Open up your mind and say, ahh...

Todd Sherer wants to put the Michael J. Fox Foundation (MJFF)–the world’s largest private funder of Parkinson’s Disease research–out of business. That may sound strange, especially considering that if Sherer achieves that goal as CEO of the Foundation, he’ll be out of a job. But it will also mean they’ve found a cure for Parkinson’s, a chronic, degenerative neurological disorder that affects one million people in the United States, and more than 5 million worldwide.

To date, the MJFF has contributed more than $275 million toward its goal of finding a cure by focusing on innovation. And agility. The Foundation reviews roughly 800 Parkinson’s grant proposals annually, but you won’t find them gathering dust on someone’s desk. Sherer asserts that decisions are made in a matter of weeks, and MJFF currently counts about 250 active research collaborations and projects. As money is raised, it gets poured right back into research.

As one of MJFF’s first in-house scientists, Sherer (who holds a PhD in neuroscience from the University of Virginia) is particularly keen on the new Fox Trial Finder, a tech tool that pairs Parkinson’s patients with clinical research trials–a vital component in the development of new treatments and ultimately a cure.

Sherer’s background in scientific research has influenced his management style, which, he tells Fast Company, takes a similar approach. From helping drive the direction of the research to becoming CEO in May 2011, Sherer’s used partnering, teaching, and mentoring to build an MJFF team that’s committed to keeping an experimental approach. Until a cure is found, Sherer says the culture of the organization continues to mirror Fox’s vision, “which is all about urgency and optimism.”

Making the Big Switch

Sherer says moving from the lab to the corner office was an evolution of his interests and responsibilities. “I joined the foundation with desire to do something more impactful for patients rather than for an individual lab and individual projects. When you have to be the world’s expert on that particular project, you can lose sight of the context.” When his original fellowship from MJFF required him to report on progress in front of its staff and scientific board, Sherer began to understand how managing science could accelerate the progress of finding a cure.

Fast Tracking–Even With Big Pharma

When potential funding partners are big companies with ingrained hierarchies and bureaucracies, it wouldn’t be surprising for things to move at a glacial pace. Sherer’s managed to make significant progress and stay true to MJFF’s nimble goals. To date, MJFF has secured nine industry partners on its landmark clinical study to discover biomarkers for PD progression in patients. On the roster are Abbott Laboratories, Biogen Idec, Covance, GE Healthcare, Genentech, Merck, Pfizer, and Roche.

“We try to use our flexibility to take on initiatives that large companies and institutions wouldn’t be able to accomplish on their own,” says Sherer. “Then we can be the glue that allows these projects to happen.”

By remaining focused on research, Sherer says MJFF is seen as a credible partner with a solid reputation.

Making Smooth Transitions

Sherer started with MJFF in 2004 and became head of research just two years later. Reporting directly to then-CEO Katie Hood gave Sherer the insight he needed into strategy and different projects. “I had a lot of relationships with key constituents in research and with industry partners from day one,” he adds.

The key to a smooth transition and getting the team behind him was good communication. “We had open communication with staff about the change. Katie was very supportive of me. She was open about her reasons for moving on and putting me in the lead. I also had one-on-one meetings with her to understand challenges and be up to speed right away,” he explains.

Finding Your Leadership Style

Sherer says what enjoys most about his job is driving for results. He says, “This may come as a surprise for a science guy, but I played a lot of basketball in high school. The first time I was someone’s boss was when I was a coach at a summer camp.” What he enjoyed then was leading by example and working with the other coaches to push for results. He loved team sports because a player’s contribution could have an impact on others. For example, he says “You can play in the back of the field and still help another team member score.”

Teamwork is critical at MJFF, as scientific research is all about collaboration. “It’s not just about one scientist who is working in isolation who may have a eureka moment, it’s about having a unifying, driving force behind you.”

To get buy-in for new projects, Sherer says one of the main concepts is inclusiveness. “We work closely with other PD foundations that all have a stake in the game. It’s an important approach to increase adoption, in same way getting collaborative feedback from partners to make changes keep things fresh and constantly evolving.”

