{"id":1993,"date":"2011-09-12T10:56:28","date_gmt":"2011-09-12T10:56:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/altlep.wordpress.com\/?p=81"},"modified":"2011-09-12T10:56:28","modified_gmt":"2011-09-12T10:56:28","slug":"the-leeds-lep-summit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/2011\/09\/12\/the-leeds-lep-summit\/","title":{"rendered":"The Leeds LEP Summit…"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last Friday, 700 people descended on Saviles Rooms in Clarence Dock, Leeds to attend the Local Enterprise Partnership’s Summit on Realising the Potential.<\/p>\n

I wish I could say it was a day full of surprises. \u00a0Of innovative and critical thinking. \u00a0Of real insights about how enterprise works in the region and beyond and what can be done to make it work better. \u00a0I wish I could say that we were\u00a0listened\u00a0to, engaged, given the\u00a0chance\u00a0to shape, not only ‘The Plan’ but also how it might be put into action. \u00a0But I can say none of these things.<\/p>\n

It was the usual formula of a stage\u00a0sequentially inhabited by a series of be-suited folk advocating their politics, or their research, or in some cases their business interests. \u00a0But generally, far too much politics and macro-economics, a sprinkling of economic development orthodoxy (clusters, sectors, high growth) and hardly any enterprise at all. \u00a0And where differences in ideology or strategy were\u00a0clearly\u00a0apparent there was no attempt at analysis or synthesis. It just came down to ‘we’re in charge now – so we’ll do it our way’.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0importance\u00a0of SMEs was mentioned several times, but they were talking about 10+employee, high growth startups willing to put together funding bids and set up KTPs (knowledge transfer partnerships) with universities. \u00a0The kind of startup that allies itself with the\u00a0economic\u00a0development infrastucture and pursues every penny of public funding that it can. \u00a0There was little to no indication that\u00a0anyone\u00a0had given any thought to the potential of the regions enormous number of micro-enterprises and the fact\u00a0that\u00a0these are the hot bed from which the higher\u00a0growth\u00a0businesses will over time emerge. \u00a0We are back to what Drucker called ‘wanting\u00a0the top of the mountain without the mountain’.<\/p>\n

The implicit assumption was the regional economy would remain one based on traditional models of ’employment’, a white and blue collar region rather than a region where large numbers of self organising free agents contributed significantly. \u00a0What kind of employer skills board is going to define the skills and attitudes needed to escape employment by others but actually shape your own portfolio of work? \u00a0No, as per usual there was much discussion of what ’employers’ are looking for and the\u00a0importance\u00a0of that Holy Grail of employability. \u00a0As I said on the day, I don’t\u00a0want\u00a0the net result of 2 decades of education for my daughters for them to be merely ’employable’. \u00a0I\u00a0want\u00a0much more from the system than that, thank you very much.<\/p>\n

It was also assumed that growth in the economy IS the only future. \u00a0And we seem to have the choice of whether we measure it using GVA or GDP. \u00a0No mention of the possibility, never mind the desirability, of a steady state economy. \u00a0Or perhaps measuring progress in\u00a0terms\u00a0other than purely financial expansion. \u00a0In fact nothing that wasn’t about mainstream economic development policy. \u00a0Nothing that we were not discussing in Mandelson’s White Papers on Building the Knowledge Economy<\/a> at the fag-end of the last century. \u00a0Those of us with alternative ideas about to make the world a better place need to take a long hard look at\u00a0ourselves\u00a0–\u00a0because\u00a0our messages are just not getting through.<\/p>\n

Somehow we were soon well behind the clock and time for\u00a0questions\u00a0from the floor was cut. \u00a0Not that it would have mattered. \u00a0If you really\u00a0want\u00a0to listen, you do not dominate proceedings from a stage and \u00a0give 700 people in the audience a couple of roaming mics. \u00a0You\u00a0take\u00a0the challenges of helping people to find their voice and express themselves a little more seriously than that, you build it into the process. If you really want to listen.<\/p>\n

I had tried to encourage a few small business people to attend and others with an interest in ‘the economy’ who do not see themselves as ‘in business’, because the future of our economy should not be left to a partnership between business folk and politicians! \u00a0Sadly most had left within the first couple of hours as they heard nothing that spoke to them of their goals, the contexts they are working in, or their aspirations and they felt the dice had already been thrown, and that the strategy had been set for yet more\u00a0capital\u00a0investment and a preoccupation with high growth companies in high growth sectors. \u00a0All I could do was mouth my apologies as they picked their way out of the hall while speaker after speaker talked of engagement with ‘the business community’.<\/p>\n

At least we had the back channel of twitter to contribute some different views. \u00a0Not that the screen displaying the twitter stream was legible and it took until lunchtime for the inimitable @johnpopham to explain that if they used twitterfall they would not need to keep hitting refresh…… \u00a0I\u00a0can’t\u00a0help but think that something so apparently trivial as understanding twitter may hold the seeds of something important for the LEP in recognising that tomorrows economy will not be the same as yesterdays, only bigger.<\/p>\n

So, we were late into our breakout groups. \u00a0The one I attended was like a fractal of the main hall. \u00a0A stage, a panel, an audience and not enough time to do the subject justice. \u00a0But\u00a0this\u00a0time there were some women too! \u00a0At least one of the\u00a0panel\u00a0members talked\u00a0passionately\u00a0of the LEP needing to speak the language of micro-enterprise!<\/p>\n

Lunch was good. \u00a0Soggy sandwiches. \u00a0Fruit so cold it hurt. \u00a0But at least WE got a chance to talk…..<\/p>\n

After lunch it was back into the main hall to listen to more clever and\/or opinionated men (I would have been at home on at least one of those counts). \u00a0One of these had some thing to say about the drivers of regional growth in OECD countries and how some ‘basket case economies’ had managed to turn things around. \u00a0I can’t think why he would choose to provide data on basket case turnarounds in our region, can you? \u00a0Sadly the slides he presented were unreadable and I could not follow the plot. \u00a0I was so angry! \u00a0We jet in a researcher from lord knows where, presumably at great expense to the sponsors and then we don’t make sure that his slides will be legible to any but the front rows? \u00a0So I bailed out to the LEP Conversation Corner which was deserted to begin with, but which did eventually\u00a0yield\u00a0some fascinating conversations!<\/p>\n

What did\u00a0surprise\u00a0me was the number of attendees who seemed to think that the gig was OK. \u00a0That it had ‘gone well’. \u00a0That any dissenting or challenging perspectives on twitter were just negativity rather than the result of any critical thinking, or different perspectives that may be worth exploring.<\/p>\n

I found it genuinely puzzling until I realised that this was the congregation of the church of orthodox economic development – at prayer. \u00a0Where GDP is all that matters, and green\/culture\/tech\/creative is only good\u00a0IF it will create yet more economic growth. \u00a0This was the economic\u00a0development\u00a0supply chain in the room. \u00a0Hardly likely to be open to\u00a0the possibility of radical innovation when they have so much vested in the status quo.<\/p>\n