Advisory Board Meetings & Reports

2008-09 Statewide Industry Advisory Council Meeting

December 14, 2008
Doubletree Hotel
San Jose, CA

Thank you to all participants in the 08-09 Industry Advisory Council meeting. This meeting served the Multimedia & Entertainment Initiative (MEI), an Economic and Workforce Development project sponsored by the California Community College System. MEI is a cross-District Initiative that serves as a bridge between education and industry. Thank you to Kitty O’Doherty, John Avakian, and Laurie Burruss for providing meeting notes.

 

The purpose of this meeting is to give a real-world snapshot from California industry leaders to educators connected through the MEI statewide network. The goal is to give industry members a chance to address educational leadership from each of the MEI Regional Centers at the same time, thereby maximizing the use of industry members’ time.

 

Objectives for this meeting include eliciting:

 

  • Insight and experience-based information from California industry leadership to shape MEI as a bridge-building institution between industry and education that promotes economic development within the state
  • Industry perspective on trends and developments that can be delivered to and used by educators shaping individual college programs
  • Input from industry into how community colleges can more effectively serve businesses

 

The meeting was held on Thursday, December 4th, 2008, at the Doubletree Hotel at the San Jose Airport, from 10:00 A.M. to 12:45 P.M. Brent Altomare, President of Groovy Like a Movie, a San Diego video production company, graciously served as Master of Ceremonies. Mr. Altomare also serves on the MEI 10 regional advisory council, which serves the community colleges in San Diego and Imperial Counties. Mr. Altomare opened the meeting, introduced himself and summarized the purpose and process for the meeting. He then invited everyone to briefly introduce themselves, starting with John Avakian, the MEI Statewide Initiative Director.

 

The industry/organizational advisors present were:

Name

Company

Dave Almos

Almos & Assoc.

Brent Altomare

Groovy Like a Movie

Michael Berman

Mobile Tribe

Casey Bernay

Local 790, Illustrators & Matte Artists

Debbie Brooks

The ACME Network

Dave Cavanaugh

Cisco

Noah Dudley

Director/Producer

Joel Hagen

IMPACT

Waqar Hasan

IBM Innovation Center

Bruce Heavin

lynda.com

Richard Herrera

Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc

Tom Higgens

Unity Technologies

Larry Johnson

New Media Consortium

James Jones

CCSF - NSF/ICT Grant

Joe Lambert

Apple

Anil Natha

JPL

David Rengh

World Organization of Webmasters

Cathy Souza

Computerland of Silicon Valley

Megan Stewart

Adobe Systems

Ann Townsager

Apple

Scott Ward

Armory Center for the Arts

Lynda Weinman

lynda.com

 

The educational participants were:

Name

Institution/College

John Avakian

MEI Initiative Director, College of San Mateo

Laurie Burruss

MEI Center Director, Pasadena City College

Christie Campbell

MEI Center Director, No. Orange Co. CCD

John Carrese

CCCEWD Centers of Excellence

Richard Holdredge

MEI Center Director, LA Valley College

Robert Jensen

Fullerton College

Jim Kiggens

MEI Center Director, Santa Barbara CC

Jack Mitchell

California Department of Education

Kathy Pulse

MEI Project Monitor, California Community
Colleges’ Chancellors Office

Debra Sands-Miller

Santa Rosa JC

Cynthia Scott

MEI Center Director, San Diego CCD

Guy Smith

Santa Barbara CC

Anna Szabados

MEI Center Director, Mission College

 

 

Mr. Altomare asked a series of questions and each industry advisor had a chance to respond. There was a five minute Q&A at the end of each round of answers. A summary of the comments are shown after each question:

 

Q1: What are the major, workforce challenges facing your industry?

When hiring, what skills are you looking for that are hard to find in potential employees?

What qualifications will you be looking for in future hires?

Prospective employees are needed who:

  • Are either trained on entry or can learn fast; self-directed learners; know how to get new knowledge; what’s learned is extinct 18 months out
  • Learn how to do something for someone else; many references to service learning/ working for non-profits or charity groups as a way to develop portfolios AND the right attitude for working in the real world; collaboration
  • Have the right mix of technical and artistic skills; such employees are very difficult to find;
  • [Quoting Nicholas Donofio, IBM Executive Vice President for Innovation and Technology http://www.gartner.com/research/fellows/asset_185385_1176.jsp] T-shaped people: skilled deeply in one specialty, but with broad foundational knowledge in a wide variety of other areas;
  • Have a strong evidence-based portfolio;
  • Have strong programming skills, including the ability to write useful comments within programs;
  • Demonstrate a strong sense of ethics and morals;
  • Can learn fast and are dedicated to lifelong learning, continuing to stay on top of emerging trends;
  • Possess cross-generational business skills (the ability to work with others across generations, e.g. Gen Xers working with Baby Boomers)
  • Possess life coping skills: the ability to cope with the demands of work;
  • Demonstrate good writing skills—this is exceptionally difficult to find
  • Have the ability to collaborate with co-workers, including virtual collaboration, in a web environment and in international workgroups; people who can communicate in writing, due to time changes; people who can build trustworthy reputations; people who can mend damage due to cross-cultural miscommunication
  • Have a strong portfolio and demonstrate the self-confidence to be “junior” employees, open to new ideas, and to “check their ego at the door”; admit to not knowing; learning how to learn; learn how to listen and express themselves, but not in an uncomfortable way; articulate;
  • Are programmers who are problem solvers; people who can solve specific problems quickly in the most recent language for the most recent consoles [game industry]
  • Have skills in security and data management in the digital cellular area
  • Have the service gene; people who can relate to the human factor, community service
  • Can communicate, not just PowerPoint, creative thinkers; people who can work on product groups and who can demonstrate the process of problem-solving
  • Have an art background and programming skills, esp. Flash Developers; Flash needs to be taught as a programming language

