President Obama’s decision to hold a summit meeting on jobs this month acknowledges the reality that people on Main Street have known all year. Jobs are not a lagging indicator as economists have told us. They are the indicator.

By classic economic measures, the United States economy has moved out of recession. The gross domestic product up. Stock prices are up. Surviving financial institutions are returning to healthy profitability, as is Corporate America. At the end of a typical recession, jobs would recover in due course. But the jobs situation is not stabilizing. It’s getting worse.

Tel Aviv, Israel, October 21, 2009. The following are the findings of the IVC Quarterly Survey conducted by the IVC Research Center, which for more than 12 years has been at the forefront of high-tech, venture capital and private equity research in Israel. This Survey reviews capital raised by private Israeli high-tech companies from Israeli venture capital funds, foreign investors and other investors. The Survey is based on reports from 81 investors of which 44 are Israeli management companies and 37 are other - mostly foreign - investment entities.

One of the best things about being an academic is being able to mold young minds and guide them to success. When one of my students, Andrew Leblanc told me he was entering the Duke Startup Challenge Elevator Pitch Competition, I [Vivek Wadhwa] told him to come and see me and do a practice run. After all, I had judged several of these contests at Duke and other universities. I thought I knew what worked.

After the eleventh iteration, Andrew got it right. He wasn’t trying to pack his presentation with unnecessary details. He had slowed down his pitch, added a personal touch and was now exuding confidence. Andrew even researched the background of the judges and tailored his message to their interests. So after two hours of intense preparation, I had little doubt that Andrew would win.

This is the fifth of several 'Innovation Perspectives' articles we will publish this week from multiple authors to get different perspectives on 'What is the most dangerous current misconception in innovation?'. Now, here is Hutch Carpenter's perspective:

The Washington State Department of Commerce has submitted its recommendations to Gov. Chris Gregoire and the Washington State Legislature for restructuring the department as a leader in the state's economic development efforts. Formerly the Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development, Commerce's report outlines two options for creating a more focused and efficient organization dedicated to growing and improving jobs in Washington.

"After listening carefully to business and community leaders, employers and our other key stakeholders around the state, we believe the priorities and organization laid out in this report provide a framework to succeed in keeping Washington state competitive and helping our communities and economies thrive," said Commerce Director Rogers Weed.

With the recent focus on innovation, it can be easy for any organization to become wrapped around building a better axle. However, innovation alone does not breed success. There is a battle brewing between the time tested practice of entrepreneurship and the requirements of the emerging innovation economy. The question is whether innovation or entrepreneurship can exist in this new environment without the other, finding the right mix, and understanding the difference. In this article, we explore the critical differences between and the many types of innovation and entrepreneurship, as well as how to find the balance between the two and your optimal mix for competitive advantage.

I’ll [Andrew Lane] be heading to nextMEDIA Toronto this week to take in the broader discussion and also moderate a panel with some incredible producers talking about bringing traditional media content into the digital space, and most of all, methods to monetize that content. I’m always excited to speak on these sorts of subjects because, for all the valuable content we consume on a daily basis - between the news, the weather, research, slideshare presentations, tabloids, sports reports, games, television series, web videos, iPhone apps and more - people tend to give it a pretty bad rap. Considering how long we’ve acknowledged content, either jokingly or legitimately, as “king”, I think it’s a little unfair. Content business models simply need time to reinvent themselves, and once they do “the king’s” crown will hopefully lose all traces of this recent tarnish.

Transparency: If people see what others do it generates support and peer pressure.

Greenhousing: Innovative ideas often start out as fragile little shoots that need nurturing.

Benefit focus: Keep asking what it is you’re trying to achieve – don’t just tick boxes.
Diversity: Of people, background, experience and outlook. Avoid groups of people who all think the same.

Risk-taking: Recognise risks, watch out for politics, listen to people at the sharp end.
Avoid deficiency models: Telling people they need to be there rather than here does not work.

Mistakes: It has to be all right to say, ‘That didn’t work – let’s try something else.’

Long-term planning: Can’t be done for innovation. Sensible next step is best that can be done. Then look closely at what happens and take another step.

Merlin John’s Innovators series is developing very nicely indeed, with articles to date on Ewan McIntosh, Paul Kelley, Margaret Vass, Carol Allen, Jaye Richards and John Davitt. The latest is a great piece on David Gilmour, East Lothian’s techno-boffin (sorry, David!).

The Chinese government will joining local governments and private investors in setting up VC funds in an attempt to boost high-tech growth in the country, Dow Jones Newswires reports. These funds are aiming to raise at least CNY250 million ($36.7 million), and according to the State Council’s Web site, the government will not be the controlling shareholder. Its stake will be capped at 20%, except in the case of angel funds.

There was one complaint I heard over and over again from Indian entrepreneurs during my three weeks shuttling between Delhi, Jaipur, Bangalore, Mumbai and Pune: There aren’t enough angel investors in India.

