FOREWORD Director of Telecommunications and Special Projects Dr. Jerrol C. Thompson M ost strategies are designed to offer solutions to ‘problems’. These strategies are delivered through frameworks and techniques that often necessitate the execution of costly experimental ‘trial to decide’ approaches to achieving developmental goals. This approach may offer substantial benefits by increasing the awareness of the specific role played by market forces in shaping the environment and, thereby providing a plan of action to address the ‘problem’. This gain infuses economics into the strategy, draws on theory to support empirical evidence. While offering some short-term benefits, the strategy automatically narrows to a competitive game plan and nothing more, achieved through the application of the popular SWOT analysis framework that produces a breadth of options at the expense of required depth. This means significant quantities of time lost in the formulation process and minimal implementation focus - more about getting a range of ideas delivered at the outset than a living strategy over time. It tends to be created in isolation ignoring the imperative role of stakeholders in formulating and implementing the strategy. Alternatively, the strategy formulation process adopted within the National ICT Strategy and Action Plan 2010 - 2015 is not just a conceptual framework based on a utopian idea; but a practical roadmap to an improved way of life for the country, and for its downstream benefactors and beneficiaries alike. Through the exploitation of the unique benefits offered by ICT, St. Vincent and the Grenadines has an unprecedented opportunity to transform our country into a knowledgebased society. At the heart of this strategy is ‘purpose’, complemented by a much more practical and less philosophical approach to ICT development. Indeed, leveraging on the ‘purpose’ and successes of the National ICT Plan 2002 to 2007, the launching point is redefined based on three (3) main areas of focus for ICT development – infrastructure; content; and training. This approach to ICT development ensures that the new National ICT Plan is set within the local context. It also incorporates people, process, and technology - the three prerequisites for successful transformation of the country through ICT investments. The successful execution and continuity of the short, medium, and long term strategies proposed in the new Plan means the role of the ‘Strategist’ is significant, arduous, and of a permanent nature. This calls for a level of e-leadership that is inseparable from the most senior level of the Ministry, Private Sector, Civil Society and beyond. Indeed, the Strategist/e-Leader must recognize the strategic significance and implications of each ICT investment being contemplated and the opportunities it presents, viewing them through the lens of the whole, even as those with lesser responsibilities may be seeing the same issues parochially. In other words, the e-Leader must be the champion of ICT transformation who drives the implementation of government-wide ICT Foreword: Dr. Honourable Jerrol C Thompson P a g e | v