Sept. 7, 2007

Innovation and transformation

Richard Florida, the renowned economist and best-selling author of the "Rise of the Creative Class" is the 2007-08 Dean Helen LeBaron Hilton Endowed Chair for the College of Human Sciences. He'll ride into town on September 19 to deliver a lecture in C.Y. Stephens Auditorium at 8 p.m. with a message for all: The U.S. economy is slipping back because we are creating an environment that is increasingly less attractive to creative young adults. He holds that the most important task in front of us is how to create a hothouse of innovation, locally and nationally, and he has some ideas about what that requires. He argues that communities trapped in the past by "institutional sclerosis" will inevitably decline, but also that the creation of "nerdistans" won't work either. Rather, a heady mix of what he calls the 3 T's: talent, technology and tolerance is key to modernize old industries, generate new product designs, and resolve the biggest problems of our time, including unemployment, stagnant productivity, out-migration, in-migration, out-sourcing and the oil crisis. The world in Florida's eyes is not so much flat as "spiky" with the spikes being those centers or nodes where creative people gather, innovate, produce, and grow. Des Moines has done something right in his estimation and it has done something wrong. His ideas are fresh, original, controversial, and exciting. Diversity is central.

Florida asserts that global talent, (whether you want to define global as Seattle or Singapore), is "finicky." An important question for us is how are we going to lure these talented faculty and students to come here to study and work? It's a question that the College of Human Sciences will be pursuing all year and to start it off, the dean's office will provide a free copy of Florida's book, "The Flight of the Creative Class" to the first 50 CHS faculty who come in and make the request (in person, one copy per person). We will also organize several dialogue groups to discuss this work and others throughout the year The first group met August 24. Others are planned for September 14 and 21. I hope you can participate in several of these activities. I hope you read, talk, come to the lecture, and participate. If you read only one of Florida's works, I recommend "Flight of the Creative Class." It is shorter and it references all the big ideas in his first book, but there are a couple of websites with shorter articles available as well.

See you soon,
Cheryl

Resources:

Florida, Richard. "The Rise of the Creative Class."
www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2001/0205.florida.html

Florida, Richard (2002). The Rise of the Creative Class. Basic Books: NY, NY. Pp

Florida, Richard (2004). "Creative Class War."
www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2004/0401.florida.html

Florida, Richard (2007). The Flight of the Creative Class. Collins: NY, NY. 326 pp.

College of Human Sciences calendar, which includes Richard Florida’s public lecture and other discussions around this topic:
www.hs.iastate.edu/news/calendar