The Senator Comes to the Falcone Center

Great day today for the Falcone Center for Entrepreneurship as United States Senator for New York Kirsten Gillibrand was at our South Side Innovation Center this morning. Senator Gillibrand convened a roundtable discussion to hear from veterans and area business leaders about how the government might work to ensure jobs for New York veterans. During the session, the Senator discussed her plans to provide tax credits for businesses who hire vets, provide more job training for veterans, and better facilitate the transition from active duty to the job market.

The Post Standard’s follow-up article provided information about the session. The South Side Innovation Center is a 13,000 square foot community based microenterprise incubator operated by the Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University. The SSIC, which was opened in 2006, offers offices with phones, computers and furniture; shared conference rooms; training and resource rooms; a resource library; large equipment use and reception area services at a low cost to local entrepreneurs. The SSIC currently houses 24 resident businesses, serves 300+ non‐tenant clients, and provides training, workshops, classes, networking, and mentoring opportunities to approximately 1,000 other individuals and entrepreneurs.

Small Ideas

Get yourself a cup of coffee, settle back in a comfortable chair, and enjoy 15 minutes with Allen Kupetz. Allen’s outstanding presentation took place at the recent TEDxOrlando conference and it considers things such as purple catsup, the Segway, and the interesting notion of The Small Idea.

Crowd Accelerated Innovation

While aggregation and syndication are the some of the watchwords of the internet, in an interesting article in Wired magazine, they’ve given me another phrase to think of: Crowd Accelerated Innovation. That article, written by Chris Anderson, made me start thinking of my own Center’s website, and the website’s of so many companies that I’ve visited lately. Here at the Falcone Center for Entrepreneurship, we’re capturing everything we can on video and getting ready to use them in our soon-to-be-updated website. I’ve also passed on the information to two of my daughters who are thinking of launching their own business. No matter what you’re doing…video makes things so much more interesting and exciting for the viewer/reader of your website.

From the article:

I believe that the arrival of free online video may turn out to be just as significant a media development as the arrival of print. It is creating new global communities, granting their members both the means and the motivation to step up their skills and broaden their imaginations. It is unleashing an unprecedented wave of innovation in thousands of different disciplines: some trivial, some niche in the extreme, some central to solving humanity’s problems. In short, it is boosting the net sum of global talent. It is helping the world get smarter.

The Dilbert Entrepreneur

This morning, while at the office working on two different workshops that are going on simultaneously(Syracuse Entrepreneurs Bootcamp and The Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans' Families) I took a break to glance through the Wall Street Journal….and ran across The Perfect Stimulus: Bad Management written by Scott Adams of Dilbert fame. So sit back, get a cup of coffee and enjoy entrepreneurship with a Dilbert flavor.

From the article:

I have always assumed there's a correlation between imagination and risk-taking. You wouldn't leave an unpleasant but relatively safe situation unless you could imagine a better outcome. So the people who leave a company first tend to be the visionaries who can best imagine entrepreneurial success. The last wave of people who leave are usually excreted just before the door is chained. They didn't imagine it would happen so soon. Bad management is how imagination gets wings.

Where in the World Do Ideas Come From?

Students are always walking into my office asking me where ideas come from. Thanks to Scott Nadzan, who sent this piece over to me on innovation, I now have an answer for them. Since I can't draw as well as this fellow, I'll send them to this piece on where good ideas come from. Steven Johnson, who is the author of this piece, has been a speaker at TED talks and provides a very interesting way to think about ideas.

Innovation and the Miners

If you’re like me, you were following the story of the miners in Chile. Watching their incredible rescue was wonderfully exhilarating as it was a story of faith, perseverance, leadership, determination, and many other things, including innovation. In today’s Wall Street Journal, Daniel Henninger writes a column on how Capitalism Saved the Miners. While the article was interesting, what I felt was particularly noteworthy was how some companies jumped in to help out. From the article:

Center Rock Inc. is a private company in Berlin, Pa. It has 74 employees. The drill's rig came from Schramm Inc. in West Chester, Pa. Seeing the disaster, Center Rock's president, Brandon Fisher, called the Chileans to offer his drill. Chile accepted. The miners are alive.
Longer answer: The Center Rock drill, heretofore not featured on websites like Engadget or Gizmodo, is in fact a piece of tough technology developed by a small company in it for the money, for profit. That's why they innovated down-the-hole hammer drilling. If they make money, they can do more innovation.

This profit = innovation dynamic was everywhere at that Chilean mine. The high-strength cable winding around the big wheel atop that simple rig is from Germany. Japan supplied the super-flexible, fiber-optic communications cable that linked the miners to the world above.
A remarkable Sept. 30 story (Innovations Ease the Plight of Trapped Miners) about all this by the Journal's Matt Moffett was a compendium of astonishing things that showed up in the Atacama Desert from the distant corners of capitalism.

Samsung of South Korea supplied a cellphone that has its own projector. Jeffrey Gabbay, the founder of Cupron Inc, Richmond, Va., supplied socks made with copper fiber that consumed foot bacteria, and minimized odor and infection.

