Guidance offered on jobs, investment
BY JOHN P. MCDERMOTT
Of The Post and Courier Staff
A 50-member council made up mainly of business leaders from throughout the state, including six from the Charleston region, met for the first time Friday to explore ways to sharpen South Carolina's competitive edge for higher-paying jobs and investment.
The task of the South Carolina Council on Competitiveness is to figure out how to put into action the findings of a study by Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter.
Porter's report, commissioned by the Palmetto Institute, the state Commerce Department, the South Carolina Chamber of Commerce and several other groups, was released in December.
The implementing stage could take 10 years or more because of "all the complex changes that must be made," said BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina chief executive Ed Sellers, who is co-chairman of the council with Gov. Mark Sanford.
"Creating competitive advantage for our state is absolutely critical to bringing jobs and economic development to South Carolina," Sanford said Friday.
The volunteer council is led by an 11-member executive committee that includes John Darby, president and chief executive officer of The Beach Co. of Charleston, and Steve Swanson, president and CEO of Mount Pleasant-based Automated Trading Desk.
The other designated members mostly hail from the business sector, which Porter said is critical to bringing about change. Academia, nonprofits and government also are represented.
The other Charleston designees are Bill Finn, president and CEO of AstenJohnson Inc.; Bobby Pearce, a partner in the law firm of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough; Rick Throckmorton, trustee with Booz Allen Hamilton Inc.; and Bill Youngblood, managing partner of McNair Law Firm.
"Now we have to implement this study in a way that it doesn't end up as something that's no more than another report on the shelf," Youngblood said after the meeting Friday.
The study by Porter's Monitor Group found that South Carolina's "low-cost, low-wage" business recruiting pitch is obsolete because most of the companies it targeted are shifting their low-paying jobs, especially in manufacturing, to China, Mexico and other developing countries.
Porter said the state must shift its economic development efforts to building on existing industrial "clusters" to compete for better-paying, knowledge-based jobs. The average annual income in South Carolina was $28,634 in 2001, or 20 percent below the national average.
Porter recommended that the Commerce Department and local economic development agencies target companies that complement the higher-wage clusters that have cropped up in South Carolina. The state has identified four such industries: automotive, chemicals, textiles and tourism.
Depending on their expertise, members of the competitiveness council will be assigned to one of eight task forces that will devise strategies for certain industries or issues. For instance, BMW Manufacturing Corp. executive Carl Flesher and state tourism chief Chad Prosser will head the task forces targeting the automotive and hospitality industries, respectively.
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