Booz Allen Hamilton Senior Vice President Don Pressley moderated a panel titled “Who Will Lead the Next Global Economy?” on July 10, 2010, at the Aspen Institute’s Aspen Ideas Festival. Pressley is the firm’s principal manager and strategist for diplomacy and international development. He led a discussion with David Hale, an advisor to the Commonwealth Bank of Australia and owner of an asset management consultancy that bears his name; Hikmet Ersek, soon to become the president and CEO of The Western Union Company; Robert Hormats, U.S. undersecretary of state for economic, energy, and government affairs; and Klaus Scharioth, the German ambassador to the United States. Pressley shared these insights after the panel.
Why did you focus on innovation as the primary topic in a discussion titled “Who Will Lead the Next Global Economy?”
When we were doing research around the question of who will lead the global economy, it became clear that innovation really is the driver that everyone is starting to look to. Certainly from the U.S. economy’s perspective that is paramount.
When people think of innovation, they think of an iPad or other technological advances. But isn’t it true that innovation is something that occurs constantly throughout the economy and government?
Technical innovations like the iPad allow for the application of more innovative processes and techniques. For instance, the mobile phone, which is pervasive now across the developing world, allows people to transfer information about crops, share the latest market price, transfer money, and do a lot of other things. Such technology is foundational for innovation in the ways people do business.
Have we seen innovation in government policy to promote innovation in the economy?
The stimulus package includes electronic medical records, a high-speed train, and alternative energy research and development in ways that we really haven’t seen before. So, yes, we are seeing that kind of policy innovation. But as Bob Hormats pointed out, we’re also looking to promote businesses process innovation—doing things more efficiently, more effectively, more productively.
Booz Allen works with clients all over the world, including helping developing countries institute policies to promote competitiveness and innovation. How does that experience fit in with some of Booz Allen’s other areas of work?
One of the things we’ve been talking about this week in Aspen is the idea of Smart Power. We’ve been helping the Philippine government with the way it licenses health clinics. The U.S. military is very interested in that work because they are trying to get out of the antiterrorism business by encouraging private sector-led job creation. In places like Serbia and Kosovo, we’re helping them get more high-value products to market. In the Middle East, we’re helping governments change their legal basis to encourage entrepreneurs in a way they’ve never been able to do before. So Booz Allen’s work in the developing countries actually helps us do a better job with our U.S. government clients, as we bring to bear that multiplicity and diversity.
Here in the U.S., Booz Allen supports science and technology education through First Robotics. Is that a way for the firm to promote innovation at home?
One of the things that makes me proud to be at Booz Allen is that we engage with the community as thought leaders. We help communities, nonprofit organizations, and educators promote science—and innovation—through First Robotics and other programs. We are a part of the effort to make the U.S. a better place to live. That’s something we regard as one of our core values at Booz Allen.
You asked everyone on the panel at the end of the conversation to list the most important points that had come out for them. What were yours?
We have an approach at Booz Allen called “Innovate @”—innovate at wherever you want, because the world is so interactive that you need to know what’s going on in India and China and the United States. It’s a global economy, and we have to be open to innovating in ways that cross boarders and allow the exchange of information in a way that really speeds up the process. That speed of interaction allows us to grow our economy and grow our efforts in a way that we never could do in the past. So, cooperation, as the Ambassador said, is, for me, one of the most important things.
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