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Category: Leadership

Thinking Big with Ryan Tarrant

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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.

Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community.

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Our guest for this episode is Ryan Tarrant. Ryan is currently the President and CEO of the Jackson County Chamber of Commerce and Experience Jackson, Jackson County’s destination marketing organization. In this role, he leads a strategy and vision to improve the regular quality of life in Jackson County for businesses and residents through advocacy, collaboration and destination development. Ryan previously served as the Chief Operating Officer of Business Leaders for Michigan, the state business roundtable, which he dedicated to making Michigan a top 10 state for jobs, education, widely shared prosperity and and a healthy economy, where he oversaw the execution of the organization’s work plan and public policy engagement strategy. He also has prior experience as a chamber executive, where his success included securing more than a million dollars in public funding for an award winning talent attraction and retention initiative, and created a robust advocacy strategy that drove community infrastructure projects, place made, placemaking activities and engagement with local, state and federal officials. Prior to his work in membership based organizations, Ryan held a variety of positions in government and politics, serving as chief of staff to US Representative John Molinar and as a district director for us, rep dave Camp and run numerous federal campaigns. Ryan has a bachelor’s degree in political science from Saginaw Valley State University, and he and his wife, Cheryl, have two mostly adult children and reside in Jackson, Michigan. Ryan, I’m excited to have you with us today here on Chamber Chat Podcast. I’d love to give you a chance to say hello to all the Chamber Champions who are out there listening, and to share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little better.

Ryan Tarrant 2:59
Yeah, thanks, Brandon. You know, reading through that bio, it’s starting to make me just feel old. You know, I didn’t feel that old before. And you know, have those Boomer, growing children that tend to go leave for college and then come home and stay for a little bit. So, you know, hopefully we’ll be empty nesters soon. But yeah, I grew up in a mid sized town similar to Jackson, you know, we’ve got 30,000 people grew up in Bay City, Michigan, and, you know, great town had a, had a great upbringing, you know, you had the river, you had the lake, you know, grew up, you know, sailing and doing those things. You know, they have a sailing association. So, you know, really, every kid in the community can go out and learn to sail. And, you know, just, just kind of a fantastic place to grow up and live, you know, real sense of community. But one of the things, you know, it’s a traditional Midwest blue collar town, and so, you know, over the years, as you lose some of that manufacturing, you know, I think there’s a tendency for people to kind of say, well, you know, we’re, we’re, we’re just, you know, I think Madonna called it the dirty little town, because she grew up there as well. Okay, you know. So, so I think for me, you know, growing up in Bay City, you had a region, and Bay City kind of always felt like that, that little bit of a red headed stepchild. You had Midland with the headquarters of Dow, and you had Saginaw that was twice as big and, and so, you know, you always felt a little bit less than maybe, but, you know, so I think that’s what’s kind of drawn me into to the chamber world.

Brandon Burton 4:31
Yeah, it turns into a fighter. It sounds like little scrappy. Yeah, yeah, that’s good. So as far as the the chamber goes, what? What’s the size look like? Staff, scope of work, things you guys are involved with?

Ryan Tarrant 4:48
Yeah. So our chamber is about little shy of 700 members, you know, budgets little north of 600,000 and then I also run experience Jackson, which is our destination. Marketing organization, which is actually housed in the same building, but has a completely separate board, had combined. We have a staff of 10, and then the combined budgets, you know, roughly about 1,000,006 or 1,000,007 between the two. So two distinctly different missions. You know, from the chamber perspective. We we have a strategic plan that, you know, really tries to put our members first. You know that customer service, what our events look like. How are we connecting our members? You know, you’re kind of, if anybody thinks of a chamber, it’s, it’s that traditional chamber experience, but it’s really only, you know, probably a quarter of a third of what we do. You know, the other two pieces are, how do we impact our community? You know, what kinds of things can we? Can we take on? Can we convene and collaborate on to to improve the community? And then the third leg of the stool for us is, is that government affairs and advocacy work? You know, here in Michigan, we we’ve seen some some changes for businesses on the public policy side. And, you know, how do we, how do we push back on that when we need to? How do we, how do we work with our elected officials on some of those issues? And, you know, so over the last year, I’ve been here about 14 months this year, we we’ve had some issues with aggressive panhandling, you know, coming out of the out of the pandemic, I think a lot more communities have dealt with, you know, homelessness, panhandling and some of those types of issues, maybe more than they had in the past. You know, we got to the point where in our downtown, specifically, it was getting pretty aggressive. We have a self described progressive city council, okay, who had had pushed back on it for a long time and and so we spent about nine months working with them, to come to a compromise agreement early in the summer, to to kind of abate that a little bit as far as that aggressive behavior, as far loitering and accosting. And so, you know, had some success there. You know, we go after a lot of different state appropriations, earmarks, if you will, to to kind of ramp up projects, and that’s kind of the scope of what we do. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 7:04
well, that should set the stage for our discussion today. You guys are busy, for sure, get your hands in some several things and making an impact, but we’re going to focus our discussion today around thinking big and some of these big swings you guys have tried and these ideas that that come to you, and I’m excited to dive into this conversation and learn from these things you present to us today as soon as we get back from this quick break.

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All right, Ryan, we’re back. I mentioned before the break. We’re talking about thinking big today. So in all these different areas of work that you guys are involved with, what are how do you incorporate thinking big? That might be the better way of asking it. How do you incorporate it? You know, every

Ryan Tarrant 9:53
community has its own personality, I would say. And you know, a lot of places in the Midwest you look at and. And and those these communities kind of take a look. And, you know, in our state, if you’re in a mid sized community, you look and you say, Okay, well, you know, Grand Rapids and Detroit sort of get everything and you know, and they’re doing a phenomenal job. I mean, you know, we all know, know about the NFL draft in Detroit and things happening in Grand Rapids with beer city, and then you’ve got Traverse City up north and and so they get a lot of play and a lot of a lot of credit for things. And I think we can, we can have a little bit of fall into a little bit of a rut where we just sort of expect to get, get what we get, and move forward, and nothing really changes, you know. And I think we take a little bit of a different perspective on it, which is, you know, kind of that, why not us? You know, if, if there’s, there’s these opportunities out there, you know, I mentioned appropriation as far as the government advocacy side goes, you know, why not us? You know, if you’re not even asking, you’re never going to get anything, and everything’s always going to be the same. You know, downtown Jackson seen a lot of redevelopment over the last decade or so. I mean, it’s really come back. You have restaurants, you have businesses downtown, and, you know, we have Consumers Energy, which is, you know, either number one or number two, as far as the biggest energy companies in the state that’s headquartered on one end of our downtown, the other end of the downtown, on the other hand, has something called the Hays hotel. It’s this historic hotel, 10 stories, and it’s been vacant for 21 years. And as I came into the community, and you know, I we would talk about the Hays hotel, and you would have people who would just kind of roll their eyes because they’ve all heard it before, and something’s going to happen with it. You know, fast forward and, and there’s a developer who’s who’s committed to it, and, and, you know, through our conversations with them, learned that there was a little bit of a gap with with all of the the different funding components, you know, you look at over the last couple of years, the increases in interest rates and labor shortages and supplies. And so, you know, it would seem that every time they would fill a gap, there was, you know, maybe another hurdle at the back end. So, you know, we kind of took a look at that and said, Well, you know, what if we tried to hit the easy button here a little bit. And so we engaged with our elected representatives at the state capitol and and kind of had that conversation and said, Look, this is, this is sort of that, that transformational project that kind of completes downtown and books and bookends Consumers Energy to then start to infill some of those, those side streets. You know, we were successful in securing we, we actually asked for $3 million and secured four and a half million dollars. Wow, yeah, they treated it a little bit like the 2023, housing market. You know, you put it up for 100 and they give you 150 right? But, you know, those are the types of things that you know, if you say, why not us? And you make the ask, you know, it’s okay to fail. You know, nothing changes if you fail, but nothing changes if you don’t try either.

Brandon Burton 13:05
Yeah? So, and if you do fail, you learn something, and you can apply it to the next, the next, you know, big idea, right? That’s exactly right, yeah. So, as we talk about big thinking, I I can’t help but think of you can’t have big thoughts if you don’t have big vision, right? If you don’t see a bigger plan or bigger vision for your community, can you speak towards that as to how you see Jackson County, what the possibilities are, what how you would like to see yourself in the future, and to be able to apply that to these big ideas that you’re working towards?

Ryan Tarrant 13:42
Yeah, I’m a big fan of, you know, looking at what others are doing and kind of figuring some of those pieces out, like, what are those aspirational goals? You know, I mentioned Grand Rapids, you know, there’s some other communities out there. We actually transitioned one of our team members into more of a data and analytics role, you know, he has a skill set for it, and so, you know, he’s been doing a lot of this. And, you know, not just kind of the, you know, hey, we’re going to do a community assessment and ask people how they feel. You know, we’ve been doing those for 40 years. And over the last 60 years, the city has lost 40% of its population because people’s feelings aren’t based on anything that you know maybe is real or or achievable. And so, you know, we look at at similar communities and find those comparable communities, then, you know, okay, what are, what are their chambers doing? Who is that, that sort of spark plug in the community, that organization, or that individual, you know what? What’s caused them to grow to, you know, achieve additional educational attainment, those types of things. And so, you know, for us, over the last couple of months, we’ve started to look at some of those things. And you know, you can look at Grand Rapids, and the things that we found are, you know, the two biggest keys to to growth seem to be, you know, persistence in your goal and strategies. And you. Yeah, and then, you know, having sort of some spark or some leader that that actually moves it forward. And when I talk about that persists, persistence, when you look at Grand Rapids, you know that that downtown redevelopment in Grand Rapids started in the mid 70s when Gerald Ford was president. You know, the Secret Service, when he became president, told him he couldn’t do a parade in His own hometown because there were so many vacant buildings and they couldn’t secure him. So, you know, fast forward a few years, and they had a conference center come in, and then, you know, and then it was a civic arena, and then it was a medical mile and a four year institution. And it’s been driven by, you know, collaborative efforts, but also by a couple of larger corporations or families that are located there. You know, similar things can be seen around the country. You know, you look at Bentonville, Arkansas with with the Walmart and Walden family, and then you look at places that that have the opportunity to do those things, but maybe don’t have that one or two businesses or individual that individuals with wealth that can kind of pull it off and keep people together. And what does that look like? You know, I talked to our peers in Mankato, Minnesota last week, and, you know, talking to them, and that persistence is there too, you know, they, they’ve, over the last 40 years, had these 20 year plans. I mean, they’re telling me they’re on number three. And so how do we create that? I mean, you’re talking mid 80s, yeah, how many changes of leadership have we had in since the mid 80s? You know, I’ve been in in communities where where you look at things and you go, Okay, there’s this collective group of leaders who have this vision and support each other and collaborate. But then you have one or two leave, and you have another one retire. And if, if that vision isn’t written down, and you’re not not pulling in those successors immediately into that, those leadership roles and to help with that vision, it starts to fall apart. And so, you know, it’s, it’s that keeping people together and that consistency in what you’re doing. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 17:06
now I love that, the creating that vision, and being able to see where there’s certain individuals in a community that maybe carry more influence they might, and I’m not talking necessarily elected officials, but you gave the example of the Walton family, and, you know, they’ve got money, they’ve got influence, big business. How do you get those people within your community to kind of, I don’t know how to say this, in the way that that I intend, but to engage, but to to not be so hyper focused on their individual business growth and success, but to be able to look at the greater picture of the community and get them to engage in the community, to see it grow and success and succeed by applying some of their skills and connections and abilities to the greater good

Ryan Tarrant 17:55
and and I think the biggest, the biggest key there. I mean, you know, you talk to economic developers. And you know what number one or number two is always people, if you’re talking to site selectors, on what’s the first thing they look at if they’re going to go into a community, right? It’s, do you have the quality and quantity of workforce, you know? So when you start talking to those, those you know, whether it’s an individual or a larger corporation, you know, everything I try and do comes from a perspective of, you know, talent, attraction, retention. You know, is this something that’s going to help us attract and retain talent, or is it just something that that we’re doing to do and how does it move the needle? You know, on our destination marketing organization side, you know, we’re making a big outdoor Bucha. Because, you know, we have something called the Irish hills in our county, and there’s, there’s opportunities for for gravel biking out there, which is the fastest segment of cycling. You know, we’ve got 11 miles of mountain biking trails, and our one of our city parks that just needs to be regrouped and maybe added to. And so, you know, how do we do that? Because now those things translate to those quality of life amenities that, you know, when one of our major corporations, or even, you know, a physical therapy organization, is hiring somebody out of college, you know, do you want to go to Jackson, or do you want to go to Chicago? And if you don’t have those quality of life amenities that, you know, you’re not going to compete with the big city lifestyle, but that’s okay. Utilize the assets you have, but make them as good as they can be. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 19:27
that makes a lot of sense. That place making aspect is huge. And I love the example you gave, the Hayes Hotel. I’m in Texas, and there’s a big historic hotel not too far from where I’m at, that has been vacant since, I believe, the 50s. So it’s been it’s quite the icon. People see it, but just now, things are starting to happen to revitalize it. And it’s great to see it’s great to see those success stories and to see it turn around. And it’s something that builds a community. Be around it too, where you can see progress happening on like, a magnified level, right? Yeah,

Ryan Tarrant 20:07
yeah. And those are the sort of transformational things that you see in a community that, yeah, you know, it’s sort of the I mentioned the last decade in downtown Jackson. And you know that that, to me, is that transformational piece that sparks the next decade.

Brandon Burton 20:22
Absolutely, are there some other big things that that you’ve taken a swing at, or, you know, that they would fall into this category of big thinking that we need to highlight?

Ryan Tarrant 20:35
Yeah, so, you know, you mentioned big things, and I mentioned, you know, a lot of lot of mid sized communities out there, you know, sometimes I think in a in the chambers, we can get hyper focused on our day to day. We’re all so busy, you know, all of those things, but, but we’ve really gotta, gotta kind of identify some of those swings. I mean, we can do that by focusing a little bit, right? Yeah, you know, making sure we’re training our sites and we leave that capacity for for those big swings, you know, but for us, I, you know, revamping those, those mountain biking trails are one of our big pushes for next year, you know, because what we’ve learned is, is, if you’re in that 12 to 20 mile range of mountain biking trails, and you develop them so, you know, you I guess, and I’m learning about Cycling right now, apparently it’s like skiing. They have green so little kids can do it and like me, and then they have black diamonds that are really challenging. And, you know, I break my neck so, you know, bringing in a trail builder to develop that and to add miles to it, so that we can draw people in, you know. And it’s in one of the, you know, I would say probably lower income or more diverse neighborhoods in the city. And so the proximity of it, you know, it’s not just doing that for talent attraction, but how do you make that accessible to everybody? So as a piece of that conversation, we’re looking at it and saying, Okay, can we do a mount like library, if you will, where, you know, a kid from the neighborhood can walk down and and, you know, show his card and essentially rent a bike without paying for it, just like the library and go ride the trails and have fun. You know, you want, you want those things to be accessible for everybody. You want everybody to be able to enjoy them, you know, and to do that because it gives you that, that sense of community pride, because with each one of those things you accomplish, it, it builds on itself. You know, we’ve got, we’ve got another nonprofit in town that’s called the hope kitchen, that’s taking the old Masonic Hall and creating a community kitchen, teaching kitchen to sort of train chefs in front of the house. And, you know, to make sure that that we have that pipeline of of talent for our restaurants, so that, you know, when somebody comes into town, or when you go downtown or to a restaurant in our community, you’re getting the service that you you expect. I mean, I think we’ve all been out to eat over the last couple of years, since COVID and and it always feels like, you know, a lot of time, I wouldn’t say always, but often times it feels like, you know, maybe that level of service that we were accustomed to pre COVID is not the same as post COVID, yep. And so, you know, teaching those people, you know how to do that, and and for us, you know, how do we support that? You know, when they need, when they need to purchase their equipment. How do we how do we help them, whether it’s with with grant funding, through the advocacy process, you know, those types of things. So yeah, so those are some of the, some of the things that that are on our radar right now.

Brandon Burton 23:33
And actually just saw this last week, restaurant that had a sign posted on their door said, No, dine in, just take out only, and it’s something that’s stuck ever since COVID and and I hope that’s because the the data is telling them that’s the best solution for them, but my fear is they can’t get the staff to do dine in or decide easier at the community the Customer Services has fallen out something,

Ryan Tarrant 24:01
yeah, the worst one I’ve seen. I saw was I actually tried to order a pizza online, and got a note when I tried to to click Order, and it said, we’re short staffed. We’re taking time to orders for tomorrow. What I got pizza from somewhere else. I think I still have pizza. So yeah, but yeah, that was the most bizarre one. I mean, they updated their their website, and they’re ordering, oh my goodness, that quickly, that you know, hey, we’re just, we’re busy, and we can’t keep up, so we’re just not taking any more

Brandon Burton 24:35
orders. Wow. But hopefully your appetite is still there tomorrow. So that’s crazy. Well, as as we start to wrap up here, I like asking for the chamber that’s listening, who’s trying to elevate their organization to the next level. What kind of tip or action item might you suggest for them and trying to accomplish that goal? So

Ryan Tarrant 24:55
I think we were, we were sort of, you know, in that mindset of. You know, about a year ago, when we were sounds like, yeah, strategic planning, right? You know, how do we elevate to the next level? We hadn’t done a lot of community initiatives or, you know, over the past few years, we hadn’t done a lot of advocacy work for our members over the past few years. And so, you know, they’ve been doing kind of this, you know, event to event kind of mindset. And so one of the things that we did was we actually developed a survey for other chambers. And so, you know, I mentioned our revenues about 600,000 so we kind of kind of broke it out into those peer chamber, Chamber organizations, and then sort of those aspirational chambers that are in that next level at 700,000 to a million or so. And we really went through and kind of said, you know, how many, how many events do you have that would be considered, you know, kind of, quote, unquote, Premier events, you know, your annual meeting, or your community awards or, or those types of things and, and, you know, how many of these advocacy pieces do you do, you know, kind of went down the line to try and benchmark a little bit to see, you know, at different levels, is, is there a different, you know, what does that look like? You know, are we doing something that’s a little bit off and, and what we found from it, you know, we had, we had, it actually ended up getting 1010, or 11 responses, you know, we, we targeted, who we who we asked. But we it was split evenly between those, you know, smaller in our our level, and then those larger organizations. And what we found was, the larger you are, the less you do. It’s hard to think about, but say it again, right? Or at least the forward facing of what you do is less larger you are, you know, because so many of us think of events, the less you do. Yeah, and it was that, you know, it felt like, as you got to that larger, larger revenue size, and you start to get north of 700,000 you know, those organizations are focusing more, doing fewer premier events, probably doing them really well. But part of that is because they’re transitioning from doing more events to more of that community based work, more of that advocacy style work. And even within that advocacy work, they’re more focused. They might pick three or four priorities that they want to work on, versus having, you know, 10 or 15 and and throwing everything at the at the wall and seeing what sticks. So, yeah, you know, I think that that next level for all of us is, is probably being more focused, you know, we, we, and we can fall into that. I mean, I’m, I’m as guilty as everybody else, right? We get so busy, you know, that there’s so many things going on, and sometimes it’s hard to to put that focus and pinpoint on on that one thing that your members need. But you know, I think at the end of the day, you know, for us, if, if we can accomplish that, that top priority, versus numbers 10 through 20, I think our members are going to be happier with us. We’re going to continue to grow, and, you know, the community is going to be better for in the future.

Brandon Burton 27:59
Yeah, but it sounds like having your new data and analytics person is a great step in that direction, to really focus.

Ryan Tarrant 28:07
It does help to look at data. You know, fewer feelings, more things based on data, really, I think, helps us move the needle a little bit. So, yeah,

Brandon Burton 28:16
I just heard the other day somebody was trying to bring back an event after the pandemic, and they put out an email to all their followers and whatnot, and said, you know, if we get enough interest, we’ll put it on. And there was like 300 or so people that responded, yeah, we want to do this. And then the person thought, you know what this is? Just feelings, you know, let me put this out there again, to the ones that said that they want to come and have them put down a 50% deposit, and if we don’t get enough, we’ll refund everything. We won’t do it, but if we get enough, we’ll move forward. And I think he said, Out of the 300 plus, you know people of interest, I think six people put down a deposit. He’s like, we’re not doing it. So I pay cancel it.

Ryan Tarrant 29:03
And I started looking at our events, and kind of said, you know, and talk to our team about if people don’t want to come to an event, you know, they may say they want it in our survey end of year survey, which, you know, we do every year, to kind of, kind of benchmark ourselves and see how we’re doing and what their needs are. And they may say they want all the networking in the world. You know, for us, we offer 22 networking events a year for a grand total of $90 you know, it, it’s literally sort of boosted by sponsors and different things. But if you’re not going to come to it, but you say you want it, we’ll just stop doing it. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 29:39
yeah. Don’t need the practice, right, right?

Ryan Tarrant 29:43
It shows that, you know, we’re a week post election. It shows that sometimes the data and the polling can be

Brandon Burton 29:48
off. Yeah, exactly, yeah. Well, Ryan, as we look to the future of chambers, how do you see the future of chambers and their purpose going forward?

Ryan Tarrant 29:57
I don’t know that the purpose changes. All that much. I mean, you know, we’re, we’re still going to have that need for businesses who who want to get together, and who want to want to network with one another, develop those relationships. But I think, you know, if there’s any change at all, it’s probably that more and more of that is going to be about that, that bigger picture work that you’re doing. I mean, when we look at our community work, we’re not thinking of, are we doing this? Does it benefit our members? It’s, are we doing this? And does this benefit the community as a whole? You know, if, if the city of Jackson grows, and the county of Jackson grows and we have a bigger employer base, it certainly helps, helps our members. And so, you know, we worry less about those types of things, you know, right now, we, we are we awaiting word on a million dollar grant that we partnered with our local two year college on. And as a part of that, it’s workforce development, you know, is building out a workforce development collaborative to make sure our educational attainment is where it needs to be, and that all of our workforce development partners are working together, you know. And so about a quarter of that 250,000 would be essentially directed to the chamber to run that piece of it, you know. So, so I think you know that community based piece is probably the biggest thing. If, if people aren’t already doing that, how do you impact your community? You know, we know our businesses want to impact their community. That’s why they’ve, you know, for 70 years, sponsored Little League teams, right? You know, done those types of things. They sponsor the local booster club like they they want their people to have community pride. They want to want to see their community and be be proud of where they’re from, and say, you know, you should come visit. You should move here. It’s a great community, you know. And I think the chamber really in in most places, can be a driver of what we look what their community looks like in the next you know, 1015, 20 years,

Brandon Burton 31:48
yeah, yeah, that’s a great point. Well, Ryan, for listeners who may want to reach out and connect with you and maybe learn more about how you guys are doing things there in Jackson County, or maybe you’re one of the aspirational chambers that they’re looking up towards. But what would be the best way to to point somebody to reach out and connect with you? Sure my

Ryan Tarrant 32:09
email address is ryan@jacksonchamber.org, and my cell phone, because I actually got rid of my desk phone. I don’t use it anyway, is 989-708-7683,

Brandon Burton 32:26
that’s perfect, and we’ll get this in our show notes for this episode. Make it easy to find, but I appreciate you carving out some time to spend with us today on chamber chat podcast, sharing the example you guys are setting there in Jackson County and and sharing these ideas and some of these big things, these swings you guys are taking, I appreciate that, and it’s provided a lot of value to listeners today. So thank you for that.