 

Q2: What’s next? What changes do you see for new media and innovative technologies that will affect your business over the next 5-15 years; how will these changes affect the way you do business?

  • Cloud computing will become more prevalent: information/data/programs will no longer be on a server somewhere but rather organized around people/social parameters, convergence into single systems that used to be separated; social changes due to collective wisdom,
  • Mobile devices and content: social networking, delivery of information & games; pressure to sell devices drives some of this activity; iPhone apps, especially games; the iPhone is the new “garage” for innovation; 1.2 million cell phone users driving a high level of innovation; web and mobile apps, not necessarily console-driven apps [game industry]
  • Virtual Communities: people as the organizing principle of information; communities no longer demographic, but psychographic; people seeking their “tribes” disconnected from geography; passions and interests fuel social connectivity; the Facebook phenomenon; people seeking authentic experiences, a meaningscape deeper and more profound
  • Games, combined with the ability to build applications without coding skills.

 

Q3: How is your company responding to the current economic climate?

  • Prioritize innovation, develop new products, educate our employees not cut them; rethink; get out in front; anticipate; identify growth markets
  • When markets contract, gaining market share should be the goal
  • Emphasize entrepreneurship and find opportunities to grow market share, particularly in emerging markets, which translates into finding employees willing to work abroad;
  • Read the book “Jump Point, by Tom Hayes--The Web 3.0 world of “pandemic economics” is a new economy that will function outside the traditional laws of commerce, free from today's impediments to business growth, and existing in a world where every person is connected to every other person.”
  • Focus on being a lean, entrepreneurial company, individual contribution matters, people who add value; focus on “next week,” being at the right place at the right time
  • Increase focus on data protection and deal with increased government oversight/regulations;
  • Reduce expenses to operate more efficiently: take advantage of Cloud computing; be very selective in hiring; combine positions and skills sets.

 

Q4: If a close friend or family member were to find themselves unemployed, and they could afford 6-9 months of full-time training, what would you advise them to learn?

  • Basic business skills: budget, finance, accounting, business law, business math, how to write a prospectus, MBA
  • Project management and visualizing a project from start to finish;
  • Learn about how a large company works: the bigger picture;
  • Business of Art: “We are in the business of art”;
  • Don’t’ chase the market—be passionate about what you love and build skills around that
  • People who can teach are needed: education and online education
  • Writing/communicating skills; it is very hard to find people who can write

 

Ad Hoc question: Certification programs—are they of value?

  • Small company perspective: like certificates because they provide a baseline, but are concerned that it is not clear to everyone that a baseline is all they provide; employees need much, much more
  • Not so keen on certifications; false security
  • Certifications are meant to be supplement, not an “end all be all”
  • Certificates alone are not enough, people need to build on the skills

 

Q5: What are your company’s unmet training needs?

  • We are small enough that we only hire previously trained employees and expect them to train themselves, or we bring in specially trained consultants;
  • We do no in-house training
  • We are not sending people to classes; we cannot afford the downtime; we question all expenses
  • We need project management training; consulting in project management
  • We use graduate level students to fill skills gaps
  • Company will fire people who do not have the skills and hire people who do
  • We provide online technical training and outsource business training; a mix of internal and outsourced training
  • Global footprint requires consistent training to worldwide workforce; we use eLearning, video on demand, telepresence, and internships; we offer cultural training, such as How to do Business with Americans
  • We have outsourced business training in HR, business regulations, business ethics, cultural competency;
  • We encourage employees to attend training opportunities but few find the time to participate;
  • Large companies often purchase off-the-shelf training such as Leadership Training, but it must be globally consistent, which is very difficult.

 

Q6: Are there specific areas in which the community colleges could collaborate with your business but don’t already?

  • Internship programs, including for-credit programs, since paid internships are unlikely;
  • Lambert: community service through community-based organizations, such as VISTA (AmeriCorps-type organization), for internships/ work experience with non-profits
  • Almos: collaboration to develop a Soft Skills Certificate
  • Apple: collaborations focused on Student Generated Content, as per the iTunes U model
  • Apple and Adobe as broker or conduit to industry
  • Adobe: can promote better connections between CCs and other/more industry partners such as SODA – Society of Digital Agencies.
  • Adobe innovation sponsored projects
  • Community Colleges need to let us know what you can do
  • Site visits>
  • Job shadowing

 

The meeting concluded with a served lunch. During lunch, there were two MEI team members at each table to lead a guided discussion. The two questions were:

 

Q1: What new product/technology/or service intrigues you the most?
Q2: If you had an unlimited budget and 6 months of time - what would you work on?