Eye on the Prize

 Sherer admits that if he ever doesn’t know what to do he’s got a veritable army of support behind him. “I feel fortunate at MJFF that the people in senior positions have a really good understanding of the mission and goals.” Within the organization, Sherer says he’s got a wealth of trusted advisors and a 40-person scientific advisory board. “I have different panels of experts who all care deeply and help us achieve our goals.”

Keeping an eye on the prize is only part of the way to reach the goal, scientific or otherwise, Sherer says. For PD research he says “I think that one of the most important things is getting assessment and input from patients to define the biggest medical needs.” From there, you must lay out a specific plan to get there. “There are limited resources and limited funding. If everyone is rowing the boat in the same direction, we can make the biggest impact for patients.”

Image: Flickr user Esther Simpson

Most of the time, if you ask someone about their agenda, it turns out that it involves doing what’s on someone else’s agenda.

I need to do this for my boss, this for my husband, that for the PTSA and this other thing for the kids. As soon as you turn over your agenda to others, you’re giving up one of the biggest opportunities you have to contribute. Setting an agenda is often as important as checking the boxes.

Obviously, you can’t be part of any system without engaging with other people and their agendas.

But perhaps we’ve absorbed that habit so completely that we’ve ceded all responsibility and in fact don’t even have an agenda any longer…

Sometimes change is a great thing, and other times it seems like a lot of extra hoops to jump through with meager benefits.

Here’s a comic from Mashable’s own editor-in-chief Lance Ulanoff, accurately expressing the way many Facebook users are feeling this week.

Just wait until they’re hit with the biggest changes, due on a Facebook account near you on Sept. 29 (or you can make the new Timeline appear right now if you’re slightly adventurous).

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 not only set a box office record for midnight showings, it absolutely shattered opening day box office records.

The film grossed a jaw-dropping $92.1 million in the U.S. on Friday. That’s not only the biggest opening-day draw of all time, it’s the highest-grossing single day in U.S. box office history.

Worldwide, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 is also breaking box office records. The film has already grossed more than $157.5 million internationally, breaking opening-day records in the UK and Mexico.

Box Office Mojo puts the figures in perspective:

• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 took in 50% more on its first day than the previous Potter film, Deathly Hallows Part 1, back in November. At the time, the $61.7 million opening day was a franchise high. With 1.5x the gross, Deathly Hallows Part 2 clearly sets the record.
• Deathly Hallows Part 2 also outstripped past films in terms of estimated attendance.
• When you subtract the record braking $43.5 million midnight gross from the total day figures, you’re still left with $48.6 million for the rest of the day. This, in and of itself, beats the midnight free gross for every other film, with the exception of The Dark Knight (which took in $48.7 million sans midnight totals).
• The first day ticket receipts alone beat every other weekend opening for 2011, with the exception of Transformers: Dark of the Moon.

SEE ALSO: Harry Potter and the Social Media Surge

The eight and final Harry Potter film is expected to easily best The Dark Knight as the biggest opening weekend of all time. In 2008, The Dark Knight took in $158.4 million in its opening weekend.

Of course, a big factor in Deathly Hallows Part 2‘s boffo ticket sales are the fact that the film was released in 3D. Although 3D tickets only accounted for 45% of the box office gross (as compared to 60% for Transformers: Dark of the Moon), the number of 3D screens available is unmatched by any other new film. Moreover, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 opened in 4,375 locations and on 11,000 screens.

Warner Bros. embraced social media in a big way in the promotion of Deathly Hallows Part 2. In addition to running significant campaigns on Facebook and Twitter, the studio also reached out to fan sites and created YouTube videos to promote the film.

What did you think of Deathly Hallows Part 2? Let us know in the comments.

Inclusion is the secret sauce of social media. It’s one of the biggest opportunities. We can fill that sense of a need to belong. Social media allows for this.

Before you get all “gee whiz” about that, or think that it’s something too touchy-feely, realize that what humans want more than most things is validation. When we look at ads, the biggest emotion we tend to feel is, “I’m the type of person who would have that.” It’s this sense that we need to be included.