Ryan Tarrant 32:49
Appreciate it. Thanks, Brandon.

Brandon Burton 32:50
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Creating Conveners with Tara Lea

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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.

Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community.

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Our guest for this episode is Tara Lea. Tara has been involved in the chamber industry at the local, state and regional level for the past decade, with a passion for leadership and a commitment to making a difference. Tara currently serves as a Vice President of Community Affairs at the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce. In this role, she orchestrates programs and initiatives aimed at cultivating the next generation of leaders and empowering individuals to enact positive change in their spheres of influence. Prior to the Nebraska chamber, Tara was the president and CEO of the Fremont Area Chamber of Commerce. In that role, she managed the strategic, fiscal and programmatic goals for the Fremont Chamber of Commerce. She also served as a spokesperson for the chamber through their region. With almost 600 members in the Fremont area Chamber. It’s the sixth largest and one of the oldest chambers in the state of Nebraska. Tara started her career, her chamber career as the president of the Ralston Area Chamber of Commerce, a 275 member organization dedicated to creating business and community vitality. She’s had. She has a very active role in creating the Ralston 20 year development plan. Prior to joining the chamber industry, Tara was employed at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln Professional Golf Management Program, and as the educational specialist recruiting students from across the country to make Nebraska their home. Tara has served as a board member for a variety of civic and government organizations. She’s She was elected to the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce executives and Mid America Chamber of Commerce executive board of directors by her peers, and is currently past chairman of both organizations. Tara has been recognized for both service and professional leadership through the Midlands Business Business Journal, 40 under 40 Leadership Award. She has earned her Bachelor’s of Journalism and Broadcasting and has a master’s in educational leadership from the University of Nebraska Lincoln. Tara is also a 2021, graduate of the US Chamber of Commerce IOM program. Tara, we’re excited to have you with us today here on Chamber Chat Podcast. I’d love to give you a moment to say hello to all the Chamber Champions who are out there listening, and to share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little better. Well,

Tara Lea 3:32
thanks, Brandon, and hello to all my chamber friends across the country, so excited to be on the podcast today to share just a little bit of knowledge that I probably ripped off and duplicated. From some of my friends across the state over the years. My bio is very long with some big words that chatgpt helped me make up. So thank you, Brandon for sharing that. But a big thing that you see in there is Nebraska has mentioned many, many, many times. Born and raised Nebraska, very proud Nebraskan. I think something interesting about myself, and I’m going back a few years here, but when I was a senior in high school, I was both a Nebraska cow queen and pig queen in the same year. So I got to go around the state of Nebraska to fairs and community events and hand out ribbons and just be a promoter of short horn cattle and the pork industry across the state. So I think my, my love for Nebraska, and kind of ending up here in the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce role probably started way back in high school

Brandon Burton 4:31
and talk about something to aspire to, cow queen and pig queen. Wow,

Tara Lea 4:36
just the royalty of Nebraska. You know, I still get the crown out once in a while. No, I’m just kidding,

Brandon Burton 4:41
and we’ve got her on the show today, folks, I love it. But tell us a little bit about the Nebraska chamber, obviously, State Chamber, but give us some perspective the size scope of work, how you guys are involved working with other chambers staff. Just to you. Kind of get our mindset straight as before we go into this conversation today,

Tara Lea 5:04
absolutely so. As you mentioned from my bio Brandon, I’ve kind of climbed the chamber ladder here. I like to say I started a small chamber, went to a mid sized chamber. Now at the Nebraska State Chamber, it’s an entirely new beast and animal compared to the local chambers. We have about 1000 members here at The Nebraska Chamber of Commerce, and our focus is obviously statewide. So we want to make a huge difference from Western Nebraska all the way to Eastern and North and South. We want to cover the whole state. So as most chambers do, we do a lot of lobbying for our businesses and communities across the state. But my role, which is new, is really to work with the local chambers across the state of Nebraska as well. So I kind of have that inside track and know what a weird job that we have. So I can be that person to new folks who come into a chamber role and help do some training and education for them. I can also, if they, you know, chambers have issues or events or things they have questions on, we’re the resource for them, trying to do a lot more meetings with the local chamber folks. So in a way, we’re making all the local chambers an extension of the State Chamber, and I think that’s just going to make the entire state a whole lot stronger as we move forward with that. Here at The Nebraska chamber, we have 12 employees that are here in the office, and then we just started a new initiative a couple months ago, which is also my baby, called six regions one Nebraska. And we’ve hired six navigators across the state, who then are kind of an extension of the chamber as well, working on some regional projects in each of those, those communities, in those areas.

Brandon Burton 6:36
Man, that you guys are busy. I mean, this is, this is awesome. I love, especially your role, this new role that’s been created, and seeing the local chambers becoming an extension of the State Chamber and and having the six navigators. I mean, Nebraska is not a small state. I mean, you get in the East Coast and you get states you can drive across in 30 minutes. Not so much in Nebraska, right? So it makes a lot of sense to have your your delegates?

Tara Lea 7:03
Well, it makes a huge difference, because even for the 12 of us, you know, each of us trying to get out to the western side of the state, it’s eight hours across the state, so we were not spending nearly as much time out there as we should have been. So yes, to have somebody right there in the community, to always be a resource has just been huge for us.

Brandon Burton 7:19
Yeah. Now that is fantastic. And really, that could be a whole podcast episode there. But our focus for our conversation today is going to be around creating conveners. So maybe some of that comes into the conversation today when we talk about, you know, helping to lift up some of these chambers, get them trained and educated, but ultimately creating conveners and and becoming one of those, you know, pillars in that C, you know, the 3c of chambers. So we look forward to diving deeper into this topic as soon as we get back from this quick break.

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All right, Tara, we’re back. So as I mentioned before the break, our topic for our conversation today is creating conveners. So as you hear that topic and the approach to your work, what does that mean to you? How do you approach creating conveners in your day to day work?

Tara Lea 10:20
So that has been just a passion of mine the entire time I’ve been in the chamber industry. I mean, even at the local level, it’s so important to bring together not just your your members and local businesses, but make sure they’re still working with city government and county government and, you know, make all of us working together to move things forward in the right direction. So now, in my role, literally, I get to do it every single day. So I mentioned the six regions one Nebraska initiative. I also run our leadership Nebraska program. So I know we have a ton of leadership programs across the country. Each of them has its own awesome element, but, you know, a lot of are very similar as well, but that’s really where I have the opportunity. We have about 350 Alumni members who we do events for throughout the year. And then each year, we take a class of between 30 and 35 those folks are from all across the state, and then we go visit different communities across the state. So at that time, it’s all about those introductions, bringing people together. It’s amazing to see, even years later, folks that are working together because they met at an alumni event or they were in class together. So I really think that’s to form those partnerships is huge, and anything I can do to make that happen is just a true passion of mine,

Brandon Burton 11:32
absolutely. So tell us a little bit more about that. As you as you take these alumni, you divide up, you go out and visit others. What? What does that look like? What do you provide? What’s the curriculum, if you will?

Tara Lea 11:43
Yeah, great question. So again, if you have a local Chamber Leadership Program, you’re probably meeting one day a month or something along those lines. For leadership, we meet three days a month, so it is a huge time commitment for folks, but we start at noon on a Wednesday and wrap up on noon on a Friday. And the whole goal, obviously, is there’s a leadership development component, which is huge, but it’s also the relationship. So we are making sure the folks in this class are getting in front of the mayors of communities, or just the key people that are in that community, senators, whoever that might be, and then the top business leaders in those communities as well. So they have that resource and they know them. And then we take a lot of behind the scenes tours as well. So Nebraska is a large manufacturing state, so we get to see some really cool things that are made right here in the state of Nebraska. Each month, we’re in a different part of the state. So we do southeast, we do Western, northeast, central Lincoln, Omaha. We hit kind of all some of the hot spots across the state. And again, just to showcase it’s usually focused on the top hitting issues within a state right now. So obviously, this year, child care comes up in every single session. We go to communities and see what kind of facilities they have or how they’re kind of battling. The child care shortage crisis across the state. Housing has been huge for a number of years. It’s fun to go see some of the small homes and just or the things that are being created, you know, in these communities, to make sure they’re covering the housing they need, housing they need, and then just workforce. So issues in Nebraska, but also issues across the whole state, we are not going to find an answer. Unfortunately, I wish we had that crystal ball that told us, Hey, here’s the answer to all of this. And if someone listening does have that, please call me and tell me what that is. But it’s just nice to see what other folks are doing, so then the people in the class can take those ideas back to their communities and help build and try to solve some of these issues that we have across the state.

Brandon Burton 13:38
Even if somebody has solved it. It’s probably only solvable in their community and whatever adaptations need to happen. So the thought came to me as you’re explaining how this, how the program works with these visits, these manufacturing facilities, you know, just getting out and seeing, you know, the childcare place, the the workforce and the housing issues. How is this all working towards the goal of creating conveners? Or would you say that’s the goal? Absolutely

Tara Lea 14:09
is the goal. And I think it happens every single session, because someone will meet someone that then they can go work with or push a project forward, because they had the opportunity to convene and meet with those folks while they were on a tour, listening to a panel of speakers. Even just the leadership development, it’s it’s getting those folks in the class stronger and more knowledgeable, so that they can then go back to their communities and bring everybody together, convene people that need to be in the room to push things forward and make things happen across the state.

Brandon Burton 14:39
Absolutely, I was thinking just the just the perspective that’s opened up to these individuals to go through the program, I think is so valuable in creating conveners, to be able to look at a problem from multiple angles and say, Yeah, I know somebody over here. Let’s bring them in. Let’s and maybe that’s getting more into the catalyst phase. Is the you know that that other C, but I think being a convener is so important to be able to have those connections, bring them in, have that perspective, to approach things from from different, different angles, really, absolutely

Tara Lea 15:12
and as a State Chamber, we just really want to see all of our local communities advance and grow. And so that is obviously huge for us is when we can bring folks together and do some the right people, so then they can go back and make an impact within their community.

Brandon Burton 15:25
Absolutely. So I know we’re talking a lot about the leadership Nebraska, can we talk a little bit about how you work with chambers too? Because I want to know, because I feel like there’s some convener development going on with those chambers too. As you work with the local chambers, what are those interactions like? And what do you do to promote them, to support them, to train them. What does that look like? Yeah,

Tara Lea 15:55
so that’s something we’ve really focused on the last couple of years as well. We have no no better value than our local chambers across the state. They are huge resources for us as the Nebraska chamber. So we want to make sure folks are loving their job and wanting to continue working in the chamber industry. Obviously, that’s kind of an issue we’ve had across the state as well, as is folks kind of get burnt out or whatever issues might arise. So we really want to focus on, what can we do to make their lives a little bit easier? So the Nebraska chamber association is our statewide group of chamber executives, and we meet every other week on a zoom call where we’ll bring in experts in the chamber field. Maybe sometimes it’s just a social media expert, an HR expert, just people who can come in and educate our local chamber executives so that then they can be a resource in their local areas and their local communities. We also do two conferences a year where we get as many people together as we can. It’s usually two to three days, and it’s just pure professional development education, but also that awesome time to be with your colleagues who do the things that you do, day in and day out, and they understand how how this job is, so it can be a resource for folks moving forward, just to have that, that person to go to and talk to when needed. As far as spreading the word the chamber newsletter, we love to get local chambers in there. And one of my dear friends in Fall city and I Amber Holly started a podcast a couple of months ago called chamber chatter boxes, where we just interview local chambers and they talk about what makes their community unique, some of the events they have going on. We really encourage folks across the rest of the state or region to go and visit those communities in our podcast. So not nearly the level of the chamber chat yet Brandon, but we have goals to aspire 12 episodes in someday, we will also be at 309

Brandon Burton 17:47
Awesome, awesome. I love hearing chambers podcast. So this is, you know, going through COVID. That was kind of the vision that I saw. Is with the pivoting. I even set up a page on my website called the podcast pivot, right? So during during COVID, chambers still needed to get their messaging out and, and some did, you know, Zoom calls, and they used other tools where they could, you know, put out video. But podcasting, when people are at home and they’re doing different things, and they can listen and and be able to be educated while they’re doing other things, is so important. And I think the world we live in today where everybody’s so busy, that’s a way to reach people, absolutely, podcast so

Tara Lea 18:27
and drive time, yeah? I mean, just drive time in our state too. People in our car a lot, yeah, driving throughout Nebraska. So it’s a nice time to just pop on a podcast and use that, that that windshield time for good, absolutely,

Brandon Burton 18:40
instead of just listening to radio or whatever, I mean, right? Music, yeah, we all have those songs embedded in our mind already, so we don’t need to keep reinforcing. We can, you know, broaden our minds. But

Tara Lea 18:53
that’s right, I could sing a little bit for you if you want to. No, I’m just happy to everyone would turn their this podcast off right now if I started that.

Brandon Burton 19:00
But I was just gonna, I was just gonna say how great you sounded, you know, with the microphone and the podcast set up. So we’ll leave it right there. But

Tara Lea 19:07
perfect, sounds good.

Brandon Burton 19:11
So you guys meet twice a year for a conference that’s you. That’s kind of unique. I see most, most state association, State Chambers, are doing, you know, once a year. So do you know what was behind that? To do it twice a year, and is a turnout similar for both, or is one more supported than the other? Yeah,

Tara Lea 19:32
so we have a fall conference every year, and that’s probably that’s been going on for as long as I’ve been in the chamber industry, and we kind of rotate that across the state, so every region has a chance to be host and show off what they’re doing. That is our bigger event that definitely gets more chamber execs there. And then in the spring, we do what we call mini institutes. It’s just a two day session. It’s typically either centrally located in the state of Nebraska or Omaha, Lincoln area. And that started. Gosh, probably five or six years ago, just because people wanted more they wanted to get together more often. They wanted more education opportunities. And that one, it’s a little less attended, but again, it’s just a two day event, so sometimes people coming from further distances, it’s, you know, can I justify the day and a half compared to the three days? And so we tried to keep the prices really low on that too. We know there’s not a huge budget for professional development, a lot of small chambers, so we keep it under $100 for both of those conferences, and try to provide as much value as we can while folks are together. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 20:33
that’s great. I think for those listening who may be on a board for their state association, just take some ideas. See if there’s value in your state to do something similar. But from Tara’s perspective, it’s all about strengthening Nebraska. So don’t, don’t, don’t compete too Right, right? Don’t

Tara Lea 20:50
get too good. Go ahead and do a few things, but you know, don’t. Don’t be as good as us. Just kidding,

the whole country will be better if everybody works together. So it’s all good.

Brandon Burton 21:00
Absolutely. I love it. I love these approaches. I mean, you guys are, it seems like you’re doing things right, to build up leaders to to turn them into conveners that are going to strengthen their communities, be that extension of the Nebraska chamber throughout the state. I love the strategy that you guys are making. Is there anything else to the approach that you guys are taking that’s worth noting again, for those listening who may be taking something, taking what they hear today, back to state association or or up to their State Chamber and say, Hey, can we do this surgery? Have you thought about this? What? What would you suggest? Yeah, I

Tara Lea 21:36
know I mentioned it, but I really there’s so much value in having someone at the local level. And that’s, I think, when I came from a local chamber to the state that was the biggest piece that was missing. It was, you know, we were expecting our members to come to us all the time. And even at local chambers, we do that too, where it’s like we’re hosting these events. If they’re members, they should be coming to our events, coffees, urban cuttings, whatever it may be. At the State Chamber, we were hosting three events a year, and expecting folks to just show up. Well, that’s that’s not a great way to do business. That’s not a way we find out what our members need and want. So statewide, I think the best thing we did is have these local navigators in communities, where they can get out and hear from each individual member, or even if they’re not members, just communities across the state, local chambers, I think, do the same thing. And I’ve really stressed this to my local chamber friends, is that you need to meet one on one with with as many members as you can. We’re here to make the business community a better place. And if we don’t know what the issues are that our business leaders are facing, there’s no way we can do that. So that one on one, time that you spend with your members is so valuable and so important and and even if, you know, no solution comes out of it, just the fact that your business member feels heard is huge for them. And when that invoice comes around to pay again, you know, the following year, they’re going to remember that time they spent with you, and it’s going to be a lot easier for them to write that check, instead of, you know, debating if they continue their membership or not,

Brandon Burton 22:59
yeah, and this, I mean, I feel like we see this model from the US Chamber, where they have representatives that they come and they’re going to state conferences, and they’re going to local chamber, you know, events and being, being seen, being present, taking note on what, what are the issues of importance, and being able to take them back to the US Chamber say, Okay, let’s focus on these things. So it’s a great, great model. It seems to be working for them. So why not? Why not do it in Nebraska, or whatever state you’re in right now? So exactly

Tara Lea 23:32
Brita. The other thing I was going to mention that we do is, I know, when I was a local chamber exec, the lobbying side of things was not my cup of tea. I didn’t, didn’t follow very well. I didn’t, didn’t understand a lot about it. I can easily admit that. But so what we do at the State Chamber also is, during the legislative session, we’re giving our local chambers kind of cheat sheets that they can then share in their newsletters or meetings with their government affairs council, where we’re basically like handing it to them with the Cliff Notes, like, yes, here’s the big things that are happening during the session or even happened this week at the state capitol. Feel free to do a social media tweet that’s similar to this, or, you know, whatever it might be, just really getting those resources to the folks that aren’t comfortable with it and don’t, you know, I would never want to do a newsletter and put something that I wasn’t 100% sure about, and now we’re just taking the guesswork out of it for the local chambers. And here you serving on a platter, like here it is. Go ahead and just copy and paste, and then if they have questions, our government affairs folks here at The Nebraska chamber are amazing and more than willing to go out and do lunch and learns and things with the local Chambers as well with their businesses, so that it kind of takes some pressure off that local chamber leader and the experts can come in and really talk about what’s going on in the capital.

Brandon Burton 24:44
Yeah, and advocacy should be such a huge part of each local chamber, and we all know chambers typically run understaffed, so to be able to put in the time individually to do the research, take an opinion to say what’s best for our business community, that’s a huge and. That’s a full time job, really, yeah, and absolutely, to be able to have that support from the State Chamber to say, Here it is. Now, I would suggest for everybody still read it, you know, look at but yes, use that as a resource to promote and put out there and and call it your own, you know, say, in a partnership with the State Chamber, this is what we were standing on, and it’s hard to go wrong if you take that approach. So great point. Nobody

Tara Lea 25:27
goes to school to learn how to be a chamber professional, and we wear so many different hats that it’s just nice when we can have, you know, help out there along the way to make us look better. That’s always a good thing, absolutely.

Brandon Burton 25:39
Well, Tara, as we start to wrap things up here, I wanted to ask, on behalf of a listener who’s wanting to take their chamber up to the next level, you’ve shared some great, great tips and strategies, but what might you offer for a chamber that’s trying to accomplish that goal of of taking their chamber to the next level?

Tara Lea 25:55
Yeah, don’t be scared to try new things. I think we kind of get in our little ruts of we’ve always done it this way, so we’re going to keep doing it that way. And I think that mentality, hopefully, is changing a little bit as we’ve all had to reinvent ourselves, especially through the COVID years and things like that. But I think just go ahead and try that event. If you’re if you’re not sure if it’s going to work or not, do it one year if it flops, who cares? Don’t do the next year. If you are looking to change some initiatives within your city your community, go talk to the mayor. Go make those relationships happen so that you can really push things forward. But you can’t be scared to try new things, because we’re ever changing and continuing to show our value to our members and our communities. So take the leap and do whatever fun event or initiative that you’re hoping to achieve,

Brandon Burton 26:43
absolutely. That’s great advice. As we look to the future of chambers, I always like to see, you know, what does your crystal ball say? How do you see the future of chambers and their purpose going forward? Well, let

Tara Lea 26:56
me wait my taro cards out here. No, I’m just kidding. So I could not be more excited for I feel the future of chambers are going throughout our country. I mentioned before COVID, like we all did a rebrand, right? We were worried. What are we going to look like when we come out on the other side of this? We can’t do things the way we always did. I truly believe chambers are stronger now than we were five years ago. I think we’re just going to continue to grow. I do see some more partnerships happening, whether it be regional chambers forming or more economic development and chamber folks merging. I think that’s probably the way things are going to go. But I think we’re only going to be stronger because of that. So I think, yeah, I have no doubt that chambers will continue to play a huge role in their communities. They will be the people who know everything about what’s going on and the place that folks go to to find the latest and greatest information. And I can’t be I can’t wait to be part of the ride, and it’s so fun where I’m at now, because I not only get to see it at the state level, but I really get to see it happening in the local communities as well, and that is absolutely amazing. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 28:01
I love that vision of the future, and I am going to plug just our previous episode with Angela Wilson. She talked about negotiating contracts. So that is the future, with chambers merging and taking on more of an economic development role. Give that episode a listen and just really get into what you need to be considering as you approach contracts with these different partnerships. But I love that, that vision of the future. So thank you, Tara, absolutely. Yeah. So I wanted to give you a chance to share any contact information for listeners who may want to reach out and connect with you. Learn more about how the Nebraska chamber is approaching different things, or what they can do to to strengthen their chamber. What would you Where would you point people to to reach out and connect?

Tara Lea 28:45
Yeah, I am always available via email. I might take two emails, like it did when Brandon tried to set this up today, but I promise I will try to get back to you much of the first one. My email is just tlea@nechamber.com, again, T, L, E, A, at, N, E, chamber.com, or I’m always available. You can call me at 402-480-6918,

they also have a great Nebraska chamber has a website that’s great leadership. Nebraska has an awesome website. I would also, if you’re interested in leadership program, would follow leaders from Nebraska on Facebook. We’re always posting the fun things that we’re doing, so feel free to give that a follow and and steal some ideas from us as well.

Brandon Burton 29:31
That’s perfect. We’ll, we’ll do our best to link all of that in our show notes for this episode. Make it easy to find all the places and and links. But Tara, this has been great having you on chamber chat podcast. I love the energy and enthusiasm and the insight that you brought to us today, and appreciate you spending time with us. Thank you so much. Well,

Tara Lea 29:52
I so appreciate the opportunity and all the local chambers and State Chambers keep doing great work. Really proud of you, and can’t end without saying, Go Big Red.

Brandon Burton 30:00
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Navigating Contracts with Angela Wilson

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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.

Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community.

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Our guest for this episode is Angela Wilson. Angela is the President and CEO of the Greater Muskogee Area Chamber of Commerce. Angela provides the overall daily management of all departments of the chamber and works with the Chamber’s board of directors to ensure the Chamber’s mission is achieved. She became the Chamber’s President and CEO in November of 2019 after serving as Vice President and Director of Programs for six years, she oversaw all of the Chamber’s programs and events and all non news revenue projects, which make up approximately half of the Chamber’s annual operating budget. Angela has worked at the Muscogee Chamber Since 2012 after serving as a tourism director and executive director for the Chamber of Commerce in Coffeyville, Kansas for four years. Angela began her career with the Muskogee chamber as the program and sales director in 2016 was promoted to Vice President and Director of Programs. Angela has a Bachelor of Arts degree in communications from Metropolitan State University of Denver in Colorado. She is an IOM graduate and a graduate of leadership, Coffeyville leadership, Mugi OCC chamber Management Institute, OK, CNP, non profit management and Dale Carnegie effective communications and human relations. Angela currently serves as chair on the OCC board of directors, Mako Conference Board of Directors, and the President of the Board of Trustees for the Muscogee public schools, education board of directors. Angela, I’m excited to have you with us today, here on chamber chat podcast, I’d love to give you an opportunity to say hello to all the chamber champions who are out there listening, and to share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little better. Sure.

