Clusters are going to become increasing important as our nation seeks to create competitive advantages. We will need new ways to think about things and researchers will have to share information to connect the dots of development. Approximately 13 years ago I started researching clusters based on something I found in Detroit just prior to the collapse. Since then I started to work on first understanding fishing, technology, and pharmaceutical companies. Once I got to a certain point I started to think of isolated rural towns like Delta County where you can watch cluster form in live time. Here is where I am now in my Delta County Model (It may not be where everyone else is. Some may be further and some less however each is going to be a little unique.)
As with all science you have to keep finding new information to better understand the model and the activities and the different components that lead to local and perhaps even at some point national innovation. This comes through the collective of knowledge on economic clusters and watching how they form.
According the report Transform Economies, Promote Specialization we find that there are possibly three ways to start a catalytic specialization area (CSA) to speed innovation (Dhar, et. al. 2022).
1. Identifying the Cluster. In my example I used Delta County and Escanaba, MI.
2. Prioritization of high-potential CSAs. This means government, industry and business stakeholders make it important.
3. Building models. Aha! I been working on this one using Delta County. See
Theory of Transactional Clusters (
Ok. There are about 4 people who are working on this in any depth from what I can sort of see. Most others are sort of drawing off of those primary theories. Mine is nearing a point where I can weave it into a bow so that it justifies itself in a way that better ensures higher levels of validity. Each of the components is justified in the literature and applied real time review but put together in this way may be new. Its not finished yet so avoid hitting it with a purist meat cleaver.)
Now the report pushes for specialization and I agree in part that this is true but its not absolute. Specialization is necessary in order to have the higher refined technical and scientific knowledge. Yet over specialization of a team leads to poor results when trying to connect scientific holes. Cognitive diversity is as important in research as it is in business and civic life.
Thus I would throw a finger to the wind and throw a ratio out 1 creative generalist to every 5 specialist on a team. This is how one calibrates a team will determine whether they will go wider to cross pollinate other industries or deeper to discover new pins of needle knowledge (In cluster management and shared research it will be important to determine the amount of forces on the cluster pushing it down some lines of development versus others. That will be dependent on stakeholders.)
One of the advantages in the Delta County/Escanaba Model is you can start formulating a way to sort of see where the gaps in knowledge lay, which industries might enhance a cluster, and move down into the granular movement of information and resources. It isn't perfect but there are some justifications at various levels of sand to beach conception.
Dhar, et. al. (December 7th, 2022). To Transform Economies, Promote Specialization. BCG. https://www.bcg.com/publications/2022/promoting-economic-clusters-to-transform-economies
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