Attendees spend time networking over breakfast before the main sessions begin.

Advance attendees introduce themselves to one another during Scott Kirsner's opening remarks. Kirsner is InnoLead's CEO and Co-Founder.

Prashant Srivastava of Innosight shares ideas in the opening session while Diana Nicholson of Fidelity Investments and David Arazawa of Hologic listen.

J&J's Michal Preminger (not pictured) ran a session on cross-industry fertilization. Dave Duncan of Innosight and Kevin Johnson of Helen of Troy spend time during the session thinking through what makes their sector unique, as well as how their specific organization is unique.

Claudia Reuter of Yale University's Investment Innovation Fund and John Kelly of BAE Systems participate in a session in the back garden.

Suzi Hamill leads a session about freedom dreaming and the intersection of art and creativity.

Chris Michaud of EPAM Continuum, Nondini Naqui of John Hancock, Ernesto Martinez of MassChallenge, and Scott Cohen of InnoLead chat before the Advance begins.

Irina Sigalovsky of MIT's Industrial Liaison Program leads a session on understanding the startup ecosystem, and how it is evolving in 2022.

Jerry Gupta of Swiss Re shares his thoughts in a garden session about deep research and problem solving. Dave Duncan and Prashant Srivastava of Innosight; Scott Miller of Dragon Ventures; John Kelly of BAE Systems; Claudia Reuter of Yale University's Innovation Investment Fund, and Julia Jackson of Takeda Pharmaceuticals listen in.

Caroline Pepek of MassBio shares her thoughts in a session about the evolution of startup pitch fests. Scott Cohen, Suzi Hamill, Danielle Duplin, and Greg Raiz of Techstars Boston listen in.

Participants from a variety of industries came together in a session to discuss unique facets of their industries and their companies. They found similarities and differences between industries. Michal Preminger of Johnson & Johnson led the interactive session.

Claudia Reuter of Yale's Innovation Investment Fund, Suzi Hamill of Cloth.love, Laila Partridge of Stanley & Techstars Accelerator, and Deirdre Crowley of Dow Chemical spend some time catching up and networking between sessions.

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We gathered more than 30 members of the InnoLead community for our summer “Advance” event in Cambridge in late July. We hosted it using the unconference format, where attendees could propose and lead sessions on topics of their choice. 

We were delighted to have attendees from the Boston area — and beyond! Participating organizations included W.L. Gore, Verizon, MassChallenge, MassBio, Fidelity Labs, Johnson & Johnson, John Hancock, the Gap, and many more. 

Thanks to our friends at Innosight for their sponsorship of the Advance.

Our attendees had fascinating topics to chat about, from the evolution of startup pitch fests, to capturing and funding the right number of ideas, to metrics and goals, to garnering stakeholder support for innovation, and more. They walked away telling us they learned a lot from their peers. 

Our next in-person event is Impact, in Silicon Valley this fall.

(Photos by Nora Swidey.)

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