Obama should appoint Cabinet Member for E-Commerce

President Elect Barack Obama’s technology plan includes an ambitious list of projects to reform the patent registration system for entrepreneurs; upgrade computer systems in our schools and fund various R&D programs for innovation.  There are a number of altruistic initiatives to promote further expanding broadband connections to inner cities, safeguarding personal privacy from corporate abuse and engaging citizens online during policy development.   However, noticeably absent from the President-Elect’s technology platform was a deliberate strategy to encourage further adoption of e-commerce.

I believe that expanded investment in e-commerce technologies by US corporations and government could have a significant impact on the US during the next four years.  Specifically, the new administration could leverage the power of e-commerce to help re-engineer the health care system, curtail industry’s carbon footprint, bolster homeland security and stimulate much-needed economic growth.  I would recommend appointing a cabinet member or senior level government official to champion the cause.  In this case I am not referring to someone who would report to the CTO and focus on improving G2G integration, although the US could certainly benefit from better interagency collaboration.  Instead, I am proposing a technology expert who could lead the thinking and strategies around public policy for e-commerce.   Of course, working for GXS I am biased towards the importance of advancing the use of e-commerce, but I will attempt to make an objective case for the proposal.

During Obama’s campaign he demonstrated the ability to influence election results by capitalizing on the use of web 2.0 through sites such as Facebook, YouTube and MySpace.  Obama will likely be recorded in the history books as the first presidential candidate to tap the power of social networking to win an election.  During his first term, Obama could be the first president to leverage public policy on e-commerce to drive competitiveness, sustainability and change across major US industries.  Much like Obama employed Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes to spearhead viral marketing efforts on the web, he could appoint an “EDI czar” to catalyze the digitization of business processes throughout the value chain.   In a series of upcoming posts I will outline several key areas that could be impacted significantly by a more active government role in e-commerce initiatives.  

I should also point out that these posts do not represent an endorsement on the part of myself or GXS to a specific political party.  The benefits of e-commerce can be utilized to further the political platforms of both Republicans and Democrats.  However, since the Democrats won the election I will focus my short term efforts to influence public policy on their current agenda.

Comments

[R_Emanuel]

President-Elect Obama is prioritizing streamlining and modernizing many costly areas of government. Once such area is health care. Excessive health care complexity is the third most important reason US health care is so costly and complex. According to McKinsey, this complexity comes primarily in two forms:

1) The first is the regulatory complexity imposed on payers in developing, distributing and managing insurance products;
2) The second form of administrative complexity burdens transactions between payers and providers: "the innumerable claims-management systems, IT platforms, reporting requirements, and contracting terms payers use."

An e-commerce czar is an interesting proposal and should be considered.

[Ted]

No way! Almost everything the government tries to fix gets screwed up. They caused the current banking crisis and will be making it worse with new solutions.

[Bill Burns]

The Federal Government is not good at commerce - just because OBama is a good speaker and manipulator of people does not justify even the thought of the bug brother screwing up e-commerce (look at the VA, Social Security, the Post Office, Medicare, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, War on Poverty - all poorly run and in constant need of a bail out)
Bill Burns
St Louis MO