A fit for purpose innovation system for Kiwi Land

Today, I attended a forum in Auckland where Sir Peter Gluckman came along to share some insights, and gather feedback with respect to two reviews he has underway initiated by the current Government in New Zealand - looking at the University System & Science System (and the associated innovation system) - it was good to hear some perspectives, some I liked, some I did not.

We are lucky we have people like Sir Peter who care, who are passionate and want to take on this missionary work. It is so important, so I appreciate him and his panel for having the courage to lean in and help make things better. Good on them.

I care about the product or function that is our innovation economy - where we can create value, make margin, make profit, build capital and generate more resource for our country so we can fund the community, the life and the climate we aspire for.

My comments in this article are in that context - how can these reviews help and contribute to improving our innovation economy.

This got me thinking, 'who' owns our innovation system and who gets to determine what it could or should be?

We do, not the G of Government and not Sir Peter or his panels let alone the current PM or Ministers who most likely have a lot less knowledge and experience than the players in our system. I doubt the collective voice of all of us will ever come to fruition, however what I want to encourage is that we speak up, we engage and we share perspectives, all perspectives however biased they are. Macro, micro and system level insights are helpful and important. We want voice because we don't want to be delivered more mediocrity, more waste, more lack of ambition. We need more. That is why I have written this.

At the time Sir Peter was speaking, and fielding questions, I was messaging someone in the room asking them to please speak up - the person did not - and said post it was a waste of time. It is not a waste of time - but maybe this person will have one of those closed door stakeholder engagements with Sir Peter and his group - that is good there is those things I suppose. Group think maybe, or maybe they have already written their recommendations and now they are just 'stake holding'?

Consult and engage away. It matters however cynical I might be.

Overall, I am encouraged by the ambition that I heard, I am encouraged with the recognition that our system is poked and could be way better. Good one. More of that please, be courageous and be ambitious.

I wrote a submission to the Science System Advisory Group, and I am going to publish it with a link 'here ' so you can see what I said, with all of its bias, opinion and assumption. It is on reflection, charged and maybe judgmental. That's me, good and challenging at the same time, and maybe even sometimes thoughtless.

So lets get back to what I heard today from Sir Peter.

What did I hear?: ?

• A big challenge with ambition?for what is possible
• Motivation to make big changes (that's a promise Sir Peter!)? ?
• An honest assessment that we have an isolated and irrelevant system that really in quant only produces talent right now? ?
• An opinion that the failures in the system go back to the designs created in the 1980s ? ?
• Examples suggested that we look to Israel, Singapore & Ireland which is the same playbook we have heard before and had largely failed - look at the tech incubator model? ? ? ?
• Frustration that other countries have science and innovation at their core and we don’t? - truth there!? ?
• Potentially a top down approach is happening when you listen to the words around lots of stakeholder engagement with the 'macro' - whether that is important people like the PM, Minister and organisations like NZTE and Callaghan Innovation.

Some personal observations I would add

• Encouraged to see the ambition to make the system a better performing system.
• The expertise around the table looks great, and may lacks timeliness and people knowledgeable in the innovation system who have first hand and relevant experience who can also be system thinkers - please, don't give me a we are talking to VCs, most of them are not system thinkers, they are needle spotters, great ones at that, but not always great at thinking at this level.
• The continued reference to offshore models is a good one for us to learn from and it was good to see the comments that these should not just be accepted, however we forget the amount of $ of resource that has been focused by the G on bringing 'Israel' to New Zealand and for example, the completely unworkable and challenging model that is the Tech Incubators when time and again Callaghan have been told about the challenges of the model and just ignore them - we are not Israel, we are not Israeli and will never be, please stop paying consultants to come to NZ to give us crap models and dilute founders, put founders as CTOs or CSOs and bring management consultants in as CEOs with unworkable cap tables.
• Do we need to know where to look for the problems to solve? Other than tidying up our base (which is good to start with) if you look at macro level you can see issues but that’s not where or how you solve the issues. You may start with macro, but you have to quickly move into the micro, and then look for patterns or issues from that to address. Macro alone is not enough. ??
• A perspective that appears inside looking out, rather than outside looking in but maybe that is harsh?
• The engagement and consultation model appears to be top down, and I would question are they talking to the right people. I tire of this, the top are not your customer, they are not the voice you should be listening to, it is the system you should be listening to, playing up is what you do in corporate or dictatorships, not when you are designing an innovation system. ?Lets swamp them with opportunities and requests for consultation. ? ? ?

Do I have confidence or even hope?? ? ? ?

I have confidence that change is required, and confidence that they will recommend change. I don't have confidence that they know where or how to create success at this point, however at the end of the day, we must have hope because if we don't have hope, what do we have? More sliding, more corporate control, more monopolies, more oligopolies and more of our kids moving offshore and us truly being the West Island of the lucky country.

A few other thoughts I had while sitting there listening actively:

• How do we get to scale when we are sub-scale across the board?- Universities, CRIs,?VCs
• Where have the greatest impact innovations in NZ over the last 20 years and do you think if the system was different you would have got a different result? - LanzaTech, Rocket Lab, Sharesies, Xero, Halter are just a few examples and there are many more, the majority of which did not come from our research system or University system. As my mate Will Charles will say, there have been some iconic ones from the system that has nurtured the extraordinary and talented professors John Boys (and many more), that is true, but could it be more? Yes.
• How do you build a science and innovation system where the majority of our large companies are domestic economy and/or in oligopolies where there is low motivation and incentives to innovate or invest? Eg Banks, Telco, Insurance, Energy and even Ag sector eg Fonterra - this is a big big one. A big one.
• You can't say we could or should release the talent from these large companies into exporters and startups because most of them have no track record or capability or honestly desire to get on a plane and go and do it world-wide - our talent in the biggest jobs, biggest companies is not fit for the task we need them to do! Bring in Israelis? Jokes.
• Super glad to hear about the need to focus and rationalise our CRIs.
• Should Universities focus on talent production alone - can they really do more without massive change and restructuring?
• How big is the problem? Big when I look at the movement to Australia and wider, feels like we are back to Knowledge Wave times.
• How do you create more Rocket Labs?? ? What is the role of the system? Halter came from Rocket, lets just do more of that? ?

Wait - do Unicorns actually make a difference? Prof Gary Hamel recently opined on their impact and suggested that unicorns alone are no substitute for a competitive, innovative economy. I disagree with the Prof for an economy like New Zealand. We need markers, we need belief and confidence. So maybe the Rocket Lab's and Crimson's are more markers for us all to see what is possible, but the base has to fundamentally come up, and we should not focus on the 'peaks' to make lasting change.

One thing an wise mentor said to me once is - it is easy to shoot down, it is way harder to come up with ideas and recommendations that make the world a better place. That actually solve things not dismiss. So good on you for getting your voice up and making recommendations for how our innovation can be better. It matters.

What would you do?

What can you do?

What about if you were leading the review where would you focus?

I am going to engage and support where I can, because it matters.

Andy Hamilton