Innovation is often framed as technology, startups, and global competition. But what happens when we look at innovation through the lens of place?
Drawing from Botswana’s efforts to move beyond diamonds, Dr. Pierce Otlhogile-Gordon shares how land, policy, history, and local Indigenous knowledge shape what innovation can — and can’t — achieve. Together, we explore how national ambition meets lived reality — and what other countries, regions, and cities can learn from Botswana’s approach.
Together, we explore:
- How innovation is shaped by policy, history, and place
- The opportunities and constraints facing emerging entrepreneurs
- The tension between big development goals and everyday realities
Guest
Dr. Pierce Edward Cornelius Otlhogile-Gordon
Across discipline, industry, and geographical borders, he's guided changemakers and changemaker communities reach professional and personal goals of system change.
Each resource he's helped to build has synthesized and activated the creative impulse to build a more just, resilient, and communal global community.
He deftly navigates the disciplines of innovation practice, evaluation capacity building, systems thinking, international development, speculative futures, and more. He's guided changemakers at community and national scopes across multiple continents, in the for-profit, academic, philanthropic, and non-profit sectors. Across his vast and eclectic professional journey, his work shares one principle: to orchestrate the spread of agency and creativity across the world.
He holds a M.S. and Ph.D. from the Energy and Resources Group at the University of California, Berkeley, and summa cum laude B.S. degrees from the University of Michigan and Morehouse College.
Learn more:piercegordon.me/
Acknowledgements
Sponsorships
This episode is supported by the Nurubian, the University of Toronto School of Cities and the Department of Geography and Planning.
Support
- Music Producer: Imany Lambropoulos
- Podcast Host and Graphic Designer: Alexandra Lambropoulos
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