Angela Wilson 2:52
Thank you for having me today. It was an honor to be asked to do this. I should could throw rich Cantillon. We used to be with the Ponca City Chamber in Oklahoma, throw him under the bus for signing me up for this that he deserves it. And though I love to share, I love to help other chambers. So in any way, I hope someone takes maybe just something from this today to help them

Brandon Burton 3:17
absolutely, and I’m sure that’s, that’s what the whole purpose of this is, right? Is to bring people on and their perspectives from their their part of the world, their part of the country, and their scope of work at their chamber and and we’ll, we’ll flesh out those things that can be a value to others listening. So tell us a little bit about the greater Muskogee Area Chamber, just to kind of set the stage. Give us an idea the size of your chamber staff, budget, scope of work, just to kind of prep us for our conversation today.

Angela Wilson 3:48
Sure, and those of you don’t know we are Muskogee, Oklahoma, USA. You might have heard a song before okie from Muskogee, from Earl haggard. That’s usually what people associate us with. But we are located, for those, again, that don’t know, in eastern Oklahoma. We’re about 45 minutes from Tulsa, so we kind of sit out. We are a micropolitan community of about 35,000 people. Our chamber has about 375 members. We know, give or take those, our budget is about a $375,000 budget, and we have, right now a staff of three. I’m in that little transition where I’m down one staff and so again, we’re like all chambers. Do we reevaluate if we want to fill that position, or if we think we can, obviously we all know we can take on more work, because we always think we can, but we’re kind of in that time where we’re reevaluating if we want to fill that so normally we’re a staff of four, and we are again solely just a chamber. And. Yeah, we

Brandon Burton 5:01
love it. So I think it’s probably fair to say most chambers are operating one or two staff people below what they need, right? So probably, probably put you right in the right the sweet zone, right there. So

Angela Wilson 5:13
yeah, we always take on more work. For some reason, I It’s really weird. Yes, we can do it. Yes, we can

Brandon Burton 5:19
do it. Yeah, chambers have a problem with saying no or problem saying yes. Maybe is what it

Angela Wilson 5:24
is yeah that we need to go to get help for saying yes to everything

Brandon Burton 5:28
absolutely. Well, I’m excited for our topic today. It’s something we haven’t really spent much time on in over 300 episodes of Chamber Chat Podcast, but it’s a focus of navigating contracts. So I know a lot of chambers out there have either tourism contracts or economic development contracts or maybe a Downtown Association contract of some sort. But all these variety of different types of contracts may or may not come across the desk of the the chamber, and the Chamber might seek them out. They might be sought out in some cases, but either way, I think it’s a good opportunity for us to have a conversation about how a chamber can go about navigating and maybe even negotiating some of these contracts as a as they appear. So I think there’s going to be a lot of value for listeners today, and look forward to getting to this with you right after this quick break.

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All right, Angela, we’re back. So as I mentioned before the break, we’re focusing our conversation today around negotiating contracts. As you introduced the greater Muskogee Area Chamber, you mentioned that you’re solely a Chamber of Commerce. I know that hasn’t always been the case, but if, if you want to take the mic and kind of give us the background and evolution of of the Muskie chamber, just to kind of set the table for us. I think that may be helpful, sure.

Angela Wilson 9:08
So when I started in 2012 we had a contract with the city for tourism, and we had a tourism staff of about, I think, three other people, and again, the Chamber has an administrative fee that we take off that contract, like every contract that we have. Well at the time, every year, that contract auto renewed. We went to City Council, we did our presentation. What we did that year, we went about our way. The chamber was very heavy in tourism. We were known for having fun, doing all these parties, entertaining, you know, at all these big events that tourism was hosting, and the Chamber kind of took a back seat to that. Well, fast forward about five or six years, and that tourism budget was. Is over a million dollars. And so when people see that, oh, I can do that, they make it look so easy and so fun. And there was always people, every year, probably since I’ve been here, that thought they could do it better. And so, come about 2017 18. There was a lot of pressure from City Council. They were, they were feeling the pressure from outside sources to kind of put their thumb on what tourism was doing. And so, you know, around here, we batten down the hatches. We jumped through tons of tons of hoops. I think our president and CEO of the chamber at the time, she spent probably 85% of her time dealing with tourism, and so again, the Chamber suffered from that. So I’m over here as vice president, holding down the chamber because we’re dealing with all of this outside noise for tourism. They completely changed. Our board completely made. You know, everyone track their time like just everything was ridiculous, almost, um, and so, you know, my president, CEO, she left, and at the time, I’m thinking, Oh, God, do I want this job? Do I want it? Do I want it? And my kind of analogy of it is, I know it was a bowl of crap, and I’ve decided to eat that bowl of crap when I applied for this job. So that’s go to 2019 I accept this job, and, you know, the pressure is still there, the red tape we’re dealing with non stop. And then COVID happens, and then I’m really thinking to myself, Oh my gosh, what did I really do? Well, when COVID happened, we didn’t know what our budget was going to be. We didn’t know if people were gonna they’re not traveling, like, oh gosh, you know, layoffs, whatever. We just didn’t. Nobody knew. And so, um, we worked. I spoke with my board, and I said, you know, guys, is this really worth it what we’re dealing with, and our chamber is suffering. Um, our Chamber members. They just think we do tourism. They don’t know what they get as a chamber member. And so with kind of all of that background and just everything going on, we decided to part ways with that contract. It wasn’t easy. It was some difficult conversations with my board, with the city manager, with the mayor, but we decided we needed to do what was best for our chamber, and letting that contract go was what was best for our chamber. Now it came with a loss of that administrative fee, loss of jobs that I had to lay off people, and so it wasn’t a fun time. And you then COVID still going on. So you’re like, oh God, we can’t do events. Oh god, you know, what did we do as a chamber? Are we going to be okay? So the fall of 21 was October of 21 was the end date for that contract. So we gave it back to the city on a silver platter, and said, Here you go. Good luck. We’ll be here if you need some help, but have fun and take it on. And so the city took it in house for a little bit, and then they re contracted it back out to a third party again. But, you know, as a chamber, it was our time then to rebrand as a chamber and say, Where do we want to go from here? What do our Chamber members want? So we sent surveys out, we visited with members. We kind of rebranded of what we do. We had a whole new program of work. Just everything was completely new, and it was scary, very scary, but it took us about three years to recuperate that admin fee is about $30,000 so we took us years, you know, just biting away each year at a time, and we did it. And it was a very rewarding kind of deal to be a part of, to be like, we’ve done this, we’re okay. We never had to pull money from reserves. We never had to do any of that. And you know, it was just a time, and our members recognized that, hey, they’re really asking me what I want as a member. And so we put some new programs out there. We got rid of a couple programs, and so looking back now, is the best thing we’ve ever done. We are, I say, we live our best life. We have no other contracts. We don’t do the economic development contract. So we are solely a chamber on our own, and it is very nice. So we answer to our members. We do what we want. We want to make up something and do something. We do it. We don’t want to. We don’t, don’t, don’t want to. We don’t have to. We’re not on purse strings or Puppet Strings of any entity, if it’s a city, county, whatever it might be, just our members. Yeah.

Brandon Burton 14:59
Yeah, and I can see where it can be difficult to serve two masters, right? So if you’ve got your chamber board, you’ve got a tourism board, and they’re wanting different things, and you’ve got staff that are allocating time different ways, trying to keep all that straight. It can be a headache. It can be a burden. I can see the benefit, of course, to be able to synergize, you know, the efforts that the chamber is doing with tourism and trying to bring that all under one focus, I can definitely see that and and we’ve had episodes where we’ve talked about where that can be a huge benefit, but when it’s splitting time going different ways, it has you not able to perform to your capabilities, really, as a chamber, they mentioned for your members to be able to understand what they get as a chamber member, I think is so important to be able to put that focus back there. So since that separation, the decoupling of the tourism contract, we call it a divorce

Angela Wilson 16:01
and the COVID, I guess I don’t know,

Brandon Burton 16:05
good terms, right? Do you have visitation? Yeah, we

Angela Wilson 16:09
have. They come visit every now and then. That’s

Brandon Burton 16:15
funny, but I imagine I mean, you still have an interest in tourism, right? I mean, a strong tourism in the Muskogee area is going to benefit your Chamber members as well. So there’s still win win within that, but not having that that burden or that weight upon you to perform in certain ways and to have the expectations that you need to meet. Can you talk to us a little bit about what that approach has been like since then, and involvement with tourism now that it’s not you know that that weight that’s on you as well,

Angela Wilson 16:45
sure, and I will say when it got really bad. I mean, we had open records requests from people for tourism. The Attorney General’s office was calling me that we were embezzling all like it was just to the point where you’re like, This is crazy things, and nothing came of any of it. So you’re like, Well, we know we’ve had audits, and we do our audits every year. We’re okay, but you know, just going forward, we’ve been there to help them. When they transitioned over, they would call us to say, how did you guys do this? Or what did you do about this? And they’ve had a couple tourism directors since then. So each time they get a new one, they call us and you know, we’re there. If we need to be, we’re going to partner. We’re going to do what’s best for Muskogee at the end of the day. But do I ever want it back? I don’t think so, unless it’s just really that bad that we need to take it back in. But it was just an opportunity for us to be us and not be everyone just associated us with tourism before we were I mean, at one time, there was all women here, and they were the chamber chicks, but they were the happy go lucky face of Muscogee, because they were tourism, and so we needed to be a more professional organization and here for our businesses and be taken seriously, be at the table on serious conversations, and not just, you know, fishing tournaments and this and that and this, parties, fun things. So we have kind of really stepped it up as more of a professional organization. You know, we still have fun, but we try to be, you know, that pinnacle the top of what we can be in Muskogee, when we do things, we want to be the best at it. But with tourism, you know, we’re all partners. We all try to partner with things, with our economic development, with the city, with the county, we definitely try to break down those silos and partner and move forward and do what’s best for Muskogee. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 18:50
I can see we’re after the divorce to be able to focus more on the 3c versus the 3p right as a chamber and your focus. What would you say for chambers out there that are either considering a partnership or considering dissolving a partnership? What are some of those things that need to be thought of and really calculated into to making these sort of decisions? I know sometimes the decisions are made for you, but if you’re if you still have a seat at the table and you’ve got some input, what are some things to be considered sure

Angela Wilson 19:25
if you aren’t considering it, my top piece of advice would be, make sure that contract is strong, strong, strong, and you have your best interest at the very front of that. Because, you know, for ours, was just auto renew, auto renew, the good old boy system. Well, then all of a sudden they wanted to have batten down and hatch down this contract. And it was just, it was a waste of everyone’s time and money and effort for things, I get a contract. But looking back. Hindsight, there’s different things of who owns what. We’ve gone through that with a logo and a branding, does tourism own it, or does the chamber own it? Buildings? Did they pay rent? If they had, you know, put money into the building? Who has what desks like it is very simple, things you don’t think about. And then if your logo, if you’re going to dissolve it, if your logo has chamber and tourism, well, guess what? Your chamber is going to have to pay for all new branding, all new envelopes, all new signs, whatever it might be, business cards. There’s a lot of just little things you don’t think about that that logo and tourism was on, so make sure that you set yourself up as a chamber. Set yourself up right and solid. Consult with an attorney. Please do that before you sign any contract. Don’t just let the city or the county hand you one and say, sign this. Have those conversations with your board of if we weren’t to do this tomorrow, what would we look like? Can we still keep our doors open? Can we still be successful or and make sure it is tourism is one side and there’s a high wall of chamber on the other. Do not merge those. It can get muddy. It can get very gray, and you don’t want you don’t want any part of that either. So keep things very clear, separate, a separate checking account for your tourism, a separate checking account for your chamber. I know there’s some out there that blend those two and Good gosh, makes me cringe, but they are separate, separate audits. Just make sure everything is very clean financially. So you know, if you do have an open records request, here you go, and you’re clean. And that is another perk right now, is we don’t have, we’re not subject to open records, not that we’re doing anything shady, but yeah, but we can say no, if we really need to, but at the end of the day, make sure the chamber everything is secure for the chamber, and that’s what look out for the chamber at the end of the day. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 22:11
on a smaller scale, it makes me think of the small business owner who may be commingling their personal funds with their business funds, and, you know, working out of their other house, but not paying themselves rent, and then they go to sell a business, and, well, what do you have to sell? What? What’s here? And so keeping things clean, and, like you said, having the contracts really buttoned down, to be able to know, you know, is the tourism or is economic development? Are they paying for rent? Are they do they own certain computers and desks, and being able to have that, that separation, but within the same umbrella, Giving definition, I guess is, is the way to say it. But I

Angela Wilson 22:49
think document everything. And you know, most of the time you should have on tourism side. If you’ve purchased the desk computers, you know all that. So if you have it, but make sure it’s very clear who owns what in your office, because we had to spend many times of like, okay, this desk has been sitting upstairs. Who bought this? Or you just don’t know, sign on the side of the building, who owns that you don’t know. You know it’s one of those things. So definitely keep track of everything.

Brandon Burton 23:25
Yeah, I can see when you take on a contract, it can be exciting to say, look, we’re getting a new sign, new business cards, new website like all this to rebrand. And you know, this is a new, fun, exciting thing, and there should be an influx of of income coming with that to the chamber. But on the opposite end, when you’re separating, not only are you losing the contract, the administrative funds, but also the cost to go through and change all those things too. Yeah, may not be less exciting. It’s a different kind of excitement, I suppose, yeah.

Angela Wilson 23:56
And when you have to, you know, if you have delay people off, tourism employees, it’s going to affect your the Chamber’s unemployment rate for a couple of years that happened to us. So there’s just little things that trickle downhill. But at the end of the day, looking back, it was on my end. It was worth it, if I were to take on again, like we’ve said, another contract or something else, if it was be a main street or an economic development I know now to make sure that that contract is solid. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 24:30
absolutely. So. As you’ve seen this, the separation, the divorce, the uncoupling, the de burtoning, how have you been able to see the focus on the members. What’s the member response been like? Has you been able to focus on them and the value that they get as a chamber member? Now, sure,

Angela Wilson 24:50
one of our first things we did in the spring of 22 we did a membership Blitz, and we went and visited 100 members. I. Was our goal, and just sat down with them and just said, what’s going on? What can we help you with? We don’t want anything. We don’t want any money. What are you dealing with? What can we do better? And so a lot of them just appreciated that they hadn’t seen people from the chamber in a while. They hadn’t had a chamber voice in a while. And so we took some of that feedback and just built a better chamber for that. Or people, you know, hey, I would really like you to bring back this or this. And so we’ve tried to implement those things, and people have really appreciated it. And they’re like, you know, you guys are doing a great job, and I appreciate you. Guys have been more attentive to us, and so just those little things in, you know, making what we do more relevant. This is what the chamber is. This is what our mission is. This is what our program of work is, and that’s who we are. And what can we do for you is really what we spent that next year saying, what is our chamber want? What do you guys need? We’re here for you. We’re open. And we got so much positive feedback of that, of just those little conversations. And you know, I was driving yesterday home from a meeting, I’m thinking, I think I want to do another one of those membership blitzes again, just to go out and just visit people that we don’t normally get to visit with and see. But that was probably the most impactful thing that we did, was just visiting with people and asking what they want, not what we want, what they want. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 26:37
and another listening tour sounds like a great idea, and be able to being able to see now that about three years post separation, if I if I’m doing my math correct, yes, it’s not, it’s not hard math, but I want to make sure I got the dates right to be able to do another follow up listening tour like that. And I would be curious to see what’s the the image of the chamber. How has that changed over those three years? Sure people

Angela Wilson 27:03
take us more serious. Now we’re not just the party, fun, happy, go lucky. We’re here for our members. We’re intentional about what we do. We’ve made some other changes internally of our processes for new members. We just are really intentional about what our members want, and we’re more professional level of what we we want to do, what we need to do. We’re there. And, you know, people recognize that. They say, you know, the Chamber events are always the best events, and we always try to be, you know, creative when we do our events, of the best advice sometimes I ever heard was, if you don’t want to be there, probably they don’t want to be there as well. So I was take that into consideration when we’re planning events or planning programming. Good gosh, I want to be there, and if I don’t, probably nobody else really does and not being able to don’t be afraid to try new things. Try it if it fails. So what you tried it, and you can go on down the road if something’s not working. Don’t be afraid to get rid of it. That’s probably my biggest piece of advice of as a chamber of when I came on the first time I tried to get rid of a program, I was scared to death. I thought I was gonna lose my job. Thought people were gonna run me out of town. And people came back and said, Thank you for getting rid of that. I thought it was waste of time. I was like, Oh, thank you. So that would be my thing is, don’t be afraid to change just because I hate saying this, but you’ve always done it that way. Doesn’t mean you have to continue doing it that way. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 28:43
we’ve got a whole episode about burning sacred cows, so you can go back in the archives and listen to that and and learn how you can get rid of some of these programs that are not serving you or the chamber anymore. So if they’re not serving the chamber, they’re probably not serving anybody else, and people are doing it out of obligation or guilt, and you can level it up and do something much more effective and impactful. So yes, amen, good. Good comment. Well, Angela, as we start to wrap up, I always like asking for listeners who are wanting to take their chamber up to the next level, what kind of tip or action item might you have to share with them to try to accomplish that goal. You just mentioned one. But does anything else come to mind that you’d like to share? Probably,

Angela Wilson 29:26
again, I would just echo, don’t be afraid of Chinese things and look out for the best interest of the chamber. Be that arm, be that solid pillar in the community. Not everyone’s gonna like everything you do, but that’s okay, at least they’re noticing what you’re doing and do what’s best for you. At the end of the day, you need to have your back, your board needs to have your back and your chambers

Brandon Burton 29:54
absolutely and I’ve mentioned it several times in past episodes, but if you’re focused. On what’s good for the business community. In your community, it’s hard to go wrong, and it’s hard to have too many people upset with you if you’re at least the people you’re serving are not going to be upset with you if you’re focused on on how to best serve the business community. So

Angela Wilson 30:14
yeah, I always say too, you know, I don’t know everything. We don’t know everything, but we know people who do, yeah, and so. And you know, you do want to say no to people sometimes, but I think telling giving them the resources and helping them along, they appreciate that, and they recognize the chamber did help me. You just, you just picked up the phone and called it another person, maybe, but to them, that was a game changer in what they were trying to accomplish. And they really look back about, oh gosh, the Chamber really helped me out. And then they’re going to start showing up to stuff and being there for you and having your back. So it’s just little intentional things, I think, as well being very intentional on the little things, yeah,

Brandon Burton 30:55
absolutely, totally accurate. So I like asking, as we look to the future of chambers of commerce, how do you see the future of chambers and their purpose going forward?

Angela Wilson 31:07
I think chambers even looking back on, good God, I’d hate aging myself, because, you know, I look 20, but I’m getting in the 40s now. But you know, we have evolved over the time that I’ve been in the chamber world, and it’s exciting because it’s something new every day. And I think just being relevant and keeping up with those trends of what businesses need, what communities need, what you guys are, the chambers are the forefront. And so we need to be those leaders, and we need to have that creative mindset of what’s next. And so, I mean, chambers are still going to be around, but we’re different than we looked 10 years ago. We’re different than we look 20 years ago and even 50 years ago, when people just paid their dues because it was the right thing to do. But I think it’s just exciting, because you it’s up to you as a chamber you can do what you want to do, and what your Chamber members want. So it’s kind of exciting that you don’t always have to do the same thing every day or every year. So I think just making sure you’re on that cusp of what’s you know kind of what your members are wanting, and stay ahead of them one step so you can provide those services for them, but chambers are always going to be around. What they look like in 20 years might be completely different. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 32:27
I would argue, even from four years ago, from through COVID to today, chambers look different so well, Angela, this has been a good conversation. I think it’s provided a lot of value for listeners, and I appreciate you getting a little, you know, authentic and raw about an experience at your chamber that I’m sure was full of difficulties and challenges, but being able to rise above and come through on the other side with some lessons learned that are valuable for others that have been listening today. So thank you for sharing that with us.

Angela Wilson 32:58
Thank you for having me, and yeah, there was a lot of wine along the way going through that transition, wasn’t it always

Brandon Burton 33:05
rainbows and butterflies? Yeah, I wanted to give you a chance to share any contact information for listeners who may want to reach out and connect. And say, how’d you get the courage to move forward with this, or whatever it may be, what’s the best way for them to reach out and connect?

Angela Wilson 33:19
Absolutely, please contact me if you have it’s not a dumb question. No questions are dumb. We’re involved contacted peers. That’s what we rely on and how we survive sometimes. But you can visit our website, Muskogee chamber.org, or you can email me at angela@mugicha.org, or if you go onto our website, you’ll find our contact or phone number on there, and yeah, email me, call me, whichever. I’m always open, and that’s one of my favorite parts of my job is helping other chambers.

Brandon Burton 33:53
Yeah, it’s such a great profession for being able to do that. Yes, we’ll, we’ll get the website and email and our show notes for this episode to make it easy to find you. But again, Angela, this has been great, and thank you so much for joining us today and sharing your experiences and insight with with those that are listening.

Angela Wilson 34:10
I appreciate it. Thank you for having me.

Brandon Burton 34:14
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Your Chamber Does That with John Tayer

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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.

Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community.

