This document outlines trends and strategies for communities to recruit talent and foster economic development. It discusses four major trends: 1) Talent attraction by promoting communities to skilled workers, 2) Regional alliances where communities pool resources for larger projects, 3) Commercialization through venture capital and university partnerships, 4) Public-private business partnerships where communities take on some business risk. The document provides examples for each trend and instructs attendees to develop recruitment strategies based on one of the four trends.

1. Road Map to the
Future
Glenn McCullough, Jr.
www.glennmcculloughjr.com
Community Development Foundation
Tupelo / Lee County, Mississippi

2. INTRODUCTIONS
• Case Analysis
• “Project Volunteer” Groups
‣ 10 groups of 4
‣ Discuss Ways to Recruit “Project Volunteer”
‣ 5 Minute Presentation

3. CREATING THE FUTURE
• Major Trends To A Brighter
Future
‣ Talent Attraction– Successful community is a
concentration of successful people.
‣ Regional Projects- Increased horizontal capacity.
‣ Commercialization/Venture Capital-Technology transfer
from the lab to the marketplace.
‣ Business/Community Partnerships- Risk/Reward Mgt.

4. TALENT ATTRACTIONTALENT ATTRACTION
• Knowledge Base Recruitment.
• Labor force is one of the top
site selection criteria.
• An educated and talented
workforce is pivotal to
successful economic
development.

5. TALENT ATTRACTIONTALENT ATTRACTION
• Use of social media is a popular
medium
‣ i.e. Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and LinkedIn
• Some communities have created a
website devoted to talent
attraction/retention.

6. REGIONAL ALLIANCE
• Cooperation between
cities/communities in order to
create expanded capacity.
• Allows regions to pool assets
in order to compete for larger
project(s).

7. REGIONAL ALLIANCE
• PUL Alliance/Wellspring Project
‣ Pontotoc, Union, Lee County in
Mississippi
‣ Multi-County Partnership
‣ 1000 Acre Mega Site

8. REGIONAL ALLIANCE
• Tennessee Valley Corridor
• Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama, North
Carolina, and Virginia.
• Multi-State Partnership
•Oak Ridge National Labs- Oak Ridge, TN
•Enterprise Technology Center- Chattanooga, TN
•Med Tech Research Park- Tri Cities, TN

9. REGIONAL ALLIANCE
• Research Triangle Partnership
• Duke University, University of North
Carolina, North Carolina State
University
• Multi-Community Partnership
• Benefits
‣ 157 companies employing nearly 39,000 people
‣ Home to IBM
‣ Over 130 R&D Facilities

10. COMMERCIALIZATION
/VENTURE CAPITAL
• Venture Capital
‣ Definition- Startup or growth equity capital or loan
capital provided by private investors or specialized
financial institutions.
• Trend that requires injection of capital
into entrepreneurial ventures within the
community.
• Venture Capital
• Angel Investors
‣ High net worth individuals
‣ Invest in high growth early staged businesses
‣ Invests between $25,000-$2,000,000 of there ownmoney
‣ Typically invests in sector that they are familiarwith.

11. COMMERCIALIZATION
/VENTURE CAPITAL
• Universities
• Local universities offer numerous
opportunities for investment.
• 3 out of the top ten sources of patents
in TN are universities
2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 TOTAL
UT-Battelle,
LLC
49 29 31 70 56 235
Vanderbilt
Univeristy
13 15 16 16 28 88
UT- Research
Foundation
7 9 12 14 15 57
http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/ac/ido/oeip/taf/asgstc/tn_ror.htm
Issued Patents from Universities in the state of Tennessee

12. BUSINESS / COMMUNITY
PARTNERSHIPS

13. BUSINESS / COMMUNITY
PARTNERSHIPS
• Shift in Business Operations
‣ Decrease Long Term Debt on Balance Sheets
‣ Shift from Debt(Notes Payable) to an Expense(Rent
Expense).
• Used as a risk avoidance
measure by companies.
• Requires the Community to have
some risk exposure and interest
in the success of a business.

14. BUSINESS / COMMUNITY
PARTNERSHIPS• MTD
• Private investors helped purchase new facility.
• General Atomics
• Private investor built the initial building and has
now had seven (7) expansions with this company.
•

15. CASE ANALYSIS
• Project Volunteer
‣ Each group will be assigned one of the
four trends discussed to use in
developing a recruitment strategy for
their community.
‣ 5 minute presentation after group
discussion.