or day at the shore.
Why slow innovation is the way forward
I joined the United States Digital Service because of the jaw-dropping success stories. Saving healthcare.gov and bringing medical insurance to an entire nation? Sign me up! Fixing refugee admissions to save 10,000 Syrian refugees from a brutal regime? Well I wanna do that, too. My plan, when I arrived, was to ride in on my white horse, my arsenal stuffed with Post-it Notes and well-researched prototypes and GitHub repos and help save government. The stories made that seem like a reasonable goal.
Why slow innovation is the way forward
I joined the United States Digital Service because of the jaw-dropping success stories. Saving healthcare.gov and bringing medical insurance to an entire nation? Sign me up! Fixing refugee admissions to save 10,000 Syrian refugees from a brutal regime? Well I wanna do that, too. My plan, when I arrived, was to ride in on my white horse, my arsenal stuffed with Post-it Notes and well-researched prototypes and GitHub repos and help save government. The stories made that seem like a reasonable goal.
The enduring mythology of the whiz kid
The story of innovation, as it is typically told, is one of rule breakers, stay-up-all-nighters, people who are sharper and shinier than everyone else–whiz kids. And those whiz kids all look the same. Young. Male. Techies or policy wonks or numbers geniuses. But in reality, innovation, particularly in government, rarely relies upon a whiz kid.
The enduring mythology of the whiz kid
The story of innovation, as it is typically told, is one of rule breakers, stay-up-all-nighters, people who are sharper and shinier than everyone else–whiz kids. And those whiz kids all look the same. Young. Male. Techies or policy wonks or numbers geniuses. But in reality, innovation, particularly in government, rarely relies upon a whiz kid.
Everything you know about innovation is wrong
We know what happened the last time you had to interact with the government. Most likely you came away feeling pretty bad about it, possibly grumbling about where your tax dollars go. You filled out a form. Maybe it was 5 pages, maybe it was 50 pages. Whatever the length, it seemed unnecessarily long for the task at hand.
Danger: Saint-Malo and the highest tides in Europe
When I stepped out of my beachfront hotel in Saint-Malo the night I arrived, I noticed a distinct lack of beach. Instead, there was only ocean: kilometres of choppy English Channel, uncomfortably close to the hotel’s entrance. But by noon the next day, the ocean was gone. As in, vanished. In its place was a beach that seemed to stretch forever. I squinted into the distance and eventually located the ocean – nearly 2km off the coast.
Let Emotion Be Your Guide
We were sitting in a market research room in the midst of a long day of customer interviews. Across from us, a young mother was telling us about her experience bringing her daughter into the ER during a severe asthma attack. We had been interviewing people about their healthcare journeys for a large hospital group, but we’d been running into a few problems. First, the end-goal of the interviews was to develop a strategy for the hospital group’s website.
Why are only two of the world’s top 100 chess players women? – Hana Schank | Aeon Essays
Here’s a story my father likes to tell. When I was five, my family spent several months living in Barbados. Since we were in a rental house, there weren’t many games or toys around, save for the beat-up travel checkers set we’d packed in our suitcase.
My Gen X Hillary Problem: I Know Why We Don’t 'Like' Clinton
My Gen X Hillary Problem: I Know Why We Don’t 'Like' Clinton As many a news outlet has told us, women over 45 are supporting Hillary, and those under 45 are feeling the Bern. On the dividing line lies Generation X. (Remember us? People used to care about us.) At 43, I fall more or less right into the statistical middle and I’ve acted accordingly. Up until a few weeks ago, I supported Bernie for president, but I felt slightly guilty doing so.
Could Vermont Be the First State to Produce Artisanal, Socialist Marijuana?
If Vermonters legalize pot, they're going to do it their way. The approach that Colorado, Alaska, and Washington have taken to legalizing marijuana can resemble the parking lot at a Grateful Dead show: a free-for-all that, while liberating, has produced only a hazy sense of where the party is going. Meanwhile, Vermont, contrary to its popular reputation for the free-wheeling life, is approaching the issue like the nerdy kid in an SAT prep course.
When Games Try to Save the World
When Games Try to Save the World Dozens of games, both online and analog, say they increase empathy and change behavior. Do they work? For a short time in my 20s, I lived for free in a house in Florida while figuring out what to do next. The house came with a PlayStation, which was an exciting new technological development at the time, and a copy of the newly released game SpyHunter. I didn’t have a job and I didn’t know anyone in town, so for two months I sat on the couch and played SpyHunter.
Why the Conference Room Is Always Booked -- The Cut
Just a guess, but I bet your process for planning a meeting at work goes something like this: You log on to your company calendar, or spreadsheet, or whatever you use. You pull up the conference-room tab. You look at everyone’s schedules and the schedules of the various always-overbooked rooms, and you're already exhausted. You finally find a time and a space and send out an invite. Several people email to ask if you can change the time.
It Isn’t Easy to Read a Book When You’re Blind, But This Rocket Scientist Figured It Out
In 1979, Jim Fruchterman was making pattern recognition systems to blow up targets for smart bombs.
It Isn’t Easy to Read a Book When You’re Blind, But This Rocket Scientist Figured It Out
In 1979, Jim Fruchterman was making pattern recognition systems to blow up targets for smart bombs.
Meet the Food Engineers of the Apocalypse
When the apocalypse comes, what's for dinner? Multiple studies indicate that if global warming continues at the current rate, we're likely to see vast swaths of our food supply vanish. Scientists at UC Davis found that fruit and nut trees rely on a stretch of cold temperatures in order to grow. No more chilly nights would mean no more almonds, apricots, or cherries, among other crops.
When Good Eyesight is a Privilege, Learning Suffers
Last fall, things were not going well in several classrooms at Middle School 223 in the Bronx. One boy in an eighth grade classroom wouldn’t stop bothering the kid sitting next to him—he was constantly being written up for talking in class. A sixth grade girl in the back of the class had yet to utter a word all semester.
The Big Roundtable
A mother goes to war with the Lords of Education on behalf of her legally blind five year old Children who have a disability and are also smart are called twice exceptional, a term that makes me want to punch something. When taken literally the term makes sense, in that exceptional can mean a rare instance, but I doubt this is what the inventors of the term were thinking.
Why don’t more women play chess?
Here’s a story my father likes to tell. When I was five, my family spent several months living in Barbados. Since we were in a rental house, there weren’t many games or toys around, save for the beat-up travel checkers set we’d packed in our suitcase.
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