Derek ÖzkalKansas CityAgents & Agency

Translating rigorous research into plain language.

A human in the loop.Photo: Matt Long

I've spent more than 20 years in economic research, philanthropy, and journalism, most of it at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. There I directed $31.9 million in research on entrepreneurship, labor markets, and what AI is doing to both. Today my work covers AI across entrepreneurship, workforce development, and college access and completion.

Agents and Agency is where I write about keeping people's judgment and sense of purpose at the center of the AI debate.

Read the writing See the research Enter the Lab

2016Wrote the call for proposals that launched Kauffman's future-of-work research, six years before ChatGPT.

$31.9Min research directed across 125+ grants on entrepreneurship, labor markets, and AI.

34papers and reports that thank, quote, or cite my work, from NBER to RAND.

90+events as a speaker, chair, or moderator, from the OECD to the U.S. Senate.

Selected writing, 2016 to 2026

Ten years on the same question

How do people keep their footing, their judgment, and their sense of purpose as technology changes work? I've been writing about that question since 2016. These are the pieces I'd start with.

Kauffman FoundationJuly 2016

“The future of work is far more than the proliferation of Uber-like business models.”

The Future of Work: A Call for Proposals

The call that launched Kauffman’s future-of-work research funding, six years before ChatGPT.

Kauffman FoundationSeptember 2019

“Specific duties and tasks will automate away more completely in the short-term than full jobs.”

Rethinking Education to Make Graduates and Workers Future-Proof

It starts in my father’s classroom at a small college in rural Missouri and argues that preparing people beats trying to future-proof jobs.

All the writing, with the best line from each piece

Featured by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation

The Legacy Project

“Led by Derek Ozkal, senior officer, strategic initiatives, RLE”
From A project to learn from, and honor, 60 years of the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, the Foundation's account of the work.

Sixty years of foundation history sat in boxes, binders, and file shares that nobody could search. I led 46 volunteers in turning tens of thousands of pages into a secure, searchable archive. Then I helped design an experimental AI tool so staff can ask the archive questions.

Finding what we funded, what we learned, and what we already tried in 1997 now takes minutes instead of days.

Read the Foundation's story How the tool works

46volunteers led

60 yrsof history digitized

20,000+documents searchable

90%+faster to find answers

Explore

Four ways in

Each has its own page, so you can skip straight to what you came for.

Writing

Essays on AI, work, and agency

Recent essays on Agents and Agency, Kauffman pieces going back to 2016, a book chapter with the Foundation's former CEO, and data journalism from the Kansas City Business Journal.

All the writing