The Directorate General for Innovation launches with Las Naves a training on innovation missions for municipalities of the region

• The innovation center hosts training workshops for the towns selected in this pilot initiative, based on an innovation model that aims to improve people’s life and that will integrate “Missions València 2030”.
• The steps of the program are: first, identifying the challenges through a participative diagnostic, followed by the identification of relevant city and area models. Then, a paper will be drafted to become the Strategic Framework and, lastly, a mission catalogue will be created.

Las Naves, innovation center for the València City Council, started on Tuesday the training workshops that are included in the support program. The aim is to orientate the innovation strategy of Valencian towns towards innovation missions. These workshops are held by the Directorate General for Innovation of the Innovation, University, Science and Digital Society Department of the Valencian Government.

This training program is based on the “Missions València 2030” initiative. Starting from an innovation model whose aim is to improve people’s life, this case includes four workshops to be held in September and October and to be replicated by the municipalities at their level. The title of the first workshop, organized this morning at Las Naves, is “Identifying urban challenges through participatory diagnostic”, and it involves two exercises: actor mapping and initiative mapping, the goal being to identify the main stakeholders and to take the best decisions possible about the right strategies in order to engage every participant.

As indicated by the Innovation General Director during the welcoming of the workshop: “the Innovation Department wishes to walk with the municipalities the path of innovation, so they can develop their strategy and orientate their actions to achieve the triple digital, green and social transition we are facing and that should arrive to every corner of the Valencian region. This is how we will become the smart, sustainable and inclusive territory we seek to be”. She added that this assistance “creates a wider impact from a cooperation framework like the one created between the Valencian Government and Las Naves”.

The training was held face to face, and just like the rest of the workshops, it focusses on the six selected towns that will take part in the pilot: L’Alfàs del Pi and Dénia, from the Alicante province; Vila-real and Onda, from the Castellón province; and Ontinyent and Riba-roja de Túria, from the Valencia province. In addition, six municipalities were chosen as followers and also participated.

Workshop n. 2 will take place face to face on the afternoon at the innovation center premises. The subject will focus on “Identifying city models and relevant areas of the municipality” through a visual story, a tool that helps imagining and describing a perfect future that will emerge from the success of the project.

On Wednesday, September 8th, the third workshop will be held, during which the topic will be “Creating a strategic framework”. This followed a brainstorming exercise in order to design missions inside every relevant area. Secondly, participants will focus on a strategic analysis, the purpose being to study two conditions on which the success for the project implementation will depend (needs and limitations). Opportunities to boost and escalate the project will also be addressed. To conclude the workshop, a table will be used to pinpoint the innovation areas and missions. It will be decided beforehand for each one of them which actor will lead the mission, the schedule and the processes to consider at a general level, in order to ensure subsequent strategic and political validation.

Choosing innovation missions

The last workshop will be held on line in October. The focus will be put on choosing innovation missions on behalf of the municipalities selected to participate in the support program.

The aim is the “Co-creation of an innovation missions catalogue” using the metaphor of the tree as a tool, where there are aspects to eliminate (the branches that protrude), aspects that need change and adjustment (leaves), key aspects (roots) and the fruits, that is, conclusions or concrete actions. In short, this final workshop will be a validation and an itinerary analysis looking for changes, improvements, adjustments and to prioritize the missions designed in the previous workshop.

After the end of the workshops, all the program know-how will be collected in a toolkit integrated by a summary of the documents used in every step, as well as some templates and support material. Any town wishing to focus their missions-oriented innovation strategy will benefit from this kit, especially those “follower” municipalities that enrolled in the program but were not selected: Quart de Poblet, Estubeny, Godella, Sagunt, Silla and Picassent.