Brewed Fresh Daily

To figure out the colors of Anchiornis feathers, Mr. Vinther and his colleagues turned to Matthew Shawkey, a University of Akron biologist who has made detailed studies of melanosome patterns in living birds. Dr. Shawkey can accurately predict the color of feathers from melanosomes alone. The scientists used the same method to decipher Anchiornis’s color pattern.

Evidence Builds on Color of Dinosaurs

More here.

Yesterday, I went on a whirlwind visit to the Penn State and the wonderful people at the Office of Economic and Workforce Development.

During my presentation, I introduced a framework for thinking about how regions evolve toward open innovation. The first horizon involves changing the prevailing narrative to emphasize the importance of collaboration and finding new pathways. The second horizon involves establishing one or more civic spaces and practicing civility. During this phase, regions start uncovering their networks.

In the third phase, a region starts moving toward more strategic habits of thinking and doing. They abandon old models of strategic planning and begin to learn faster, more agile disciplines of strategic doing. At the fourth horizon, regions establish a regular process of conducting strategic conversations and translating ideas into action. They continuously update their strategic action plan.

In the region around Purdue, we have gone through these four phases, and we are now continuing this work. Other regons around the country are at different points in their transformation.

In my talk yesterday, I focused on what universities can do to move regions ahead. Penn State, Purdue and The University of Akron will be collaborating on developing customized “strategy packs” for regions.

More later.

Hopefully, the hyperventilating over the Cleveland Foundation’s reduced support for the Future Fund will move to figuring out “What’s next?”

Here’s what we know:

The Cleveland Foundation will not outsource its economic development budget. It does not want to hand over a major slice of its economic development budget to a the Fund, headed by the president of the Gund Foundation.

The Cleveland Foundation badly fumbled the public explanation of its move. It could have effectively made the case that the Future Fund is a regional effort, and that after priming the pump, it was time for others in the region to step forward. The Cleveland Foundation could make the case that the Future Fund needs a sustainability plan beyond initial start-up funds (just like any other grantee).

The Future Fund handles the press better than the Cleveland Foundation. No surprise here. Abbott and Brent Larkin share a professional and personal bond that goes way back.

Neither the Future Fund nor the Cleveland Foundation leverages Web 2.0 effectively. The Cleveland Foundation’s failure to embrace new media means that it is hostage to the perceptions drawn by the press. If the Cleveland Foundation is worried about its image, quit complaining and do something about it. The Future Fund has never effectively engaged the region in an on-going strategy, despite its heavily promoted Voices and Choices. (Voices and Choices was the big Greek wedding, and little more.)

The Future Fund isn’t as collaborative or as open as it said it was. It’s probably time for the Future Fund’s leaders to stop promoting themselves this way — a nationally recognized collaboration, blah, blah, blah — and start focusing on the issues of strategy and governance that led to the blow-up.

The Cleveland Foundation did not kick the Future Fund to the curb. It’s still providing support, albeit not much. Larkin is certainly over the top when he writes, the the Foundation “kicked regional collaboration in the teeth “. This is the type of inflammatory commentary that does no one any good. The fact is that the Cleveland Foundation provided major support for the Future Fund over the last number of years. Without the Cleveland Foundation’s early support, there would be no Future Fund.

The Cleveland Foundation’s president needs to take a breather (and a course in handling public relations would probably help). As a real estate developer with strong interests downtown, Goldberg stands to benefit from the Foundation’s refocusing in Cleveland. Absent any public statement of broader interest or strategy, people will assume that Goldberg is more worried about Goldberg than the Foundation. (His petulance does not bode well for the Foundation.)

It’s time for the Cleveland Foundation and the Future Fund to step back and define their new direction clearly. The Future Fund should focus on developing its connections to higher education…major drivers of both talent and innovation. To get more professional focus, Ronn Richards would do well to hire his friend at Angelou Economics to give voice to the Foundation’s new direction.

It’s time to move on.

Continuing this pie fight does no one any good.

Here’s a place to start on a new path: How about the two organizations focusing their attention on a set of regional principles for collaboration?