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Our guest for this episode is John Tayer as President and CEO of the Boulder Chamber in Colorado, John is honored to lead the organization that serves as boulders unified voice for business interests advances the community’s economic vitality and provides valuable business support services. Prior to joining the boulder chamber in 2012 John was Public Affairs and Communications Director for the pharmaceutical manufacturing company Roche, Colorado Corporation, and policy development director at the Boulder City Manager’s office. John also spent six years as the boulder area’s elected representative to the Regional Transportation District. As a native of Brookline, Massachusetts. John earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan. Spent a couple of years working on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, and moved to Boulder 34 years ago to earn a law degree from the University of Colorado. He now resides in South Boulder with his wife Molly, and enjoys playing outdoors, accessing local cultural attractions, and generally loves his community. But John, I’m excited to have you with us today here on Chamber Chat Podcast. I’d love to give you an opportunity to say hello to all the Chamber Champions that are out there listening and share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little bit better,

John Tayer 2:27
Sure. Brandon, and thank you so much for reaching out and offering to include me in your podcast series. You know. I’ll just say this that you know i a Just so appreciate my chamber colleagues and I learned so much from conversations with them. One of my favorite things is getting together with them at professional conferences. And so this kind of a podcast is a great opportunity to for me to just share my thinking, but I look forward to just listening to others as well as I have previously. I will say that just if you think about me, just as a individual, quirky as I am, I’d say just I love the chamber universe and the work that we do. And I’m sure we’ll get into the details of that, but it is somewhat overwhelming. I mean, we are engaged in so many aspects of our communities, our schedules are, you know, seven or gosh, I get up so early, like four in the morning to get my emails done till late at night, and then just get up and do it again. So in order to balance that kind of a work lifestyle, I would say something different about me that might be relatable to other chamber directors, and that is, I have to be very compulsive about how I schedule in time to exercise and to engage in activities outside of my chamber experience. And what that looked like for quite some time was for three years, three months and three days. I ran five k5, kilometers or more every day, not skipping a day, and whether it was ice storms, the snow, rain, wind, crazy wind days. So you know, for me, that was a just a great way to a keep a consistent pattern of Exercise and Health, but just for also just finding a way to get space where I could just release my mind and think about some of the key issues that I was addressing at work or in life, just amazingly important. So I think maybe the compulsive nature, there’s other elements of that in my life, things I’ve done, but that might be something a little bit unusual to just to give you a sense of my character, yeah, that’s

Brandon Burton 4:56
a that is quite the feat. I. I’ll say, I I’m run. I’ve run as well. I Fitness is important to me. But most mornings, I’m getting my my oldest daughter up at 5am get her going and and I’ll take that time, I’ll get her up, and then I’ll put on the shoes and go out for a run. And in Texas, it’s either like, you gotta beat the sun up, or else, you know, it’ll beat you up, you know, on your run, yeah. So, so I do that, but this week I got her up, and we had a cold front come through, and it was, like, in the 30s, and it’s like, wow, I’m not up for yet. I’m gonna wait for the sun to come up today. Wow. So the fact we’re out nice and,

John Tayer 5:39
yeah, we haven’t had anything like that up here in Colorado. So interesting,

Brandon Burton 5:44
yeah, but I enjoy your your sentiment about, you know, going to chamber conferences and interacting with colleagues and learning from them, spending time with them, and I don’t think we have them enough. So that’s where this podcast kind of fills that void and gives us that, hit that we need in between. So love it, yeah. Well, tell us a little bit about the boulder chamber. Give us an idea of the size, number of staff, scope of work. You guys are involved with budget to kind of set the stage for our conversation today?

John Tayer 6:14
Sure. So the boulder chamber is about 1200 and mid 1200 membership, shooting for 1300 we are a we have about 21 staff members. And just to describe the character of it, we’re one of those chambers that has the opportunity to have economic vitality under our umbrella. So we serve as the economic development agency for Boulder and the broader region from a chamber perspective. And for me, I just we might get into this later, but I wouldn’t have it any other way, in terms of just that marriage of economic vitality underneath the typical chamber functions. So that’s, I think, key, about a $2.6 million budget and just a wide array of just activities that probably aren’t typical of a chamber. So we’ll get into some of that in our conversation. I’m

Brandon Burton 7:16
sure. Yes, absolutely, and and I agree. I think being able to have that marriage of chamber and economic development, makes a lot of sense. As far as that cohesiveness and really building community, you need to be able to be on the same page. So even if they’re separate organizations, being able to come together and be on the same page,

John Tayer 7:35
absolutely. I mean, I hate seeing when you have an Economic Development Authority, separate from the chamber, and they’re competing for funding events for, you know, the elbow throwing around what activities are within their purview. It’s, it’s, to me, that’s undermines Community and Economic Vitality.

Brandon Burton 7:56
Yes, I would agree with that. So we settled on a topic for our conversation today around your chamber does that and that can either that can be a statement or that can be a question. So we’ll get into that much deeper as soon as we get back from this quick break.

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All right, John, we’re back, and before the break I’d mentioned so your chamber. Does that can be a statement or a question, as as we approach the topic today, what, what direction do you want to go with it? First is a statement or a question?

John Tayer 10:09
You know, I’d say that it’s a it’s a statement and, and we do that, it’s, you know, got a period, but it might as well have an exclamation point at the at the back of the the end of it. And the point of that statement is, when you think about chamber organizations, many folks, they’ll say, Well, what does a chamber do? I mean, you’d like to think that the job that you’re doing daily and working your tail off, and folks would completely understand it and have awareness of what Chamber organizations do. But when you, when you talk to average business leaders, citizens on the street, many of them have no idea what a chamber is. And they, they’re, you know, once I tell them what I do, I’m the head of the boulder chamber, they they’ll next question is, and then what do you do for work? And I have to this is actually a full time, more than full time job, really. And so you know the chamber, your chamber does, that is a statement about you should know what your chamber does. And if you you know, if you’re have an issue as a business, if you’re thinking about a community issue that’s impacting the economy, you should talk to us. And so, you know, it’s an expression for us about the just wide range of activities and programs that our chamber is involved with. And you know, I’ll just touch on it. But I mentioned, I mean, we have the traditional three areas of chamber activity, member support and marketing, services and networking. We have our advocacy, which is the being the voice for business interests. And I would say that, you know, that was for us, a very important element of our own sustainability and our strength as it as an organization drawing in members. And then third is that economic vitality element. So we, we are the economic development group looking to retain and attract businesses, to carry the data resources for our community on the health and vitality of our economy and generally helping businesses build toward their future vision. But in addition to that, we’ve taken on significant other ancillary activities that are important to business success. So for example, when we think about one of the challenges for business activity in our region, it’s workforce retention and attraction. And so we’ve we’ve had to approach things like workforce development, helping to develop the talent that we have in our community, to serve the best, serve and align with the businesses needs for different expertise and skills. In addition, we become very active in housing policy, because it’s become very expensive to live in central boulder. So how do we help to develop a ray of housing, not just in Boulder, but around the region? And then third, just as another example, and there’s so many more, we are very active in transportation, where the transportation management organization for our community, and that is facilitating workforce mobility that is in around Boulder, but also, more importantly for workforce retention and attraction, it is what helps us facilitate longer regional commutes for Our workforce, making it really convenient for them to travel to Boulder for work and back maybe to housing outside of our community.

Brandon Burton 14:09
So that gives a great scope of some of those things that you guys are involved with. I love that even in your email signature, you say your chamber does that, you know, so you’re, resonating, that you’re putting that out there and that messaging to your community. So for those listening, yeah, I’m thinking of the chamber executive who’s already overwhelmed, who’s like, we can’t take on one more thing right now. And then somebody in the community will come to the chamber and say, Hey, I think you should do this. So talk to us about that. How do you approach when the new ideas, either if it self generated within the chamber, or ideas are presented to you from the outside, how do you figure out how that aligns with your mission, if it’s something that you’re going to take on and to really run with? Tagline of your chamber. Does that? How does that fit in with this? What

John Tayer 15:03
a brilliant question, a brilliant question. Because I will tell you that that was one of the conversation elements when we did our rebranding to think about, you know, the message that that sends is that, do we become the sponge for just about anything that a chamber can do, because that is one of the greatest challenges in this role, is figuring out what are the things we don’t do, what are the the the opportunities to have an impact on our community, on the economic vitality of our area and support our businesses. And you know, every day, somebody’s calling and saying, Hey, we’re having this parade, and we’d love the chamber to lead it, and you know all this. So how do we approach the decision making around what is appropriate for our organization? And I won’t claim to be expert on this. In fact, if you talk to our staff team, they say we need to do a better job at this. And I think we all with that. But it first starts with the strategic plan. We the way we plan strategically is every year we do, we update our strategic plan. So it’s not a three year plan or five year plan that we we we point toward we know that the conditions in our community and our economy are changing all the time. So every year, we do a soup to nuts review, and that’s everything from just making sure that our mission, our vision, are still in in alignment with what we want them to be, making sure our core values are are still what we feel are critical for our organization to represent. But then you start getting into the meat of the work, of the strategic plan, and we have key pillars they relate to the kinds of things I mentioned earlier, things like being the voice, being the the strong economic vitality pillar member support those kinds of things, a little bit broader scope to to them and nuance. And then, you know, those things don’t change that much. But then underneath are the activities that support success in those key pillar areas, and that is reviewed every year, and they change regularly. I mean, sometimes, you know, we’ll have programs that go on, and we know that they will for a number of years, but other times, we have a mission or goal project that we’re pursuing. We know it, and hope that it’ll be a one year, one and then we’ll be able to move on to something else. But under that umbrella, every year, we’re doing a check to make sure that we are keeping a focus on achieving our key pillar, pillar goals, strategic priorities and the programs, all our programs need to lead toward that we look to weed out things that maybe are no longer serving us in those areas, and then that sets the pace for the year, and we try to be strict about not deviating too far from What we set at the beginning of the year. But you know, opportunities come forward, and so when that happens, we do have a tool for analyzing. Are these things that you know are aligned with our mission? Are they going to serve our goals? Is it something that we have the capacity to take on, whether it’s financially or whether it’s with our staff team. And sometimes there are creative ways that we can either support others in achieving a goal and still be tied in a way that is comfortable and strategic for us. And then at other times, we just have to say sorry. We just can’t be involved with that at this time and and try to offer support and guidance, but you have to make that difficult decision, and you know that at times can be disappointing for folks, but I think the greater clarity you can provide to them up front without hemming and hawing, is serves, serves you long term. And last thing I’ll say about that is we just actually made a decision to take on, for example, the film commission under our umbrella, and something that I really excited about, wanted to pursue, and had to listen to our, my staff team, when they said, you know, no, not now. And this was, this was quite over a couple of years, really. And there, then came a point where we said, Okay, now we see that this fits with us. We see how we can adopt it. And. A way that doesn’t over Burton, our staff, team and resources. So it’s not always a permanent, no, it can be a hey, not now, but maybe in the future.

Brandon Burton 20:12
Yeah, I like how you say you have a tool for analyzing, you know, whether or not something is a fit or something you can take on, is there like a canned response when you get a phone call or an email to one of your 2021, staff members? How does that filter in from the the original source to that feedback of, yes, let’s explore this. Or, you know, how can we support you in another way with your parade or whatever it is, how is the staff trained to handle you know, as more things come your way, you

John Tayer 20:53
know, I think each of them have a different approach. I’ll say just my style. I mean, I just tend to be an exuberant person in general. So my initial response is, wow, that is an exciting idea, if I think it’s a great idea. And boy, I’d love to think about how we could be engaged with that. And then I will absorb as much information as I can. Usually entail some sort of a meeting and discussion. I’ll bring in the appropriate staff folks to have that conversation, and then the statement is, hey, I need to bring it back to the team. It’s kind of and I think folks respect that’s fair when I, when I, when I offer that. I’m really excited about it, but I need to take it back to the team. You know, it’s, it’s an honest statement. I mean, if I don’t think that this is a fit, then I’ll usually let them know. But I really do rely on the team. We have so such great, great staff team members and partners that I want to make sure that they buy in our I meet with our leadership team every week, we walk through just the list of issues that are coming to us, whether they’re existing projects or new ideas. And I’m always testing with them, and there’s some very hard conversations that they have, and you know, listen to periodically, I’ll get reprimanded because I got somebody a little bit too excited about the potential of working with us, and they’re like, wait a minute, you know? And I, you know, they’re they’re right to do that. And so I respect them and look for them to give me honest push back when it’s taking on something that is just not within our capacity, or maybe even not a good fit for us? Yeah.

Brandon Burton 22:40
So I like that approach. I think it’s good to show if there’s some genuine interest to express that, but take it back to the team, and it all has to go through that filter. I think that makes a lot of sense. So I had mentioned before you’ve got the tagline in your your email signature of your chamber. Does that? How do you guys go about telling the story? I mean, you guys are involved in so many things. How do you let your community know exactly what it is you’re involved with? I mean, it’s, it’s in your email signature. You’re on the podcast today talking about it. What are, what are other ways that you’re getting the messaging out there? This is what the Chamber’s doing to advance our community.

John Tayer 23:20
Yeah. So listen, I will defer to our expertise in the marketing era staff team. But you know what we will often do is tell the story through our programs and activities and so we, we, we are very aggressive in our media outreach, our editorial commentary, in our video content, all sorts of ways of communicating that we have this broad scope. And you know for me, some of the most effective tools are the opinion pieces that we write, which allow us to speak up on issues that are important to our businesses, important to our community, and indicate that our organization is at the table, playing a critical role, Speaking on behalf of business interests. I say, always say business interests in harmony with the values of our community, which we shared, environmental sustainability, social equity, but at the same time making it clear, hey, this is the impact this issue will have, or the position. This is why we’re taking this position on a particular issue area. And so to me, these kinds of proactive free media opportunities are really important, having a relationship with our local newspaper reporters so that they know and think to call us on the kinds of activities that we’re working on. And so we. Balanced that kind of approach with just our own marketing messaging, which covers an array of topic areas. We have newsletters in the economic vitality area, in our public policy programs area and in general membership, and try to meet them out in a way that doesn’t overwhelm our membership and our business community, but is demonstrating that we’re active in all of these different areas. I

Brandon Burton 25:31
like that, especially those opinion pieces and your idea of, you know, showing the business interests in conjunction with the community interests. I think it’s so important to show that that alignment there. When you take take something to the team to evaluate whether or not we’re going to take this on as something new that the Chamber does talk to us a little bit about what you look at, as far as the financial aspect, because all of it’s going to take some kind of staff time. I would assume most of these things are going to take staff time. There’s a cost to that. Are these programs? Are they going to be revenue generators? Are you going to have to go after grants? Are you going to so talk to us about the financial aspect as you, as you bring on new programs or new initiatives? Yeah.

John Tayer 26:16
So for me, that it starts with the foundation of the the characterization I have for our organization and any 501 c6 or 501 c3 and that is we are a non profit business, and that means that we have a mission and purpose to our work. We there are specific goals that we have for the work that we do, and we want to be incredibly impactful in those areas, but we know that we cannot achieve those goals or have as much of an impact if we don’t operate as a normal business that has a mindset of bringing in revenue that helps us to employ the staff, team members, pay them in a way that is appropriate for their expertise and skill levels, and also invest in the tools and and and support services that allow us to drive toward those, those those goals. So for everything that we do, we’re always assessing, how can we pay for that? What are the the sponsors? What are the the grant programs? And also thinking about some of the programs that maybe not drawing in direct revenue, but are a driver for membership at standard or even higher levels, because we’re doing that work. So there is that revenue assessment for just about everything we do. You know, there are some things that you would, you would say, Okay, we are doing this because that is a chamber activity. Were so many fewer of those than when I first came on board. I mean, there was just, I’d say, just an array of activities that we said, Well, we do that because it’s, you know what a chamber does? Well, let’s find out how we can turn that into a revenue, revenue generating mechanism for organization that allows us to do that and also supports our other operations and activities. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 28:35
I appreciate that perspective. I think hopefully that’ll help others that are, you know, facing those challenges to bring this on. How do we do this? Figuring out a way to pay for it, to make it all work, is super important. It’s, I

John Tayer 28:48
will say, Brandon. It’s a philosophy that just it. You know, even myself, you know, when I came in, you know, I will tell you that I wasn’t somebody who understood. I wasn’t, didn’t come up through the chamber ranks. I came into the organization and wasn’t clear on all the, you know, the Chamber financing tools and but was focused and compelled by the mission. And I think that’s probably most of the staff team members that that join. They want to serve and support our businesses. They want to achieve things that are important for our community and our economy. That said making sure that everybody has a mindset of generating revenue to then support and keeping some expenses at the lowest possible rate that allows us to perform our mission to do the programs and initiatives that we find so compelling and that lead us toward achieving our mission.

Brandon Burton 29:48
Yeah, that’s perfect. Well, as we shift gears here a little bit, I wanted to to ask for the chamber listening, who’s interested in taking their organization up to the. Next Level. What kind of tip or action item might you share with them? And as they try to accomplish this goal,

John Tayer 30:07
you know, I I listen. I first of all just, I say this with all humility, because there’s so many chamber leaders out there that I follow, and think I need to take that on so but what has been successful for I think our organization are a couple of really key elements. So one is that I do believe that there is a very critical need to represent business interests and represent them in a way that is constructive, that drives goal toward goal policy, goals that support our businesses, and I think, to the extent that that becomes a significant area of investment for chambers, to me, I’ve seen that propel colleagues around our region to much greater success and impact in their communities, and also a greater financial base. It’s it’s the larger businesses, the ones that have the capacity to invest in your work. They want to see you speak up on their behalf to help make sure that their businesses can operate most efficiently and effectively in their community, and at the same time they they want to be represented responsibly in a way that isn’t, you know, you know, hell with business interests. I mean, we have, I always joke that we have these beautiful flat irons that are the back backdrop to our community and really the the symbol of our our communities, just beauty. And, you know, I joke that, you know, we’re never going to be the chamber that says, let’s, let’s tear down the the flat irons and sell off that sandstone, because it’s really good for business. No, we are about long term business vitality and economic strength and the vitality of our community for the long term. So for me, that’s the character of advocacy that I think is so important for our business. In addition, I then move toward the economic vitality side of the equation. And to me, it’s not just the classic business retention and attraction and for us strong strengths and data collection and understanding the vitality of our community, but it’s the programs that have a broader, long term impact on our community, things that aren’t going to be addressed in you know, either a single, you know, you know, one month action or activity, but also aren’t things that are just part of your daily work. So for example, we have homelessness has become an issue in our community, housing costs are significant challenge for for our workforce. So we took on what we call the greatest challenges to our economy and to our community under the umbrella of what’s called the boulder Together program, and that initiative is allowing us to describe and define those issues that are of most concern to our businesses, and then attract resources that help us to tackle them for specific goals, to to for for Our community and for our economy. And so we’ve, you know, now in our seventh year, I think seventh year, yes, seventh year of Boulder together, and we’ve been able to see really important progress in transportation programs, in housing generation and in we developed an entirely new workforce development program through the boulder together umbrella, and I’d say that’s the message to our to fellow colleagues, and I know a number of them are doing this, but it’s instrumental to our success, and that is identifying the greatest challenges that our businesses have for their success and their their vision for the future, and then outreaching to them for support to tackle those issues with specific programs and initiatives that, to me, has helped to define Our organization as a leader in much broader scope of activities that I don’t think are typical for a chamber organization. I

Brandon Burton 34:49
love that answer that identifying those biggest challenges and go attack it. Yeah, go, go after it. Go get it. And I, I wrote down the the comment you made about the. Character of advocacy. I love the way you said that, and I think that resonates very well, John, as we look to the future of chambers of commerce, how do you see the future of chambers and their purpose going forward?

John Tayer 35:13
Yeah, well, you know, listen, I’m a chamber believer. And you know, when I think about the state of our society, and that the challenge we have in communities, but nationally, internationally, just communicating and and getting folks together to address these very difficult issues. I see Chambers as becoming the place where we come together diverse perspectives, but with understanding that we have common goals. We want our businesses to be successful, we want our economy to thrive, and we want our communities to be wholly sustainable. And so a chamber organization has become that unusual place in society now where you can bring folks together in a in a in a in a in a problem solving nature brass tacks not not no fluff, but really pointing toward solutions that are actionable and drive toward positive results together. And I find that that’s just the the opportunity for chambers, especially in this day and age, it’s, it’s, it’s a community center, and it’s a place for achieving results that in many ways are are even our government entities are not capable of given the the consternation at the political sphere. So I see chambers evolving and developing to become bigger players in a whole array of community issues that impact our economy and business success. So I’m bullish on where we position ourselves for the future, and I’m just excited about just, of course, our own chamber. But just chambers writ large,

Brandon Burton 37:14
it’s a great vision. I love it. John, I wanted to give you a chance to share any contact information for listeners who may want to reach out and learn more about how you guys are approaching things there in Boulder. What would be the best way for someone to reach out and connect with you?

John Tayer 37:29
Well, I’m glad to reach or be connected with on LinkedIn. You can find me John, John Taylor, T, A, y, E, R, you can also email me directly at john.tayer@boulderchamber.com, and if you feel compelled, give me a call. 303-442-1058, and you know, I’ll just say this that I’m glad to respond to any questions. Just share what we know I was just emailing just yesterday, somebody on our team, and I said, Let’s do it. Let’s do that. R and D rip off and duplicate the work of other chambers. It’s just, you know, this is not a competitive business. This is a business of collaboration toward a broader vision of healthy economies, strong businesses and strong communities, and so anything that we can learn from each other and successes that we can share a newer to our common collective benefit. So I’m looking forward to getting any calls or questions folks have about the work we do, and I’m sure I’ll be reaching out to them after they call me and say, Well, how did you approach it? Right, right? Thank you for that opportunity. Brandon,

Brandon Burton 38:47
yeah, it definitely is a collaborative effort. So we’ll, we’ll make sure to get your contact information in our show notes for this episode make it easy for listeners to find you. But John, I wanted to thank you for spending time with us today and just, you know, shedding a little bit of light about how you guys are approaching things at the Boulder Chamber, the impact you’re making and those things that you guys do in Boulder so thank you for being with us today.

John Tayer 39:12
Your chamber does that. Just, you know that I’m sure your chamber, whoever’s chamber, does that too. Great.

Brandon Burton 39:20
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First Reaction of the Chamber Industry with Dale Kooyenga

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Below is an auto-generated transcription. Because this is auto-generated there are likely some grammatical errors but it is still a useful tool to search text within this podcast episode.

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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.

Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community.

Our title sponsor for this episode is Bringing Local Back. Remember when your community could turn to a local TV station or newspaper for the latest updates and affordable ads? Those days may be fading, but the need for local connection remains. That’s why we created Bringing Local Back, a game changing platform that restores the local visibility and advertising power to your community. It’s more than just tech. It’s about driving engagement and creating new revenue for your chamber. Ready to see the future visit bringinglocalback.com to schedule your demo today. This is the future of local commerce.

Our guest for this episode is Dale Kooyenga. Dale grew up in as the oldest of four children in a blue collar family. He played college basketball at Moraine Valley Community College, followed by Lakeland University. Following graduation from Lakeland University, Dale moved to Milwaukee and immediately fell in love with the Milwaukee community, inspired by the events of September 11, Dale joined the US Army alongside two of his brothers. He attended a fit Officer Candidate School, followed by the Army’s military intelligence officer training program, Dale was assigned to the United States Army, civil affairs, psychology, Operations Command in 2008 he was deployed to Iraq with the 400 and 32nd civil affairs battalion as part of the surge strategy led by General David Petraeus. Dale was awarded the Bronze Star for service in Iraq. In addition to his service in Iraq, Dale has served in military intelligence units attached to the Defense Intelligence Agency, two company commands, including command of Wisconsin’s First Army Reserve Counter Intelligence Unit, and overseas assignments with NATO allies in Europe and in South Korea. Dale currently holds the rank of lieutenant colonel and as the battalion commander for the 407th Army Reserve civil affairs battalion. In his civilian career, Dale is the President at the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce. The MMCA represents over 2000 businesses serving as the region’s boardroom in pursuit of a globally competitive economy that fosters high value jobs, sustains a vibrant quality of life for all, Dale is a certified public public accountant, and obtained his MBA from Marquette University prior to joining MMAC, Dale served eight years as Wisconsin state representative and then four years in the Wisconsin State Senate, where he developed a reputation as a hard working, pragmatic Problem Solver who worked across party lines. Dale and his wife Jennifer have four children, their son grant and three daughters, Taylor, Quinn and Ada. Dale, I’m excited to have you with us today here on Chamber Chat Podcast. First of all, thank you for your your dedicated service, but welcome to the show. Give you a chance to say hello to all the Chamber Champions who are out there listening, and I’d love to give you a chance to share something interesting about yourself, maybe that we didn’t cover, so we can all get to know you a little bit better.

