Tuesday, October 27, 2009
A roadmap to the innovation economy
Cory Donovan is the executive director of the NewVa Corridor Technology Council. If there is a topic you would like to see, e-mail us at newriver@roanoke.com. According to a recent report of the AeA (formerly known as the American Electronics Association), Virginia has the highest concentration of technology workers in the nation.
However, a Kaufman Foundation study found that the commonwealth lags in both entrepreneurial endeavors and the creation of intellectual property.
Moreover, Virginia's entrepreneurs have a more difficult time securing seed stage funding for start-up than entrepreneurs in Maryland and Pennsylvania. To be globally competitive, it is in the commonwealth's long-term interest to resolve these and other issues.
As private sector leaders know, management excellence requires commonsense performance measurements.
The establishment of a new strategic management tool -- the Commonwealth Innovation Index -- is enabling the business and the technology community to provide guidance to government leaders so they can steer Virginia toward global leadership in advanced technology company formation, expansion and attraction, while targeting public investments more strategically.
Massachusetts, Virginia's gross state product peer, has successfully used indexing for policy development and performance measurement for 10 years. And a National Governor's Association's Innovation Report recommends the establishment of baseline measurements and cites the Massachusetts index as a best practice.
Unlike Massachussetts and other states that use centralized planning and top-down directives, however, this is a grassroots, regional approach that gives local industry and technology leaders the opportunity to provide input about innovations that will shape the future of their regions.
The NewVa Corridor Technology Council has convened a series of focus groups to identify industry clusters that will guide economic activity for the next several years. Council and business leaders see these as areas for growth and innovation and are outlining issues that need to be addressed.
During this process, regional leaders are profiling leading technology sectors and related work-force requirements, educational attainment and areas of research emphasis.
The Innovation Index is creating both a road map to the innovation economy in our region while providing elected officials and business leaders with guidance and expertise to make strategic investments that benefits the region and the commonwealth.
