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Rick Carlisle, the North Carolina Secretary of Commerce, has bucked a trend. Most state economic development and department of commerce directors in the United States come from the business community. Carlisle, however, has a background in economic development and a degree in planning from DCRP.

Carlisle spends most of his time working in three main areas of economic development: keeping the state competitive for technology based companies; strengthening their international engagement; and creating opportunities for people and places in danger of being left behind. Additionally, the demands of running a state department put heavy demands on his time.

Carlisle leads a department that is constantly evolving to keep pace with the rapidly changing world economy. To keep the state competitive for technology based companies, the Department of Commerce is revamping its industrial recruitment efforts to increase its capacity to work with specialized technology companies. They are also modifying their marketing to reach more targeted markets in such areas as telecommunications/networking and pharmaceuticals. Carlisle and his staff have worked with NC State University to create a technology extension program for existing companies, making more engineers available for smaller and mid-size manufacturing firms. Internally, they have reorganized resources to create a Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology to provide greater direction to the department’s efforts in these areas. Through legislation over the past two years, they have also introduced new tax incentives to lower the cost of investing in new machinery and equipment.

To promote international activities, the Department of Commerce is increasing the number of foreign offices; they will have seven in major world markets by next spring. These both seek to promote trade and reverse investment. Carlisle and his staff are organizing the state's first economic mission to mainland China, taking place in November, 1998. They are also attempting to strengthen long term relationships through more joint activities with the state's universities, which have faculty contacts, alumni, and sometimes institutional investments in other countries.

As Secretary, Carlisle has helped to start several initiatives to promote economic development in rural areas of North Carolina, as well as a new inner-city development program. Rural initiatives include enhanced tax credits for investing in more economically distressed counties, new funding for water and sewer investments, demonstration programs to examine the potential of electronic commerce to open markets to rural business, and heritage tourism as a development tool. The new inner city program targets state development zones, or distressed areas within cities, for state aid through tax policies, brownfield legislation, and state funds to help lower the cost of development. In the spring of 1999, the department will initiate new efforts to help dislocated workers upgrade skills and to examine how to improve mobility for the working poor in North Carolina.

As a DCRP student, Carlisle didn't have a clear sense of where he would be working. He had a strong interest in economic development, particularly as it related to his home state of North Carolina. He was particularly interested from the beginning in state policy issues and how state governments can stimulate economic progress. His job choices were driven more by opportunities to work on these issues rather than any clear career path.

While in graduate school, Carlisle and a fellow student created a small consulting firm, C&R Associates, that secured small grants and contracts from the Federal Trade Commission to work on examining the community costs of plant closings. Following that, he joined the then North Carolina Department of Natural Resources and Community Development to work on community and economic development programs, particularly in rural areas. He did that through various positions for nearly seven years, except for a stint at a regional university, including a period as director of the Division of Community Assistance. Carlisle then spent several years in non-profit organizations working on economic and community development policy: in Washington with the National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials, in North Carolina with the Rural Economic Development Center, and then with the Washington-based Corporation for Enterprise Development. In 1993 he joined the Hunt Administration as Governor Hunt's Economic Policy Advisor. After four years in that role, Carlisle was appointed Deputy Secretary of Commerce in 1997 and Secretary in 1998.

Carlisle’s undergraduate degree was in economics. At DCRP, he focused his coursework in spatial economics, quantitative techniques, and economic development policies. The grounding in theory, critical thinking, and policy analysis continue to be the main tools he applies in his work.

Carlisle thinks the future of economic development will be at the state and local level. The federal government has devolved most domestic policy making to the states and he doubts that will be reversed. Still, this will happen in an environment where global market forces can dwarf the ability of state and local government to have an impact. He thinks that the question of how to build the competitiveness of people and places in the context of global movements of markets, technology and capital will drive much economic development policy and practice.