Last night I went to see CityMusic Cleveland perform at the Fairmount Pres Church. While I enjoyed Schubert and Mozart, Matt Haimovitz kills the SHOSTAKOVICH Cello Concerto No.1. Granted, my taste runs Kronos Quartetish with a bunch of Philip Glass thrown in, but that shouldn’t stop you from enjoying the music and the venues especially St. Stan’s in Slavic Village on Sat.

By the way, I’m doing a bit of social media coaching, but this is by no means a paid endorsement. If you’ve read anything I’ve posted to the internets, you know I’m a raving fan of things CLE particularly when it comes to culture and the arts. I’m excited to work with Eugenia and her org—they grok social media and are doing awesome community work.

From Youngstown: Third Frontier is a success
From Columbus: Lee Fisher commentary: Third Frontier is key to nurturing Ohio recovery

I have been in Career Transition for almost two years now and I have become an expert in the Art of the Small Talk.

With any job search strategy, in my opinion, you have to either go to professional organizations or conduct informational interviews to find the “hidden job Market.” Believe me, it does exist. In layman’s terms, I call it- throwing yourself out there! Plain and Simple.

Secondly, in order to find your “dream job” or a position that will make you happy, you have to endure the laborious process of finding the right people to talk to. Consequently, they might help you find the “hiring manager.” And, the words everyone is looking for, “You’re hired.”

To become an expert or comfortable in the small talk arena, you have to practice everywhere you go. This can be at your local grocery store while waiting at the check out line or at your local library. I enjoy meeting and talking to anyone wherever I go. It is as simple as, “Wow, you sure have a wide variety of groceries, are you having a party?” Or, “It sure has been a long day, I seem to pick the longest line in the store.” At the library, I always give advise on what DVD’s the person might like. “If you like a poignant, coming of age film, try this.”

The goal is to become comfortable talking to strangers so when you go to that all important professional networking event, you can get a conversation started easily by finding generic topics. Do not ever begin a topic with, “Hi George, what line of work are you in? then immediately give them your labored story about how you lost your job and now you desperately need a job. They will politely exit and find someone else to converse with. They do not care why you lost your job. You must think of reasons why I’m the best and I deserve people’s attention.

Employers and individuals in general enjoy conversing with people who are multi-faceted and are interesting. Find out what your passions are and what you enjoy doing-sports, writing, or the environment. Do not begin a conversation with controversial topics such as politics. You don’t want to make enemies with people you do not even know yet. Keep the conversation going until you get a general feeling that this is the type of person you want to keep in touch with, if not, move on. There are plenty of individuals who you will strike a cord with.

After the networking event, you can either save the card and put a note on the back where you met the person or discard it. I recommend sending a quick email if it is someone with whom you want to keep in touch. “Hey, I enjoyed our conversation last night at the XYZ networking event. You know how I mentioned to you how I am in career transition, can we have a cup of coffee so I can get some advice on my job search?” This friends, is the beginning of a business relationship. And, keep in touch every month or so. The goal is to keep you’re name at the forefront of their mind.

When you go to a networking event or your local grocery store, just think today I want to talk to one-three new people. After you achieved your goal, reward yourself with some ice cream or a movie. Challenge yourself and enjoy this invigorating part of life – meeting some new people.

Toni Chanakas

A while back some folks at McKinsey published an interesting — albeit incomplete — map of “innovation clusters”. At the Purdue Center for Regional Development, we’ve been spending a lot of time looking an how regions establish “ecosystems” that support open innovation. You can see some of our latest work here.

The McKinsey map is interactive and it accompanies a good article on innovation. The authors have read too much into their data, so their grand categories are flawed. At the same time, they do a good job of recognizing the different types of formation patterns.

The key issue, from my perspective, is the role of universities in shaping the regional innovation landscapes. For too long, economists have been focused too narrowly on patents — because the data are available and easy to measure — or on small business births (or a subset, spin-outs), also easy to measure.

An effort is now underway among universities to develop a better description of how they leverage knowledge in a region through a range of activities. Penn State has been convening a group of universities, including Purdue, to explore these issues. The Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM) is also taking up this matter of measurement.

As Sean Safford at the University of Chicago has clearly outlined in his comparison of Akron and Rochester, universities shape their role in regional economies differently.

You can access the McKinsey article here:

Building an Innovation Nation

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