In mid February, our tight-knit team here at Mobility Labs cooked together, glided down a snowy slope, and co-created something out of nothing as part of our third corporate retreat. We also got sore, lost, and sick, but I’m getting ahead of myself. Previously we enjoyed the crystal Caribbean water of Cabrera in the Dominican […]
At Mobility Labs, we encourage open-source development for many of our social impact projects and work with open-source tools for the best solutions. As part of this work, we regularly hear why partners are uncomfortable with the idea. We want to dispel some common open-source myths that we’ve heard. Let’s first outline what we mean […]
Corporate retreats are not common in Colombia. Before I experienced one, I imagined they were all about employees compelled to travel to idyllic locations just to be locked up in dark conference rooms where they had to listen to motivational speakers non-stop, drink unrestrained alcohol (to abide the motivational speakers) and participate in silly trust […]
I have been known to paraphrase President Barack Obama’s first inaugural address in remarking that the “patchwork heritage” of my own work history is a strength, not than a weakness. Different company types, different clients, different workflows and organizational structures, different people and software and office architecture. At times it felt less like a patchwork […]
Last week, I started working at Mobility Labs. My first week was a blur of amazing doughnuts, hugs, discussions about Chaos vs. Order Muppets, and getting up to speed on current projects. Mobility Labs is building all sorts of things that make an impact, including lesson planning tools, apps for young children across the globe, tools […]
Start-up culture has captured the word “innovation.” It sits on the mantle with words like “disruption” and “fail forward.” But innovation happens in a lot of other places, and seeing start up culture as the be-all and end all of innovation is stifling. The start up entrepreneur model is that a person, or small group, […]
After visiting the coffee farm on our recent expedition, some of the Mobility Labs team went out to meet a woman who works in the river panning for gold. We learned a lot about this part of the Colombian economy which employs thousands of people. Several of our team members gave this task their best […]
A big part of the Mobility Labs retreat involves reviewing our processes. We took a look at almost every aspect of the business to better understand how we do what we do for clients, for projects, and for ourselves. We subscribe to the belief that often the best way to understand something is to explore […]
The Mobility Labs retreat in Medellin, Colombia continued with a trip into the hills around Medellin for some paragliding. We arrived there early in the day and got a chance to watch other people floating gently in the sky. It was a bit of a hike up to the launch point, but it was worth […]
Mobility Labs is in the second week of our first team retreat in Medellin, Colombia. Mobility Labs team members from the New York and Washington, DC offices have made the trip along with members who normally work from as far away as Berlin. All these travelers join the team working out of the Medellin office […]