ECC: Building a Entrepreneurial Ecosystem for Cleantech?
ECC:
Building a Entrepreneurial Ecosystem for Cleantech?
Recently, I had the marvelous honor of helping with the
first Energize conference by the Utah-based Energy Commercialization Center. My
readers know my strong interest in how you build an effective, “defragged”
entrepreneurial ecosystem and I was jazzed to see the great first steps that
ECC is taking to do that for cleantech (broadly defined). Their charter is to
build this for the entire intermountain region.
What
are they doing right?
Engaging
the right people (and not the wrong people). Other than a little
of the usual nobody-loves-me, I’m-all-alone whining, this even included a nice
cross-section of the “A Team” [see my “DEFRAG” post below] and deftly avoided
the more negative voices. Idaho Commerce’s Jessie Speck can attest that with a
positive vibe and the level of competence, we heard a level of candor that is
rare and much, much appreciated! (Jessie made Idaho look good, btw.)
Focus
on excellence. The competence level was terrific. People got
to contribute where they add the most value, not necessarily what their job
titles might suggest. I would be bowing deeply toward the various talented
attendees but I can’t figure out how to bow in multiple directions (attendees
came from CO, AZ, NM, MT, ID and NV and beyond).
Understand
that it IS an ecosystem, interconnected, messy, noisy and dynamic.
Ecosystems are more than a state of nature, they are also a trajectory. If you
want to get from A to B, don’t you need a good idea where A is? And B? J In the various discussions,
I can see from my notes some useful insights as to the current state of the
ecosystem (and how we got here). We also
got a few insights about where we want to go. (Where the “A team” wants to go
is usually very telling.)
So
what makes an ecosystem special?
One point that became crystal clear is that effective
ecosystems don’t do 1 or 2 things differently, they do several important
things differently that are decidedly different from the “usual.” And these
different things are unavoidably disruptive.
(Paul Ahlstrom’s closing keynote cheerfully suggested that the lean startup
crowd hijack federal tech transfer. As you might guess, I was a WEE bit happy!)
At best, these “different” features run completely counter to the conventional
wisdom.
In my notes, I wrote something I stole from Utah’s Rob
Wuebker, the narrative is completely
different. The story of how things get done and why and by whom… is very
different in effective ecosystems. Go back and re-read Brad Feld’s “Startup
Communities”. (Look at the markers of a healthy entrepreneurial ecosystem at http://bit.ly/EcoSys ...
tell me these are “normal” for most communities, whether a city or an industry.
Robert Bell and his crew at ECC have a mandate to be
disruptive. So far, they’ve been gentle (only one bureaucracy has yelled at
them… so far) but things will be getting, um, “interesting.” J
Paul
Ahlstrom
Co-author of lean book “Nail It Then Scale It”, VC/angel
and another gentle disruptor, Paul closed the Energize event with some great
insights, including a few on how Utah’s is mapping their ecosystem.
#1. It
never ends.
#2. You’ve got to talk to the entrepreneurs; he mentioned over 140
interviews with Utah entrepreneurs, triangulated with multiple other mapping
efforts, including help from the Kauffman Foundation ( Idaho, we could do that
too.. interested?)
#3. Need a critical mass of entrepreneurial and innovative
human capital.
#4. A major [emphasis on MAJOR] research university is
necessary.
#5 The "ingredients” aren’t enough; you need to defrag the
ecosystem.
#6. Identify the right players to defrag (what I’m calling the “A
team” who reflect the 3 C’s: Competent, Connected, Collegial. I’m guessing that
Paul would underline collegial.) ***
To Paul: Thanks! To the rest of you: Go add
Paul’s book to your reading list.
And... again thanks!
In Jim Collins’ terms, sometimes you can’t get the wrong
people off the bus, you have to build a new bus. Thanks to Robert, Mike and the
rest for letting me (Jessie Speck too) on thise bus! We can’t wait to see this
new bus move forward!
p.s. We also see how important it is to have events managed brilliantly - so major props to Social Enterprises of Portland - Stephanie Stettler & Jennifer Worcester [if they tell me more names, I'll edit this!]
***)
Nobody is entitled to be involved with driving the ‘defrag’. Even the wrong
people do get to be on the bus, just not at the outset. Isn’t it smarter to
start with the highly competent, highly connected and highly collegial?
posted by Norris Krueger at 7:29 PM
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