On Friday, December 4, U.S. Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker delivered remarks at the National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (NACIE) meeting. As an extension of the Economic Development Administration, NACIE is charged with identifying and recommending solutions to issues critical to driving the innovation economy. The Council serves as a vehicle for continuous dialogue between entrepreneurship and workforce development communities.
In her remarks, Secretary Pritzker thanked members of NACIE for their contributions to the overall mission of the Department of Commerce. She tasked NACIE with the delivery of tangible outcomes for innovation, entrepreneurship, and employer-driven workforce development projects and policies to better enable American businesses to access and develop a skilled, globally competitive workforce. Secretary Pritzker also offered support and encouraged collaboration between NACIE and other Department of Commerce resources to enhance NACIE’s efforts.
Remarks as Prepared for Delivery I am pleased to welcome you all back to Washington. Thank you to Google for providing the space for us to meet. I know each of you has been very busy over the last six months. I am grateful that you have volunteered your most precious resource, your time, to be part of this Council.
As members of NACIE, your work is closely tied to our “Open for Business” Agenda. We fundamentally believe that each of you are critical to the innovation, entrepreneurship, and employer-driven workforce development projects and policies that are central to our mission here at the Department. Your recommendations will not sit on the shelf gathering dust. They will influence our priorities and ultimately our outcomes.
We have added workforce development to your innovation and entrepreneurship charter because the foundation of any enterprise is its people; and because workforce development is a critical part of our agenda. If we are going to stay innovative as a country, we must win the global competition for talent and prepare our workforce for the jobs and careers of the 21st century.
To meet this objective, we must find better ways to align our local training ecosystems with the needs of local employers. The topics you have chosen to focus on reflect the innovative thinking I would expect from such a diverse group. Right now, you are looking at multiple challenging workforce issues, including updating 20-year-old employer training data, and measuring the size and impact of the sharing economy. I look forward to hearing more about these and other recommendations that we can implement over the next 10 months.
Like many of you, I have been a business leader for decades. Finding innovative solutions and serving customers are critical to the success of any business. There is a strong willingness in government at all levels of leadership to apply private sector principles to the work we do. The passion and specific focus you have brought to turning federal research and development into viable commercial opportunities has the potential to impact policy and legislation.
While basic research will always be critical, I am personally excited about the idea of having business representatives and scientists together on SBIR panels, working together to strategically invest our research dollars to start more companies, serve more customers and grow more jobs. This is smart government at work.
We recognize that innovative projects can encounter road blocks. It has taken longer than expected for the Glassdoor data modernization pilot to get access to the State of Virginia’s unemployment data. My team is reaching out to other states to get the data Glassdoor needs to continue the project. I want to be clear: Supporting your efforts is a top priority for my team. Please let us know where I can be particularly helpful to you.
One specific resource that you will hear about later this morning is our Commerce Data Service. Our diverse team of top-notch designers, developers, software engineers, and data scientists can unlock Department of Commerce data in support of NACIE’s work. For example, I am certain that our data can add value to your recommendation for creating a “What Works” playbook for innovation and entrepreneurship economic development plans.
In the next year, time is of the essence. While NACIE has quarterly meetings, we need you to continue your efforts between meetings and make progress on your nine specific projects. Thank you for your hard work and commitment. I am really looking forward to this briefing.
Source: U.S. Department of Commerce
