Beware the Takers

As is our Pittsburgh tradition, let's start with some wisdom from Mr Rogers, who knew how to lead by example.  He once said, “When I was a boy, I would see scary things in the news, and my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’”

Looking for helpers is the most foundational concept to growing a business of any shape or size because, let's face it - very few people have enough time, money, or resources to make it happen alone, at least at the speed they need. Whether it's a high-tech and high-growth startup, a service firm of one, a side hustle, slinging pierogies from a food truck, or virtually any other flavor of entrepreneurship, we all need help. Help in learning new skills, experienced-based mentorship, access to resources, finding the right talent, and so on. Everyone building anything meaningful needs help.

But here's the kicker – Mr. Rogers' advice isn't just about finding the good; it's also a warning. Don't let the takers steal your focus. This includes those who can undermine our community's fabric, such as the smooth talkers who convince sponsor officials to cut long-standing traditions for their own gain. Or those who ignore truly innovative ideas in favor of projects that look good on paper but fail to deliver any of the promised impacts

Don’t get us wrong. This isn’t unique to Pittsburgh; having spent countless trips around the country visiting other ecosystems, you can see glimpses of it everywhere. But something weird is happening right now, echoing the pandemic and the excitement of all this money and goodwill meant to build us back up better.

It’s making takers, not helpers.

We felt this firsthand recently. Some of you may recall that a couple of years back, a handful (literally) of founder organizers and dozens of active builders in the region put on a four-part event series (XchangeIdeas, XchangeInnovation, XchangeValue, and XchangeAwards) under the umbrella of XchangePgh.

If you missed the year-long event series where tens of thousands of people were challenged to explore their relationship with entrepreneurship in person or virtually, here are some highlights:

• Privé’s opening breakfast video where it was 8 degrees and 300+ still people came out to build a vision for innovation and entrepreneurship (h/t 7 Senses catering for making sure people were well fed). 

• Some of the insta-classics and where X marked the spot

• Highlights from the 70+ events during XchangeInnovation Week thanks to community leaders who created and curated their events into the week

• We focused on Ideathons (creating ideas) instead of hackathons (where privilege often wins) and on aging, sustainability, transportation, food access, and more.  Our favorite highlights (h/t Privé) are found here with special thanks to Blanket and Board, Chef Dix, Community Kitchen and of course, Weird Ash Yankabytch for our lip-synching battles. 

• Community-nominated and voted awards that veer away from the pay-to-play nature of associations looking to juice up their corporate board members.

Despite our city already having so many bridges, it was obvious we, the entrepreneurship community, built 1,000 more with the help of organizations from nearly every neighborhood, including the Airport’s 91st. That achievement is thanks to so many of you, dear readers.

From the outset, XchangePgh had earned strong backing from across the innovation community. Still, we ran into challenges in securing support from key stakeholder organizations at the table, particularly the current administration. After half a dozen meetings about a partnership, which included a material sponsorship from the local office of a Fortune 10 tech company, things got tricky. During a meeting with the administration and the potential sponsor’s team, they demanded that we hire their NYC-based event planner, or we’d lose the sponsorship, and they’d “do their own tech week” if we didn't play ball. 

We left that meeting a bit shocked and frustrated but more determined than ever. We regrouped and dug deep to double down on a plan to fund and ultimately produce the entire Xchange event series without their support or involvement, delivering on our commitment to the community.

So, what’s with the recent history lesson?  

This week, we received a text about an event aiming to rehash the decades-old trope of bringing “the next Southby” to the region. This initiative is led by the event planner and the current administration and supported by several organizations that have otherwise been uninvolved and lack a genuine track record of supporting grassroots efforts.

Before we even had a chance to process why this yet-to-be-completed effort or site (TechweekPittsburgh.com) even existed, its header image, copy, and branding jumped off the page like bad déjà vu.

For comparison, here is OUR Xchange logo and branding:

And now, here is what the current City administration, Google Pittsburgh, Walnut Capital, and the Pittsburgh Tech Council, among others, are backing:

One could be forgiven for mistaking one for the other. And their calls to 'eXplore Tech,’ 'eXplore Art,' and 'eXplore Culture' sound eerily familiar.