Now, truth be told, that’s a complaint I also hear in the American heartland, in Canada, in Europe, in Africa, in China and, well, pretty much everywhere I’ve traveled to over the last few years. I’m not sure people ever feel they’ve got enough money being thrown their way.

This isn't news anymore (see here, and here), but Bruce Alberts, Editor-in-Chief of Science has weighed in on the out-of-whack system of incentives in the biomedical sciences:

Assuming that the system supporting this career path works well, these will be the individuals with the most talent and interest in such an endeavor: young people well positioned to make the scientific breakthroughs that societies need to survive and thrive. But the current system squanders the creativity and energy of these exceptionally gifted young people through a funding process that forces them to avoid risk-taking and innovation.

Innovation in the state's economy was unchanged during the second quarter, ending a year of decline, but a quarterly index from the University of Michigan-Dearborn finds that job creation lagged other indicators.

The quarterly Innovation Index remained at 80.0 during the second quarter after falling each quarter since reaching 96.0 points for the second quarter of 2008. The index tracks trademark applications, Small Business Administration loans, venture capital funding, new business formation and other indicators.

Nine months after the $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA, commonly referred to as the stimulus package) passed, efforts are being made to count the number of jobs it has created or retained. These figures are being reported by the federal government as evidence of the package’s success. Recent investigations by the Associated Press, CNN, and Denver Post, however, have found that these some of these figures may be inflated due to misreporting.

The success or failure of the stimulus package will be determined in large part by the number of jobs it helps to create or retain. The federal government recently declared that the stimulus package had already helped to create or retain 640,000 jobs, well on its way to the 3.5 million job goal by the end of 2010. This job count comes primarily from organizations who received stimulus money and reporting job creation and retention is a required part of the funding process. However, the reporting process is complex, with long, detailed forms to complete creating room for error and ultimately skewing the results.

The Economic Development Council of Collier County (EDC) announced in September an initiative to support entrepreneurs in Collier County, Economic Gardening. This program marks the "Era of the Entrepreneur" and is designed to provide technical assistance to CEOs of 2nd Stage growth companies, those companies that employ between 10 and 99 employees. The Collier County program is supported by the Florida Economic Gardening Institute, located in Orlando, Florida and the Edward Lowe Foundation, located in Cassopolis, Michigan. The Florida Economic Gardening Institute was created as a result of a pilot program funded earlier this year through the Florida Legislature.

Being an entrepreneur is tough... very tough. There are many reasons some entrepreneurs make it big, and others do not. Tonight I [Jim Randel] would like to speak to the organic, the personal, reasons that some entrepreneurs fall short of their promise. This is not about capital, which is a challenge for all entrepreneurs, nor about the economic climate (also a challenge). But rather about those individual characteristics that keep some entrepreneurs below their potential.

Collaboration can pay off, as Procter & Gamble shows, but only if companies jump in with both feet

Open innovation is a hot topic at almost every company that is serious about innovation. Why? Because the idea of combining internal and external resources to increase innovation productivity and prowess is just too good a value proposition to miss out on.

Nevertheless, I believe that only about 10% of all companies are adept enough at open innovation to get significant benefits. Another 30% have seen the light and are scrambling to make open innovation work and provide results that are worth the bother. I call them contenders. The other 60% are pretenders—companies that don't really know what open innovation is and why or how it could be relevant for them. Some might figure out how to follow the leaders one day, but today they're mostly going through the motions.

EVEN AS RECENT economic indicators begin to move in a positive direction, the US economy continues to struggle. Unemployment has crossed the worrisome 10 percent mark and is likely to recede slowly. It will take many years to regain the $14 trillion of wealth lost by American households. Our faith and finances have been shaken to the core.

Among the policy prescriptions emanating from Washington, investments in new areas of clean technology, infrastructure, and manufacturing deserve support. But while government should enact broad stimulus programs, it cannot be the driving force out of this recession. Indeed, if America is to recapture its position as a leader in the new economic order, it must be the new ideas coming from the private sector that shape our future.

The Internet search engine Lycos began as a research project by a professor at the Carnegie Mellon University in 1994. Five years later, it became the most visited site in the world, with a global presence in more than 40 countries.

All over the world, governments are showing greater interest in university spinoffs. European governments are pouring resources into universities with the goal of turning them into engines of economic growth through spinoff company formation. The Japanese government recently changed its intellectual property laws to favor spinoff company formation.

Here is the latest list of contests, sweepstakes, and awards for growing companies. This listing is updated every two weeks and brought to you as a community service by Small Business Trends and Smallbiztechnology.com.

Improving the absorptive capacity of regions and organisations is a major mechanism for accelerating innovation, raising productivity, and economic growth. The present World Bank working paper discusses trade flows, foreign direct investment (FDI), research and development (R&D), and labor mobility and training as key processes for knowledge absorption.

Particularly interesting is Chapter 3 on the links among knowledge absorption and spillovers fromFDI. I quote “Empirical studies generally find strong, robust effects of foreign ownership on the productivity of wholly or partially owned foreign subsidiaries. In other words, firms with some level of foreign ownership are more productive and technology intensive than are purely domestic firms.