Dale Kooyenga 3:37
Yeah. Well, thanks for having me on the show, and hello to my fellow colleagues in the chamber world. This is a whole world I’d never thought of three four years ago. I do a lot of speaking with high schoolers, and we do a lot of programming as far as you can’t be what you can’t see. And I you know new associations existed, knew they had presidents and CEOs and all that stuff, but never thought of myself in that role up until about two and a half years ago in the interview process. So great. I love it. It’s It’s amazing where life brings you love, where I’m at in regards to interesting things that people don’t know about me, that’s only to be revealed on your podcast no one else knows, besides the koinga kids and some of their select friends, is I do a very mean, authentic Donald Duck impersonation.

Brandon Burton 4:28
All right,

Dale Kooyenga 4:32
there’s some interesting those

Brandon Burton 4:34
are one of those things that between father and the children, like grandchildren, something like, that’s that’s something, a special bond that you’ll have. I can’t. It’s a weird thing. I

Dale Kooyenga 4:45
can never be able to snap. I try to try to be like, Oh, it’s so easy. Why didn’t they try to teach you I cannot snap. But somehow, God gave me this ability to make Donald Duck noises.

Brandon Burton 4:53
There you go. Hey, that’s got to be worth something. It’ll never be on the resume, but there it is. That’s right, you. Well, give us some background about your chamber. Give us an idea of size, staff, scope of work, budget, just all of that to kind of set the stage for the perspective that you’re coming from as we enter into our discussion today.

Dale Kooyenga 5:12
Well, I appreciate that, because as we talk about how healthy and impactful the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce is, I have to acknowledge, is that I’m fully aware that I’m on third base. I did not get a triple. It was primarily my predecessor before me, Tim Sheehy, who has been the president for 30 years, 31 years, and there for 40 years at the MMAC. So very, very appreciative for his leadership. The impacts he’s had, really has led a great chamber, and also the community in general. So we’ve been around since 1861 so we have, you know, just like a lot of associations, there’s a bunch of at the time, gentlemen who were upset with things going on in the community or just thought that there needed to be a change in some institutional guidance, in addition to a government and formed our association in downtown Milwaukee. We’re now, you know, we’re metro Milwaukee, but really more of a Regional Chamber in Southeast Wisconsin, and we do have aspects of our business, including health insurance program and a food and beverage group, among other initiatives that are statewide in Wisconsin. So it’s a very robust chamber. We do a lot of lobbying, primarily at the state level, to a lesser extent, at the federal and local level. We, like any association, do events. We have a health insurance plan. We actually have a sub Sarah doing Milwaukee development, corporate sales, real estate, and that’s just a scratch of service. So we’re in a lot of different things and really making a big impact here in Milwaukee.

Brandon Burton 6:45
Yeah, that’s fantastic. I’m excited about our topic for discussion today, especially after going through your bio, the background that you have, the military service, estate service, you know, civil service, to be able to get your perspective as you entered the chamber world, and what some of those first impressions were, how you adapted, and just the story around that. And we’ll dive into that much deeper as soon as we get back from this quick break.

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All right, Dale, we’re back. As I mentioned before the break today, we’re going to be focusing our discussion primarily on what some of your first impressions were as you entered into the chamber world. Like you mentioned, you didn’t even know this world existed to the level it does until you’re in it. But just tell us from from your background and the the introductions you had in the chamber world. What were some of those first impressions and reactions that kind of introduced you into this space? Well, my

Dale Kooyenga 9:28
first interactions with the association was when I was in political office, and they would come and lobby me. So it’s funny, when I was looking for jobs, I was interviewing, I actually had a couple positions already in mind where I knew the direction I wanted to go, and it was not a political direction. I didn’t want to go. Politics was always something I did. It was never something I was and so I didn’t want to do something where I was in the political realm. So I remember our current chair, Austin Ramirez, was CEO. Of a husco, which is a manufacturing company in the automotive space in here in Milwaukee area. He called me up and said, Hey, you Tim, she’s not going to be around forever. We’re looking for someone to be positioned at MMAC and then transition into possibly his role someday. Would you be interested? My reaction, immediately, without even thinking about was, No, I’m not, and the reason was because I thought of NBC as a lobbying organization, and I didn’t want to be a lobbyist. I didn’t want to have that be part of my post political life. And I remember I hung up the phone that night. I’m a solid sleeper, but I woke with the middle of night, and just thought about that very brief conversation, and I looked at MHC on the internet, and it just struck me, man, there’s a lot more to this organization than what I saw on the receiving end of the lobbying, economic development, the events, the the business line activities that we provide to our members. And it really struck me as like, this is actually a perfect fit for my background. Was a business background and a political background and the military leadership I learned. And so I remember thinking, Is there a time too early to call a CEO a multi million dollar company and say, Hey, can I get a take back? And I did just that. I called him at 7am and said, Austin, can I get take back? I actually am interested. That’s that’s perceived with what this process looks like. And so proceed with that process. There’s a national search and an interview process, and it obviously went well. Here I am. So that was my initial thought. And I just, you know, really, actually enjoy the public policy work we do. I would say it’s about 30% of my job, if I had to quantify it, but it’s been really impactful. And I just have a really deep respect for associations, because I really deep respect for America, and I mean some cheesy about that, but if you look at TED Talk, Phil as far as what makes America America, he talks about those institutions and the institutions that are outside of government to help shape the Democratic Republic governance process and how impactful that is. You know, just one more thought on that. I apologize be long winded. You know, just last week, there was a Nobel Prize, a peace prize, awarded to two authors of a book called Why nations fail and the book goes around the world and talks about places where there’s the same people, it’s genetic makeup, the same climate, but somehow radically different economic results, or community health. And you look at East Berlin, West Berlin, Nogales, US side Nogales, Mexico, side North Korea, South Korea. And there’s a couple key takeaways in the book about what works and what doesn’t work. But one of the things is that institutional strength leads to a healthier community and economy, and the Chamber world is part of that institutional strength, clearly. And so I’m a romantic. I believe in our country. I believe in meaningful work, meaningful relationships. And so when I find myself in this job, I mean, this is the perfect job for what I believe and live and what I want to do, and looking at what I think makes an impact to community. I think associations really do matter, and I think I’m at an association that has is and will matter in the future.

Brandon Burton 13:29
Well, I’m glad that Austin reached out to you. I’m glad that he took your your immediate call back the next morning, because we need people like you in the chamber world and having the unique background you do. I was going to ask about the percentage of lobbying time that you give in your current position, and I think you covered that with about a third of the time is kind of focused in that, that direction and the advocacy part. But I guess my question is, how? How can the chamber community in general, how can we do a better job of relaying what it is that the chambers do for communities, to strengthen and build communities. So when you know the next Dale coin goes out there trying to be recruited for the next chamber executive seat doesn’t shoot it down because, you know, the it the work is being seen. It’s being recognized. And it’s not just that surface layer initial reaction, I guess, do you have any thoughts of what, what the chamber community at large could do better to to attract people with with great backgrounds to the industry,

Dale Kooyenga 14:43
I think primarily telling the story I just told, as far as the importance of institutions. I mean another great book by Robert Putnam that I think is now, gosh, 20 years old, but it’s still very relevant, maybe older than that is bullying alone and the propensity of individuals. Go alone and be alone, as opposed to plugging into associations and institutions and groups like the rotaries and the legions and things like that. So I think it’s that person that wants to press and push for a community. I also think it needs to be a doer. I see a lot of associations and chambers that tell people what they do. I don’t think they are as effective as showing people what they do. And what I mean by that is you can’t have your meetings. You can’t have your board members being given a show and talking about a topic. They want action. They want to see things shaped. They want to see state statutes eliminated, modified or created. They want to see buildings going up. They want to see crime going down. They want to see relationships form that create tangible, substantive fruits for the community. So I see a lot of event, heavy conversation, heavy associations and chambers, and my recommendation would be, that’s good, that’s deliberative, that’s healthy, but you gotta translate that into effective action that actually changed the landscape. Otherwise, you’re just a bunch of talking heads about radio show.

Brandon Burton 16:25
Yeah, I think that’s a key point to be be a doer show that action, and I’d say, from your perspective, before you came into the chamber world, your your point of view of the doer, the action that the chamber is doing was as a lobbyist. So it makes sense, that’s what you would see, right? Yeah, it

Dale Kooyenga 16:45
was in my office. So that was the engagement. I was my value to the association, was my ability to write and vote on laws. And so that was the face I saw. I was in the business community, but at my level of CFO in midser companies, I was not engaged. Maybe I should have been, but I was not engaged from a business level with the Association, like, like I should have been. So that was my perch. That’s what I saw. And you see what you see from your perch. And so it’s really good to see now all the different other aspects to what we do and why we do it.

Brandon Burton 17:19
Yeah, absolutely. I think it’s just a it’s a fascinating idea, just to think about the perspectives that one comes into the chamber world. I love getting people’s stories of how they found the chamber industry, how they were invited in. Some people, you know, it’s out of high school, some it’s after a very productive career. Some it’s just by total accident, right? But being able to see how people are introduced, how they can take their skill set and be able to apply it to make a an organization of action, to be able to really drive things forward within their community, is what I think. That’s what makes the chamber work so special. That’s what makes it the industry, such a special thing. I’d like to always ask for chambers that are out there looking to take their chamber next to the next to the next level. You’ve given some great, you know, action points already, but what kind of tip or action item might you share with listeners who are interested in taking their organization to the next level? Um,

Dale Kooyenga 18:23
I mean, have an engaged board that you could actually call upon to help with things. I mean, they’re there for a reason. And so, you know, don’t be afraid to engage your board and have them be what we call the military force multipliers. So, so that’d be the big thing I would. I mean you gotta serve your members and what the members want. I think in this space, there’s probably few memberships that are politically uniform in one direction, and so therefore, I would encourage a chamber of association to be mindful that if you look like you are a part of a political party, or just relationship wise, on one side of the political party, you’re probably going to minimize your ability to get things done. And now I say that because the nation’s different, and I can’t pretend or dive down into what’s your politics look like, where your chamber association is. I can tell you from Milwaukee, we are a purple state in Wisconsin. Milwaukee is blue, like most large metros, our outer part of our region is more red, and so therefore we have and we will and to be most effective, we have very healthy relationships with both sides of the aisle. And I would say that our membership, especially our board, is bipartisan and probably increasingly no partisan that claim no party. And so we need to be in the relationship business. We can’t be in the political ideology business, and we. Need to know what’s right for our community, and sometimes that falls in different parts of political spectrum. But I mean, I’ll just give an example, like last year, we had a really, really big win. The city and the county of Milwaukee were in a very tough financial position for reasons that was no fault of anybody that was in office or in power. These were decisions made decades ago related to pension issues, and the big compromise we need with both parties was Republicans wanted more police on the street. Wanted more public safety. Democrats wanted additional revenue in the form of a sales tax and sure and more shared revenue from state. Both parties wanted more fiscal solvency, which meant freezing some pensions. It meant so that goes to the whole deal, but there was a compromise made on both sides that we put together, and now this fiscal State of the County the city are much, much better. They’re not closing libraries. They are adding police to the street. They no longer have this infant, these infamous pension plans. So that’s what I’m talking about. I mean, for us, I think you really don’t be a be politically astute and make sure you’re in the relationship business, not the political ideology business.

Brandon Burton 21:18
I think that’s great advice. And your comments, you know, resonate with being the same center, you know, when it comes to political issues. But I, I’ve heard it said that if, if you can resonate with what makes for a good, you know, pro business environment. If that’s your members, that’s what’s, you know, supporting organizations and business members when it comes to politics, if you’re doing things that are that support business, that grow business, you have that to stand on, and it’s not doesn’t have to be a political party at all. And oftentimes you’ll find things on both sides of the aisle that support business. And if that’s your mission, to drive business, drive your local economy, you can’t go wrong if that’s your focus, but builds relationships along the way. So that’s absolutely key.

Dale Kooyenga 22:09
See, like, for example, is, you know, I can really be angry right now with you and like, be hostile because you’re clearly a 49 ish fan.

Unknown Speaker 22:17
Yeah,

Dale Kooyenga 22:18
I’m a Packers fan, but I’m still going to be pleasant and polite and find common ground here. So yeah, and I’ll forgive you a perfect example.

Brandon Burton 22:29
That’s right, and you’ve got the American flag behind us. That makes it all better. So we’re there you go. We’re on the same team. Yeah, that’s good. Well, as we look to the future of chambers of commerce. How do you see the future of chambers and their purpose going forward?

Dale Kooyenga 22:45
Well, you need to fight for it. I don’t think you can assume that there’s some sort of inertia with membership, either growing your membership or retaining your membership, if you’re just going to keep the same model that you had yesterday. I there has to be value propositions within your I mean, I know they say it’s not transactional, and you know, you should do this for the good of community. I think there’ll be a good percentage of companies that believe that, but it’s going to erode when a recession happens. I think you gotta find your value proposition, whether directly or indirectly. And you know, you gotta have your why, like, why do I need you part of the you know why. And for us, it’s Milwaukee without the Metropolitan walk. Association of Commerce is in Milwaukee without the Milwaukee Brewers. It’s in Milwaukee without the Milwaukee Bucks. It’s a Milwaukee without a river that’s being cleaned up, that’s going to return native species of fish and cleaning up chemicals from 100 years ago that are at the bottom of the river. It’s a Milwaukee that has huge financial issues, as opposed to solvency day. So we, we, our value proposition is, imagine a Milwaukee without a Mac and you think, oh gosh, and walk without, without. That is not a city I want to live in. It’s not a city I can recruit talent to. So you got to get there. And I think non dues revenue is has to be part of your plan. For us, our non dues revenue continues to grow and grow and grow, and we are hungry after growing that our health insurance plan and combination United Healthcare has been very, very good for us, and that continues to grow. And not only is it good for our revenue, but it’s clearly a solution to our members, and we actually offer it to non members as well, which is why they’re purchasing it. I mean, they wouldn’t purchase it, but wasn’t a value for them. So they’re they’re saving money. We’re making money. It looks like we’re going to go to market with some other innovative things revolving around maybe 401, Ks to help reduce costs and give access to some of the HR tools that larger companies would have. So it’s a twofer, but I think you really need to focus on you. A stream for that non dues revenue to diversify your revenue streams, because I’m just leery that the philanthropy and the community involvement will be as strong as it has been in years past in America.

Brandon Burton 25:18
Well, I think in that explanation you just gave the what the new tagline, or slogan for the Milwaukee, you know, MMAC should be, you know, think of Milwaukee without the bucks, without the brewers. Yeah, that’s what we do, right?

Dale Kooyenga 25:32
Yeah. And this is very specific to Milwaukee, and I know, and I’ll just give it put me it means a lot to us, a whole lot to us. But the biggest one is, imagine a Milwaukee without, and I can name it doesn’t mean, I think to you, but without a st Marcus, without a Milwaukee Academy of Sciences, without an odd prep. And what those schools represent, I just said, is, they represent very high performing schools that are in parts of Milwaukee with high poverty. And one of the things I think my predecessor, if he had, if I had to choose one accomplishment to put on his on his marker someday, say, This is what Tim Sheehy accomplished. Is Tim Sheehy alongside a former superintendent of walk public schools here in 1991 so this is not working when you try something radically different. And that’s where the concept of school choice came from, and now you see the concept of school of choice growing nationally. And they came out of Milwaukee. It came out of MMAC, and our relationship with a gentleman named Howard Fuller, and now that has grown not only in Wisconsin, but it’s grown to a national concept that parents should be able to decide where to send their kids based on your academic standards and based on your principles, whether that be rooted in religion or ethics, whatever that is. And so that’s, that’s the big, bold change. And I think, you know, chambers and associations do need to take some risk. I mean, you can’t just always put your weight on a topic that you have 100% agreement on because if you have 100% agreement on it, you’re probably not getting after a social injustice. You’re probably not getting after an issue in your community, because there are people and sometimes institutions that are rooted in social injustices, and you need to get out to that. So I would also argue, as I talk about, you know, being smart and being pragmatic, that doesn’t mean that you’re always safe. And in the long run, I think you’ll be rewarded for taking some risk and taking some big issues head on.

Brandon Burton 27:36
I agree. I think that’s that was very well said. Well, Dale, as we wrap things up, I wanted to give you a chance to share any contact information for listeners who may want to reach out and connect with you and learn more about how you guys are doing things and taking care of business there in Milwaukee. What would be the best way for someone to reach out and connect LinkedIn?

Dale Kooyenga 27:56
Send me a LinkedIn message, D, A, L, E, and his last name’s K, o, o, y, E, N, G, A, and I am the only Dale coin go in the world. So you will not be confused with a another deal coin go.

Brandon Burton 28:08
That’s good. Well, we’ll get a link to your LinkedIn account in our show notes for this episode too, to make it nice and easy and they don’t need to worry about spelling if they’re in the car driving or wherever they’re doing. Sounds good. Dale, it’s been great having you on the show. I appreciate you taking some time to be with us and share some of the impact and and your perspective as you entered the chamber world and and how chambers can make a bigger impact in their communities. I really appreciate you sharing your insights with us today.

Dale Kooyenga 28:37
Thanks, Brandon, thanks for having me. If

Brandon Burton 28:39
If you are a chamber professional, please subscribe to Chamber Chat Podcast in Apple podcast, Google podcasts or Spotify. When you subscribe to Chamber Chat Podcast new episodes will show up in your podcast app each week as they are released. If you’re finding value in this podcast, please leave us a rating and a review in iTunes. But most importantly, please share Chamber Chat Podcast with your colleagues that are in the industry.

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Creating a Chamber of Impact with Matt Lofy

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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.

Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community.

Our title sponsor for this episode is Bringing Local Back. Remember when your community could turn to a local TV station or newspaper for the latest updates and affordable ads? Those days may be fading, but the need for local connection remains. That’s why we created Bringing Local Back, a game changing platform that restores the local visibility and advertising power to your community. It’s more than just tech. It’s about driving engagement and creating new revenue for your chamber. Ready to see the future visit bringinglocalback.com to schedule your demo today. This is the future of local commerce.

Our guest for this episode is Matt low fee. Matt is the President, CEO of the Worthington area Chamber. And since joining the Worthington area Chamber in August 2021 he’s been driven by his vision, which is he wants their chamber to serve as a igniter of positive change, rather than merely serving as a resource to cope with change. Matt’s strategic focus on business advocacy, bridge building with key stakeholders and relentless pursuit of relevance has significantly strengthened the Chamber’s influence and engagement with local businesses, amplifying the voice of business, his initiatives led to a 20% increase in local business engagement within the his first year. This impact resulted in him being named as one of the chamber industry’s top emerging leaders, as a 40 under 40 honor honoree by ACCE and a 2023 chamber professional of the Year by the Chamber of Commerce executives of Ohio. Prior to this position at the Chamber, Matt served in numerous roles within the Westerville area Chamber, including executive director of leadership at Westerville he also taught morning spin classes for over a decade, and is a veteran of the United States Coast Guard. In addition to his professional success, Matt finds joy in his roles as a husband and father to his beautiful wife, Heather and their two young children, Tuckerman and Caroline. He’s also the founder and co host of the award winning Dadass Podcast, Matt, I’m excited to have you with us today here on Chamber Chat Podcast, I’d love to give you a moment to say hello to all the Chamber Champions and share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little better.

Matt Lofy 2:51
Absolutely. Thank you so much Brandon for this opportunity, and thank you to all the chamber champions who are listening. You know a fun fact I like to share you had mentioned about my my podcast and from one podcast post to another, one of my fun facts is we actually used our podcast platform, not so much to grow beyond just a local podcast, but to actually advocate. So we’ve worked with our Columbus City Council the last two years to advocate to get we’ve now had over 300 changing tables put into men’s and gender neutral restrooms throughout businesses and nonprofits in the city of Columbus, and so as a way to marry my passion project And my chamber career, to really bridge build with a public private partnership. So we’ve been able to do that and advocate for easier access to changing tables. That’s

Brandon Burton 3:48
awesome. I’m convinced that chamber work is like a drug. You just get addicted to it, and then whatever you do in life, it’s going to tie back to the chamber somehow. So that’s proof and point right there.

Matt Lofy 3:58
So absolutely can’t get away from it. I drank the Kool Aid. That’s right,

Brandon Burton 4:02
that’s right. I need to find out where to go to get awards for podcast. I’ve yet to win an award. So congratulations to dadas podcast. That’s pretty cool.

Matt Lofy 4:11
There was a local one here. So really, I think we joke, but we’re pretty serious. It was our mom, my colleague, and my mom and all their older friends who are retired, just voting daily. That’s all it was. So don’t

Brandon Burton 4:24
awesome,

Matt Lofy 4:25
but now we can say winning.

Brandon Burton 4:26
We can edit that out. Nobody has to know. No,

Unknown Speaker 4:29
it’s our secret.

Brandon Burton 4:30
That’s right. But tell us a little bit about the Worthington area Chamber. Give us an idea of your chamber size, staff, budget, scope of work. You guys are involved with just to kind of set the stage for our discussion today.

Matt Lofy 4:42
Yeah, for anyone who’s not familiar with Columbus, imagine a big circle around a major city. We are at the north, north central part of Central Ohio, and Columbus, which we actually get confused. Worthington, Minnesota. When I when I first started, I was told that half of the phone calls in Minnesota, in Worthington, Minnesota, are phone calls for Worthington, Ohio, but we’re a small chamber of commerce of roughly 550 member businesses, a modest budget in the mid 300,000 range, and a staff of two currently putting out roughly 65 to 70 events and organized meetings a year. So we were doing quite a bit for two people in terms of the scope. We went from a chamber that really wasn’t was kind of in a decline prior to COVID to not not being relevant or impacting our community or supporting our businesses during COVID. So really, we’ve done a lot as a two person team to bring back all networks. So from our Soho groups, small office, home office, which we call Small Business Roundtable, to our Women’s Business Network, yp, those all have been started from scratch within the last two to three years. So just to really show where we’ve been and how far we’ve come just in three years, and then we’re in a city that’s four and a half to five miles square, miles in size. Our school districts four times that, because we pulled from the city of Columbus, and so that’s really the taste of our community and our chamber in, you know, 90 seconds or less.

Brandon Burton 6:32
Yeah, no, that’s perfect. So you came into the chamber world at a very interesting time. So I think that’s going to play in well, your story with our topic today about creating a chamber of impact, because I’m sure you’re able to see all of the opportunity around you at that timing of when you came into the chamber here. But we’ll dive in much deeper in that as soon as we get back from this quick break.

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All right, Matt, we’re back. As I mentioned before the break, we’re talking today about creating a chamber of impact. So how did coming into the Worthington area Chamber in August of 21 How did that timing affect your thinking going into creating a chamber of impact and the opportunity that you saw at that time frame?

