The Venture Edge

On Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, I participated in a very interesting seminar here in San Diego: The Art of Science Learning: Shaping the 21st-Century Workforce. As many of you may be aware, the United States faces an innovation gap that is growing wider with each passing year. According to John Lechleiter, chairman, president, and CEO of pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly and Company, "A recent study ranked the U.S. sixth among the top 40 industrialized nations in innovative competitiveness, but 40th out of 40 in 'the rate of change in innovation capacity' over the past decade. The ranking, published last year by the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, measured what countries are doing -- in higher education, investment in research and development, corporate tax rates, and more -- to become more innovative in the future. The U.S. ranked dead last." The bottom line is that our nation is falling behind the rest of the world when it comes to innovation, and this problem is getting worse, not better. 

My friend and coauthor Harvey Seifter -- former executive director of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and expert on business and the arts -- served as guest editor (along with Ted Buswick of BCG) for a special issue of The Journal of Business Strategy. This issue -- titled: Creatively intelligent companies and leaders: Arts-based learning for business -- was just released online. Downloads of individual articles are available free of charge for the moment. Simply click on the article title, then download the document.