Why the best investment in innovation might be your team

For corporate partners like U.S. Bank and Kao, the Learning Lab has become more than a training resource. Their experiences extended well beyond a single workshop, offering teams an opportunity to step away from day-to-day work, challenge assumptions and return with new ways to grow together, strengthen relationships and develop fresh perspectives.

Since joining the 1819 Innovation Hub in January 2025, U.S. Bank has leveraged the partnership to connect employees with innovative learning experiences, collaborative problem-solving opportunities and meaningful engagement with students, educators and industry partners. The relationship continues to serve as a bridge between employee development, innovation and community impact.

“Historically, innovation was driven by knowledge; what you knew directly shaped your ability to create something new,” says RJ Sargent, assistant vice president of Partner Success at 1819. “But in today’s rapidly changing world, knowledge becomes outdated faster than ever. Learning is the new currency of innovation. For our partners to win, they need to learn faster and better than their competitors. That is the role of the Learning Lab: helping teams build new innovation skills, work more effectively together and apply those capabilities to real business challenges.”

Learning Lab director Nicholas Partridge and assistant directors Rebecca Rudolph and Kurt Myers work closely with each partner to tailor programming that strengthens their team’s collaboration, execution and innovation.

Together, they serve as a hands-on resource for innovation and workforce development, helping business partners learn faster, work smarter and deliver results sooner.

Laretha Elliott, vice president of digital innovation at U.S. Bank, leads a team focused on turning complex ideas into real, scalable products – work that demands technical skill and sharp collective thinking.

“The Learning Lab challenged our team to think more intentionally and to lean into our strengths as individuals,” Elliott says. “We left with a clearer sense of how we think as a group, not just whatever project we are working on. It makes us better as individuals and as a team, which improves the quality and pace of our work.”

Both partners point out the concrete frameworks they brought back into their day-to-day work. For the U.S. Bank team, the session focused on empathy mapping and current-state process mapping, which became a turning point in how the teams represented think about their customers.

“Taking the time to do this helped us really focus and dig into the places our clients and end users experience the greatest pain points,” Elliott states. “And how prioritizing those pain points can deliver a better experience – one that is not only easier, but one that delights our customers.”

One such method used in the Learning Lab is systematic inventive thinking (SIT). Drew Boyd, one of the world’s leading practitioners and facilitators of the method, has helped popularize SIT as a practical approach to creativity and innovation. The SIT methodology centers on five classic thinking tools. Sometimes called “patterns of innovation,” these help teams generate creative solutions by working within existing constraints rather than starting from scratch.

“SIT turned our innovation mindset on its head in the best way,” Elliott says. “Thinking ‘inside the box’ lends itself to not only what is attainable but to great ideas we wouldn’t have considered otherwise. It is a total shift from traditional innovative thinking.”

Many organizations naturally want to jump straight to solutions. Partridge says Learning Lab sessions, including customer journey mapping and SIT, help teams pause long enough to understand the customer, examine the current process and challenge long-held assumptions. That's where the best ideas come from, not because people brainstorm harder, but because they see the problem more clearly.

Beyond new frameworks and techniques, both organizations found unexpected value in the Learning Lab’s collaborative environment inside the 1819 Innovation Hub.

Reusch’s team applied SIT principles to one of their internal processes, uncovering new ways to improve the organization's operations. They also adopted AI-assisted techniques for executive summaries of project management notes, a practical shift that has stuck.

Both leaders agree that organizations get the most value when they fully embrace this experience. Learning Lab workshops aren’t lectures or off-the-shelf training sessions. Instead, facilitators tailor each engagement to the partner’s needs, guide participants through proven innovation frameworks and encourage teams to challenge assumptions, explore new perspectives and work through real business problems together.

“Take full advantage of this amazing tool and facility,” advised Reusch. “The people at 1819 can improve your team collaboration, efficiency and productivity.”

Elliott believes the biggest factor in a successful Learning Lab session isn’t the framework; it’s the mindset participants bring into the room. “Go with an open mind, a good attitude and a little humility,” she says. “The real value comes when teams drop their badges, loosen their grip on ‘how we normally do things’ and engage honestly. Nick, Rebecca and Kurt are excellent at helping everyone get there and challenging mindsets in the kindest, most professional and most meaningful way.”

The Learning Lab team is intentionally industry agnostic, allowing them to ask fresh questions and introduce methodologies that help organizations uncover opportunities they may have overlooked, whether the focus is on customer experience, innovation, strategy, process improvement or team development. The goal remains the same: to equip participants with practical tools they can immediately apply back at work.

“Our mission is to help our corporate partners grow by maximizing the value they get from the partnership with the 1819 Innovation Hub,” Sargent says. “Sometimes that means connecting them to a researcher, a student or a new technology. Other times, it means helping their teams step back, challenge how they work and discover new ways to solve problems together. The Learning Lab is a powerful example of that mission in action. We're helping our partners develop the skills and capabilities they need to turn innovation from an idea into impact for their business and the people they serve.”

That approach has made the 1819 Learning Lab an ongoing resource rather than a one-time experience. U.S. Bank is already planning its next engagement. “This team is the kind of partnership that evolves with us,” Elliott says. “Which is exactly what innovation teams need.”