But advertising and marketing quite often leaves people feeling left out.

Invite Them In

Your community is a gift. Loyal connectivity between whatever you represent and the people who are drawn to it is a huge boon that you must nurture and feed. This leads to the business you’re so hoping to attain.

Think about it: would you rather 10,000 dispassionate people swing by, and maybe 50 make a purchase, or would you rather 300 really loyal people stick around, buy from you when the products make sense, and tell their friends how they’re part of something?

Really think about that for a moment.

Part of Something

These tools like Facebook aren’t places to put your coupons and your deals. They’re places for you to interact, to answer questions, to support people’s causes. Twitter is a chance to understand your buyers’ moods in between purchases, to support their goals, to listen to their concerns.

It’s fascinating how many businesses pay for customer opinion surveys but don’t listen to the free opinions given via the social web. Dip into a tool like Radian6 and you start to understand sentiment, percentage of conversation, and even more. Use even free tools to grow bigger ears and you’ve got the chance to understand people in many actionable dimensions.

Keep The Fires Warm

The environment of social media is quite often the cocktail party before the sale. It’s a chance to include people, to invite them in, to get to know them. And not because they’re a buyer, but because they’re people who’ve expressed an interest, and who might lead to even more serendipitous opportunities.

On a very personal note, I’m writing this from a conference ( SOBCon) where the opportunities are often a few years from when you first met the person, but where the intensity of those opportunities brings a whole new level of appreciation for what it means to belong to something. There’s no better sense of belonging than what you get from being part of something like SOBCon or PodCamp or Podcasters Across Borders. And that’s what has to happen with your social media and related efforts, online or offline.

Help others stay included. It’s worth gold (of many kinds).

By the way, the photographer for this photo above, Eric Albee, has some great snaps.

One of the biggest issues with hydrogen fuel cells, aside from the lack of fueling infrastructure, is the high cost of the technology. Fuel cells use a lot of platinum, with is frightfully expensive and one reason we’ll pay $50,000 or so for the hydrogen cars automakers say we’ll see in 2015.

That might soon change. Researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory have developed a platinum-free catalyst in the cathode of a hydrogen fuel cell that uses carbon, iron and cobalt. That could make hydrogen fuel cells “two to three orders of magnitude cheaper,” the lab says.

Although the discovery means we could see hydrogen fuel cells in a wide variety of applications, it could have the biggest implications for automobiles.

Despite the auto industry’s focus on hybrids, plug-in hybrids and battery electric vehicles — driven in part by the Obama Administration’s love of cars with cords — several automakers remain convinced hydrogen fuel cells are the best alternative to internal combustion.

Hydrogen offers the benefits of battery electric vehicles — namely zero tailpipe emissions — without the drawbacks of short range and long recharge times. Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are electric vehicles; they use a fuel cell instead of a battery to provide juice. You can fill a car with hydrogen in minutes, it’ll go about 250 miles or so and the technology is easily adapted to everything from forklifts to automobiles to buses.

Toyota, Mercedes-Benz and Honda are among the automakers promising to deliver hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in 2015. Toyota has said it has cut the cost of fuel cell vehicles more than 90 percent by using less platinum — which currently goes for around $1,800 an ounce — and other expensive materials. It plans to sell its first hydrogen vehicle for around $50,000, a figure Daimler has cited as a viable price for the Mercedes-Benz F-Cell (pictured above in Australia).

Fifty grand is a lot of money, especially something like the F-Cell — which is based on the B-Class compact — or the Honda FCX Clarity.

Zelenay and Wu in the lab.

In a paper published today in Science, Los Alamos researchers Gang Wu, Christina Johnston and Piotr Zelenay, joined by Karren More of Oak Ridge National Laboratory, outline their platinum-free cathode catalyst.

The catalysts use carbon, iron and cobalt. The researchers say the fuel cell provided high power with reasonable efficiency and promising durability. It provided currents comparable to conventional fuel cells, and showed favorable durability when cycled on and off — a condition that quickly damages inferior catalysts.

