The Future of RDAs

In the warm up to the 2010 election campaigns, the future of Regional Development Agencies (RDAs) is becoming a hot issue. If the Conservatives win, the future looks cold for these supposed drivers of economic development and even under a Labour government serious reform and funding cuts seem certain.

So what are RDAs?

The eight original RDAs were established in 1999 (with the London RDA being established in 2000) with stated purposes of:

• furthering economic development and regeneration

• promoting business efficiency, investment and competitiveness

• promoting employment

• enhancing development and application of skills relevant to employment

• contributing to sustainable development

The RDAs' agenda includes regeneration, taking forward regional competitiveness, taking the lead on inward investment and working with regional partners to ensure the development of a skills action plan so skills training matches the needs of the labour market (source: www.bis.gov.uk).

The impact of RDAs

In 2008 PriceWaterhouse Coopers released the ‘Impact of RDA Spending’ report, which showed that between 2002 and 2007 RDAs had:

• created or safeguarded 213,000 net additional jobs, which would not have come about without their involvement

• Inward Investment, which generated £13.50 for every £1spent

• investment in generation activities projected to generate future potential economic output of £8 for every £1 spent

• brought more than 570ha of contaminated or disused brownfield land which would have otherwise stood derelict

• supported the development of educational infrastructure in the 'people theme' which generated £5.20 for every £1 spent.

But… what the sceptics say

Some people hold the opinion (the Conservative party included) that RDAs are a waste of time, inefficient at best and in some cases causing economic damage. Another negative point that is made is their lack of accountability for their strategy and funding. The London RDA is the only RDA that is operated with an elected mandate, so there are many questions about the legitimacy of the other RDAs.

What do IoD members think?

In March 2009 the IoD released its paper 'Big Picture, Recession: Are we on the Mend?'.

The feedback was varied:

• Only 18 per cent of of IoD members stated that RDAs perform well when rating delivery against target.

• Around 60 per cent said that their region would have achieved the same growth rate without the RDA.

• There is a clear North-South divide in the perception of the contribution of RDAs to economic performance.

ed quickly in areas such as Lloyds or Corus we coul a spiral of decline

What could the future look like for RDAs post election?

In a recent letter the Conservatives stated:

'We want to re-focus regional economic agencies back onto the things that matters, namely renewing local economies.

‘So, we will reform the system by enabling your local councils to replace the existing agency with a new partnership between themselves and local business, to focus on things like regeneration and jobs. This will mean elected councils and local businesses deciding local economic priorities.

‘Secondly, the boundaries of the partnerships will reflect natural economic areas. If a clear majority of local authority and business leaders decide that the current boundaries of their RDA genuinely reflect their local economic area, then we will respect their view, under the new arrangements.'

However a recent memo suggests that reform rather than recyle is the new Conservative approach, possibly a response to the CBI and British Chambers expressing concern about devolving regional strategic policies to ‘local town halls’.

On a Regional basis – Yorkshire Forward

Tom Riordan, the Chief Executive of Yorkshire Forward for the past four years, has given the IoD the opportunity to contribute a strong business voice for the region ensuring its position as a key partner in any ongoing strategy.

The IoD report released last March also stated: 'Slicing by region, IoD members’ views on the success of the RDAs in furthering economic performance delivers some interesting results. Most telling is the fact that the dissatisfaction with RDA performance is lowest in South West, North East, Yorkshire and Humber and North West' confirming that all agencies should not be tarred with the same brush and that Yorkshire Forward has been consistently outperforming some of the other regions.

In an interview Tom Riordan commented on the challenges during the recession:

'For me, like many people, the past year has been the most challenging of my career. We almost stared into an abyss a year ago, facing thousands of job losses in Halifax, thousands in financial services in this region, a virtual meltdown in manufacturing orders and regeneration grinding to a halt. But we have not suffered as some people thought we would. We still have a financial services sector that is growing again. At Yorkshire Forward there has been a Dunkirk spirit about the place. We have been on a war footing and it has worked.'’

Certainly the future looks uncertain, but ensuring economic success for the Yorkshire and Humber region is still the key focus for both teams. The IoD is keen to ensure that, whatever happens, it maintains the strong voice for business in the area, and if the RDA continues in any form, it hopes to work with Tom and his team to help promote sustainable economic growth.

Have your say – what are your experiences of your RDA?

Managing the workflow around social media campaigns

From the view of a larger company it is crucial to effectively manage the conversations in the social media channels to ensure that you manage the reputation of your brand online.

If your brand is quite well established there is going to be some volume of traffic in the tweets, facebook fan pages posts and community.

The question I have had posed many times is how do organisations manage the workflow, business process and customer relations around this emerging channel?

What is work flow around social media?
With all these conversations going on, you need to keep track of who are the key influencers in your community. On top of that you will have a range of questions being asked from offers, customer service, operational issues, technical issues and I am sure there are some I have missed out.
The point being the person managing the social media campaign cannot be expected to have all the answers. They need to ask the experts in the business for their response to the question / statement so they can work out a response. So companies need to manage the work flow around this, so the person managing the social media can keep track of which tweet has been answered, which are still outstanding and which ones need escalating.

They also need to build up a knowledge base which will be the common tweets / questions with the stock answers.


Saleforce Service Cloud



Salesforce is one of the leading CRM and cloud computing companies. They have launched Serviced Cloud which enables companies to integrate CRM and work flow around the twitter, facebook and community. Quite an effort to set up and not cheap either (so more for the larger businesses). Does provide an enterprise solution for managing your online CRM.



I am not sure if the lightweight version of the software for small business has this application included of if you can embed it in it.

