enFocus Fellow Visits Indiana Statehouse
Brad Tener highlights his trip with the Elkhart Chamber
My day started early when I put my car into park outside the Elkhart Chamber of Commerce at 6:00am. I knew it was going to be a long one. Beginning at 6am and returning at 8pm that night, I would be traveling to the Indiana Statehouse and back with members of the Elkhart Chamber. I was extremely excited because I’d never been to the Statehouse before, and I was eager to bring back insights that might impact my enFocus projects or possibly my own business Frost Control Systems.
Upon arrival at the Statehouse, we quickly grabbed breakfast before programming started for the day. The hour-long state chamber presentation was quite interesting. Notable speakers included Kevin Brinegar, the President of the Indiana Chamber, Indiana House representative Timothy Brown, and Kevin Courtois from the Great Lakes Chapter of the US Chamber of Commerce.
Kevin Brinegar gave a quick update on a variety of important bills being drafted. A few of the bills Brinegar discussed have implications for the future of enFocus. One could add taxes to cloud-based software, making it more expensive for enFocus to use platforms like ArcGIS or IBM’s Watson.
Representative Timothy Brown, discussed a variety of topics such as autonomous vehicles, but primarily focused on the high priority workforce development bill 1002. This bill addresses a wide ranging set of programs in all levels of education, and therefore was a major talking point for the various chambers. As the presentations ended we all prepared to head over to the Statehouse for a tour and observation of a short session.
It was my first time experiencing a legislative session at the Statehouse. It was quite an experience. Everything was going a million miles per hour — people running around everywhere. The session itself was a bit more relaxed as the focus of the day was acknowledgements of various successful school music programs and a discussion on raising the tanning bed age from 15 to 18 because of new research.
As the legislative session ended, we headed to the breakout sessions where we discussed issues as a group. The Elkhart Chamber decided to attend the breakout session with Secretary Milo. This was by far my favorite part of the entire experience because it was a direct opportunity to discuss workforce development objectives. While the conversations ranged from a variety of topics, one dominated more than others: the need for technology skills. Multiple individuals from Elkhart brought up the need to build critical learning skills to navigate new technology. One anecdote discussed was that of a construction company that cycled through 4–5 entire software systems in the last 12 years. Just learning the software, and not the critical thinking skills required to move between systems, can be a crutch in the long run as individuals stay attached to software that is outdated and inefficient.
The day was quite an experience, highlighting a lot of interesting changes being made within workforce development and software as a service. Both topics are very impactful for not just enFocus, but also my own business. I will be training new employees, and a significant portion of the long-term profit of my business will be based off of software as a service revenue. All in all, I would highly recommend the trip to anyone who gets the chance to visit the Statehouse.