Chile's health minister, Jaime Manalich, said, "I never realized that kind of thing actually existed."

Ideas and Innovation

Yesterday while hanging around the airport waiting for my flight to be ready to leave, I ran across in Wired magazine the short but interesting article on ideas and innovation, Kevin Kelly and Steven Johnson on Where Ideas Come From. I liked several things in the piece… the notion that ideas are like networks…that to create good stuff you have to create a lot of bad stuff first…and that ideas come through collaboration and standing on the shoulders of other ideas before you. A quick but very interesting read.

Innovate or Die

This afternoon, before the football games kicked off, I started reading a book by Tom Kelly, one of the founders of IDEO, the wonderful design company. I had the chance to hear Mr. Kelly speak at the Famous Entrepreneurs Series (thanks to our friends at the Sensis Corporation)here in Syracuse a couple of weeks ago, and found his presentation to be outstanding. So, with high expectations, I openede up The Ten Faces of Innovation and was blown away in the first pages.
From the book:

“As Tom Peters would say, you can’t shrink your way to greatness. One way to look at the current pressure cooker of international business is as a fierce competition, where you win through innovation or lose the game. Today, companies are valued less for their current offerings than for their ability to change and adapt and dream up something new."

I can’t wait to continue to get into the rest of the book. And if you get the chance to hear Tom Kelly speak…take advantage of it. You won’t be sorry!

I Love the Newspaper Industry...

I love the newspaper industry…always have. However, I’m probably exactly what’s wrong with it because even though I read more newspaper now than ever, I only pay for one. I read the Wall Street Journal and parts of the NY Times, LA Times, Denver Post, the Syracuse Post Standard, South Bend Tribune (to keep tabs on Notre Dame) and the Chicago Tribune to keep track of my beloved Blackhawks. But I only pay for the on-line and print edition of the Wall Street Journal, and the others I read for free on the internet.

Which brings me to Peter Kann’s column in today’s Wall Street Journal. As you read this article, for a moment, forget about the newspaper industry and insert your industry or your company whenever Mr. Kann refers to his industry. That’s to me the interesting thing about the demise of the newspaper industry; just a few years ago it was unthought-of that the thing could go down in flames as it has. Sure it’s been in trouble for a while, but no one really saw this coming and that’s the lesson for all of us, no matter what industry we are in. Look; watch; and think because if you are not careful…if you aren’t paying close attention to your business model…if you aren’t innovating...if you aren't talking and listening to your customers…and your customers kids…you too someday could be sitting in the same place that they are today.

Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship

Take a look at the following press release:

Commerce Secretary Locke Announces New Commerce Initiatives to Foster Innovation and Entrepreneurship

WASHINGTON—U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke announced today his plans to create a new Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship within the Department of Commerce and launch a National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Both substantial new initiatives will help leverage the entire federal government on behalf of promoting entrepreneurship in America. The new office is expected to announce additional initiatives in the coming months.

The new Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship, which will answer directly to the secretary, will be geared toward the first step in the business cycle: moving an idea from someone’s imagination, or from a research lab, into a business plan.

“We're not lacking for groundbreaking ideas in this country; nor are we short on smart entrepreneurs willing to take risks,” Locke said at the Inc. 500/5000 Conference today. “What we need to do is get better at connecting the great ideas to the great company builders. And I think The Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship is a big step in the right direction.”
The National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship will advise the Commerce Department on policy relating to building small businesses and help to keep the department engaged in a regular dialogue with the entrepreneurship and small business communities. The council is expected to be comprised of successful entrepreneurs, innovators, investors, non-profit leaders and other experts.

The Obama Administration is committed to helping America’s entrepreneurs succeed, evidenced by its efforts to free up credit markets, unprecedented investments in America’s physical and intellectual infrastructure, and variety of tax credits and other incentives to help foster promising industries like renewable energy and smart grid technologies.
Working toward the Obama Administration’s vision, the Department of Commerce will lead the effort to encourage high-growth entrepreneurship through these new initiatives, among others.

The mission of the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship is to unleash and maximize the economic potential of new ideas by removing barriers to entrepreneurship and the development of high-growth and innovation-based businesses. The office will report directly to Locke and focus specifically on identifying issues and programs most important to entrepreneurs. Working closely with the White House and other federal agencies, this new office will drive policies that help entrepreneurs translate new ideas, products and services into economic growth.

The office will focus on the following areas:
Encouraging Entrepreneurs through Education, Training, and Mentoring
Improving Access to Capital
Accelerating Technology Commercialization of Federal R&D
Strengthening Interagency Collaboration and Coordination
Providing Data, Research, and Technical Resources for Entrepreneurs
Exploring Policy Incentives to Support Entrepreneurs and Investors
National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship

The National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship will advise Locke and the administration on key issues relating to innovation and entrepreneurship. The council will include successful entrepreneurs, innovators, angel investors, venture capitalists, non-profit leaders and other experts who will identify and recommend solutions to issues critical to the creation and development of entrepreneurship ecosystems that will generate new businesses and jobs. It will also serve as a vehicle for ongoing dialogue with the entrepreneurship community and other stakeholders.