Comments on: Talented Resources Lack in Maine! http://blog.sephone.com/2008/05/06/talented-resources-lack-in-maine/ Tue, 19 Aug 2008 22:30:19 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5 By: anonymous http://blog.sephone.com/2008/05/06/talented-resources-lack-in-maine/#comment-141 anonymous Wed, 02 Jul 2008 17:22:23 +0000 http://blog.sephone.com/?p=45#comment-141 I can empathize, I'm a college student enrolled at UMaine and I've heard the same sentiment expressed many times over that talent cannot be found here in the backwoods. The problem is, compared to large urban areas, technology skills aren't as highly valued here and at the fore front of peoples minds, versus construction, forestry, tourism, and marine harvesting. The benefits of a city versus a small town are that there is a dense population, which brings with it greater competition among people and as a result high levels of ability. When a person is in a small town with only twelve people as competition versus a hundred or more in a city, there isn't as much competition. Additionally, cities do have a higher level of capitol to use versus small towns, which has been a bane to me when working out contracts with small businesses which will try to get the cheapest rates (understandably), but have unrealistically low expectations for costs versus small businesses in Portland. How this can be fixed is by having small towns throughout Maine put more emphasis on internet technology, by installing public wifi, having internet cafe's, encouraging people to subscribe to highspeed broadband, making accessible online public recordings of events (video and photos), encouraging more small businesses to have a web presence (particularly restaurants, hotels, and other areas of interest for tourists), as well as having high-schools offer classes on website development that delve into server-side scripting, frameworks, and graphics design. Ultimately, there needs to be a shift in public consciousness in Maine about web technology, and more opportunities for upcoming students. An interesting possibility too would be to open your company up for paid internships for UMaine and local high-school students in the Orono, Bangor, Old Town area. We need to look at what makes places like San Fransisco, Atlanta, and New York hot-spots for web technology, and make those conditions come to life in Maine, otherwise there's little incentive for people of talent to stay when they can have a higher paying job and better quality of life else where. I can empathize, I’m a college student enrolled at UMaine and I’ve heard the same sentiment expressed many times over that talent cannot be found here in the backwoods. The problem is, compared to large urban areas, technology skills aren’t as highly valued here and at the fore front of peoples minds, versus construction, forestry, tourism, and marine harvesting.

The benefits of a city versus a small town are that there is a dense population, which brings with it greater competition among people and as a result high levels of ability. When a person is in a small town with only twelve people as competition versus a hundred or more in a city, there isn’t as much competition. Additionally, cities do have a higher level of capitol to use versus small towns, which has been a bane to me when working out contracts with small businesses which will try to get the cheapest rates (understandably), but have unrealistically low expectations for costs versus small businesses in Portland.

How this can be fixed is by having small towns throughout Maine put more emphasis on internet technology, by installing public wifi, having internet cafe’s, encouraging people to subscribe to highspeed broadband, making accessible online public recordings of events (video and photos), encouraging more small businesses to have a web presence (particularly restaurants, hotels, and other areas of interest for tourists), as well as having high-schools offer classes on website development that delve into server-side scripting, frameworks, and graphics design. Ultimately, there needs to be a shift in public consciousness in Maine about web technology, and more opportunities for upcoming students. An interesting possibility too would be to open your company up for paid internships for UMaine and local high-school students in the Orono, Bangor, Old Town area.

We need to look at what makes places like San Fransisco, Atlanta, and New York hot-spots for web technology, and make those conditions come to life in Maine, otherwise there’s little incentive for people of talent to stay when they can have a higher paying job and better quality of life else where.

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