Matt Lofy 9:07
That’s that’s a great question. We had our challenges, just as a lot of chambers did, because of the impact of COVID. What I had kind of up against me coming into this role is one I left another chamber in a neighboring community, but not in the president role that did everything, I think, right during COVID, coming to a chamber that hadn’t done much to impact the community or the businesses. So I had a different lens to look through, but at the same time, because of where we’re situated in in central Ohio, we pull from Columbus public health. So after my first week, we actually got put into a six month mask mandate. So there were just some extra layers that were added. But how I looked at it, it was because we hadn’t impacted our community and our businesses. I had a four. Whole deck of cards to play with, because no one was going to question and say, well, we didn’t do things this way. No one really remembered that. And so I jokingly say I came in like, I pulled a Miley Cyrus and came in like a record. Oh, yeah, I have to right. All I had to say is, I came in like Miley Cyrus, and you knew it, that’s right. But at that point, it was okay. We have a mask mandate, but we have to be seen. And so I started to really look at ways to how do we amplify the voice of business and our chamber without having events here in the first few days and not having the relationships? And so we use it as a way to completely flip our ineffective emails and getting squared away with three separate monthly email newsletters that went out and specifically targeting different areas of interest for our businesses. Instead of just showing and sending out future events and and things like that. We had to get better and more strategic with the way we reached out. One of the first things I did on social social media was I wanted to be seen and build a relationship when I couldn’t be in person and build relationships. And so with without knowing, at the time of your podcast, I kind of stole your name and created a chamber chat with Matt. Video, okay, bi weekly, where it was just me. I had my own theme music and introduction, and it was me sitting in my office, or even in my my basement office, giving key updates of what the business is doing. We might not be able to meet together right now, but this is what your investment in our chamber, in us is helping us do to impact you, your business and our community. So it really allowed us to take non existent social media and email and flip them upside down and more impactful, as well as start to strategize, you know, unfortunately, six months out what our impact would be when it comes to reigniting our network. So that was really what we did, you know, from day one to the first six months outside of cleaning out the organization and getting the house in order.

Brandon Burton 12:13
Yeah, now I can appreciate coming in and people don’t remember what the programs were before, but to be able to have kind of that almost a blank slate. I mean, you could do essentially what, what you wanted to, but to be able to be strategic about the emails going out. Can you talk to us a little bit more about that? You said, going from those ineffective emails, which I think everybody listening knows exactly what you’re talking about, and what are the what’s the strategy behind your three purposeful emails each month,

Matt Lofy 12:41
yeah, and let me, let me first go on the record, because I always want to say things first. I don’t have the magic formula. So I don’t want anyone to be like, oh, you know, or think that. I think that I have it all figured out. But I think from my previous role doing communications at another chamber to just emails I’ve gotten from other organizations. We get too fixated of we got to throw all this stuff into one email, and then we tend to sometimes get so bogged down about events that all we’re sending our event correspondence. Don’t look at my social media right now, because that’s all I’m doing. But I looked at, let’s get the events out of all of our emails, and let’s look at respecting people’s inboxes. And here’s how we’ve done it. And again, this is just one man one Chamber’s way to do it, but either the final days of a month or the first days of a month, depending on when, when that falls in the week, I send an events bulletin out that just has picture header, brief description and a CLICK HERE button, and we list out five events for the month with a corresponding social media post. We’ve we went from emails that we’re getting in the teens to the low 20s of open rates to mid 40s to low 60s. Open rates, click rates, I won’t talk about because I want to stay with the numbers that make me sound that’s right, that’s right, but open rate wise, and then what we’re seeing on registrations, in terms of revenue, we’re certainly seeing a huge amount of investment of revenue coming in per email specifically for our events bulletin, but then the second week of each month, that’s what I refer to as our member highlight cycle in our business connections email, where we’re putting out things in our Member Notes section, accolades about businesses, businesses who are hosting maybe an upcoming Lunch and Learn, or businesses we’re partnering with, as well as announcing our new businesses. And then somewhere in there a link to our events calendar, because again, I don’t want to bog down everything with give us more money come to more events. And then the third week, I try and put more advocacy efforts in there upcoming major events, but talking about what the takeaways would be at those events. You. So much about the event, and then any other major things that we’re doing impacting, you know, our city or regionally, and that’s been a really good winning formula for us. And hopefully anyone that you know wants to possibly use that, maybe it works for them. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 15:17
and I’d like how you said you still have your events in there, but you’re not drawing all the attention right to the events, but it’s in there. It’s like, oh yeah, I saw an email a week or two ago. It talked about an event. Oh, here it is, right here, and you can click on it, but you’re not focused on, give us money, give us money, right?

Matt Lofy 15:35
And that’s kind of the lens. And you’ve been in the industry for for a long time. I mean, sometimes we get a little too focused on events or revenue, you know, without respecting what we’re putting into people’s inboxes. And I think, you know, I’m a relationship builder. I’m a relational leader. And I think chamber leaders need to start thinking more relational than transactional. And that’s how I also try and view the emails, yeah,

Brandon Burton 16:00
and I think most chamber staff are probably guilty, at least at times where the next event’s coming up, and that’s all you can focus on, is the next event, and just getting bogged down with with that and nothing else, and forgetting that that one event is not the reason why 90 plus percent of your members joined right? Like it’s important for you in that time, because that’s what you’re focused on. But they all are members for so many other reasons, that as you reach out and communicate with them, you gotta be touching on those points as well,

Matt Lofy 16:31
well and and just in a what is the chamber done for me? Aspect, if, if we’re not putting that in the in the in the emails or in the newsletters to the membership they you know, I count that as retention, so, you know, we’re sharing out information, but also saying, Here’s what we’ve done since this last advocacy update, or here’s what we’re doing shortly. You know, there’s, there’s a lot of different things strategically, if we put it in the newsletter, that can go into recruiting new businesses, retaining businesses, beyond just getting butts in seats for another event, right?

Brandon Burton 17:08
Exactly. So the emails, that’s a great example of of making that shift to creating a chamber of impact. What are some other areas that you were able to attack as you came into the chamber there,

Matt Lofy 17:22
one of the things that we needed to do is our our community being as small as it is, like the city, not the school district, again, four and a half, five square miles, we’re so disconnected in a small community that we have a pro and not so pro business nonprofit that has started through the last decade in our community, not called the chamber, Okay, which one I thought was an issue, because we’re not relevant. We weren’t having an impact. That those groups had to start. We should have been convening both sides. But at the same time, if there’s those two groups, no one’s hitting that that 80% in the middle, the same center. So one of the things that I wanted to make sure that we did was get heard, and two of the things I did quickly was try and identify and make those relationships with key stakeholders. And I’m sure that’s not anything new that any chamber person that’s been in the industry for a while has heard, but I probably met with key stakeholders more than I did businesses, just to make sure that we built those bridges, and also we’re being heard of what’s to come from this new chamber and our pursuit of relevance and the impact we wanted, so no one was caught off guard or challenged. And that was the biggest piece, because a lot of what I was saying at that time was deemed political and well, the Chamber’s never done that before. That’s not going to go well. And I go, I assure you, I have surveys and countless of data points that our businesses want this, and chambers are doing this across the industry. This is only new here, and so I kept those voices, those stakeholders, close in that to ensure that they they knew what was coming from our chamber, and now they’ve been on board, even if they are challenging. And I think that really massaging those relationships and building those collaborations, especially with those that aren’t on board with what the chamber is doing, is key. And the other aspect is at the same time, we started a podcast called amplify Worthington that allowed me to use that as a platform to say it even louder to businesses, but also to the community, and then we did it in in a collaboration with our economic development director. So it’s a little bit, possibly a little bit different of approach for a chamber podcast, compared to some who highlight just primarily what the chamber is doing and what businesses are doing, and those. Us to were probably the best investment of time outside of of re kind of retooling our chamber.

Brandon Burton 20:06
I’m a huge fan of chambers having a podcast. I even have a little course. If anybody wants to explore having a podcast for your chamber, it’ll be in our show notes, but going back to your meetings with the key stakeholders you didn’t necessarily say these words, but this is how I heard it. So correct me, if I’m wrong or if there’s a different take, you weren’t going and asking for permission necessarily to say, these are the changes I want, but it was more just so they’re not surprised when they see the changes coming, that they can be on the right side of things and not be like, Whoa, who’s Matt. Think he is coming in here, changing everything, but just saying, Hey, here’s some things that can be impactful for our community. Wanted to bring you in the loop and let you know some things that are coming down the pipeline. Is that, is that kind of accurate, or did I get that off? Yeah, I

Matt Lofy 20:58
You probably even said it better than than what I said. That’s exactly it. I think, as chamber leaders, we also serve as community architects, and the best way to do things smoother is to ensure everyone knows what’s to come, but also to say change in our community at some point, some level, is coming. Let’s control that change and do what’s best for our community. And the only way we can do that is if you join the conversation. And so yeah, 100% I think that that is one of the things we should do, and not ask for that permission, like you said, but just include the voices so that they they feel heard through this transition,

Brandon Burton 21:40
right? I think the worst case is you can come in with a big change and surprise them, and then you’re going to meet, get met with the resistance all the way along, where, if they have a heads up of it, and they feel like they’re in the know, it’s going to go a lot smoother to push along something new. Yeah. So you mentioned, as you came in to the chamber, was kind of on a decline through COVID and everything. You guys have implemented some of these changes. How are you seeing the needle move at this point, now that you’re three years into it?

Matt Lofy 22:10
Yeah, I feel like we have an aircraft carrier moving full steam ahead in the ocean while also going forward on the course, it is altering the course at the same time. So I’m like, I’m just starting my fourth year, and it’s like I’m still having to clean this up. But I think what what we’ve seen greatly is we’ve had a steady flow of new members, and then having to really work extra hard on getting better contacts of those that we want to return retain, just because there’s so much turnover. So we’re still seeing those battles, which I’m sure there’s a lot of people nodding right now listening like, oh, in there. Brother, yeah. But one of the things that we’re seeing is we’re getting a lot more initiatives up and running, and a lot more businesses who have not been engaged are starting to get more engaged and start poking their head out at events or in my inbox. And that’s the most flattering, especially seeing people you know, with all due respect to those leaders before me that said, I haven’t been a part of the chamber in X amount of years, and I’d like to come back. And that’s that’s been a lot of what we’re hearing now. That’s

Brandon Burton 23:23
very rewarding to know that the work you’re doing is being noticed and really making an impact. To be able to not just retain but bring back some of those members that have dropped at some point along the way. So that’s, that’s awesome. I can imagine that those members that hung through COVID and everything too are like, wow, the chamber is like, revitalized, like, they’re really making an impact right now. So I would imagine that first year retention for those, aside from just financial strain through the pandemic, if they could see that impact, that they would hang on.

Matt Lofy 24:00
We’re getting there. I don’t have we didn’t have good enough numbers to know what that retainment level was at the beginning. But yeah, we are starting to hear that. You know what? One of the things to maybe, hopefully not getting too far off your point, one of the things we did with those that dropped and didn’t want to reinvest in our chamber. I still wanted to show value on investment in the chamber and respect and support our Chamber members first. But I worked a little extra hard, and maybe this is political and there’ll be a lot of hate emails or anything that comes through to you or me, I still busted my hump almost as much for non member businesses to see, to show them the value of a vibrant and strong chamber, and I got a lot of return on that. And I don’t mean that ignorantly. I think sometimes, as leaders, we. Too caught up of oh, you’re a non member, or you’re not in, you’re not involved with the Chamber anymore, and we forget them. I’ve tried to work really hard to say, You know what? If maybe it’s a no for them about being a part of the chamber. Let’s talk about how, because at the end of the day, if they come to one event and they find value in the chamber, they found value in me as their chamber President value in our mission, and at the end of the day, we’re chamber leaders, but we also have to think like civic entrepreneurs. We also got that revenue, and so we saw a lot in these first three years, and I’m still seeing now a lot of the networks, like our Women’s Business Network, half of the women coming to these luncheons are non members, but I can almost have enough data points to show this has been one of the best networks to bring in new members and new investors in our chamber by dropping the real significance of how we treat a member versus a non member. Again, wanting to show the value on investment for members, but that’s really been something through this transition to whether they were dropped or they just didn’t see the chamber as relevant, back, you know, a month ago or a couple years ago, that I think, has been one of the biggest things that have led to a success for us, not saying no to supporting them or being involved in the chamber, but asking ourselves as a two person team, How do we get them a part of the chamber or involved with the chamber? And that’s been a huge game changer for us, and we’ve actually gotten positive feedback. Hey, thanks for not being pushy and really wanting to help me first, and now it helped me see what the chamber really means.

Brandon Burton 26:36
Yeah, I think that’s an excellent point. And I think we forget as chambers, we think, you know membership, membership. You know everybody’s got to be a member. And we forget that each business has its own different walk of life, so to speak, where some businesses and maybe against their corporate policy to join a local chamber because they had a bad experience in another community, another state, whatever. So as a policy, they can’t join a chamber, but if you have an event that resonates with their mission, then they’ll sign up and they’ll be a sponsor. They’ll they’ll be there for it. So being able to be there for all the businesses in the community and to show value to the community at large, rather than just being hyper focused on membership, I think is a very smart approach,

Matt Lofy 27:25
yeah. And I know, you know, I can hear the comments and the emails coming in that disagree with that approach. And if not those emails coming to me, they’re coming to you, right? But I think in a day and age to you know, let’s, let’s see the reality. All membership organizations are seeing declines, right from veterans groups to other membership organizations are seeing declines in membership we as chambers, if we want to have a great impact, we need to also switch our mindset. But at the same time, I can think right off the top of my head, five different businesses who’ve come to our events paid a non member price. But if I tallied up how many times I’ve seen them at paid events this year, they’ve done more than their share of an investment in an annual membership and a one time or two time lunch that most of those who are members coming to one or two events have invested so, you know, getting away from mission and thinking about, you know, being a civic entrepreneur, in a sense, having that hat on. I still got that money, yeah, and they got to see the value in the chamber. So I think we got to shift that mindset too. Sorry if I got too far off.

Brandon Burton 28:34
No, it’s all about being community architects, as you said before. So, yeah, I love it. Love the thought process there. Matt, I wanted to ask for chambers listening that are wanting to take their chamber up to the next level. I’d argue that you’ve done that there at the Worthington area Chamber. What kind of tip or action item, what piece of advice might you share with with that chamber who’s looking to take their organization up to the next level.

Matt Lofy 29:07
You know, I think it’s kind of a, I have one answer, kind of a two part response to that. I think, in order to really continue to grow your chamber, and we’re still doing this ourselves, so I don’t want to sound like I have it all figured out, but we have to take chances in doing something that we’ve never done. And if you’re a chamber that is doing things differently than how they’ve been done, what’s that next thing for us to be doing and and to that end, for me right now is we’ve kind of gotten things back our way. I think for us, being here in central Ohio, which is a growing community, is I’m also having a mindset now that’s a little new for me. I want to think regionally to better impact locally. So I really challenge. A two part answer there. Think about what’s that next thing that your chamber needs to do? And just like I said earlier, Channel your inner Miley Cyrus and do it as a wreck, be a wrecking ball. And then secondly, let’s start thinking a little bit more regionally and bring that home locally for that change to really spark that positive change. Yeah, I

Brandon Burton 30:21
like that a lot. I like asking everyone I have on the show about the future of chambers, and how do you see the future of chambers and their purpose going forward?

Matt Lofy 30:34
You know, that is the million dollar question. If I had it figured out, I would be probably living on an island right now, and not in a two person office, but I think for chambers, we have to adapt to what’s to come. That’s why I’m excited about the horizon initiative being updated. I think chambers need to stop thinking so small in some ways, or at least for the smaller chambers, and start thinking a little bit more broadly in what our impact is. Where are we serving and where are we not serving? What chances and opportunities do we need to take? But on on top of that, I think the future of chambers lie in being that that connector for all voices to cut through the noise and be that trusted source that we need to be, and hopefully we’re all serving right now, so that we can hit that same center, that 80% that’s not in the know, or that is voiceless or just isn’t aware right now. And that’s that’s where I think the future lies, right there in the that, that same center. And we have to address that, and we need to address it yesterday, absolutely.

Brandon Burton 31:47
And if you knew all the answers, you could write the horizon 2.0 all by yourself. But this is right, yeah,

Matt Lofy 31:57
absolutely. And again, we don’t have it all figured out. I just want to say that one more time, but some of the risks we’ve taken and some of the initiatives we’ve done have definitely helped us do more than what I thought we could do possible in three years. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 32:12
absolutely. Well, Matt, before I let you go, I wanted to give you an opportunity to share any contact information for listeners who may want to reach out and connect with you and learn more about how you guys are doing things there at the Worthington area Chamber. What would be the best way for someone to reach out and connect? Thank

Matt Lofy 32:29
you for that opportunity. I’d love to connect, especially on LinkedIn. I’m huge on LinkedIn. You can just find me at Matt. Matt low fee, l, o, F, y, on LinkedIn, or you can email me at mlofy@worthingtonchamber.org and you can just find more about us at WorthingtonChamber.org I’d love to connect in any way that’s perfect.

Brandon Burton 32:53
And we’ll get all that in our show notes for this episode as well, to make it easy to find you and connect with you. But Matt, this is this has been fun to to have you on Chamber Chat Podcast to share your story and the the impact that your chamber making now in the community, and kudos to you and in in your your two person team for being able to to do this. I know there’s others involved, there’s there’s volunteers, and there’s board and all that, but you guys are doing things right to be able to right the ship and turn in the right direction. So thanks for sharing that with us today.

Matt Lofy 33:29
Thank you, and thank you for this opportunity. I certainly appreciate it’s been an honor.

Brandon Burton 33:33
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Success Through Involvement with Derek Rusher

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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.

Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community.

Our title sponsor for this episode is Bringing Local Back. Remember when your community could turn to a local TV station or newspaper for the latest updates and affordable ads? Those days may be fading, but the need for local connection remains. That’s why we created Bringing Local Back, a game changing platform that restores the local visibility and advertising power to your community. It’s more than just tech. It’s about driving engagement and creating new revenue for your chamber. Ready to see the future visit bringinglocalback.com to schedule your demo today. This is the future of local commerce.

Our guest for this episode is Derek, rusher from the Kearney Area Chamber in Nebraska as president and CEO of Nebraska’s third largest chamber, Derek carries a fun and creative energy with him as he walks through the doors of the office each day. He believes in bringing about positive change and by fostering a can do attitude in those around him, and is proud to serve and promote the quality of life in their community. Derek maintains a strong commitment to leadership and public visibility, recognizing that both are essential to grow and sustain the mission of the chamber. He actively works to expand the Chamber’s reach with his hands on leadership style and innovative troubleshooting. This can be seen through how he relates to various organizations, through his interactions with the chamber, with Chamber members, individuals from the Kearney community chambers around the state to oversee their own day to day operations. Derek also serves as a chair for the State Chambers small business policy council, and an ex officio board member for the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Outside of the chamber, Derek is the founder and president of a nonprofit business impact art. Impact art is known for a variety of large murals in the Kearney community. He is subdivision threes representative on the board of directors for the Nebraska public power district. He possesses more than 15 years of experience as a teacher and many more former collegiate athlete and coach. Altogether, Derek is passionate about supporting the growth and education of others. His favorite motto is, do right. His attendant he picked up from his father. He lives with a beautiful wife, Maggie, and Derek continues to pass his teaching on to his five daughters. But Derek, I’m excited to have you with us today here on chamber chat podcast. I’d love to give you an opportunity to say hello to all the chamber champions that are out there listening, and to share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little better.

Derek Rusher 3:08
Yeah, absolutely. Well, well, thank you, Brandon, it’s definitely blessed to be on your podcast. Excited to talk with you today and talk with the listeners, and I love the chamber world, I think, you know, going back to my bio, when you’re reading, you know, I was a, I was an art teacher for 15 years, and I was a former collegiate athlete, and there was not a lot of athletes that were art majors. And so that was pretty unique in itself. But I remember when I was was probably first hired back in January of 2018 and I’m sure a lot of our Chamber members and past leaders and current leaders were reading my bio. They’re like, what are we doing? We’re hiring a, you know, art teacher to lead our chamber. And so, you know, I was, yes, an art teacher, but obviously, you know, athletics had taught me a lot of leadership skills. I went through our local leadership class here in Kearney. And, you know, I started building my business at QM, actually through impact art, which was part of that, I was actually working part time for a company called Team concepts, where we where we will, do we, we did a lot of employee engagement, leadership development, some school programs, just team building in general. And so my background was actually pretty diverse, and I was always one to, you know, make sure I was, you know, stayed involved in continuing my own education. I was getting my master’s in administration, so I was building, you know, kind of my more professional development there and personal development. So yeah, in the day, if you just maybe saw art teacher, you would have been like, oh, man, what are we doing? But yeah, I got the, I think one of the things. That is a strength of mine, is my diversity that I that I brought to the chamber and also art. It’s that creative mindset, and I think that’s one thing that I brought to the chamber too, is kind of my creativity as a leader.

Brandon Burton 5:12
Yeah, I think there’s definite parallels without the creativeness that comes from art into the chamber world. And I don’t know why that needs to be a it seems to be a sticking point for people, and they’re like art like they don’t see it as a real major or anything or real career, but it is. People do, people do art, people teach art, people make a living with art, and it definitely brings that creative mindset.

Derek Rusher 5:34
No doubt I could, I could probably have a whole podcast on why the arts are great for kids and students and, you know, proven, there’s, there’s actually a lot of stats out there that prove that your test scores are better when you’re involved in the arts. So not just, you know, painting or drawing. I mean, it could be music, any kind of performance art as well. So, yeah, yeah.

Brandon Burton 5:54
So I’m curious, what type of athlete were you? What sports did you play?

Derek Rusher 5:58
I played them all growing up, anything that I could, you know, swing a bat, throw a football, shoot, shoot a basketball. I did get into golf later on in life, but, yeah, so I went to college to play football, and I was a quarterback, and then transitioned into wide receiver. I did. I dabbled in a little bit of high jump, actually, on the track team, but I went through a core workout for track, and I was like, holy cow, I’m here to play football. This isn’t too much setups and crunches and everything else. And so I went back to throwing the football during spring. Yeah, but no, it’s a great experience, and great teammates, and just the long life relationships that I have from my college teammates. You know, that’s, it’s pretty awesome. That’s

Brandon Burton 6:44
awesome, fantastic. Well, tell us a little bit about, I think I pronounced it wrong earlier, Carney area, chamber, yep. All right. All right, yeah. Tell us about the the chamber, size, staff, budget, scope of work to kind of set the table for our discussion. Yeah,

Derek Rusher 6:58
absolutely. So Carney is pretty much smack dab in the middle of the United States. So Kearney, Nebraska is right on Interstate 80. We’re positioned really well being on the interstate. I think that’s one of the advantages we actually have over our peers. But so Kearney is about 33,000 people, and our county is about 55,000 we have members from all over, but mainly, obviously in the Kearney area and then Buffalo County. Our chamber size is about 870 members. We usually hover right around that number. We’re we’re about a million dollar budget pushing that. I think one of the things that’s exciting is how we’ve grown as a staff and a team. And I think when I first started, we were about five staff. Now we’re going into six. I like big teams. If my budget could afford it, I’d have even more teammates. But for Nebraska, you’ve got the Greater Omaha chamber, the Lincoln Chamber of Commerce, and then the Carney chambers, is the third largest chamber in the state of Nebraska. And so, yeah, we’re two hours west of Lincoln. If you’ve ever driven down I 80 and driven under an archway, we’ve got an archway monument that crosses over the interstate there, and so that’s that’s Carney right there. Alright,

Brandon Burton 8:28
fantastic. Well, I will be focusing our the majority of our conversation today around the topic of finding success through involvement and what that’s meant for you throughout your career, and we’ll dive deeper into that as soon as we get back from this quick break.

