IEDA meeting (and IRP followup)

A quick followup re last Tuesday’s IRP board meeting after a note from last Thursday’s IEDA meeting…

IEDA is the state “trade association” for economic development & has some serious, committed, passionate talent working for our communities statewide [www.ieda.biz]. Entrepreneurial development is slowly getting on their radar screen. [Even nationally, economic development tends to focus on business attraction/recruitment, much less on business retention/expansion, and even less on business creation.] But the typical IEDA members ARE interested, so we need to keep cultivating friendships with Idaho’s economic developers. (They would be ideal to carry the entrepreneurial “gospel” across the state… and it’s fundable. More re $$ in future posts…)

The most interesting part of Thursday’s IEDA meeting was a presentation by Ms. Brenda Deeley of Porter Novelli, a big-time “Madison Avenue” marketing/PR outfit, who BVEP engaged to get Idaho’s name out there. They are doing this through sharing great Idaho stories. If you’ve noticed an upsurge in national stories that refer to Idaho or Idaho businesses, you’ll know they’ve been busy. However, the biggest positive impact from PN’s Brenda Deeley (and George Medici - who apparently loves Dawson-Taylor) may not be attracting firms. [I'll explain after the jump...]

What I see through my entrepreneurial lens is not “business recruitment”; I see “entrepreneurial recruitment.” A player like Porter Novelli can’t be spinning major league publications and major league reporters, their personal and corporate reps are on the line. Accentuate the positive, yes, but the truth matters. Business recruitment may be less optimal as an economic strategy, but it’s a political reality. And if it’s done right, adding someone like PN to the mix does provide an unalloyed blessing: Educating the world about Idaho.

The more people out there know about our strengths and about the opportunities here, the better off we are. Note that I said “people.” You don’t need to be Dick Florida (a fellow Buckeye!) to know that if Boise and Idaho are to become truly “happening” places economically -and entrepreneurially - we need an influx of “happening” - and entrepreneurial - people. One stat has Idaho #45 for net in-migration of knowledge workers. The more educated people are about Idaho, the odds of improving that stat grow dramatically.

There is some evidence this is already happening, even beyond Planet Ada; we certainly can see the talent here that doesn’t want to leave, again across the state. Will Porter Novelli’s efforts lead to attracting more talent? Seems promising. Even if we don’t draw entrepreneurial companies, but we draw terrific entrepreneurs and potential entrepreneurs… that will still be a most positive sign for the future!

So….. if YOU have an entrepreneurial story to share or know someone who does, I’m happy to pass along the intel (as will Reverend Rick).

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update from the IRP Board Meeting– one thing I neglected to mention is that the Entrepreneurship Task Force and the Board as a whole are very interested in a Web 2.0 approach to connecting entrepreneurs, mentors, other resources. The “Facebook” model and eventually a cloud representation [Brice Sloan's idea] of the interconnects would be quite useful. Interesting how the “rural’ crowd “gets” Web 2.0….

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