These are not articlesContribute to a New Rural Economic Development HandbookCould you benefit from a locally-developed rural economic development handbook? Does your organization have a business or community economic development story it would like to tell? The Monieson Centre at the Queen’s School of Business is preparing just such a tool and would like to have your input. Drawing on more than three years of community-based research in Eastern Ontario, Using Knowledge to Revitalize Rural Economies – A Guide for Practitioners highlights best practices in rural economic development identified through academic research and local success stories. The book will feature research developed through the Monieson Centre’s Knowledge Impact in Society (KIS) project, a three-year initiative to connect academic research with rural Eastern Ontario’s economic development needs. In particular, the book speaks to key themes identified through a series of community workshops such as innovation, sustainability, business development and the knowledge economy. Using Knowledge to Revitalize Rural Economies - A Guide for Practitioners is intended as a resource for academics as well as practitioners. If you would like to showcase a story from your community or organization, please contact Jeff Dixon at jdixon@business.queensu.ca or (613) 533-3271. New "How To Guide" Helps Local Governments Tackle Rural Unemployment in the UK The United Kingdom’s Improvement and Development Agency (IDeA) has published a "how to guide" to help local governments tackle unemployment in rural areas. How to help people into employment in rural areas provides examples of best practices and suggestions for employment development in rural areas based on their unique labour market characteristics. The new guide is part of a series of "how to" guides on unemployment for local governments and their partners. While this guide probably won’t be groundbreaking for most economic developers, it offers an interesting (and brief) peek into the strategies being used in the UK. The guide also draws extensively on two reports produced for the UK’s Commission for Rural Communities that provide a more in depth look at rural employment issues: Rural Financial Poverty: priorities for action and Working in 21st Century Rural England. As references and sources of inspiration, these documents are worth a look for those working in rural communities. Building Communities With Soul An interesting study was recently completed in the United States by Gallup Consulting and the Knight Foundation titled Soul of the Community. The report is the result of a three year effort to measure the emotional factors that make people passionate about their communities. Year 1 compared residents attachment levels to the GDP growth in 26 communities. Year 2 reinforced the findings, and Year 3 analyzed connections between community attachment and economic growth, exploring whether attachment drives growth or vice-versa. Nearly 14,000 people were interviewed each year, and surveys were completed in both English and Spanish. The results found that there are three main qualities that bind people to a place: social offerings (such as entertainment venues and places to meet), openness (how welcoming a place is), and the area's aesthetics (it's physical beauty and green spaces). By looking at information like the Soul of the Community, economic developers can better understand how to make their communities places where people want to live, work and play. Georgetown University Releases Projections of US Jobs and Education Requirements through 2018 The Center on Education and the Workforce at Georgetown University recently completed a comprehensive study titled Projections of Jobs and Education Requirements through 2018. While the study was conducted in the United States, the findings may be useful in the Canadian context. The report does not go on to provide recommended actions, but there are some potential responses for municipalities. With education being an important resource it is more important than ever that municipalities play a facilitating role in linking industry to educational training programs, connecting workers with apprenticeship and co-op programs, and increasing high school completion rates and college entrance by engaging the secondary school system in workplace needs and awareness programs. More information on the study and its findings can be accessed here. New Report Explores Economic Development in a Low-Carbon Economy The International Economic Development Council (IEDC) has released a new report that looks at economic development in the context of a shift to energy consumption based on lower emissions of greenhouse gases. Using nine U.S. states as case studies, the report explores key issues, including the economic development impacts and opportunities associated with the transition to a "low-carbon economy", and how (or whether!) current economic development efforts are preparing communities for this inevitable transition. Whether motivated by environmental concerns like global warming, or by the business opportunities presented in the growth of the green energy market, all communities are now being presented with significant new issues on the energy front. The IEDC report includes detailed descriptions of industry trends and opportunities, often filtered through the practical lens of the nine case studies. It also offers a pragmatic final chapter on "Lessons Learned" that will help communities map out their own strategies in the shifting green energy field. The full report can be downloaded in PDF format here. Online Surveys 2.0 – Free LimeSurvey.com Software Unveiled Have you been using SurveyMonkey or another online survey tool to conduct community surveys? A major competitor has jumped to the fore, and may be worth a closer look. On July 6, LimeSurvey.com released version 1.90 of its online survey tool, which can be downloaded here for free! LimeSurvey not only costs less than other online survey tools, but has a number of powerful logic algorithms and statistical analysis tools that enhance its interactivity and usefulness. Based on open source software, LimeSurvey has been around in various forms since 2003, but appears to have made a major leap forward with this latest version of its software. It can be used for surveys in more than 50 languages, from Albanian to Welsh. |
