About the PIF Foundation

Mission

The world has changed significantly since our nation’s founders first sought to form a more perfect union. The challenges we face are great and incredibly complex: from saving lives when faced with natural disasters, to upgrading the infrastructure that serves our veterans, to unleashing government data that powers the economy and creates jobs.

Presidential Innovation Fellows represent the best talent our nation has to offer to deal with the new challenges of today. As entrepreneurial leaders in design and technology, fellows are asked to take on difficult, multi-headed and technologically-oriented problems and create transformational changes to make a real and lasting impact. Fellows start each day with full knowledge that their project’s scale, scope and even direction might change. Resilient in the face of uncertainty, fellows seize opportunities, untangle bureaucracy, and foster partnerships both within and outside their agency, all while being focused by their guiding principle:

Aut viam inveniam aut faciam — Either find a way or make one.

The experience that each fellow has is different, but in the end, their work is the same: do the hard thing, do the right thing, and serve the interests of the people of the United States and the world.

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The Foundation

As the alumni organization for all former Presidential Innovation Fellows, the PIF Foundation serves to preserve the history and development of the program over time. Our mission is to continually develop the people of the U.S. Government for lasting social impact.

The Presidential Innovation Fellows Foundation (PIFF) is an independent, non-profit organization that:

Promotes and uplifts the people producing innovative products and thinking within the Federal government to deepen impact.
Oversees alumni resources, talents, and initiatives to advise, guide, advocate for and support the Presidential Innovation Fellows (PIF) Program. The Foundation amplifies the Program’s reputation, reach, and impact.
Cultivates a mutually beneficial connection between current Presidential Innovation Fellows (PIFs) and its growing community of alumni. The Foundation supports alumni programs and services, facilitates communication between, and seeks to strengthen alumni bonds.

The PIF Program continues to attract the brightest entrepreneurs as beacons of change and continuous improvement in government to make a profound and lasting impact on our nation. The PIF Foundation is the nonprofit, nonpartisan center supporting the overall mission of the Program to bring the principles, values, and practices of the innovation economy into the government.

The experience that each fellow has is different, but in the end, their work is the same: do the hard thing, do the right thing, and serve the interests of the people of the United States and the world.

History

The Presidential Innovation Fellows (PIF) program was established by the White House in 2012 to attract top innovators into government, capable of tackling issues at the convergence of technology, policy, and process. Presidential Innovation Fellows serve for 12-months, during which they work on one or several initiatives, working to transform ideas into tangible results in at startup speed. Fellows operate with wide latitude for individual initiative in planning and executing solutions to problem, and spend a significant portion of their time co-working and collaborating with other Fellows. Throughout the program, Fellows receive support from partners and change agents in the White House across various federal agencies.