As we celebrate Global Entrepreneurship Week (16-22 November 2009) – amid the hyperbole of how if just one in ten aspiring entrepreneurs in the UK set up their own business, 647,000 businesses would be created, potentially employing 1.1 million people* – one minor question that has been overlooked is just “who are these future entrepreneurs”? Clearly, IT and the digital sector are going to account for a major proportion of the new ventures given the pervasive nature of technology in business. And yet British presence in the technology game is lamentable and many cite a UK “entrepreneurship crisis” in the digital sector. Perhaps the only ray of hope is Becta, the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency, our one key advantage in the trillion dollar technological global marketplace.
I have to declare an interest here – I am a Non-Executive Director on the Board of Becta – but given the fact that I do not receive remuneration for my role, I feel perfectly reconciled to defending it. I only took on the role because I fervently believe that Britain needs to “raise its game” in the IT sector and that it needs to start with school-age children. As a nation, we are great at using technology, now we need to start innovating with it so that we can claim our rightful share of the IT marketplace that is driven by the USA and more recently by the tiger economies of China and India. IT is a young industry filled with young people who are at this very moment “in the right place at the right time” and it is our 11-years olds that are most likely to succeed for us in the next few decades.
Tech Entrepreneurs need 10,000 hours to perfect their skills
In his book ‘Outliers: The Secret of Success’ Malcolm Gladwell assesses that factors needed to ensure success. Can we create the environment needed to ensure that the stars of the future find themselves to be in “the right place at the right time”, Gladwell asks. His profiles of Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft and Bill Joy, Co-Founder of Sun Microsystems, are illuminating. Essentially both men are brilliant, but according to Gladwell, genius isn’t enough. Both had unrivalled access to technology at a time when computer programming was costly and indecipherable: Gates had a mothers club that bought a computer for his school in 1968 and Joy found a backdoor to free computer time at the University of Michigan in 1971. The result was that Gates and Joy both had unfettered access to technology and spent the golden ‘10,000’ hours perfecting their craft – long before they set up Microsoft (turnover $58 billion in 2009) and Sun Microsystems (turnover $11.4 billion in 2009).
So where is the unfettered computer access for British children? Where are the British equivalents of Bill Gates and Bill Joy?
The answer is that we need to nurture them. We need to provide good quality ICT infrastructure in schools, set standards for support and delivery, showcase the best examples of work for other children to emulate; we need to train the teachers in ICT use, inspire and engage parents, applaud those achieving high standards, share and export our best practices and we need to give unfettered access to children via free laptops for those who are unlikely to be able afford their own whilst also keeping all kids safe online.
And who is doing all this? The answer is Becta.
It’s successes are that:
– Becta has created a ‘Self-Review Framework’ (a survey) that each school can use to work out what stage its at and what it needs to do to become an ICT-excellence school. Currently 16,372 schools (77%) have used this free tool and 25% are deemed to be using technology really well.
– 90% of local authorities use Becta frameworks when purchasing technology for schools. – Becta has created the ICT mark to recognise and applaud those that can achieve its standards.
– Becta works with suppliers (corporate, independents, SaaS and open source developers) to ensure that effective ICT tools are being used.
– Becta evaluates and sets standards for ICT equipment and services supplied to schools, colleges and FE bodies. It’s ICT procurement program saves the UK £250 million a year.
– An estimated £1 billion has been saved in teachers’ time in three years from 2005 – 2008 in efficiency gains from using technology for everything from online attendance records to lesson planning.
– Becta’s ‘Home Access’ program is set to roll out in 2010 and will offer a free laptop to children where the household is unlikely to be able to afford one. 10,000 have already taken up the pilot offer and 270,000 families will benefit by next year.
– Becta’s annual Learning and Technology World Forum shares best practice on IT in the education sector with the world and it showcases Britain’s lead in this arena.
– Becta does all the “boring bits” like setting interoperability standards, undertaking research and providing guidance documents to stop the education sector having to “reinvent the wheel” on ICT issues. Many of Becta’s guidance documents have become the definitive standard-bearer in a complex industry.
Even as business gurus bemoan the lack of availability of funding, or lack of skills and experience among would-be entrepreneurs who themselves moan about lack of support, role models and mentoring, we must not lose sight of the “pipeline” of young entrepreneurs for the future.
Post credit-crunch, it is easy to give in to economic pressures in the current scrutiny on public spending, but we need to bear in mind that revenue generation for the future will come for the new creative industries like IT, video gaming and digital media. Where are the future British equivalents of Bill Gates (Microsoft), Bill Joy (Sun Microsystems), Larry Ellison (Oracle), Steve Jobs (Apple), Larry Page & Sergey Brin (Google), Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Robin Li & Eric Xu (Baidu), Narayana Murthy (Infosys), Azim Premji (Wipro) and S Ramadorai (Tata Consulting Services) going to come from – Britain or abroad?
* Figures released 17 November 2009 by Enterprise UK.