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All right, Derek, we’re back, and as I mentioned before the break, we’ll we’re going to focus our conversation around finding success through involvement. So you’re coming with this art background, you found ways to get involved, to transition that into a chamber career, but talk to us a little bit about that, that story, that transition, but how involvement has really helped to catapult your career in the chamber world.

Derek Rusher 10:52
Yeah, I think what I found is, you know, I’m a people person, and I always wanted to be around other people and then let lend a hand, whether it was through, you know, an artistic skill or whatnot. But at the end of the day, I just felt that, you know, I was always driven towards to be on a committee or be on a board or help out, however I could, whether it’s through our church and serving, or what it might be. So when I was actually teaching at the facility that I was teaching at my my last stop in my education career was actually at a juvenile detention center, and we had an accredited high school there, but I got involved in about everything that I could at that facility, Teaching these juveniles of Nebraska, and we built a confidence course, basically an obstacle course. We did landscaping with my students there, and then I would get involved in our gang team. And so we had a lot of kids that got caught up in gangs and so. And then I eventually led our gang team. I was on employed development groups. I was part of our teachers association out there, and so I just continued to get involved. And people saw, you know me as a as a leader there, like, like I said in my intro, I started our facility administrator asked me if I wanted to go through our leadership Carney, our local leadership group. And I was like, yeah, absolutely. So I did that, and continue to just find ways to get involved. And then I started kind of learning more about the extra the Chamber of Commerce, not knowing the job was even open, and at that time it wasn’t. But I had a friend that was on the board of directors, and so it would attend some ribbon cuttings, and just started continuing to build my network. And again, it was just making sure I was, you know, being involved in different things. A funny story, my my art classroom had a a lot of murals. We were actually in a shop, and a somebody from leadership Carney had toured my classroom because they knew I was alumni, and so they’re like, Hey, can we come tour the facility and come tour your classroom? I said, Yeah, absolutely. So as that person from the city of Kearney was walking through my classroom, they’re like, Hey, we were looking for a muralist, and I was pretty naive at the time, and they’re like, Hey, would you like to paint a mural? And I said, Absolutely. So I had a good friend that I said, Hey, do you want to? Do you want to help me do this? And his sister was actually an art major at the time, and so we tackled a mural, and that was our first mural, and we were not impact art at that time. And then after that mural, the VFW asked, Hey, we want to paint a flag on the front of our building? Who did that mural? So they put us in contact. And then Coca Cola was delivering beverages to the VFW, and they need a mural restored. And so we started that. So at that point, I’m like, Okay, this is a business. I need to get a business plan. So I wrote a business plan, and went through that whole process. And again, I started building my business at you, that board member that I talked about being on the chamber, him, and I hit it off. We had some different things that we shared, and one of them was the Clifton Strengths Finder, and he was a Gallup certified coach, and I just love leadership development. And so we started working together, and he hired me to work part time as a teacher to do different, you know, workshops with him, team building, employee development, employee engagement, leadership, and I still take a lot of those things today, and definitely helped me. And so all those things kind of catapulted me into this position. And the board member said, hey, when that, when this job opened up for the chamber. He said, Hey, I think you should apply. But he’s my friend, right, right? So I was like, okay, you know, thank you. But I actually had two emails that got in my inbox, and they were from just my network. I did not know the two people that well, but basically the gist of their emails were the same, yeah. Hey, this job’s open. I think you’d be really good in this position. You should apply. And that’s what really put me over the edge. And when I do things Brandon, I go all in. And so, you know, I did what I did, and now I’m here, so six and a half years later, I love it. And when I first joined the chamber, we had accreditation due for the US Chamber. That was a big thing for our chamber. It was the first year. I remember my board members said, Well, we’ve been four star. Probably can’t get to five star because of our size and different things. And I said, challenge accepted, right? And we were fortunate enough to get to a five star accreditation. So that was the first time in our Chamber’s history to be a five star chamber. That was a great learning experience for me. You know, I did not come from the chamber world and kind of that non profit sector, and so it was a great learning experience. But, you know, that’s just what I wanted to show, kind of our our chamber and our business community, to say, hey, here’s here’s how we’re going to operate, and we’re going to operate with excellence and and like I said, it kind of the rest is a little bit history. And what I love about my involvement and how I found success through that, that’s obviously one of our Chamber’s pillars, right? Is involvement and making connections and and networking. And then how can we help as a chamber, do that with others, and so I found success that way. Now I’m able to help our Chamber members find success as well through involvement. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 16:30
and you’ve been involved with with boards as well, that the it’s the State Chamber and the public power district. And how are some of these things that impacted your career and be able to help you, whether it’s connections or leadership skills or whatever that you’ve taken out of these experiences that have helped you be successful and really a relatively short time in the chamber world.

Derek Rusher 16:56
Yeah, it’s a great question. I would say that right before I was with the chamber, I got asked to be on our Junior Achievement board. And they do financial literacy with kids. And when I went through leadership, Carney, I had a one of the speakers. I’ll never forget, he told us, don’t be on a board just because someone asks you if you need to be passionate about that board was basically his, his talk to us, and so you’re going to get asked as leaders to be on boards, right? Everybody. A lot of nonprofits need boards and things like that. A lot of organizations need board members, but they said, make sure you’re passionate about it. And so that with that tie to education and working with kids, I was like, Yep, I think that’s a good board. Well, since I got on the chamber, as you can imagine, chamber presidents get asked to be on a lot of boards, and so right away I was like, oh man. And so I actually had to kind of sift through some of them and tell some of them no. And I served on one for one year, and then I told the director. I said, Hey, I said, I actually have a I actually have a chamber employee that’s way more passionate about this, and they would be a better fit. And so we did that transition. And I think it’s just knowing that you don’t have to do everything as a chamber president, right, as a chamber executive and and make sure you’re passionate about it, make sure it’s, you know, something, that you can add value as a board member too. Now going through boards, you know, you learn a lot of things, and I think probably the biggest step I made in my career was the decision to be an elected official, and that’s through our public power. So Nebraska has public power, so I was asked to be a representative on the board of directors for Nebraska public power district. I had a campaign talk about learning a lot about campaigning and politics there and all the things that go along with it. Obviously, there was a lot of parts that I liked about campaigning. There was a lot of stuff that I did not like, and it’s just some of it’s ugly, but in the day, going through that process was a big learning experience, and something that I definitely do not regret, and I’ve been on that board since it’s about about 20 months now. And what a fascinating business, because it’s, you know, power, the the energy industry is probably the most capital intensive industry there is, and so the sticker shock was a little crazy, right at first, because we’re dealing with millions and billions, and I’m not used to that as a chamber of commerce, right? And a little impact art business as a nonprofit

Brandon Burton 19:33
guy over here, yeah, yeah, I remember

Derek Rusher 19:38
one of my first meetings, they were saying, we’re going to refurbish this piece of equipment, and it was like 900 some $1,000 and I’m like, wow. I’m like, Well, what’s a new one cost? And they’re like, 5 million. I’m like, okay, refurbish. It is. And, you know, as as as I want to be the best BOARD MEMBER I can be, you know, and that preparation, I’ve found a way to. Uh, you know, get through all of the board packets and all information and just educate myself. And it’s been wonderful. And then the board meetings itself and how they prepare, and just their organization. It’s such a robust organization. I’ve taken some things that they’ve done and tried to right fit them for our little chamber of commerce. And so it’s definitely added value there. And again, I think having a business representative on that board, having a, you know, somebody that’s tied in and has a pulse in the business community, I think it’s really added value that way, as well, on that board of directors. And so it’s been a great experience. It’s a six year term, so I would love to stay on that board for probably two terms. I think that’s probably the right amount, but it takes a long time. I mean, talk about drinking from the fire hose when I started the chamber, yeah, mppd was nothing like that. I mean, it was just, it was like three fire hoses. It’s crazy to learn all the ins and outs of that, but I would say my advice for I think the chamber executives that are listening would be be on a board, not just because you got asked, make sure you’re passionate about it, make sure that you’re able to add value and then take something away as well. We should always continue to learn. I’m a lifelong learner. I believe in that. That’s my education background. That’s why I got my administration, education Education Administration degree. I got my master’s when I was still here at the Chamber of Commerce. Because there was a multiple reasons. I started it, I wanted to finish it. There was a lot of things that overlapped. I mean, every single Master’s class I had talked about communication. And so there’s a lot of great things that I learned through my master’s classes. And I also want to show my kids, you know, I got five daughters. I want to show my kids. My kids that, hey, education is important, and it still is. Yeah, I

Brandon Burton 21:47
especially like your your thoughts about board service and to only serve on boards you’re passionate about. And for any chamber executives listening they they know the headaches of working with a board member who’s not passionate about the chamber, or, you know what they’re supposed to be there, showing up for and executing on, you know, plans of action and things like that. And if you’re not able to show up and give your best self, it’s okay to say no, it’s okay to delegate to somebody else. It’s okay to pass up an opportunity if it doesn’t align with, you know, the mission that you’re, you know, being driven by, in this case, with the chamber, or personal values even, but it’s okay, and I think that organization would appreciate no thank you versus a Okay, I’ll do it on top of my already busy plate, and I’m not really going to give it all the time and effort and Energy it deserves, right,

Derek Rusher 22:41
right? Well, I think that’s part of my reason to be on the small business policy council, because I know it adds value to our Carney businesses. And so at the state level, we have a representative, and I’m actually pregnant is only serve one more year there. I’ve talked to the State Chamber, and I’m going to serve one more year because of just timing of things. And I’m ready to, you know, hand over the reins of someone else. You know, there’s someone else that definitely has earned that spot to be the chair of that business council, but I think that’s that at the end of the day, yeah, just be passionate about the boards that you’re serving on and making sure you can add value for sure.

Brandon Burton 23:15
So in this involvement with these different organizations, different boards, nonprofits, these different ways you’ve you’ve been involved, you’ve been intentional about being involved. Can talk to us a little bit about how your network has been affected, and kind of rubbing shoulders with people in these groups, and just how that’s impacted you. Well,

Derek Rusher 23:35
my kids don’t like to go in public places with me. You know, I didn’t do it really, to, like, selfishly, honestly. I mean, I did it because I truly, I think I love serving, I love what I do, and that’s why I ran for the Nebraska public power district board. Yeah, I didn’t understand everything in the industry, but I just felt like pulled to serve, and so that’s really has been my intent. Now, what it’s done, obviously, is my connections and network has grown tremendously, and I don’t know everything. And so now I have a phone with friend, but I’ve got a lot of friends that I can call on or email and contact and say, Hey, have you guys ever dealt with this, right? And, yeah, there’s forums out there, you know, there’s Facebook groups out there that you can, you know, put a put something out there and get some responses. But when you have a closer relationship, right? And you’ve maybe served together or been on a committee together, you know, that’s a lot easier to get a response from. And so when I can pick up the phone or shoot an email over to somebody or text them, that’s what it’s really done. Because, again, I don’t know everything, and I don’t claim to know everything, and I’m I’m always one that’s always saying, Hey, you. What I like this idea, but let’s see what this chamber is doing, or let’s see what this business is doing, and how can we operationally be better? Because that’s me. I’m I’m in, I’m competitive, and I want to be the best, and so maybe that’s a little bit of my servant leadership, I suppose, and why I want to be on different boards and committees and be involved. But I’ve also, I like leading. I like, you know, being at the front and leading. And I’m a very visionary guy. I’ve got big ideas. I like to move fast. And I know my cons of my leadership too. I know what I’m, you know, moving fast is not good for all my teammates, so I have to slow down. And I don’t I remember, when I first started the chamber, I would present a bunch of ideas, and I’ve learned to present one. Hey, here’s something I think we can focus on, because I’ve got leaders that are very supportive leaders, right? And they’re, they’re the ones that are great at getting all the details and all those things. Well, if I present all these ideas, my other leaders and my on my team are going to be like all the work. They don’t see that. And I’m just, I’ve got all this, you know, this big picture stuff. And so I think it’s, I think it’s wise of me to understand the pros of my leadership and my strengths, but then the cons, right? And maybe what I’m not good at, right? We’re all Swiss cheese, right? We all holes. And I’ve got a great team right now that fills the holes of my leadership and my strengths and what I need to improve, or my weaknesses for lack of better words. And that’s where we are, and we really focus on that. We focus on our strengths as a team, and I’ll continue to do that with any committee I’m on and and knowing people that way. And it’s definitely I found success that way.

Brandon Burton 26:45
I can really appreciate you kind of bridling your your creativity, your ideas, and being able to instead of taking the list of 10 or 15 ideas to say, here’s one for your team, and really as a leader, that’s going to drive your team to be creative and to be leaders as well. Because introducing one idea at a time, they might catch the vision and say, what if we add this too? And it may be something you had on your list of ideas, but letting them drive that helps to build them up as well, which I think is super important,

Derek Rusher 27:18
and that’s the chamber world we’re in right now, right? I think we need to be creative and innovative.

Brandon Burton 27:24
Absolutely. Derek, as we start to wrap things up, I wanted to ask for chambers listening who are wanting to take their chamber up to the next level. What kind of tip or action item might you share with them and trying to accomplish that goal?

Derek Rusher 27:39
This is a great question. Um, obviously very subjective, but I would hope that all Chamber members just love their current members. One thing I learned right off the bat, I had this lofty goal, right? I’m competitive. I wanted to grow our membership, and so I had a membership growth goal, and then I had a retention goal as well. And then I would say, shortly, and probably less than a month, I squashed the growth goal, and I said, You know what? If, if they don’t want to be Chamber members, whatever, I’m going to spend way less time on recruiting, basically, and I’m going to spend time on retention, and I’m going to love the members that are investing in our chamber now, and we will grow organically, because I believe everyone wants to be part of something great. And so if we can be great and we can show that we are adding value, then we’ll grow, and we have slightly right? There’s the ebbs and flows, as you know, the members come and go, and we feel that in Kearney as well. But, you know, just loving your members. And then I would say the other part of that is, I kind of reference it is being innovative. I mean, AI is you need to embrace it as a Chamber of Commerce. My marketing director, Riley Mills, is phenomenal in social media and AI and all those things, right? And I just love the things he’s doing. We’ve got some really neat, innovative things with making like tiktoks and reels, and he would explain it way better than I but he’s making custom songs for businesses using AI, and it’s awesome, so cool. It’s so cool. And so, you know, there’s a lot to it. I know you can, you know, you got your your recording meetings and all those things. And obviously, I think everybody’s using, you know, chat, GPT and things like that. But you need to embrace, I think, AI. But then also, what else is out there, right? It’s not just AI. We can’t drive our chamber with AI. And how can you continue to be authentic but innovative? And what is next? How can we kind of stay above that business community and see what they’re doing, what trends they have? And I think that’s going to be important for us. And one of the ways that we’re doing it, besides just looking at trends and trying to. Stay up to date on technology is we’ve actually decided to look at our facility, and we sold our building about a year ago, and we’re building a new building, and it’s a major investment, and we ran a capital campaign, and it’s taken a lot of work, but our new building is going to be a collaborative environment for our team. It’s going to allow our Chamber members to come in and work, maybe not quite have a straight incubator space, but there’s space for them to come and work. So we have small businesses, obviously, freelance and that work from home. We didn’t embrace that sector. How do we help the business that’s selling shoes on YouTube and making more money than all of us? Right? How do we help that chamber member now? Right? And then we’ll have a media room where you can do a podcast, you can do video, you can do photo. There’s flexible spaces where you can hold meetings or interviews and things like that. And so that’s kind of our strategic plan is looking at, how can we continue to add more value to our Chamber members through even a facility? And I think we’re super excited. We’re about 30 days away from moving in.

Brandon Burton 31:01
That’s awesome. I can feel the excitement. Well, I like asking everyone I have on the show, as we look to the future of chambers of commerce, how do you see the future of chambers and their purpose going forward?

Derek Rusher 31:14
I think it’s I think it’s relational. I think it’s really having close relationships with your Chamber members, the the adage that I’ve seen in our industry of businesses joining chambers because it’s the right thing to do, yeah, that’s starting to go away, right? And I still think though that, because still

Brandon Burton 31:36
the right thing to do, but Yeah, correct. Yeah, 100%

Derek Rusher 31:40
but now it’s like, well, what do I get, right? I’m going to invest in in the chamber. Well, what do I get? And how can we continue to add value? So we always look at, what other benefits can we give? And obviously, every industry is a little different, right? Banks need something different than insurance agents and so on and so forth. And so I would say that I see chambers going just more like on a relational and so building relationships and finding opportunities to, you know, have those opportunities where you can just continue to get to know your Chamber members, not on just a Hey, thanks for paying. And here’s your invoice and just a transactional relationship I’d call you need, I think then intimate relationship is going to be a healthy way to run a chamber. And then how can I knowing that chamber member better, you’re going to be able to help them better, because our answer is always yes. That’s our motto, right? That’s a chamber. How could can you do this? Yep, and then we figure it out. And so whether it’s marketing or education or advocacy or involvement. We’re going to tackle those things for those Chamber members. But you need to know them, right? And you need to get to know I mean, just be like your family, right? And that’s, that’s what we call it. We call it our chamber family. And if you know your family members well enough, then you can help them when things are good, when things are bad, whatever it is, and that’s what we need to do for our chamber. And so that’s that’s a tough task that is not easy, but I think that’s really where chambers can hopefully thrive in the future, is continue to build those relationships that you have. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 33:16
I think that’s key. Well, Derek, this has been great to have you on chamber chat podcast and share your your story, your experience, how being involved has helped lead to the success you’ve seen in the chamber. Or listeners who may want to reach out and connect with you or learn more about how you guys are doing things there in Carney. What would be the best way for someone to reach out and connect with you?

Derek Rusher 33:38
Yeah, I would say our website, obviously, is a stand, you know, a standard there, so kearneycoc.org, but then our Facebook, I think, is probably still our go to on social media. Yeah, we’re on, we’re on all the channels, but seems like our social media for Facebook is probably the go to there, but feel free to reach out. Even via email. You can find my email pretty easy on our website when you go to our team page. But we’ve got a lot of things going on. And you know what I love about the chamber world is you’ve got the old saying of R&D, rip off and duplicate. And so, you know, we’re looking at other chambers around the around the United States and seeing what they’re doing well, and we’re going to see if we can duplicate that and right fit it in Kearney, and that’s what we do. So yeah, I definitely welcome that for others.

Brandon Burton 34:29
That’s awesome, and we’ll get all that in our show notes for this episode as well, to make it easy to find you and easy to connect. But Derek, this has been great. I appreciate you and appreciate the experience you shared with us today. Thanks a lot. Well,

Derek Rusher 34:43
thank you. Brandon, appreciate you.

Brandon Burton 34:46
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How to Manage & Lead Change with Lynn Turner

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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.

Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community.

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Our guest for this episode is Lynn Turner. Lynn is a formally trained business coach, facilitator and people analyst with over 20 years of experience in her business Core XP Business Solutions. Lynn focuses on the core of business people and culture making them stronger and more agile so they can stay competitive in in today’s ever evolving landscape, and lead and change innovation and create better experiences for all those involved. Lynn believes that without a strong core, the best strategies and action plans will be difficult to execute, wasting precious time, money and energy. Her many years working with a variety of businesses in different industries, and unique approach helps organizations build a stronger foundation so they can not only survive, but thrive in these unusual times. Over the years, Lynn has helped individuals and businesses gain clarity about their intentions to make informed decisions so they can achieve their goals and vision for life and business. During this time, she’s helped businesses and boards facilitate strategic planning and thinking sessions innovation and change management and initiatives and high performing teams, utilizing her certifications within virtual collaborations, graphic facilitations, the Lego series, play methodology and innovation management and strategy through wobi, which is world of business ideas, and the Kellogg School of Management, certified in a variety of assessment Tools. Lynn recently attained her Master Practitioner certification with Agile brain, a revolutionary new assessment based on neuroscience that transcends traditional cognitive measurements. Lynn also volunteers her time in a variety of workforce and entrepreneurial development initiatives across the Commonwealth that focus on underrepresented populations, including women bipoc and neurodivergence. But Lynn, I am excited to have you with us today here on Chamber Chat Podcast. I’d love to give you a moment to say hello to all the Chamber Champions who are out there listening, and to share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little better.

Lynn Turner 3:19
Sure, I’m really excited for this opportunity and to get a chance to talk with you, Brandon, as well as your chamber champions, this is really exciting. I know a few individuals that have been on your podcast and and really admire the work that you do. As far as something interesting, I guess I’ll, I’ll share what we were talking about a little bit earlier. So for anyone, if you’re Googling my name, you might want to try Lynn Whitney Turner, because there is, there are lots of other Lynn Turners, and one out there actually happens to be a mass murderer. So I just want to clarify that I am not that person. So that’s why I use Lynn Whitney Turner, and

Brandon Burton 4:07
this is why we have middle names, right? So you could differentiate ourselves.

Lynn Turner 4:11
Absolutely, absolutely.

Brandon Burton 4:16
Oh man, I can imagine the confusion.

Lynn Turner 4:18
Yes, yes. And I, and I did, as I mentioned to you, I did have somebody that googled my name and said what they found. And I said, Yes, don’t drink the Kool Aid. So yeah, yes, actually, that person did pass away while in prison. So

Brandon Burton 4:35
okay, so no chance of them being confused with you now. So, yes,

Lynn Turner 4:39
exactly. Okay,

Brandon Burton 4:41
well, I know I, I touched on a little bit with your bio, but tell us a little bit about your business and kind of what your focus is, especially as it has to do with when you work with chambers. But what, what is core XP business solutions and and your focus and kind of center of work? Yeah.

Lynn Turner 4:59
Yeah, yeah. So the name core actually came out of something of my my past life, once upon a time, I was a certified aerobics instructor and personal trainer, and that has stayed with me and has really influenced my approach to the current body of work that I’m using, as well as it was influential in the name of my business. You know, with our bodies, I look at business very similar to our bodies, right? And developing a strong core helps us to become stronger and more agile, and that is really, in my opinion, what is needed in today’s landscape. I talk a lot with businesses about VUCA, and VUCA, if you’re not familiar with it, it’s a term that actually came out of the military back at the end of the Cold War, of of all things, and our military, at that point, with the dismantling of Russia, became very concerned with who is our enemy. And then if you kind of fast forward from there to 911 that was really one of the things that they were really scared about. And VUCA stands for volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. And it’s now been adopted by the business world. Because I think many people can when they hear of VUCA, they’re like, yeah, that really explains where we’re at in the current landscape. And it’s not really necessarily about change. It’s really more about the pace of the change our world is speeding up faster and faster, and it’s really about helping individuals and organizations stay ahead of that change, if possible, so not just managing the change, but hopefully leading the change. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 7:09
well, that’s a perfect segue into what our topic for our conversation will be to stay is around managing and leading change, specifically in a Bucha world, you know, where there is so much change and volatility and uncertainty and ambiguity, how do we approach this and how do we move through it? So I’m excited to dive in much deeper on this topic. As soon as we get back from this quick break.