 

Here is a summary of responses:

 

Q1: What new product/technology/or service intrigues you the most?

  • MMOG [massive multiplayer online games] for pairing up/ relationships, dating behavior, duos, marriage group dynamics
  • My son’s iPod touch
  • Online software services, how to resell
  • No more need for MS Office software; subscriptions, business models – pay for function, repercussions of Cloud computing, GoogleApps,
  • Cards to send picture info
  • Too many apps? Death to be at bottom of list
  • EBooks; the Kindle
  • iPhone – ecosystem and applications
  • Software – has to work on current technology, as well as technology not yet developed. Has to be transportable – not locked into one thing
  • Mobile applications – adapting what is being done via consoles to phones
  • Potential of providing real-world examples as projects for students and faculty field trip to visit industry.
  • WebEx conferencing. Help people to work in virtual environments, e.g. Central San Joaquin Valley. Showcase how to use virtual collaborative environment.
  • Collaborative teaching with industry
  • Wonderland by Sun Computers, similar to Second Life, better for corporations
  • User generated content for game developers
  • A copy machine that can do everything—one or two brochures, advertising print
  • 3D printers for just-in-time manufacturing
  • Storage on the cloud; green technology no need for paper documents [laughter here]
  • Big hooray for Adobe Acrobat Pro 9
  • The Red camera—a video camera that has raw technology, a new technology invented by Oakley (the sunglass company), costs $17,000 and worth it

 

Ad hoc question: How does open source affect your business?

  • Don’t have to write code for web publishing to have a good web presence
  • Teach people how to deal with services rather than knowing certain skills
  • Decentralizing of information, can get it anywhere

 

Q2: If you had an unlimited budget and 6 months of time - what would you work on?

  • Finish the projects I’m on now,
  • MIT online,
  • Blogs – decentralizing truth and learning
  • Road Trip Nation, teachers as synthesizers
  • Find better ways to train employees – more interactive ways, not in classroom or video.
  • Complete infrastructure for user created training – You Tube, social networking, to store and retrieve; let engineers teach each other thru online communication. 2.0 capacity. Make it easy to find person with expertise. Issue: Do I want to be found?
  • Take broadband into every household. Infrastructure. Internet capacity. There is money in innovative infrastructure. Africa went straight to wireless connectivity and the rest of the world is far outpacing the u.s.
  • Teaching & understanding failure (e.g., through a statewide innovation competition)
  • ICT – Showcase in SF City College [ http://www.mpict.org ]
  • Internships

 

 

Resources

The 2009 Horizon Report
The Web Version
http://wp.nmc.org/horizon2009/

 

The Manpower Workforce Report
A San Diego Labor Market Snapshot, Jan 6, 2009
http://www.sandiegoatwork.com/pdf/lmi/Bus_Barometer/business_barometer_dec08.pdf 

 

San Diego County Economic Roundtable--the longest-running local economic forecasting event in San Diego County
Presentations are available at:
http://www.sandiegoatwork.com/generate/html/LMI/Roundtable_05_main.html  

 

The USD Index of Leading Economic Indicators
Click on the current month to get the report for that month
http://home.sandiego.edu/~agin/usdlei/

 

The AIGA/Aquent Salary Survey
The current year survey, plus previous years for comparison, are available here:
http://www.aiga.org/content.cfm/salary-survey 

 

Leslie Jensen-Inman surveyed 32 prominent Web designers and developers on their views about what they think should be in an educational program. The results are released here, under a Creative Commons license:
http://teachtheweb.com/interviews/   

 

Gartner interview of Nicholas Donofio, IBM Executive Vice President for Innovation and Technology on his description of T-shaped people and emerging SSME [service science, management and engineering] based curriculum http://www.gartner.com/research/fellows/asset_185385_1176.jsp

 

Mid-Pacific ICT Center
Information and Communications Technologies
http://www.mpict.org

 

Note from Dr. Larry Johnson on 11/17/08, “Steve Jobs just advised the Apple staff that their strategy will be to innovate through the downturn, so as to come out the other side with strong new ideas and a strengthened ability to meet the needs of their communities.”

 

How to Manage Your Team in a Downturn (and Come Out on Top)
by Lindsay Blakely
http://www.bnet.com/2403-13059_23-208896.html

 

The Upside of a Downturn, by Jesse Harriott, Ph.D. Vice President of Global Monster Insights and pioneered the Monster Employment Index (ME I), the first measure of online recruitment activity now tracked in the United States and Europe.
http://changethis.com/46.04.UpsideDownturn

 

Innovating Through Recession (Andrew Razeghi, Kellogg School of Management)
http://www.scribd.com/doc/7450921/Innovating-Through-Recession-Andrew-Razeghi-Kellogg-School-of-Management