Throughout the day, every day, you experience multiple interactions. Whether it be picking up your morning coffee, going to your daily meeting, or something else, you are left with a feeling about a service, person, or organization that, over time, and through constant interaction creates a perception.
A strategic theme sets a tone for how a company successfully achieves strategic goals and objectives and encourages complimentary action. Each year at Arc Aspicio we choose a theme that inspires our employees to work to bring our strategy to life. This year, we chose #Spark. #Spark captures our desire to accelerate bold ideas.
Arc Aspicio recently completed pro bono support to the Amara Legal Center to develop a brand for the Virginia Coalition Against Human Trafficking and design communication materials to educate Virginia legislators on human trafficking within the state.
The Federal Government relies on technology to deliver critical services to citizens and to protect the homeland. Communication, enabled by technology, allows government agencies such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to coordinate with local partners when responding to emergency events. But what happens when technology fails? How can operations continue when a cyber security attack compromises communications, or an extreme weather event obliterates IT equipment?
As access to data is expanding at an unprecedented pace, Government agencies are developing data analytic capabilities to support data-driven decision-making. However, many agencies have yet to implement a data approach that expands beyond traditional analytics. Combining behavioral science into analytical approaches helps uncover nuances and deliver insights that are a catalyst for action.
Human Trafficking is an insidious practice – one that is very hard to crack down on. The complexities of human trafficking make it especially hard to stop. Though organized crime, drug trafficking, or other global illicit networks come in infinite iterations, human trafficking is even more nuanced due to its commodity – human beings. All humans – from your daughter or son, to your neighbor, to your teacher, are vulnerable to the pernicious cycle of human trafficking, and an understanding of this is both vital to solving the problem, while also making it extremely difficult to investigate, prosecute, and ultimately mitigate.
In November 2019, facilitators from Arc Aspicio’s Strategy Innovation Lab (SILab) led a dynamic conversation with a distinguished group of human trafficking professionals with experience in federal law enforcement, victim services, non-profit organizations, academia, the private sector, and included a survivor. I was part of a team of facilitators who provided ground rules and led a small group’s conversation with prepared questions. My background of twenty-eight years of Federal law enforcement has given me a breadth of experience attending and participating in human trafficking events across the United States and abroad, usually aimed at training personnel or presenting information about this crime. Seldom do they engage human trafficking experts across profession areas to share experiences and perspectives and strategize actionable solutions.
Do you ever find yourself adding fruits and vegetables to your tray while dining at a cafeteria and the asking yourself “Why do I have an apple and salad on my tray when I don’t even like salad”? How about grabbing a lighter or a shaving razor from the check-out lane at the Supermarket? If the answer is yes, then you have experienced and been influenced by Choice Architecture.
Human Trafficking is a global problem, the extent of which is not clearly understood and is difficult to measure. To tackle this issue, Arc Aspicio’s SILab hosted Innovative Ideas to Combat Human Trafficking – A Conversation in November 2019. The SILab is a knowledge hub that accelerates innovative and sustainable solutions through methods, tools, thought leadership, events, and other resources to help our people, partners, and clients solve complex problems. Nearly 30 professionals with experience combating human trafficking in law enforcement, victim services non-profits, academia, and the private sector and a survivor participated to offer strategic and actionable solutions for combating human trafficking during the event.
Engaging with a great artificial intelligence (AI) application is like watching a professional athlete in a game. The greatest of athletes make their efforts look so easy that we often forget we’re seeing the result of decades of hard work. Just like athletes, established corporations that have repeatedly collected the same data over years also make their AI solutions look effortless. But, in most cases, their AI is using data that has been carefully refined over decades of transactions and is enabling machine learning and statistical analysis.
Human trafficking is a complex crime that requires the collective resources from law enforcement, industry, academia, and victim services providers in Government and the private sector to address. It is a national level problem but, unfortunately, it is often only addressed at the local level where it impacts communities.
Most of us have seen strategies that looked great on paper but never seemed to get off the ground. Somewhere along the way, implementation faltered. Important goals fell by the wayside and the organization never rallied around the direction set by leadership. And still, business as usual carried on. This sort of failure is practically guaranteed without buy-in and participation from employees across an organization
Human trafficking, whether it be labor or sex trafficking, is a complex crime where victims may not even recognize they are victims. This makes it hard for law enforcement professionals to identify and prosecute it, and for victims to find the extensive support they need to participate in the legal process. The mission to fight human trafficking is complex, but Arc Aspicio is dedicated and proactive in fighting this prevalent crime.
