At 11:55 AM +1300 8/1/03, Vicki Hyde wrote:
Most of the awards out there look at absolute level of turnover as a
measure of success, so you see the same faces time after time. It would be
good to suggest other measures we can use as an industry to honour
achievement -- but what? Percentage growth? Longevity? Employee
satisfaction? (There's an award which does recognise the latter but I
think you have to have over 100 employees to be able to enter...)
Execution of a business plan, submitted well in advance? Too much
work to assess, I suspect! Also, there would be wonderful legal (eg.
IP) issues... [Perhaps simply have them sealed stored at a third
party location and only opened on the businesses' instruction to
include them in the competition?]
> Based on the figures provided in the report most NZ businesses are in
the very front edge (<$5M) so a commitment from the Government to making it
easier to create and run a small business in NZ would be a good start.
Reducing compliance costs (and time) for these smaller businesses would
That's common across all industries and there hasn't been a great deal of
government movement that I've noticed on helping out here despite repeated
calls from the Big Boys such as the Round Table, ManFed, Employers' Assn
etc over the years.
I have a feeling - not really supported by any real evidence other
than a familiar feeling my gut - that part of this is that the
government, at least at a senior level, simply sees its 'encouraging
innovation", etc, hype as another way of re-dressing the decades-old
"employment support" issue (ie. keeping up the employment figures and
schemes for encouraging employment).
As far as I am aware few of the government grants are for product
development per se (except perhaps some of the academic grants which
now accept applications from industry). [I have been pointed to the
TechNZ awards, but these seem small -- two mentioned in today's ODT
are for $4350 and $880, respectively. In the later case you'd have to
factor in advertising value when applying as it'd nominally cost you
more that $800 to apply!] Rather, most (?) offer dollar-for-dollar
support *if* you employ more people to some program. If you don't
employ more people, no dosh. You can't argue that you're making
yourself or existing staff employed either. Sometimes I consider
finding a way to go on the dole - I'd actually get more support
easier!! (JK) Seriously, my point is that they are tied to employment
rather than business success or plans per se.
I worry that some folks up top in political circles are thinking this
is another way of doing the employment thing, rather than realising
that supporting innovation, etc., is another kettle of fish entirely.
Employing staff is certainly a part of it for some people, but not
everyone. Funding to support a plan, with or without more employment,
is more relevant - ?
If your plan is to get the product up to some stage first with your
current team, there appears to be little help in sight. I've asked
some agencies if they will fund product development with view that
employment would result once the product is present, but no joy.
They'd prefer to stick to their criteria rather than judge the
proposal on its own merits. How proposals are assessed is critical:
they must not be held to rigid criteria, but rather judged against
their own merits.
Currently, I've decided that I prefer to "waste" my time in more
productive ways, so I haven't been following the funding scene
terribly closely so maybe this is all out of date. But I hope its
food for thought anyway...
I have a couple more comments (from an off-list discussion), but I'd
better let this fly and see any responses first.
Grant
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