To drive IT, State needs entrepreneurial makeover. Education is the key.

That speaks to the type of creativity and problem-solving that innovation experts believe is absent in K-12 education. Thieme, author of Islands in the Clickstream, has written about technology’s impact on the social and cultural events that affect business, particularly collaboration and work teams, and how executives are oblivious to it. He said the same neglect affects public education, which has been slow to recognize the benefits of creative collaboration fostered by electronic games.

"Kids are supposedly `wasting time’ on online multi-player gaming, but when half a million people are online at the same time, participating in new social structures, it’s not wasting time," Thieme explained. "It’s learning new skills and new collaborative abilities. And to give kids the opportunities to explore that rather than just drill down and do exercises about it, is absolutely essential."

To develop a more robust information technology industry, Wisconsin may have to undergo a cultural makeover, according to keynoters at this week’s E-Business Best Practices and Emerging Technologies Conference.

Joe Vanden Plas

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