This document discusses ways to grow and strengthen entrepreneurial ecosystems. It outlines four constants of great startup communities: 1) being entrepreneur-led, 2) inclusiveness, 3) rallying points like events and programs, and 4) long-term perspective. Specific strategies are provided, such as making sure the ecosystem is bottom-up driven by entrepreneurs' wants, having resources for different types of entrepreneurs, and developing metrics to measure ecosystem health. The talk emphasizes the need to "defrag" ecosystems by understanding connections, aligning resources to roadmaps, and celebrating successes to inspire others.

1. Building startup communities!
» How can we help grow healthy entrepreneurial
ecosystems?
» Resilient?
» Self-renewing?
» How do we help “defrag” our own startup
communities?
» Video of this talk is here.

2. From EGOsystems to ECOsystems
Thank you, Martin Justensen for coining that!

3. Norris Krueger, PhD
@entrep_thinking
norris.krueger@ gmail.com
How to Grow DEFRAG Your Entrepreneurial Ecosystem
Slideshare
My blog
Short bio

4. Why not look at successful startup communities?
Serial entrepreneur, VC and one of the architects of Boulder, Colorado’s tech
ecosystem Brad Feld: What generalizes across great startup communities?
http://entrepreneurshipidaho.blogspot.com/2013/03/
how-to-defrag-your-entrepreneurial.html

5. Four Constants of Great Startup Communities
» 1. Entrepreneur-Led
» 2. Inclusive
» 3. Rallying Points
» 4. Long Term Perspective
» And how do we make this work? What else do we
need?

6. 1. Entrepreneur-Led
» Bottom-up not top-down
» Easy to say, hard to do
» Are you a “leader” or a “feeder”?
» And do you really, REALLY get the entrepreneurial
mindset?
» Doesn’t it make sense for strategy and tactics be driven
by what the entrepreneurs want?
» (what they want, not what we think they need)

7. 2. Inclusive as Hell
» Have something for all the different flavors of
entrepreneur in your community:
» Growth/no-growth, small/large, new/old, rural/urban…
» Realize they’re all interconnected (see ‘maps’ below!)
» What can you do or support that is the ‘rising tide’ that
lifts all boats?
» Who needs more specialized resources?
» Suerangel Chris Devore (@crashdev): Need broad and
deep… some need longer runway

8. 3. Rallying points
» Startup communities need things to rally around – great events,
recurring events and…
» Great programs!
» Big fan of the TechStars model (and Global Accelerator Network)
check out www.techstars.org
» Seattle has StartupWeekend.org
» Gothenburg, Sweden has Chalmers School of Entrepreneurship
» Enschede, Netherlands has U Twente & VentureLab
» Helsinki has Aalto… Aalto Design Factory, Startup Sauna and more
» All are student-driven…. (your university could do this too!)

9. 4. Long Term Perspective
» Startup communities take decades to form… even Silicon
Valley dates to the 1950s.
» Check Steve Blank’s “The Secret History of Silicon Valley”
(www.steveblank.com - you should read his blog anyway!)
» However, there were –and are – great catalysts like Fred
Terman, Stanford’s engineering dean who connected
everyone.
» People like Tina Seelig continue Stanford’s efforts – you
can never rest on your laurels!

10. More than just connectors
» Fred and Tina are not your usual “connector”
» Think “liaison-animateur”
» Proactive, professional but connecting isn’t their job
» Study of a major US city identified the top 100 connectors,
local magazine identified the “100 most influential”…
overlap was… 1 person
» Liaison-animateurs and any good connector is
intrinsically motivated

11. Mapping the ecosystem
» Important to understand how everyone is (or is not)
connected -read this! http://bit.ly/Karen_S
» Who are your “gatekeepers” (who control access to
key resources?
» Who are your connectors?

