Some food for thought. Dave Smith's talk is obviously focused on the UK but so much of this applies to Canada too. Point 1 on short term vs long term makes me think of the good line from Alex Usher and Higher Education Strategy Associates in their analysis of the recent budget: "it seems like a continuation of a pattern under the Liberals: lots of good little one-and-done policies, but extreme difficulty in maintaining a sustained effort on the files that matter." On fragmentation, that definitely applies. Just at the federal level the budget highlighted the Pan-Canadian Artificial Intelligence Strategy, the National Quantum Strategy, the Pan-Canadian Genomics Strategy, and the Biomanufacturing and Life Sciences Strategy. How these fit together along with other smaller and one-off initiatives into the 'big picture' of Canada's direction on science, technology, and innovation I don't know. This is without even get into the fragmentation inherent in Canadian federalism - something I am immensely interested in when it comes to the reality of how innovation policies actually impact the economy. The provinces are both hugely influential here, and also for the most part, rather absent when it comes to a strategic focus on this space, with the notable exception of Quebec. As for compelling narratives, we are lacking here too. When it comes to the question of "are we good enough at explaining the real value of investments in science and technology on making all our lives better?" we haven't done a good enough job - both from the government and from the innovation 'sector' at large. Again, Alex Usher often says how the PSE sector needs to tell better stories about their value and how investment in them leads to tangible outcomes on people's lives. For me, this is, in part, where industrial strategy comes in. Part of the value there is not just the policy levers you are using, but how you are pulling them together into a coherent whole that pulls in the same direction, enabling you to tell a stronger story about the direction you are trying to move in. Packaging things that way facilitates storytelling, helping connect the dots both in people's minds as well as between the actual policies deployed.
Last night, I attended a great talk* by the UK’s new National Technology Advisor, Dave Smith. His talk was on “The Government, science policy, and products - from concept to consumer”. I was struck by how many themes covered during the talk and subsequent discussion were – unsurprisingly – similar to those raised during last week’s event in Sheffield on ‘The Future of UK Manufacturing’ run by the EPSRC, High Value Manufacturing Catapult and Institute for Manufacturing (IfM), University of Cambridge. If I squish everything together, I reckon three themes emerge. 1. Short term versus long term. The nature of the UK’s democratic process is not going to change any time soon. We will continue to be driven by relatively short-term election cycles, and some public investment will be dictated by this. But we have to make decisions for the long term, like managing the energy transition or ensuring national security or supporting the NHS. So, we need to make sure that any investments that have a short-term, re-election focus align with longer term needs. To do that, we need to address the next issue. 2. Fragmentation. The UK has no shortage of plans and strategies for innovation. These all show how our superb science and technology resources can deliver new and improved products and services to improve our lives. And we have excellent resources across the public and private sector to support the delivery of those strategies. However, we are losing a lot of energy trying to work out how all these strategies, plans, visions and missions fit together. Without the ‘big picture’ of how all the dots join up, this fragmentation of plans and resources is really going to slow things down. And one of the reasons we struggle to do this is the next point. 3. Lack of compelling narratives. Within our own communities, we are really good at shouting about the value of science and technology, or of manufacturing, or of our own sectors. But I think we are less good at explaining things beyond our natural boundaries. At last week’s event in Sheffield, I and the other 200 attendees from across the manufacturing world were very comfortable talking to each other about importance of manufacturing. But could we explain that to those outside that manufacturing world? Do we have access to the compelling evidence to support the telling of engaging stories to a much wider community? Looping back to Dave Smith’s talk, are we good enough at explaining the real value of investments in science and technology on making all our lives better? I think that unless we get way better at that third one, the first two are going to remain a huge brake on our ability to make things better for the long term. #innovation #scaleup #manufacturing #industrialpolicy #STEM #storytelling University of Cambridge *Organised by the CSaP - Centre for Science and Policy, University of Cambridge. A summary of Dave’s talk will be available via https://lnkd.in/epB-Z3hK shortly.
