Innovation Intern - Project Concern International - San Diego, CA

In many ways, PCI (Project Concern International), a non-profit organization based in San Diego California, has been innovating in the field of health and development for the last 50 years. In the 70s, PCI popularized the walk-a-thon as a mechanism to engage communities across the country to raise awareness and money for its charitable work through the Walk for Mankind. In the 1980’s it tripled immunization rates in Indonesia through the unconventional practice of engaging grade school children as immunization advocates within their own families. More recently in India, we’ve played a central role in eradicating polio by fundamentally changing community resistance to vaccination in the most endemic areas of the country. In Bolivia we have tripled annual income of poor Bolivian llama producers in part by innovating how they corral their animals to reduce mortality. And in the far reaches of Afar, Ethiopia where Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is a brutal rite of passage from which almost no young girl can escape, FGM has virtually ceased in communities where PCI worked with government, religious leaders and women themselves to transform the way this centuries old practice is perceived. Today 95% of households in these communities no longer practice FGM.

Despite our organizational capacity and accomplishments, we have determined that the status quo within PCI is not sufficient to meet the global challenges ahead of us. Therefore, PCI has identified innovation as one of seven strategic directions. From 2013-2016, PCI will seek to embed innovation within its culture and structures, coining the process as PCInnov A tion. It is a means by which we continuously unleash the creativity of our people, and foster it towards concrete and remarkable outcomes for our beneficiaries, our donors and the world. It is an approach that incorporates intentional innovation structures and pathways, as well as a culture and practice, that enables us to elevate the dimension of performance in all that we do and the ways in which we do it. Through PCInnov A tion , innovation will come from every person, every unit and every country. It will be directed to solve our greatest development challenges, increase our operational efficiencies, and improve the capacity of our people and the productivity of our environment. It will inspire everyone to play a more active role in our noble cause and create a place where the words “ That’s not how we do it here” are replaced with “How can we do it differently to vastly improve results.” PCInnov A tion will ensure that PCI is recognized globally as the most innovative organization in our field.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS:
We seek an intern that can assist in our goals for Year 3. Applicants should be:

Excited and motivated to learn about innovation and how to intentionally embed innovation into a company or organization

Willing and able to think unconventionally

Very strong at research and summarizing analysis

Willing to assist in detailed event and training planning

Applicants must be a current student and either able to receive academic credit or able to provide an official letter from the school stating that the internship contributes to intern’s education.

INTERN RESPONSIBILITIES:
Logistics and preparation for rolling out PCInnovAtion to our final international field offices

Research, compilation, verification and entry of past innovations (both internal process-level innovations and health/development program-level innovations) within our tracking system—at least 1-2 submitted by the end of the 4-month internship period

Assist with “coaching”, creating tools, and gathering valuable information for teams as they develop their innovation submissions

Assist in our marketing and outreach by building up the PCInnov A tion website, gathering resources to disseminate, writing updates to post on various PCI websites and social media sites, and more

Identify diverse resources and foundations that may be contributors to our “prototype fund”, as well as events for that may provide valuable networking opportunities

Develop an internal toolkit for submission teams and review teams

Develop marketing materials/toolkit to teach other NGOs how to set up systems to embed innovation in their organizations and track it

SCHEDULE:
We are looking for dedicated individuals willing to commit to approximately a 3 month internship of 15 hours per week during business hours.

Required Skills

Required Experience