Nomination Charles Cracknell Start up Nations Award

The Global Entrepreneurship Network announced four finalists for the Startup Nations Award for Local Policy Leadership. The award recognizes public sector achievement at the local level in championing innovative policies or programs that advance new and young firm formation. The award is one of three Startup Nations Awards that will be presented at the Startup Nations Summit on Tuesday, November 21 in Estonia.

The other two Startup Nations Awards are Groundbreaking Policy Thinking and National Policy Leadership. This year, the four finalists for the Local Policy Leadership Award hail from four different countries, and have contributed to their community as a startup champion through a variety of initiatives ranging from ecosystem coordination and collaboration, to promoting entrepreneurship education and innovative skills building in local communities.

Charles Cracknell Youth Enterprise Manager Hull City Council said

"I am delighted as well as somewhat shocked at this announcement of my shortlist for this prestigious award for those in public service across the world that support entrepreneurship in their communities- working with colleagues  and with the many young entrepreneurs and enterprising young people in our schools & colleges and those that support we have made great strides in the last twenty years supporting  our enterprising young people that has contributed to Hull becoming recognised as the UK's Most Enterprising Place and I am proud to have played a small part in that.

Councillor Martin Mancey

Hull has a real commitment to enterprise education and youth entrepreneurship and Charles has played his part within that agenda forging an effective partnership of the willing who work tirelessly on behalf of our enterprising young people. We wish Charles well in Estonia and we are pleased that the judges have shortlisted one of Hull City Councils staff for the prestigious 2017 Startup Nations Award for Local Policy Leadership."

Further Information 

The Selection Committee evaluated nominations based on the following criteria:

• Clarity in the identification of the bottleneck(s) affecting the local ecosystem
• Level of innovativeness of the specific policy lever(s) or program idea(s)
• Level of personal commitment to shifting local government thinking on entrepreneurship
• Extent to which the local effort helped set the example for national level action
• Availability of metrics or evidence to show the impact of the policymaker’s efforts
• Extent to which it is possible to replicate efforts, adapting to other policy areas or other ecosystems

The winner will be the third recipient of the award, which was previously received by Bart De Wever, mayor of Antwerp, Belgium, and María José Vengoechea, executive president of the Barranquilla Chamber of Commerce in Colombia.

Below are the three other  finalists for the 2017 Startup Nations Award for Local Policy Leadership along with Charles Cracknell.

Jorge Lawson,
Former Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Mining, Province of Cordoba
Director, Argentinean National Bank (Banco de la Nación Argentina)
Argentina

Mr. Lawson designed and implemented a plethora of programs and policies during his time as a regional policy leader in the Province of Cordoba, all with a vision to build an ecosystem that can continue to develop, well-past government support. He instituted the Province’s SME and Entrepreneurial Development Secretariat. His legacy proved to be self-sustainable, as ecosystem coordination and collaboration continues via the “Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Córdoba,” an entity that he formed in 2012 with 65 different organizations with legal capacity. Mr. Lawson’s vision allowed the Province to more effectively address capacity building gaps across different types of business: traditional, new, young, and high-growth.

Frank Aguirre
Business Development Manager, Office of Los Angeles Mayor
United States 

Mr. Aguirre is a collaboration-oriented public official who created synergies between the local and the national policy efforts to support entrepreneurs. Most recently, he successfully led the City of Los Angeles proposal in response to the Start Up in a Day “Dream-Big” competition, which was launched at the national level by the United States Small Business Administration. The City proposed an open-source web portal to help streamline the process through which business owners apply for permits. The idea won the top prize of $250,000, which will help L.A. launch the portal within a year, as announced by Mayor Eric Garcetti. The portal will be open-source so other cities can replicate it free of charge.

Rebecca Palmer
Member, Barrie/Simcoe Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Committee
Canada

Ms. Palmer has focused on access to skills by providing entrepreneurial education, workshops and events to youth aged 10-24, many of which in collaboration with the local government authorities, particularly in the Simcoe county. Ms. Palmer works closely with the City of Barrie to help develop the city's approach to entrepreneurship, as well as with other ecosystem actors like Georgian College's Entrepreneurial Advisory Board. She is also currently working on developing a new microloan program that provide access to capital to youth under the age of 19, and as such continues to test programs that could be then scaled by public sector agencies.

Charles Cracknell, 
Youth Enterprise Manager, Hull City Council
United Kingdom

Charles was an elected representative on Humberside County Council and Hull City Council and championed the aspirations of young people. Mr. Cracknell brought to the city-level public sector the voice of young entrepreneurs, having devoted years as a grassroots advocate for enterprising youth. He has established a range of enterprise education and youth entrepreneurship programs in the City of Hull. Mr. Cracknell  established the John Cracknell Youth Enterprise Bank www.youthenterprise.co.ukwho are launching new ventures in the fields of science, engineering, technology and healthcare. This policy tool provides them with seed funds along with mentorship.