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Everything today is about precision. We live in an age where human knowledge combined with technology can afford us surgical precision, both literally and figuratively. Bionic orthopedics, the latest tailored cancer medications and now, tantalizing, new drugs that can treat cancer Alzheimer’s. We see technology-enabled precision applied across every business, every political and advertising campaign, and every venture on the surface of the earth and in the air.
Precision targeting is an important tool for economic development, which essentially seeks to improve the standard of living in a community, whether a city or county, a region or state. Economic developers increasingly use myriad data to help drive decisions made by both business prospects and the communities in which they may (or may not) locate.
Economic developers, as essential workers in their communities, need to focus precisely the types of businesses they should attract and then intentionally pursue them. Gone are the days where manufacturers came in large numbers to build even larger plants and where wining, dining and golfing could clinch the deal. Gone, too, are the days when the community at large was mostly absent from the planning for those deals.
Today, strategy combined with precision is the way to go. Take, for example, the Economic Vitality Project (EVP). It aims to bring everyone in the communities of Monroe County together to agree on the future development, to coalesce around actions that will attract, grow and retain business in the county. One approach they have taken is to delineate those industries that will the focus of attraction.
More: It’s Your Business:Private, public and nonprofit collaboration needed for economic vitality
These targeted industries include biotechnology, cybersecurity, the creative arts, life sciences, artificial intelligence, defense tech, food and more. Precision techniques were used to isolate those industries with the greatest potential to positively impact life as well as work in Monroe County. As a whole, these industries are predicted to grow significantly and have staying power (aka resiliency), providing not only important products and services, but also paying higher wages and salaries. In late 2022, there were nearly 800 establishments in those targeted industries, with employment of more than 3,500 and an annual (estimated) wage of just under $100,000. Other factors in the selection included community input, research and, yes, data, lots of data.
Carol O. Rogers is director of the Indiana Business Research Center in the Indiana University Kelley School of Business.
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