The researchers say the carbon-iron-cobalt catalyst completed the conversion of hydrogen and oxygen into water, rather than producing large amounts of hydrogen peroxide. They claim the catalyst created minimal amounts of hydrogen peroxide — a substance that cuts power output and can damage the fuel cell — even when compared to the best platinum-based fuel cells. In fact, the fuel cell works so well the researchers have filed a patent for it.

The researchers did not directly quantify the cost savings their cathode catalyst offers, which would be difficult because platinum surely would become more expensive if fuel cells became more prevalent. But the lab notes that iron and cobalt are cheap and abundant, and so the cost of fuel cells is “definitely two to three orders of magnitude cheaper.”

“The encouraging point is that we have found a catalyst with a good durability and life cycle relative to platinum-based catalysts,” Zelenay said in a statement. “For all intents and purposes, this is a zero-cost catalyst in comparison to platinum, so it directly addresses one of the main barriers to hydrogen fuel cells.”

Photo: Daimler. The Mercedes-Benz F-Cell hydrogen fuel cell vehicle roaming Australia during the round-the-world F-Cell World Tour.

It was 50 years ago when people first flew in space. Here’s an infographic that shows you the spacecraft humans have flown to reach that great void over the past half-century.

With just two flights of the space shuttle left, what’s next? You can see Richard Branson‘s SpaceShipOne in the infographic, giving us a look forward at what’s waiting in the wings — vessels that might find a different financial route to space, relying on private funding rather than governmental largess.

All is not lost, though, for the U.S. manned space program. Even though NASA‘s Ares launch vehicles and their associated Constellation program were canceled because of budget constraints, NASA selected SpaceX and its Falcon launch vehicles and Dragon spacecraft for the space agency’s Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program.

SpaceX successfully test flew its Falcon 9 launch vehicle with an unmanned Dragon spacecraft along for the ride last December, and just last week introduced its newest heavy-lift rocket, the massive 27-engine Falcon Heavy that’s the biggest rocket since the Saturn V. SpaceX says that monster will fly in 2013.

What you think of human space travel? Post a comment!

Infographic courtesy Space.com

This series is supported by IGLOO, a leader in helping organizations improve business processes, increase employee productivity and enhance stakeholder engagement inside and outside the organization using social technologies.

As more companies and PR firms attempt to manage their brands using social media, there are just as many opportunities for greatness as there are pitfalls.

To broaden our collective understanding of these challenges, we consulted six social media pros with extensive experience in PR, branding and marketing. Each one has gained respect in their respective spheres of work; and each one of them told us about a unique challenge and how to address it.

From being transparent to being profitable, from the tools you use today to the ones you’ll need tomorrow, here are six specific challenges to managing your brand on the social web. If you’ve got your own insights to share, please let us know about them in the comments.

1. Drew Olanoff: Your Biggest Challenge Is Transparency

You might know Drew Olanoff from his long and ballsy public “feud” with cancer. But he’s also a king among community managers — currently working for textPlus — and an all-around bright young man, especially when it comes to dissecting how social media mechanisms work in real-world business environments.

Olanoff’s advice stressed the need to “be everything to everyone.” He advises not holding back or skimping on your branding and marketing. Internally, you have to let employees know what your external messaging is going to be.

When communicating to the outside world, Olanoff said, “You have to be straight up. If your company fails, you have to be the first to call yourself on it. If you succeed, you have to message that in a way to get people’s attention.” It requires undivided attention to communicate with the social web in an honest, diligent way. “It’s a 24/7 job,” he concluded.

2. Scott Monty: Your Biggest Challenge Is Scale

Scott Monty is Ford’s intrepid and brilliant social media chief. He told us that among all the challenges facing a brand on the social web, “one of the biggest is the issue of scale. If you’re working for a successful brand, there will always be more customers than there are employees, which means there will be many more conversations about your brand than you’ll be able to participate in.”

