WaterAid
Two billion people worldwide – that’s one in four – still do not have a toilet. WaterAid partnered with Who Gives A Crap to create the Impact Accelerator – an innovation program that trials new approaches to creating sanitation solutions across the globe.
What we did for WaterAid
Critical to the success of the Impact Accelerator was the creation of an innovation framework at WaterAid. This innovation framework would ensure that WaterAid’s people could approach their biggest challenges with tools to enable better solutions.
As a registered B Corp, we were super excited to be working with a purpose-driven organisation and helping WaterAid scale its impact through innovation.
Specifically, we have:
- Engaged and aligned senior leaders on the key ingredients necessary to create an organisation where innovation can thrive, such as strategy, roles, process and culture
- Trained over 40 ‘Innovation Champions’ in science-based tools for delivering innovation across WaterAid (including working with Champions in countries like Cambodia, India and Nicaragua – we are working on our Spanish!)
- Worked with a core Innovation Team to develop an innovation process that could be used to execute innovation projects in WaterAid’s country programs
- Supported the execution of WaterAid’s first Innovation Mission – uncovering innovative solutions for sanitation workers in Bangladesh, Cambodia and India
The results
Across the globe (in countries such as Australia, Canada, Cambodia and Bangladesh), WaterAid’s people now have a process and tools to enable better thinking every day. As an organisation, WaterAid is taking a strategic approach to thinking innovatively about some big sanitation challenges.
You can see updates (and learnings) from WaterAid’s innovation missions in Bangladesh, Cambodia and India.
We were excited to see the launch of WaterAid Bangladesh’s “Kohinoor” – a film that unearths the day-to-day challenges of a sanitation and waste worker, and her unfettered ambition to reach her dreams.
This film stems from a mission to address one of the most vulnerable groups in the waste and sanitation value chain, people who work in landfills, facing multiple layers of vulnerability and uncertainty – making health, safety, and dignity an every-second concern. These challenges are further compounded in respect to women waste pickers and workers.
Waste workers working in landfill are historically deprived of basic amenities, social security, rights, and are faced with unimaginable challenges. Women sanitation and waste workers, like Kohinoor, are especially vulnerable. In the story, as a single mother, she keeps on finding herself at a crossroad of choices to make a better future for her daughter.
WaterAid’s goal for this project is to increase awareness among the general public of the plight of female sanitation workers and gain traction to support their needs, and reach five million people with the film and campaign messaging – so get viewing!
You can watch the film here and check out Rosie Wheen, Chief Executive of WaterAid Australia sharing the ‘why’ behind the making of Kohinoor here.
Hear from our amazing clients
Kickstarting change across the world, one client at a time
“The key for any innovation to succeed is to depart from long held perceptions and rekindle the entire thinking process. This helps teams to look at problems in a new lens and attempt to solve them in ways that is practical and innovative. Innovation Impact Accelerator process focuses on this principle which is unique.”
WaterAid Bangladesh
“Our new film Kohinoor is so powerful and such a new way to tackle the sanitation crisis. Our innovation mission was to tackle negative attitudes to sanitation workers. Watching it you can’t help but feel empathy and connection with Kohinoor. The film has had hundreds of thousands of view so far in Bangladeshi and with each view we hope we transform those negative attitudes so that the work of waste and sanitation workers is valued.”
WaterAid Australia
