A business plan for tech

Dear President Trump,

As you know, most successful business ventures have a short, mid and long-term plan. Election cycles have often driven government to focus on the short-term at the expense of long-term.  

{mosads}As a long-time venture capitalist, I believe strongly that your administration has the potential to make investments in the technology area that can position our economy for continued and sustainable growth.

I wanted to share some key components of a plan that ensures that the American tech industry continues to lead the world. 

Short-term

Attract and Retain Tech Talent: Only Congress can fix the broken immigration system—and I hope you look beyond the important issue of strengthening our border security as you work with Congress to create meaningful, broad-based reforms that will be good for the economy and good for all Americans. 

In the near team, as you evaluate past executive actions, judge them on their merits and recognize that some of them were the right thing to do for the tech industry and the American economy.  For example, it makes good business sense for skilled techworkers on temporary work visas to have more flexibility in the labor market on their path to becoming Americans.  Highly skilled workers should be able to accept promotions, change positions or employers, and especially start new companies while they and their families wait to receive their green cards and work towards becoming Americans.  Job mobility for immigrant workers means a level playing field and better outcomes for native workers.

It’s also good business to attract and retain the best and brightest—especially those we are already educating here in the U.S.  Let’s keep the fixes to the immigration system that strengthened and extended on-the-job training for STEM graduates.  Finally, let’s use the recent international entrepreneur rule that allows DHS to grant the equivalent of a “start up visa” for promising entrepreneurs that will provide significant public benefit to the U.S.—meaning more good paying American jobs in industries of the future.  

Strengthen Digital Initiatives in Federal Government: In recent years, the federal government has brought in talented techtalent for short term “tours of duty.” These new efforts—the U.S. Digital Services, General Services Administration’s 18F, and the Presidential Innovation Fellows—are changing how government buys and build technology, improving digital service delivery, and saving taxpayer dollars.  Continuing to bring best practices from the private sector should be consistent with your objective to make government more efficient. 

Reform Federal Government IT: The federal government spends almost $90 billion a year on IT, and too much of it goes to the long-time Beltway vendors that build expensive, custom systems—many of which don’t work and take too long.  The federal government needs to retire legacy IT systems, and focus on buying modern cloud software where possible. We also need to invest more in cybersecurity and federal workforce.  Finally, we need to bring the latest data analytics to government to make better decisions, identify waste, and improper payments. The net result will be a more cost-effective, efficient, and secure government. 

Mid-term

Invest in Tech Skills:  There are nearly 600,000 open IT jobs across the economy, and they’re not just in Silicon Valley—they are in fields like healthcare, financial services, and manufacturing.  As a country, we need to invest in initial and ongoing skills development for these workers, focused on meeting the needs of employers.  We should be championing recruiting and hiring for people without traditional credentials, expanding tech learning programs (like coding bootcamps), and redirecting government-funded training programs to focus on the tech skills that employers need in the marketplace. With next-generation online learning platforms, we can expand access and reduce costs at the same time.

Ensure Infrastructure Investment Includes Digital: In the business community, we appreciate long-term public sector infrastructure investment—our roads, bridges, and transportation systems need an upgrade, borrowing costs are low, and the benefits are broadly shared.  But as you work with Congress on an infrastructure bill, let’s make sure we are also prioritizing digital infrastructure—like fiber optics, wireless Internet, sensors, and the underlying software that powers our critical infrastructure.

Long-term

Early Access to STEM Education: In the long-term, our economy will be prosperous and competitive only if we reform and improve K-12 education—which includes early learning investments in STEM subjects.  All students should have access to a computer-science education, yet by some estimates less than a quarter of K-12 schools in this country offer classes with programming and coding.  A long-term investment in this area must also include a focus on attracting and training the nation’s best teachers in computer science.  While most education funding and decisions still happen at the state and local level, the federal government has an important leadership role to play.

Invest in Federal R&D: Basic research has been a strong driver of breakthrough technologies and innovations over the long term. For example, look at the semiconductor and the Internet, both of which have roots in defense R&D.  Put simply, the federal government has an important role making long-term investments in R&D, including in life sciences, physical sciences, robotics, and artificial intelligence. The federal government invests $140 billion per year in R&D—much of which goes to universities and the private sector—and that frankly seems low in the context of a $18 trillion economy. In addition to continuing to invest in federal R&D, a Trump administration should focus on making sure we all can use that research. Entrepreneurs, in particular, should be able to take taxpayer-funded scientific discoveries and turn them into new products and services that serve customers and create business value.

As you begin your journey in the White House, it’s important to remember that a mix of near-term and long term investments in these areas has the potential to create sustainable job and economic growth and position the U.S. to be a strong leader in technology.

Deven Parekh is Managing Director at Insight Venture Partners. The views expressed in this piece are Parekh’s and do not reflect the views of Insight Venture Partners.

The views expressed by this author are their own and are not the views of The Hill.