Monty says that being able to scale your social media conversations and branding requires careful prioritization. “Exercise judgment to determine which discussions are worth spending time on. It could be engaging with a major influencer, publicly handling a customer complaint, or giving fans special access to events, information or other opportunities that would deepen a relationship.”

He also noted that you’ll need to limit how many services and platforms you use. “Decide which social networks are the most relevant to your customer base and help you achieve your broader business communications goals. Choose a small number to begin and expand your footprint based on staffing and trends that are evolving externally.”

Monty noted that half the battle is simply showing up. “It’s not just about running an online promotion or campaign and expecting results. You need to be there consistently and reliably every day, so that over time, a community will grow — and that’s when the magic begins to happen.”

3. Laura Fitton: Your Biggest Challenge Is Your Toolbelt

We love Laura “@Pistachio” Fitton. This woman is a powerhouse: Intelligent, capable, and bursting at the seams with a deeply ingrained knowledge of the apps and software that make the social web both easier and more robust.

For Fitton, the biggest challenge facing brand managers is “figuring out which tools you should use from the hundreds of tools you could use.” As the founder of oneforty, an app store for third-party Twitter applications, she knows better than anyone just how many tools are available and how much they can vary in quality.

“It takes time and effort to find tools that suit your business’ needs, your team’s work style, your data, backup, analytics and tracking requirements,” Fitton said. “The right tools can save a lot of time, money and hassle.”

4. Peter Shankman: Your Biggest Challenge Is Revenue

PR man Peter Shankman is perhaps best known for Help a Reporter Out, his amazingly cool resource for PR folks, subject experts and journalists trying to find sources. He also wrote the book on PR stunts that actually work.

While this sometimes flamboyant, outspoken, skydiving entrepreneur clearly loves making a splash, he advises brand managers to keep and eye on the bottom line. Your biggest challenge, he said, is “convincing the people actually doing the managing that it’s not about cool, but about revenue. If what they’re doing doesn’t increase revenue in some way, the powers that be won’t give a damn how cool it is.”

5. Ayelet Noff: Your Biggest Challenge Is Relationships

On the flip side of that coin, online marketing and branding pro “Blonde 2.0,” a.k.a. Ayelet Noff, reminds us that not every action will or should lead to a quick buck for brands that use the social web.

“Brands have to make the mental switch from seizing every opportunity to sell to their market and rather look for ways to engage with consumers instead,” she said. “If a customer reaches out to you, instead of pitching them, try talking to them, listening to what they have to say and make an effort to develop an ongoing communicative relationship. Such a relationship is far more valuable than any one-time sale.”

6. Brian Solis: Your Biggest Challenge Is the Future

One of the biggest names — and one of the best guys — in PR right now is Brian Solis. He is the principal at über-firm FutureWorks and recently published Engage!, a thorough and fascinating guide to online PR and branding.

When we asked him about the blessings and curses of social media for brand managers, Solis gave us the following forward-looking advice: “The greatest challenge that faces brands in social media today and tomorrow is the culture shift required to not only support engagement in social media but also adapt to become an authority within each network of relevance. In order to do so, however, businesses require a bottom-up conversation workflow that leads and responds, and also a top-down hierarchy that transforms insight into new products and services.” Essentially, businesses need to listen to their communities and embrace new ideas while having the administrative structure and openness to convert those ideas into practicable services.

“This is not about competing for the moment,” Solis said, “this is about competing for relevance and resonance for the long term.”

This series is supported by IGLOO, a leader in helping organizations improve business processes, increase employee productivity and enhance stakeholder engagement inside and outside the organization using social technologies.

IGLOO is a social software company that builds online communities for business. Uniting content management, collaboration and knowledge sharing tools, within one secure social networking platform, IGLOO enables organizations to overcome the barriers to communication and collaboration that emerge because of size. Whether the obstacles are organizational or geographic, a more open and connected business improves employee productivity (Workplace Communities) and helps to foster better relationships with customers, partners and suppliers (Marketplace Communities). Learn more about how IGLOO is socializing the workplace and helping organizations build successful online communities through the IGLOO Social Media Playbook.