12. Great startup communities…
» Both build and are built on
» Entrepreneurial human capital and
» Entrepreneurial social capital
» In other words,
» Healthy entrepreneurial ecosystems are constantly providing ways
to grow the entrepreneurial mindset in the community AND they
» Constantly “defrag” the ecosystem itself!
» (for more on the DEFRAG model: http://goo.gl/6mmmy and on
ecosystems… http://www.slideshare.net/norriskrueger/growing-truly-
entrepreneurial-ecosystem )

13. Think “FIRE”…
» FIRE is a useful acronym…
» Defragging an ecosystem requires
(human capital)
» Fostering the entrepreneurial mindset broadly and deeply across the
community
» Inspire the next generation of Ideas
(social capital)
» Re-capture & reward communities & organizations that return to their
entrepreneurial roots
» Enhance the Entire Ecosystem (e.g, grow & support connectors)
» http://www.slideshare.net/norriskrueger/iic-preso-pdf-new-5749635a (pp.
21-25)

14. “Defragging” means…
» Where are you? Map the ecosystem in ways that capture the
dynamics and interconnections
» Where are we going? Where does the entrepreneurial
community want to go?
» Use these to build a bottom-up, task-driven roadmap
» Align resources to the roadmap.
» For more on this: http://goo.gl/6mmmy

15. Want to map the genealogy (dynamics)?
www.heikemayer.com

16. Want to map the content of ecosystems?
http://www.empactsummit.com/ecosystemmap.php

17. “Defragging” also means…
» Keep it positive!
» Build on what you have, not worry about what you don’t
have.
» Example: Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD
model)
» Example: Don’t ask “What is the barrier you face?” Ask
“What’s the one thing that will enable launch/growth?”

18. “Defragging” also means…
» Great metrics – be data-driven!
» Check out USA site www.youreconomy.org
» Most countries have the same kind of data
» SHARE this data with civic officials, other champions of
entrepreneurship and your students!

19. An example of data you can use!
» Idaho’s numbers 2001-2008
» Startups created 58% of gross new jobs
» Expanding firms created 40%
» (only 2% from in-migrating firms)
Net job creation..
Births – deaths = ~10% of net new jobs
Expanding – shrinking = ~90% of net new jobs
Most states & countries have similar patterns
BUT you need to share this reality…
To grow your OWN jobs means you need to grow your own firms,
to grow your own entrepreneurs!
(also known as “economic gardening”)

20. Measuring the Health of your Ecosystem
Peter Vogel http://www.entrepreneursship.org/
has great objective metrics of overall health that you can use
at local level (see diagram to right)
Markers of a Healthy Ecosystem:
Take a look at http://bit.ly/EcoSys
these make a good dashboard;
put it online and let the community rate the ecosystem’s health.

21. Back to the Four Constants of Great Startup Communities
» 1. Entrepreneur-Led
» 2. Inclusive
» 3. Rallying Points
» 4. Long Term Perspective
» And how do we make this work? What else do we
need?

22. So how do we get started?
Never miss opportunities to…
Celebrate
celebrate what you already have – celebrate your
entrepreneurs, celebrate your champions
Educate
don’t miss chances to educate somebody about the
realities of entrepreneurship (and its merits)
Initiate
and never, ever miss a chance to JFDI,
to Just. Do. Something.

23. Do you want in? Want to know more?
Norris Krueger, PhD
Norris.krueger[at]gmail.com
@entrep_thinking
Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+
Mobile = 1.208.440.3747
Skype = norris.krueger
So how can I help you to help grow great startup
communities?

24. p.s. Why me? ;)
» 2015: Ewing Marion Kauffman/US Sourcelink global summit of thought leaders on entrepreneurial
ecosystems (co-organizer)
» 2015 (Aug) Academy of Management global conference workshop on ecosystems (link)
» 2015 (Aug) Academy of Management global conference symposium on entrep learning
» 2015 (proposed) TEDxEntrepreneurship on ecosystems
» 2015 (in prep) Workshop on ecosystems ,World Entrepreneurship Forum, Hangzhou, China
» 2015 (in prep): Workshop on ecosystems at NACCE
» 2015 (proposed/invited) Ecosystem workshop for Inc. global conference
» 2015-16 (in prep): Kauffman ‘best & brightest’ on entrep mindset/entrep learning
» 2015-16 (proposed/invited) Ecosystem workshop for TiE
» 2015-2016 (c-organizing): Major NSF / EDA ecosystem conference (‘Lean meets EcDev’)
» 2014: Video for Strascheg Centre for Entrepreneurship/EU-funded Coneeect program
» 2014: Academy of Management global conference workshop on ecosystems (link)
» 2013: OECD research workshop on entrepreneurial ecosystems (link)
» 2013: World Entrepreneurship Forum master class on ecosystems, Singapore
» 2013: Global Entrepreneurship Week, Cairo/Giza, Egypt
» 2013: NACCE workshop co-presenter
» 2012: ICSB research symposium on ecosystems
» 2012: Academy of Management research symposium