ESRC RCUK Innovation Fellowships

As outlined in the Government's White Paper on the Industrial Strategy, and its Digital Strategy, the world is becoming increasingly digitalised, and digital connectivity has rapidly become an essential requirement for the way people live and do business.

Over the course of the three-year fellowship I plan to investigate technology-driven growth in the UK, and expect to produce work on the following three areas:

- Prices, wages and the labour market;
- Productivity, IT uptake and supply chain management;
- International comparisons.

The aim would be three major workstreams aligned with the themes I have identified. Each one would have a peer-reviewed journal paper at its core. But I will also put together short-term multimedia outputs (blogs, videos, tweets) and short 3-4 page articles. I am used to presenting at BEIS, HM Treasury and the Downing Street Policy Unit, and this fellowship will allow me to build on these relations. I will provide briefings for policymakers at key institutions (as set out in Pathways to Impact).

The fellowship rightly emphasises corporate engagement and international comparisons. I would take this seriously and have investigated the idea of setting up a secondment / knowledge exchange with Chief economists at various potential partners in the UK including Spotify, Google Deepmind, LinkedIN, Public, and KMPG. In terms of corporate collaboration, out scoped partners the CBI and KMPG may be useful here in that both of these institutions hold information on significant networks of companies.

In terms of international links it is going to be vital for the UK to learn from other countries. As with the above I will seek knowledge exchange with other countries seeking answers to these questions including academics in America, Japan and Estonia.