A while ago I wrote a post for the Women Chemist Committee’s Just Cocktails (http://tinyurl.com/wccdirtywaterjg) on “dirty water”... my mother often said “don’t throw out the dirty water until you have clean water”.  She would use this saying as an explanation for anything from why not to dump an old boyfriend (especially when SHE wanted me to keep him and I wanted out!) to changing majors in college (I knew I wanted science but she wanted me to be a school teacher, as she was and which she loved, and which, as a child of the Depression was to her – safe).

Problem with this idea of safe is that a sink filled with “dirty water” has no room for the clean.  It’s a physics problem – so my argument was that we have to get rid of the dirty water so there’s room for clean – both physically and psychologically.  But how we get rid of the dirty water and how we define dirty is what really matters…

Take careers for instance.  Here’s my opinion – if you’re in a rut in a job but need the income – as 99.999999999% of us do – ACKNOWLEDGE that you need to change and take actions to do so WHILE keeping the current job and continuing to do excellent work and see your current position through the lens of continuing to gain skills, contacts, and experiences as you transition to the next place.

If you’re a researcher – how does this idea of dirty and clean water pertain to translating your research into solutions that can help people and the planet?  Well, while not every researcher wants to commercialize their research – being informed about markets and market challenges can aid in defining research questions and experiments.  For many researchers the thought of commercializing the fruits of their research is really dirty water and as such they want no part of tainting the clean water of pure research.

Yet this planet has many challenges that I contend need solutions that come from the results of excellent research.  So here’s an example of how one defines dirty water being an important aspect.  My take – it’s not a question of one or the other – of research versus commercialization or dirty versus clean “water”.  It’s an opportunity to look at a problem through a new lens, a new vocabulary and a new skill set – and hopefully provide a valuable solution!

December 2011

The NCIIA in conjunction with ecosVC has put out an interesting and informative video series discussing how understanding customers' needs is essential for innovators and entrepreneurs.  Seven experts share their thoughts on how to understand customers' needs and how to go about meeting them.

This video series was supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation, grant CHE #0920877.

Judy Giordan, Partner ecosVC and Senior Advisor to the NCIIA, explains that viewing research through the lens of the market in addition to the lens of pure research can truly spur innovation and be a benefit to the innovators, the economy and the world. Hear what everyone else has to say!

December 2011

The NCIIA in conjunction with ecosVC has put out an interesting and informative video series discussing women's perspectives on entrepreneurship.  Three experts share their thoughts on the challenges of being a female scientist or entrepreneur, and advise women in these fields to persevere and to let these challenges make them stronger.

This video series was supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation, grant CHE #0920877.

Judy Giordan, Partner ecosVC and Senior Advisor to the NCIIA, explains that we all view the world and everyone in it through different lenses, and we need to use these lenses to discover and embrace opportunities, rather than allowing them to limit us. Hear what everyone else has to say!

October 2011

Judy was a speaker in the Joseph Priestley Society Lecture Series at the Chemical Heritage Foundation, in Philadelphia, PA.  Her talk was titled "21st Century Technology Commercialization – A New Contact Sport" - click to view the PDF of her presentation.  Click here to listen to the audio from the lecture provided by CHF!

Photographs by Conrad Erb, courtesy of the Chemical Heritage Foundation.

September 2011

Judy spoke at the  Nanomanufacturing Summit 2011 in Boston, MA, in the "High Performance Green Nanomaterials for Electronics & Industrial Applications" session.  Her talk was titled "GOAL: Sustainable Materials Commercialization and Innovator Preparation" - click to download a PDF of the presentation.