We're at a critical juncture for entrepreneurship in our region, with two distinct paths ahead. The first leads to a thriving, sustainable ecosystem driven by entrepreneurs themselves. This route empowers entrepreneurs to lead, engaging the full entrepreneurial stack and continually injecting fresh energy. It recognizes the crucial distinction in the roles of the community’s leaders (entrepreneurs) and supporters (lawyers, accountants, investors, and government orgs).

The alternative path, where supporters and government orgs attempt to take the reins, has historically not provided equitable or successful results. It might generate short-term buzz but often fizzles out before achieving sustainability. It risks creating a system where emerging builders focus more on securing grants than acquiring customers.

Our innovation ecosystem is certainly on the rise, but we all must be better stewards. It's essential to ensure that all stakeholders are accountable for contributing meaningfully towards our uniquely shared goals. This means fostering initiatives that offer unique value and address the community's actual needs. Building a vibrant ecosystem requires ongoing dialogue, good-faith engagement, and a shared commitment to success. The choice we make now will shape our region's innovative future, determining whether we empower entrepreneurs to lead or risk stagnation in a system that looks good in headlines but fails to get us where we are growing.

This is not an isolated incident; there are still too many examples of people exploiting opportunities, claiming to contribute and build, or worse, simply taking advantage with only a tourist-like approach to the ecosystem.  

Take the assuredly well-intended grant application that brought us Tech Compass Pgh, for example. The resulting effort duplicated (and scraped) existing community resources and, with all due respect to “users” like Logic, Yung Gravy, and Lil Dicky, doesn’t accurately reflect our community.

It’s the worst version of helicopter parenting where a) we don’t need otherwise uninvolved or unaligned parent-orgs in the ecosystem, and b) we definitely don’t need people that get involved because their boss voluntold them or they need a headline or press release after making big promises to someone in Harrisburg or DC.

Okay, okay—enough griping. People will make their own judgments about whether we will support or not support TAKERS.

But one thing is true: if we don't empower our local builders and community leaders and instead let outside organizations overshadow those from underutilized communities, we have to ask ourselves: What message are we sending to the people who are actually building real things? Are we falling back into the trap of thinking we can only succeed with ‘help’ from the Valley, Boston, or wherever else is trending? We should stop trying to be the next great anywhere else and continue to double down on our actual strengths.

So, instead of throwing another policy-errr-tech summit/week, etc, bank-rolled by those constantly battling monopoly claims, how about considering creative alternatives that could actually catalyze the people and organizations building our city’s future, including:

• Get some of the incredible companies we have here to put up SALES dollars, not PRIZE dollars, for businesses (https://pittsburghregion.org/data-on-demand/ and look at “Business Presence”)

• Create a Space where EVERYONE can work with amazing WiFi. For FREE (shouting out to you City and County execs) or all of these downtown landlords that need people in their spaces that are otherwise empty

• Create a culture of humanity-centered design, as The Forbes Funds offers for FREE so that complex problems can be explored by people who are experiencing them.

• Create a structured SPONSOR program instead of performative mentoring where the cost of time far outweighs the benefit of dollars for anyone except those without choice.   

• Create a beta marketplace where anyone and everyone can show off their goods and get deep user testing, early pilot, or co-design partners (that pay…).

• Create a monthly city-wide “Demo Day” where anyone, especially those who don’t do tech, can get the same flowers as those who do.

The list of ideas could go on and on, but what is clearer than ever is that we don’t need more one-off lobbying or grant-sponsored efforts to make copy-paste directories, academic policy summits that don’t empower the actual builders, or pretending that taking the brand of grassroots organizations is okay just because it has the City seal on it. After all, it’s not the first time this has come up about the administration or this organization, and it doesn't bode well for our collective future. We need sustainable, practical solutions that catalyze the actual community’s efforts, not short-term or superficial initiatives.

We would love to hear your thoughts and feedback!  Please share your ideas about what is working and what is not (or any advice on how to ask the City for more original thinking).  

We are inspired every day by impactful programs like Catapult and OwnOurOwn. Organizations like this work to be less imperfect every day while continuing to push boundaries. It would be great to see them at the planning table for these kinds of efforts (please correct us if we missed any real planning committee named in public for discussion), as so many were with us at XchangePgh, out in front, sharing the hard-fought lessons they learned. In return, they would bring authentic community voices, moving at the speed of trust, not the price of re-election. 

- The PSN Editorial Team