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CASE STUDY
Creating an Innovation Led City
The City of Pomona launched a bold effort to strengthen innovation across city government. Partnering closely with the Innovation Leadership Team, and staff across all departments, Ascendant's team supported the development of Pomona’s first Innovation Strategy—a five-year roadmap designed to leverage creative problem solving techniques and mindsets improve how the City delivers services, collaborates with community members, and supports a vibrant, inclusive future for all Pomonans.
This project combined strategic planning, human-centered design, culture change, performance management, organizational development, and capacity-building to ensure the strategy is not just a document—but a long-term, sustainable framework owned by City staff.
6. CO-CREATED THE OBJECTIVES, ACTIONS & METRICS
Through a series of structured workshops with the ILT and departments, we then co-created the strategy’s objectives, actions, and metrics. This collaborative process produced a clear, measurable framework that ties day-to-day work to long-term outcomes and helps the City track progress over time.
1. THE CHALLENGE
Pomona is a diverse, dynamic city facing complex challenges: growing service demands, an increase in unhoused residents, aging infrastructure, and a need for clearer, more consistent customer service. While there was strong leadership commitment to innovation, staff needed support aligning around shared priorities, building new capabilities, and strengthening collaboration across departments.
The City wanted:
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A unifying vision for innovation
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Clear long-term goals tied to measurable outcomes
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Practical steps departments could take
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A scalable internal training program
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Processes that help staff partner more meaningfully with residents
2. CONDUCTED A BASELINE ASSESSMENT
We conducted a citywide baseline assessment using interviews, workshops, surveys, document analysis, and Ascendant's robust Innovation Maturity Model. This helped identify strengths, gaps, and opportunities.
The insights grounded the strategy in real staff experiences and operational realities.
3. FORMED A CITY STAFF AND COMMUNITY ADVISORY COMMITTEE
To ground the strategy in lived experience, we formed two advisory committees: one composed of diverse community members and another representing City staff across every department. These groups met throughout the process and served as an essential sounding board, ensuring the strategy was co-created in a way that reflected both community needs and city aspirations.
4. CO-CREATED THE VISION, VALUES & GOALS


Working closely with these committees, city leadership, and the Innovation Leadership Team (ILT), we facilitated a series of co-design sessions to create Pomona’s innovation vision, values, and long-term goals. These conversations helped define what innovation means for the City, what the community expects from its government, and how staff can work together toward a shared future.
5. RECRUITED DEPARTMENTAL WORKING GROUPS
With the vision and goals in place, we began recruiting departmental working groups to take a deeper look at the systems, services, and challenges within their areas of responsibility. These groups played a key role in shaping the strategy’s direction and identifying high-impact opportunities for improvement.
To support learning and adaptability, we designed feedback mechanisms that allow staff and community members to share insights, flag barriers, and help the City adjust course as needed. These loops ensure that the strategy remains dynamic rather than static, evolving as staff test new ideas and gather real-world evidence.
7. LAUNCHED POMONA’S INNOVATION STRATEGY 2025-30
In November 2025, Pomona formally launched its Innovation Strategy 2025–2030 and began implementing the first round of training. Shortly afterward, we facilitated an action planning workshop with the ILT to shift the work from strategy development into execution. The workshop clarified departmental roles, identified early next steps, and outlined how data will be collected and reported as implementation moves forward.
8. BUILT INNOVATION TRAINING


Building the City’s internal capacity was a central part of the project. We developed and have launched a citywide Innovation Training program to equip staff with tools in human-centered design, customer service, collaborative problem-solving, and facilitation.
The program was piloted in November and is being rolled out to every team member, ensuring staff have early exposure to the mindsets and practices needed to bring the innovation strategy to life.
Looking ahead
With action planning underway and training expanding citywide, the City is well-positioned to begin piloting projects and building a culture of continuous learning and improvement.
As next steps, we are supporting the city in finalizing their action plans, creation of a performance measurement and management, and embedding systems and processes that more formally align culture, expectations, and performance in city systems with the innovation goals.
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