Investing in education for tomorrow’s entrepreneurs

During the 10th annual Global Entrepreneurship Week, Anna Curzon reflects on how New Zealand needs to keep investing in technology via its education system to grow future generations of entrepreneurs.

At Xero, we love small businesses and we especially love entrepreneurs! And we understand the impact technology is having on their success. Technology is permeating so many parts of our lives – communication, relationships, health, business, work.  It’s solving everyday problems and both driving down the cost of, and opening access to, tools, information and advice that were only once available to big business or the privileged few.

The mass distribution and increase in accessibility of technology over the last decade means there has never been a better time to be an entrepreneur – conditions are ripe for new value to be created and scaled globally at a blistering pace, whatever field you’re in. 

Technology doesn’t discriminate between creativity, the arts, maths, science and finance. If you have a idea that removes friction, solves a problem, or inspires, then it’s more than likely technology will provide the platform in some shape or form to catapult your concept forward.

In this way, technology is democratising the success of entrepreneurs.  It’s ensuring that truly great ideas are given the chance to grow, and new business communities like Xero and its Partners (across Accounting and the App Ecosystem) are providing the support to drive productivity and build resilience in each small business.

While we’ve seen huge change in the last decade, it’s nothing compared to what’s coming. The World Bank predicts that over the next 15 years, 600 million jobs will be required to accommodate a growing global workforce, and small businesses will create four out of five new positions. This means our childrens’ approach to work will be different, because instead of spending the lion share of their career with corporates, technology will allow them to support a number of jobs at any one time, and have clients right around the globe. We’ll see the rise and rise of the Gig Economy. More people will be consulting or contracting, and they’ll need to think about themselves as a small business.

Given the pace of change and our relative distance to the rest of the world, our children should be equipped with the technology and entrepreneurial tools and thinking to identify opportunities as they arise, to jump on new value pools and leverage them quickly.  We need to think now about what education and reskilling is appropriate to ensure our people and our country plays to its strengths to compete in a global economy.

Here’s what this could look like:

• Per capita, New Zealand has the most digitally literate people on the planet.
• Every child has access to the Internet at home.
• Every child grows up learning how to code, and adults have the opportunity to re-skill. We should look at what other countries like Sweden are doing, who are introducing coding as a core subject from a very young age.
• There is true diversity and a gender balance in the technology industry in New Zealand – and this is seen as a key source of our success for our country.  At the moment there aren’t enough women in technology roles, which means opportunities to solve real problems and identify new value pools are being left on the table at both a social and economic level.
• The majority of our exports are technology oriented, and a large proportion are weightless, i.e. they are technology and service in nature, leveraging value in IP and not large physical supply chains.
• We have the most entrepreneurial people per capita on the planet (note, in a recent Global Entrepreneurship Index which analysed over 138 countries, New Zealand wasn’t even included).

The new Government’s Young Entrepreneurs Policy is encouraging. In addition, we ask the new Education Minister to continue and strengthen the previous Minister’s focus on digital technologies at all national curriculum levels to broaden the opportunities for New Zealand.  But put a timeline in place and set some clear objectives. It’s too important to be a policy on a piece of paper.  

Initiatives like Hour of Code and OMGTech! that support digital learning are doing excellent work, but it is unfair and unsustainable that such a strategic decision about the future of our country falls on the goodwill of a few good souls. This is too important for the Government to opt out of. We need to lift the tide for everyone. Access to Internet for everyone and learning code as a right, not a nice to have, has to be a priority.

Xero is taking up this challenge now to create lifelong learning tools and multiple pathways to recognise and nourish the abundant talent we have. 

For example, we’ve changed the way we recruit for certain roles within our business. Earlier this year, Xero signed an open letter to New Zealand along with over 100 other local companies declaring that we do not require a traditional tertiary qualification for a range of skills-based roles within our company. Our focus will be on assessment of necessary skills, attitudes, values, motivation and adaptability to join our organisation. Prior work experience, community work, portfolios, online learning and entrepreneurial endeavours will be factors we will consider during the employment process.

The launch of the Xero Lifelong Learning Platform early in 2018 will be another way that Xero will commit to democratising education for all and encouraging more entrepreneurs into the New Zealand economy.  Not only will the Platform address the aging population that wants to upskill, it will also help students at a primary and tertiary level understand the flow of value and basics of business through a small business accounting platform, so they’re able to have the confidence to take risk and be entrepreneurial and create growth through small business.

New Zealand needs to act now and invest in technology in its education system if we want to set our future generations up to be successful entrepreneurs. We can’t wait. This is far too important and if we don’t act now, we risk our children and our country being left behind. 

Anna Curzon is Xero’s Chief Partner Officer.