What can politics can learn from Miami, startups, and lean thinking
By: Shaurya Pandya
Tags: Silicon Valley, Books And Authors, Politics, Startup, Lean Startup

Political success, anywhere- is often, no short achievement. In a democracy, good legislation, economics, and campaigns make the pinnacle of political drama. Engrained in the collective political history of our nation, come slogans such as “I Like Ike”, or “It’s the economy, stupid”. The campaign trail functions as the voice of a candidates’ news. Unlike a broadcast from PBS, the voice of the candidate is not news made to inform but to persuade. On election day, the effectiveness of this same news comes to fruition, as counties line up to tell the world which candidate said it better. To do this, the better flaws of the other is chased in the pursuit of audacious victory. In the information age, this also means that policy is more political than it arguably has ever been.

In Silicon Valley, such politics is mixed in deeply with the startup scene, even to the extent to which it was satirized by HBO’s show of the same name, where “Making the world a better place” (ultimately, political motivation) became an obsessive battle between millionaires and billionaires. Such satirical representation might have one think that the scene of startups mainly relates to policy in an artificially profitable manner, but the two are actually, in many cases, highly intertwined. While policy primarily functions as public solutions in writing, regulation, and systems- startups can (and do) function as public innovation in practice. Votes maintain themselves as the capital of both practices. In policy, those votes are through a ballot, and in startups, a check.

On a national scale, bills don’t always see great success. In fact, in 2019, only 1% of bills in congress became law (Govtrack, 2019). Hoops, like making them to the committee, passing through the house, making it to the debate floor on the senate, getting a vote, and finally, passing, makes for tremendous loopholes and partisan lag. Other legislations, however- do see formidable success. In 2019, that number was 86% percent, to be exact. 4% lower than the startup failure rate, which stands at 90%. Which, is 9% higher than a national-bill success rate.

What this establishes is a necessity: that, non-partisan legislation is a highly effective tool that can quickly get on the ground and test. But when massive-scale problems do happen, startups can be a powerful way to scale ideas and solutions, when bills cannot.

Bringing the story back to the Valley, tech startups are the epicenter of startup work. Well- up until now. That same center of innovation is seeing itself diversify in cities all across America. California, in and of itself, saw more than 135,000 people leave than move in. (ABC, 2020). Meanwhile, Denver, Pheonix, Miami, Austin, Charlotte, and many other cities were among the fastest-growing in the nation. Only Oakland, California, made 15 on that same list. (ThinkAdvisor, 2020). For a startup hotbed, it has a rent problem. Even after tanking 11%, rent in the Valley still maintains a median of $3,280. For startups, this means all the more money to raise- just to maintain enough living standards to work. Areas within the region have seen 30% increases in the homeless population within the past 2 years (CBS,2019). Giants have joined in themselves, with Tesla, Oracle, and most notably- one of the Valley’s own pioneers, Hewlett-Packard, is now leaving. (KTVU,2020).

This being said, there’s a couple of things that politics can learn from in the startup world, and the first is- demographical change. As noted above, there’s a flooding opportunity for business in the US- whether that be Austin’s Silicon Hills, Miani’s Silicon Beaches, or Denver’s Silicon Slopes. How a city gets that business can take a lesson from the startup world.

For Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, the lesson he took was simple: Use social media. Well.

Now, for context, I’ve had the privilege to join and see Gen-Z’s “startup twitter” page buzz around in the past couple of weeks. From idea-makers to venture-backers, the scene is quite lively, and as you may expect- quite Valleyesque. However, not too long ago, came trends towards someone who wasn’t an entrepreneur, but a mayor. Mayor Francis, who, in response to an idea by Delian Asparouhov (the idea being, moving the Valley to Miami), asked the simple question of how he could help. Since then, the Mayor has been retweeting, talking, and listening to Gen Z founders who are looking to talk about moving out to start their ventures. Now, before looking at places like Austin, Denver, Vegas, Pheonix, or other nearby cities- the first city that will come to mind for “startup Twitter”, is Miami. Marketing the city, front and center, as one that will listen to founders can actually pose as a huge relief towards prospective creators who want a less competitive landscape, less rent, and better communication with the political officials that govern how these founders can govern a corporation.

It’s a simple idea- but it works. Previously, The Kauffman Intex ranked South Florida as the 31 spots for startup activity, Miami ranked 11 in Investment Dollars. (Forbes, 2019).

Miami on its own is not the only case study of how politics can take a page from the startup book. It can also take a page from, well- the startup book. “The Lean Startup”, by Eric Reiss, which is the foundational startup terminology that’s taken venture capital and startups by storm. High-profile accelerators like Y Combinator have made it central towards the approach a company will take towards raising money. The methodology is simple- find a problem, run data-driven tests to see who is affected by that problem, target the most simple solution you can towards that market, test its implementation, get feedback from the test, then rinse and repeat. It’s a consumer-driven model that tests for success early, by verifying and exploring the depth of the problem, before rushing to solutions.

Lean-thinking doesn’t limit what a startup can do, but instead, expands it’s horizons, including that of solving public problems legislation can’t easily do. Take @ItsSudz (Sudarshan), on Twitter, who’s building Fion- which stops wildfires before they start. Soylent replaces meals on, on-the-go. It’s interesting to think how, for students with early classes, who would otherwise go hungry to sleep in- could use this as a quick breakfast if it was, one day, to be placed in lunchrooms across the nation. Socially centered companies, such as Charity: Water- which is solving reduced access to clean water, can still raise funding by starting small, and thinking big. Started by throwing a party.

These same mechanisms that can help people at scale, can also become part of the political process and transform the effectiveness of policy around the nation. What if instead of centralizing focus on partisanship and debate, policymakers could follow similar tactics to startups, by finding problems, pilot localized tests, and running feedback loops, that can eventually create data fit to discuss? Instead of producing lag from partisan pacification, on-the-ground implementation could become the standard of how policy is produced?

It’s a concept that would be interesting to see. This startup terminology can be implemented for the public, fascinatingly so. It’s why I’m not just writing this article on it, but a book- Mindshifts, that dives deep into the relationship between startups and the potential for public policy, using education as the primary case study. Whether you’re a startup nerd or a policy junkie, understanding that dynamic relationship can be a great stepping stone towards political, and ventured- effectiveness. It’s available for pre-order now, at https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/mindshifts-by-shaurya-pandya?create_edit=true#/.

Sources:

https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/040915/how-many-startups-fail-and-why.asp#:~:text=In%202019%2C%20the%20failure%20rate,70%25%20in%20their%2010th%20year.

https://twitter.com/zebulgar?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

https://twitter.com/FionCo