I recently enjoyed listening to Guy Kawasaki in person at the Cleveland TechSync, which is trying to foster regional economic growth and tech innovation. His talk was good, he is a good speaker and has a wealth of experience (as he put it – ” I know too much”!).
I love the efforts going on in this region – helping young and upcoming entrepreneurs with resources that would make it condusive to start a company in this region. But as Guy highlighted in the talk, the main focus should be on education and specifically engineering which will drive innovation. Everything else will follow.
Case in point: Ford vs Toyota, the latter has great products and very little in “employee discounts”. This month it overtook Ford as the No.2 in terms of sales volumes. If you look around there are several such examples – iPod, BMW, Sony, etc that stand true to this test. Great products “that have depth – Guy” will shine and emerge victors (as look as they do not really really mess up other aspects of the business).
I think the sure way to improve the region is to invest in school and university. Start from ground up..teach kids math and science and let them think freely. Honestly I have taught some freshmen classes, the students are totally ill equipped when it comes to simple mathematic. Not their fault really, in a culture where geeks are projected as freaks or looser (ridiculous)
Once they are nurtured, their quest for knowledge will drive them to find ways to acquire it – be it college or real life. The next best thing is to make the local universities worth aspiring for and not having to loose these smart kids to the Yales and Harvards.
Easier said than done, however it begins with leadership and the aspiration to challenge the status quo, which I think is present in North East Ohio. So what are we waiting for?