Client CornerInternational Recognition for Perth County’s BR+E Efforts Congratulations are in order for Bernia Wheaton and her team in Perth County, Ontario, for being the recipient of an award from Business Retention and Expansion International. To be presented in August in New Orleans, the award recognizes not only the work that went into completing the business visitation and strategy, but more importantly, the community’s desire and effectiveness in following through on eight Council-approved recommendations to improve the business environment. Establishing an economic development office was one of the outcomes. In the Spring, Millier Dickinson Blais was hired to follow through on another one of these recommendations – complete a workforce development analysis and economic development strategy for Perth, Stratford and St. Marys. The extensive program of community consultation and data analysis confirmed the importance of retention for the economic development workplan and identified how the intertwined economies can align traditionally successful sectors like agriculture, tourism and manufacturing into the new realities of the knowledge and creative economies. Resource ReviewRichard Florida Hits Reset There’s no question that the biggest – and most controversial – name in economic development of late has been Richard Florida. The New Jersey native, who relocated to Toronto a few years ago to head the Martin Prosperity Institute, is best known for his 2002 book The Rise of the Creative Class. In that book, and in several follow-up books and articles (including The Flight Of The Creative Class and Who's Your City?), he explored the increasing economic importance of a new group of creatively-oriented knowledge workers, and how they were reshaping the economies of communities across the industrial world. While that work won him many accolades and has helped to anchor a "creative industries" focus for economic development in many communities, it has also been described as too elitist, too urban and too obvious. Now Florida is back on the bookshelves with a new offering. The Great Reset explores how the latest global recession is forcing a fundamental rethinking of the way local economies work, and how cities and regions are reshaping themselves as a result. And while the "reset" that Florida refers to is an economic one, it also signals a redirection of his own thinking at work. Essentially, Florida suggests that we need to look to history to understand current economic development cycles. The "Long Depression" of the 1870s and the "Great Depression" of the 1930s are examined for parallels with the current global recession, with Florida concluding that each of these downturns fundamentally altered the global economy, and led to a "great reset." This time out, instead of focusing on individual occupations and workforce-level measures of creativity, Florida explores how urban and suburban geography is being recreated. He returns to his old notions of "mega-regions" but in this book is far more interested in how and why some city-regions are thriving and growing (like Toronto, Pittsburgh and Seattle) while others are failing (like Detroit, Phoenix and Las Vegas), and how the successful ones are reorienting their focus in the face of the great reset. This new orientation apparently owes a lot to Jane Jacobs, an urban theorist whose environmental and social critiques of 20th Century urban life helped reshape the way that planners conceive of "livable" cities. Although Jacobs’ last book, Dark Age Ahead, predicted the collapse of urban life in the industrialized world, Florida uses the reset analogy to predict a brighter possible future. Florida’s vision is based upon more closely linked urban and suburban zones thriving and growing where public transportation links are strongest, where the sense of community is greatest, and where youth congregate to explore and realize their full human potential. It’s a compelling vision, and described in a convincingly realistic manner. Is it still primarily urban in its focus? Certainly. Does it celebrate an elite class of knowledge workers to the exclusion of other segments of the labour force? To a degree. But The Great Reset also offers a compelling and insightful view into the probable reconfiguration of our communities after this global recession. It speaks to the kinds of communities that are well-positioned in this reset, and to the kinds of economic and community development activities that we must pursue if we are to succeed in the economy to come. Whatever your thoughts on Florida’s past work, The Great Reset is an important, compelling and highly recommended read for those trying to understand what comes next. You can buy The Great Reset here for 37% off the cover price. Out and aboutMembers of the Millier Dickinson Blais team will be participating in these upcoming events: September
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Employment Development Index May 2010 Our Employment Development Index is a visual representation of changes in regional employment figures over time. For a Statistics Canada map of the economic regions highlighted in the Employment Development Index, click here. |
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Lauren Millier will be attending an