The past few days I had the opportunity to help lead, participate, and facilitate a deliberately disruptive economic development think tank session in Albuquerque, New Mexico. And luckily for me, this event was strategically timed around one of the greatest entertainment spectacles in the United States; the Balloon Fiesta. It is a party of sorts for hot air enthusiasts and admirers alike to elevate their perspectives. And while the beautiful balloons painted the Albuquerque sky and helped heighten many a rider’s point of view, a couple of miles away at the CELab we were similarly enhancing our own mindsets through the elevation of issues, ideas, and alternative methods of thinking.
Scientists, government representatives, seasoned entrepreneurs, data professionals, collaboration experts, management consultants, and even Chinese business investment representatives showed up to answer one question: How can we change the future of our economies? The conference challenged conventional economic development perspectives and prescriptions with modern, data-driven recommendations backed by psychology, strategic foresight and private sector validation. Our audience may have been diverse, but a theme of shared economic prosperity was homogeneous.
Here are some of the ideas that rose to the top:
1. Ecosystem thinking - Success doesn’t come alone. Understanding that the economy is made up of silos, different functions within an economic system that have different agendas/functions, and yet can be part of a bigger solution. Patrick Lencioni, in his book Silos, Politics and Turf Wars, wrote that "Silos – and the turf wars they enable – devastate organizations. They waste resources, kill productivity, and jeopardize the achievement of goals." If silos can negatively impact the resources, productivity and goals of an organization, imagine what they can do to a community! It is the idea that through collaboration the different structures cannot only achieve their goals, but accomplish even more than they thought possible. Those who understand the economic ecosystem will generate a competitive advantage.
As one colleague, Joe Slater puts it, "the solution lies in figuring out what matters together, making better decisions faster and acting together with grace and accountability."
2. Strategic planning - It’s hard thinking longer term in economic development. But if not us then who? Without concerted and accountable planning efforts, economic development’s impact on our economy will be lessened and likely short-lived.
3. New program development - New efforts are underway to support improving economic and community health. Some of the programs discussed included leveraging the remote economy, breaking poverty cycles to stimulate the economic base, transitioning boomer owned business as a BRE strategy, and middle school curriculum programs that could redefine our workforce capacity conversations.
4. Disruptions - With so many advancements in technology, such as AI and autonomous vehicles, the future of work is uncertain. How do we prepare for the unknown, and how might this effect we define work at a fundamental level?
5. Relentless execution- Talk is cheap (if it isn’t followed by action) and you can’t just shape an economy on what you are going to do.
6. Better sales + marketing - A basic, yet often overlooked, concept is the idea that communities need to be better marketers, storytellers, and purveyors of all things compelling about their communities. My international work at Conway, Inc has shown me that value-added marketing is a universal language and the best organizations understand how to leverage this tool to generate buy-in, differentiate assets, and manage expectations. The digitization/disruption of industry is also impacting how economic development organizations can re-tool their current marketing and business development approaches.
As another colleague, Sean Hutchinson says, "We move in the direction of our conversations." But if we’re not having them, we’re not moving. So let’s have them. And just like the hot air balloons, we’ll take off and see just how high and how far we can go.