Investing in the future.

Every city in Indiana should have a coworking space, they’re the innovation centers of the future. Every city isn’t financially practical so I’ll settle for every county, which is an extension of the former Lt. Governor’s initiative to make coworking and innovation a priority. I helped build The Mill and know the ins and outs of what works both in terms of the building itself and the programming to support the ecosystem.

This is a non-profit in Los Angeles that helps transition folks away from gangs. They provide employment opportunities through their bakery, Mexican restaurant, and other businesses. Bloomington needs a version of this but for anyone marginalized, particularly those experiencing homelessness, to get back on their feet.

I’d like to build a business park with offices. But in lieu of it feeling corporate, the focus should be on architecture and design. And it should be surrounded by the woods with a quarry, sculpture garden, butterfly garden, pond, and bridges.

Many folks are in a career they don’t like and that doesn’t pay well. Many workforce development programs focus on reskilling but the model doesn’t go far enough and it’s not financially sustainable. For sure, a 10-week bootcamp can help people pivot their careers but in rare cases will it allow someone to earn six figures in programming or cybersecurity or as a sales development representative. A financing model that allows students to earn while learning is ideal (because if folks are already in a job that doesn’t pay well, asking them to save $25,000 for tuition excludes a significant portion of potential students). But the likely starting point for a financing model is one where for no- or low-fee, students learn and then pay tuition from their new job via an income share agreement.

It’s becoming (has become?) unaffordable for many Americans. The cost of infrastructure is an obstacle and so is the way we think about housing itself. The goal would be to create housing at scale for 150k or less. Why not condo-ize apartments? They’re cheaper to build and offer a path to home ownership. Why not create tiny home developments? Not everyone wants a big house but some folks still want their own yard. Why is the down payment 20%? Can you a new finance model look at reliability of payment versus ability to save?

A new model of venture capital, a venture studio is a new asset class that focuses on starting companies in lieu of just investing in them. Let’s pair founders with great ideas from Indiana University and Crane, finance the company, and utilize resources at The Mill to help them accelerate their growth.

I built my last company by hiring for raw skills and teaching position skills. That is, we hired for attitude and taught everything else. We did that through skill assessment tests and there’s an opportunity to a) decrease the cost of skill assessment tests and make them available to the masses and b) combine them with a culture assessment test (there are few companies that offer this) that increases the chance of a good hire and decreases the time to determine - through normal interviews - whether someone “meshes” with the culture.

Bloomington has a great international food scene but we’re missing some good ones. There’s an opportunity to take some staples like Japanese and Turkish and Greek and pair them with missing ones like French and German and Filipino. In lieu of individual restaurants build a single kitchen with individual menus. This reduces startup costs, reduces the time any single kitchen has excess capacity, and allows for market costs to be spread out.

Baseball is America’s pastime and it’s romantic. There’s an opportunity for us to create a wood bat league for college students, to create a draw to our city during the summer, and to increase our civic pride. There’s actually lots of minor league teams in Indiana (besides the Indianapolis Indians) so there’s a clear path to bringing a team to Bloomington.

High-speed internet is a utility and one that everyone should have access to just like water or heat or electricity. Costs for this, especially in a city where limestone rules, can be high. The cost of not making high-speed internet- and in turn, information- available to everyone is higher. We’ll fall behind other cities who ensure their residents keep up with the rest of the world.

HR departments are 3-5 years behind other departments in terms of using technology to grow and streamline. I don’t know the specific idea, but based on my 16 years building a Best Places to Work, there’s an opportunity to build software to help companies that’s not just an applicant tracking system. The pain should be big enough that it costs at least $1000/mo and can serve as the backbone of the company to help it build and develop your entire workforce.