CoTweet
Is a currently a free online service that allows you to keep track of those twitter conversations (doesn't do facebook). It allows you to schedule tweets, assign updates to colleagues and keep track of conversation threads. Not as full weight as Salesforce - but then SME's don't need that do they?

Which software have you used to track your social media work flow - what recommendations do you have?

The power of social media: when the virtual & real world collide

Virtual vs Real World Conversations

There are differences between what people say on the internet and what people say in the real world.

The main difference is what people feel they can say to someone online compared to face to face.

Somehow people feel they can be slightly more rude and abrupt people feel they can be.



Because they are having these conversations online rather than to their face, then they feel less inhibited.

At some point the backchannel will backlash and the person you are talking about could make you stand up and take responsibility for your discussions.

Think personal reputation
Managing your own personal brand online is important for your own credibility and authority online. How would you come across twittering on the back channel at a conference slating the presenter? Getting a reputation as someone who's trigger happy and lippy on twitter and other social media sites will damage your personal reputation.

Think the wider picture
When doing business these day's people will research who you are and judge your integrity, honesty and credibility online. People will 'Google' your name and company. The 'private world' of the conference is long gone and your tweets are a reminder of your harsh opinions.

2 Tips to manage your Reputation Online

• Only say to people online what you would say to their face. At some point the virtual and real world will collide. You may have to justify what you have said, it's easier to have the same beliefs and values online and offline.
  
  
• Keep track of what is listed in Google for your name and company name. Managing your profile and what's in the news is important to your profile. Use something like Google Alerts, TrackUR or Alterian are useful tools for achieving this.

Leeds Social Media Surgery- Tuesday 13th April

The Leeds Social Media group is run by a group of local bloggers and social media enthusiasts.

We're a really friendly bunch and offer free advice for local community and voluntary groups, clubs, societies and small arts organisations.

If you want to know how to use your website to best promote your cause or organisation or may be you want to know more about blogs, twitter, wikis and forums but don't know where to find out more then come along to one of our sessions.

Date: Tuesday 13th April 2010

Time: 5.30pm - 7pm

Place: Round Foundry Media Centre, Foundry Street, Leeds, LS11 5QP

People can drop in but we 'encouraging' people to sign up on the eventbrite site here: http://leedssms3.eventbrite.com/

Or join the Facebook group or future events and information, links and advice http://bit.ly/LeedsSocialFB

Book Review: The Backchannel, Cliff Atkinson

How Audiences are Using Twitter and Social Media and Changing Presentations Forever, £12.99

The backchannel are the people in your audience who are using social media sites such as Twitter to collaborate, chat, share information either prior / during / after your presentation.

I have been to a few seminars / barcamps / workshops where there's an unofficial backchannel chatting throughout.

I wanted to learn and understand more about how to embrace and make the most of this channel to get the most from facilitating and leading workshops / social media sessions.

Within the technical world, the backchannel has been growing in influence since the rise of Twitter. The backchannel has become mainstream at most large conferences / meet ups / barcamps. As a presenter / facilitator this backchannel will happen with or without you.

If you choose to ignore it, then your credibility as an expert within your field crashes in one hit should anything negative be said about you, without you responding or moderating the conversation.

Anyone who's involved in running workshops / seminars / training / events / membership organisations needs to sit up and listen to what Cliff Atkinson has to say.

Cliff runs through the different models of how to manage the back channel along with some great tools on managing those potential hazardous situations when the virtual back channel collides with the real world.

If you embrace the backchannel and use it effectively, then the likelihood of the virtual and real worlds colliding are minimised. Not only that the back channel can boost your online reputation and credibility. So if you want to boost your ratings....get reading.

What you think about the back channel - what's your experience been?

Leeds Initiative - Have your say in the future of Leeds

Last Monday (22nd February), Martin Dean, Deputy Director, Leeds Initiative joined IoD Members over lunch to discuss The Vision for Leeds 2030.

Leeds Initiative is 'the city’s local strategic partnership. Founded in 1990, we bring together the public, private, community, voluntary and faith sectors to work together to achieve success, encourage improvement, and tackle and overcome problems for the benefit for all citizens now and in the future. In 2004 we published the Vision for Leeds 2004 to 2020, a long-term plan for the ongoing economic, cultural and environmental development of the city.'

The Leeds Arena was one project that came out of the Vision for Leeds 2020 and much much more.

They are now looking ahead to 2030 and the Vision for Leeds. The consultation for this vision already started in June 2009 with the Leeds Initiative Assembly at the Leeds City Museum. Over 120 people participated in the initial discussion. The top 12 issues are now being worked on as the main themes for 2030.

Martin posed 2 questions to the IoD members and guests to discuss over lunch:

1. Sustainability - what are the main issues for business leaders on this
2. Ambition - as leaders in Leeds are we setting the goals high enough, are we ambitious enough, what should the goals be?

We all had an interested and lively debate over lunch, which certainly got the conversation going!

Main feedback:

• More joined up thinking within Leeds City Region on transport
• More joined up thinking on highways maintenance (currently roadworks on main roads in Leeds and commuter routes
• More green spaces in Leeds city centre (think about New York)
• Improve transport to Leeds Bradford airport
• Sustainability from a business perspective -> need to ensure new generation employees have the right skills
• Need to encourage the next generation entrepreneurs and business leaders to drive the vision for Leeds

The IoD has recently joined the Economy and Skills Partnership and will continue to work with Leeds Initiative to ensure the views and concerns of our members are represented in the Vision for Leeds.

What do you think about The Vision For Leeds 2030 - are there any points you want to raise?