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All right, Lynn, we are back. So right before the break, you I think you did a really good job in introducing, kind of what our topic is for our discussion today, on managing and leading change. And I know whenever change is introduced, there’s always that pushback. You know, there’s always people in the group, whether it’s in a board or maybe it’s the lead of the organization that pushes back on the change, maybe it starts at the very top. So as you work with organizations on leading and managing through change, what’s your approach to try to help get everyone on board that? You know, change is a necessity. Change is always happening, whether you want it to happen or not, and especially in today’s world, in the Bucha kind of world, what? What’s your approach to help get their mind wrapped around it? Absolutely.

Lynn Turner 10:13
And you, you brought up some really good distinctions, right? So, change, everybody has a re a response to that word change. In fact, we, in working with an organization on a change initiative. The owner of the company was was pretty resistant, and it really even came down to language. We ended up changing the word change. And instead of calling it change, we called it continuous improvement, because that’s really what we’re looking to do through change. Most leaders and there is a distinction too, between leading change, you know, because if we’re leading change, we want, we’re we’ve already embraced it, and therefore we’re ready to move forward. But to your point earlier, for some of us, it’s being imposed upon us, and typically in those situations, we do push back. Each of us has a different propensity for change, especially if it’s being imposed upon us. And I’ve really been digging down deeper into this. As you mentioned earlier, when you were introducing me, I am a people analyst, which is basically just a fancy way of saying, I utilize a lot of different assessments. And over the past 20 years, I mean, there’s tons of assessments out there, and I follow a lot of Peter Drucker’s work, and Peter Drucker is of the belief. And Peter Drucker is a business management guru who was ahead of his time. He passed away several years ago, but he really was ahead of his time. And one of his quotes is you can’t manage what you don’t measure. So that’s really where the assessments play a role, because if you can measure something, now you can better manage it. And if you’re looking at individuals, we each have a different style, whether you’re using Myers, Briggs, predictive index, I happen to utilize disc each of us has a different style, and each of those styles respond differently to change. So it’s really too about understanding, having that self awareness about how we how we deal with change, but also understanding how others may deal with change.

Brandon Burton 13:04
Yeah, and I like the approach of changing the word change. And I thought that before, before you even said that, that I wonder if there’s a better term we can use for the word change, because there is such resistance, it can be a scary word to hear. Hey, we’re going to change this. There’s a safety in insecurity and in doing what you know has been working, right? So when you change it, there’s, there’s some insecurity that comes with that, but to look at it as continuous improvement, say, Yeah, I think we can all get on board with that, right?

Lynn Turner 13:37
Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Brandon Burton 13:41
So as we talk about leading and managing change, I assume you’re working with the leaders of these businesses and organizations to kind of get their head wrapped around how to communicate this to their their staff, or to their organization, to their members, so they’re whatever the organization is that you’re working with, so talk to us a little bit about that. But how you help them manage that that change or lead through that continuous improvement? Sure,

Lynn Turner 14:14
yeah, and it’s about understanding what is the purpose of the change. You know, why is it necessary? So it really is important to set context for for change. Is it change for the sake of change? If so, you know, people may not feel comfortable in doing that, because, as I mentioned earlier, we each have a different propensity for change. You know, some people really enjoy changing things up. Other people like things a little smoother and steadier. And there has been work done by Gallup where they looked at what are followers looking. From their leaders, and they’re looking for four key things when they’ve surveyed followers, and this can be, you know, they’ve done it for large groups, and they’ve been doing this study for many, many years, but four common themes seem to come up. One of them is trust. The followers want to trust in their leadership and trust in their decisions in the direction that they’re going. They’re looking for stability. They are looking for that stability to know that things are going to be okay. They’re also looking for compassion. They want their leaders to kind of understand where they’re coming from and understand what they’re going through in their day to day, and how this change may impact them. And then they’re also looking for hope. And hope is about what is that? Direct. Where are we going? Give me, you know, is it a positive? You know, give me something to hope for, something bigger than myself. So it is about understanding how followers what they’re looking for, before you’re in, helping to set that context about the change and how does it address each of those areas?

Brandon Burton 16:25
I like that. And I imagine followers in different organizations might have maybe different values slightly, but it’s going to stick, you know, pretty traditionally, I would think with these four categories that you talked about as a as a leader, do you need to adopt or really focus on all four categories? Or if you’re really good at two or three, can you lean into those and maybe carry through maybe a weaker category that your followers are looking at?

Lynn Turner 16:57
Yeah, and I think you have to one understand, you know, the type of leader that you are, right? We’re not. There isn’t one set type of leader, right? And and, you know, part of understanding VUCA too, is things are moving so fast that it’s going to require a village. It takes a team so understanding our own strengths as leaders, but also understanding maybe where we don’t have strengths, and building our team accordingly, so that you can hit each of those aspects with regards to what followers are looking for from leaders. And you know, one of the things that I do talk with leaders about, there was a term that I came across, I think it’s from the book talent IQ, and they talk about strategic humility. So strategic humility is knowing, at least having an idea of where you want to go, having that, you know, that strategic purview, if you will, but having the humility to say, You know what, I’m not exactly sure how to get there, and I’m willing to ask for help. So that’s also to the the name of my company is core XP that so I explained core. Core is really about developing that core. And for me, the core of your business is your people and your culture and and that’s what drives your business, that’s at the heart of your business. And everything radiates out from there. It radiates out into how you do, what you do, your internal operations, systems and processes, into your products and services. And that’s what interfaces with your customers and creates your brand image. So that’s the core. And then then two, the core for individuals is emotions. We are driven by our emotions. Those are at our core and their subconscious, and they influence our mindset, in our attitudes, which also influence our behaviors. And our behaviors are what people see. So it’s really about understanding our core and I’ll explain a little bit more about that, but that XP process is actually a process that an intellectual property that I’m developing, and it really about creating an innovative culture and mindset for individuals and organizations, and it’s really steeped in curiosity. So it is about helping you know leaders to be to really lead with curiosity, because we can. Have all the answers. It’s impossible today, in today’s Bucha world,

Brandon Burton 20:03
right? And that, if you’re looking for answers within your followers too, that that creates more buy in and and appreciation of them, seeing feeling valued and noticed by their leader, looking to them to help with that continuous improvement.

Lynn Turner 20:20
Absolutely, yeah.

Brandon Burton 20:23
Okay, so talk to us a little bit more about the core. You said, come back to that and more on that focus. Yeah,

Lynn Turner 20:30
yeah, yeah. So I mentioned earlier about the assessments, and as I had mentioned to you, I utilize disc. Disk is about behaviors. So that’s kind of in that outer ring of the individual, if you will. Because we’re onions, right? Individuals, people, humans are very complicated. We are very complicated, but our behaviors are what people see, our motivators. And you did talk about kind of those motivators. That’s another layer of us, and that’s not seen. That’s why we do what we do. Behaviors are how we do what we do, but motivators are why we do what we do, and we’re each motivated by different things. So you kind of talked about that, that you know, understanding what motivates people can help them work through the change, if you will, or that continuous improvement, but really at the core of individuals, our emotions, and that has not been an area that we’ve really been able to measure up until recently, I recently, as you shared earlier, I’ve become a Master Practitioner with a very new tool. It’s it’s revolutionary, called Agile brain. It’s based in neuroscience. It’s literally taken 125 years of motivational theory and condensed it into a pretty simplistic, not simple, but simplistic model that we are really finding incredible for for one understanding unmet needs and motivators for individuals, and also for understanding culture within an organization, because a lot of times, traditional surveys are asking you to think about how you feel, and there’s A lot of flaws in that which I can explain.

Brandon Burton 22:43
Yeah, that’s that’s fascinating, the the flaws in thinking about how you feel. And I, I’m guessing, there’s some maybe expectations that maybe you shouldn’t feel this way or shouldn’t feel. So if you give too much thought into it, it’s like, well, what’s the expectation on what I should feel, and it’s kind of skewing. Is that kind of the along the right paths of,

Lynn Turner 23:07
Oh yeah, yeah, you’ve kind of nailed it. So, you know, a lot of organizations do employee satisfaction surveys, or with chambers are doing member surveys, right? And the challenge becomes, we’re asking people to think about how they feel, and they may not share. So there’s reasons that the answers you get may not be accurate. One is, people may be trying to please, so they’re going to kind of share that very rosy picture of things because they’re trying to please others. Others may not be completely honest because they may not feel safe sharing. But the other piece of it is through the neuroscience, our emotions come from the limbic part of our brain, and in that limbic part of our brain we have no language. So I don’t know Brandon for you, but I know for myself, there have been times where I don’t even know how to explain how I’m feeling, and it’s because it’s wrapped up in that limbic part of the brain, and it’s really not until it gets to the nearer cortex, the frontal lobe, until we’re able to make sense of it and put language to it, because that’s the rational side of our brain.

Brandon Burton 24:35
That’s fascinating. I think, going back to the VUCA world, where we’ve got so many, you know, volatility and uncertainty and complexity and ambiguity. There used to be a time where maybe it, maybe it’s more of a perception than a reality, but people seem to be pretty cookie cutter, right? Like you go to school, you get a. A job. You work there your whole life, until you retire, and then you move on, and once you start introducing feelings into this like, as a leader, what are you supposed to do with somebody’s feelings? And that’s a whole nother discussion, I think, to be able to train and help leaders understand how to deal with the feelings and then motivate. Because even though even the motive, the motives that people have for why they do what they do, being based on feelings, not everybody has the same motives for showing up to work and doing their task and what it just kind of opens a can of worms that it’s a can that needed to be open. So how do you work with the leaders on this, on on managing that that change,

Lynn Turner 25:44
you brought up a few, a few different things that that are pretty interesting. So first of all, I do have to forewarn individuals with regards to Agile brain. If you’re looking to do culture work for your organization, it is not for the faint of heart. So I forewarn leaders, do not go down this path unless you are really want to know right? Don’t ask the question unless you really want to know the answer. So first of all, otherwise, I don’t recommend it, and unless you plan to do something with that information. So it’s not just about, okay, now we know whatever you gotta do something with the information, but it can be, it can be, it can be scary, right? Because maybe you weren’t ready to hear this information, but the, you know, there’s a I’ve had the opportunity to see Alan Mulally speak. Alan Mulally was the former CEO for Boeing many, many years ago, and then he got he started working with Ford, and that was during the the financial crisis, and they were the only one. They were the only car company at that time that did not take the bailout. But Alan Mulally had a belief that you can’t manage a secret, so you really have to get to the heart of things if you’re really going to solve the challenge or the problem or come up with solutions. So agile brain really helps you identify specific areas that may need some assistance. And sometimes it’s just communication. It’s not it and sometimes it’s things that the company offers, but employees aren’t aware of it, so having this information just helps you build a stronger core, if you will, of of people and culture.

Brandon Burton 27:52
Yeah, I like that coming back to the core. So how does agile brain? How does it work? Is this like, do you put on, like a helmet? Is it a test? What does it look like to actually perform this neuroscience on these followers and organizations?

Lynn Turner 28:09
Yeah, yeah. No, no helmet required, unless maybe for afterwards, when we do debris, but no helmet required for that. It’s actually, it’s really quick, and that’s part of the neuroscience. We don’t want people to have time to think. The other thing is, it’s image based, so it’s not no text. There is a prompt, and we can customize the prompt to help, you know, really get at what you’re trying to get at for the organization. So if it’s around culture, we would do it about how people feel about working at XYZ. And then basically, these pictures flash in front of you, and it takes three minutes, and you’re done, and it will show what we would call activation in different areas. So it’s basically broken down into four domains of self, which is that world within us, material, which is the external world of work and play, social, which is about our relationships and our connections, and then spiritual, which is about higher ideals and principles. And then there are three levels. There’s the foundational level, which is about being, there’s the experiential level, which is about doing, and then there’s the aspirational level, which is about having. So as you can see, I mean, Maslow’s is probably the most widely known or understood. So it does pull from Maslow, as well as a host of other bodies of work, but those are kind of the four, four domains and three levels that it looks at.

Brandon Burton 29:54
Okay. Well, that helps, because I’m picturing like nodes and stuff hooked up to your brand, and I. Like in the laboratory, all sorts of stuff. No, that that makes sense. So I’d like to ask, as I have people on the show for those listening, they’re typically leaders of chambers of commerce. For these chamber leaders who are looking to elevate their chamber to the next level, what kind of tip or action item might you share with them, especially as it relates to managing and leading change? Yeah, so

Lynn Turner 30:29
with leading change, so, you know, we talked about VUCA, and we kind of talked about that ominous volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, there is a flip side. So the way to fight VUCA is with VUCA. So it is about developing a vision. It is about having understanding of both your internal and your external worlds, and then also having clarity and creating clarity for those inside your organization as well as those outside your organization, and then building in agility. So these all need to be built into your organization, into your culture. But one of the biggest things that I talk to leaders about is shifting that mindset, because I think a lot of leaders felt that they need to be experts, and there’s a lot of pressure to be experts, and as I think you need experts within your organization, but as you rise through The ladder and become a leader. It’s more about being an explorer and leading with curiosity. So that’s kind of the shift that I’m I’m suggesting to leaders of all kinds, whether chambers, business world leaders even, is to really shift into curiosity. And one of the reasons, when we are genuinely curious, we are void of judgment. So if we’re void of judgment and we have that curiosity, we’re able to make better decisions, because sometimes we want to get we’re too attached to certain things and improving our expertise, if you will. And that can sometimes narrow the aperture, and in today’s world, we really need to widen that aperture.

Brandon Burton 32:37
I like that. I love the idea of curiosities and void of judgment and, and I think it may be helpful even to put that out there as you ask questions and try to learn more, to say, look, this is coming from a place of curiosity, so there is no judgment attached to it. I want to learn more about you and what motivates you and and being able to create the flip side of VOCA, the vision understanding clarity and agility. I love that. So Lynn, as we look to the future of chambers of commerce, how would you, from your perspective, how would you look at the future of chambers and their purpose going forward?

Lynn Turner 33:19
It’s an important question, right? And I have been working with several different chambers, and, you know, I think it does. I’ll go back to Peter Drucker. He’s got a slew of different quotes that just really resonate. He really was ahead of his time, but he asks a couple questions, What business are you in, and what business do you want to be in, or what business will you be in for the future? And depending on how you define yourself, can tell you a lot, because if we say we’re a buggy whip company. Well, then I if we’re locked into that, that may not give us an opportunity for future growth and expansion if we’re so attached to being that buggy whip company. So I think it is about really taking a good hard look at who you are, what you do, and why you do it. What is that purpose? What is that vision? And for chambers, it is a difficult time. You know, there’s a lots of different competition out there. And I mean, where I am, we have, we have chambers in every town, if you will. So there’s a lot of competition, and the businesses only have so much, you know, so many resources as far as time, money, energy. So where do they? Want to best spend that time, money, energy. So I think it’s really about also asking yourself, what problem are you trying to solve for your your members, your community, whatever it is.

Brandon Burton 35:12
Yeah, absolutely. I love that. This has been a fun, interesting conversation. Admittedly, it’s gone some directions I did not expect. So this is hopefully listeners as well, are taking some notes and thinking of different perspectives, different angles that they can take with their their followers, with their members, with their staff, their board, to be able to figure out what, what are the emotional aspect that drives their motives to their actions, that they see to further drive engagement and participation. So I appreciate the perspective you brought your expertise and ability to speak so clearly to this topic. I did want to give you an opportunity, Lynn, to share any contact information for listeners who may want to reach out and learn more or figure out more about your work. What would be the best way for them to reach out and connect with you?

Lynn Turner 36:13
I’m sure they can email me at lynn@corebusinessxp.com and that is the web website as well, corebusinessxp.com so either way is, is fine. And you know, the biggest two thing too, I would say, for chambers too, is getting that alignment with you, with your board, making sure everybody’s on the same page and has the same understanding of language, too.

Brandon Burton 36:47
Yes, I think that’s key. Well, I will get this in our show notes for this episode so people can can find you there. But again, Lynn, this has been a fun and a fun conversation. I’ve learned a lot, and I’m sure as I go back and re listen to this episode of I’m going to pick up some other things too that kind of sink in the second time around. So I appreciate it, and I see a lot of application into the chamber world. So thank you so much for being with us today.

Lynn Turner 37:15
Yeah, thank you. Thank you. I really appreciate it. Brandon, it was great conversation with you.

Brandon Burton 37:20
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You’re joining us for a special episode in our 2024 chamber of the year final the series and our guests for this episode is Sandra Wilson. Sandra is the president and CEO of the Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce. She joined the chamber in 2013 and before that she was a community volunteer she was the first woman to serve as Chairman of the Board for the Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce in 1996 and later also as the first woman chair of the greater Paducah Economic Development Board. on a statewide level, she served as chairman of the Kentucky Manufacturers Association and on the board of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce and leadership, Kentucky. She is a past board member of ACCE and serves on the local chamber advisory board for the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce and as chair of the board for the Carson center Performing Arts Center in Paducah. She is the ambassador for Kentucky for the Association of leadership programs. She’s a graduate of Murray State University and leadership Kentucky and leadership Paducah and 2017 that Paducah chamber was named as chamber the year and category two from ACC. They’re also a five star accredited chamber by the US Chamber of Commerce. Sandra holds IMF IOM certification from the US Chamber of Commerce that Sandra, it’s great to have you back with us on chamber chat podcast. It’s always good to get past guests back on the show. But first congratulations to you and your team for being selected as a chamber the year finalist again, what an accomplishment. wanted to give you a chance to say hello to all the listeners and to share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little better. Oh

Sandra Wilson 2:53
my goodness, Brandon. Well, thank you so much for hosting us and inviting me to be on the show today. I consider it quite an honor. And we are thrilled to be a finalist in 2024 is chamber of the year in Category Two. And we know who the other chambers are. And we look forward to seeing them at the ACC conference and visiting with them we have in the past about sharing ideas. And I think that’s really what chambers are so good at is doing is sharing ideas of what’s working in each other’s community so we can all be the best that we can possibly be for our community.

Brandon Burton 3:29
Absolutely, yes, that category two really all the categories this year, great chambers, great programs, but I’m looking at category two specifically I know them as well. And it’s a good competition all around. So whoever whoever wins, this is going to earn it for sure.

Sandra Wilson 3:48
Not be in the category with with those other chambers. So we’re thrilled about it. Absolutely.

Brandon Burton 3:54
Well tell us a little bit about the Paducah chamber Puducherry chamber and give us some perspective of the size of the chamber staff budget scope of work just to kind of prepare us for our discussion today.

Sandra Wilson 4:06
We are located in Paducah, Kentucky, and it’s in the western part of the state of Kentucky. So it’s kind of a rural area. But we’re located in the city of the rural part of Western Kentucky. And we’re the largest chamber in this area. We’re about 950 members always pushing to get to 1000 staying around that area. We have been at five staff members until the first of June, and the first of June we finally had the opportunity to hire a sixth employee. We during the last couple of years we raised money to launch a leadership center within our chamber of commerce. So we’ve hired a full time Executive Director for that will be staffing that portion of our chamber and he started June 1 So it’s been different having six here. You know you are so excited to be able to grow and add more staff. We are truly the chamber. We, our economic development involvement is we own our building we just bought our building within the last year and the greater paddock economic development is here with us are one of our tenants, we work very closely with them and helping to recruit economic development, but we’re the chamber and we work on behalf of our community, we lead the advocacy efforts for our region. We’re a hub for small business development programs. We’re the convener of people, and we love that part. You know, what we really want to do is just continually work to improve this community. So others that come here and visit it love it as much as we do. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 5:45
absolutely. What a great time to join the chamber though for the new staff member I mean, chamber the year year. Yeah. Great timing. So on these chamber, the or finalist episodes, I’d like to spend the majority of our time discussing the two programs of work that you guys submitted on your chamber the your application. I think there’s a lot there that other chambers listening can learn from and be able to scale and adapt and maybe apply something similar into their communities. So we’ll focus the majority of our time on those programs as soon as they get back from this quick break.

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All right, Sandra, we are back. As I mentioned before the break, we’re going to focus on the two programs that are submitted on your chamber the your application. If you would please introduce the first program that you’d like to address this today on the show and we’ll we’ll dive into the details of that. As

Sandra Wilson 8:34
a chamber, I think it’s really important that you look at what is going on in your community and what is the most important program or something that you need to take on and tackle. And for us, it it’s been the Department of Energy site here in Paducah for many years. But it took a different perspective in the last year and a half that planet that they announced in 2013, that they were ceasing operations and they would go into in what’s called Legacy environmental management. It was for cleanup of the site, which meant that they were still going to be there for probably 30 to 40 years and the cleanup stage. But it’s it’s it’s different than when it was operating. And it was different for us is the way our community needed to embrace the Department of Energy. So we’ve been in that phase for over 10 years now. And it became apparent to us because we got very involved with the national trade association for communities that have a department of energy side that’s in this phase of cleaning up the energy communities Alliance. We started going to their meetings we started meeting you know, we’ve always been the advocacy organization asking for money, but we for the for the cleanup, but we started looking at what needs to be done out there for the future. We really didn’t have a plan for beyond the cleanup phase, where there’s all He’s an opportunity for development, economic development to continue. So we applied for a grant with the Department of Energy to lead the reindustrialization study for that site to really map out the future. Because there there could be a parallel path for this site, you can have it the cleanup going on that we’re working with. Now, again, on our advocacy side, for the chamber, we are fighting for funding, we have fight for long term contracts, those are the things that we’re representing there. On the second side of it, the parallel path would be looking at how we could get the land that has been dedicated and managed, owned by the department of energy transferred back to our community so that we can begin to do economic development project programs, and overall economic development of that site. So we developed a grant request, and we’re very successful to get that, and we’ll be we’re about a year into it now. And we’ll be, you know, continuing throughout the next six months to a year as well on it. So with that, I have grant request had some major pillars in it, of course, that we have to accomplish. And one of those is identifying and infrastructure needs for the land that would be transferred back to the community. And in step one of that also, you had to, we had to do the official formal request from our community, for the very first parcel of land to be transferred back to the community. So that has been accomplished. And so now we’re looking at what the infrastructures would would need water, roads, all of that, to make that successful economic development. And then we will continue with working on prospects for economic development. We’ve been to national conferences to meet with companies that are interested in locating and an economic in a on a Department of Energy site, a joint adjacent to it or nearby. We’re working on the workforce. And really, we’re looking on the workforce for now and for the future. So that’s part of our grant that is really overlapping from what’s happening now, and going into the future for the next few years. And so those were the main things, those were really a little bit unusual for our chamber, because we’re not the economic development organization for our community. But we work with economic development very closely. And we have worked with the Department of Energy for so many years that we know knew that they have a lot of trust in our chamber, that we have built a relationship with them for the year. So they knew that we would take this very seriously, and that we would make sure it’s done correctly.

Brandon Burton 12:50
So what kinds of things were maybe surprising as you went through the study of trying to revitalize this this land? Was there anything that came to light that you didn’t expect? That has kind of course the direction that you’re going going forward?

Sandra Wilson 13:07
I think that identifying the companies that might be interested to come here has been a very interesting prospect. I mean, that we can’t really, you know, we’ve just put in the land transfer request, that had to be step number one, and then we’ll begin to identify who would be interested in coming here. So there’s a lot of opportunity there. The Department of Energy has a lot of funding available for developing new companies. But there’s just a lot of things that will come to light as we begin to work through this process. Yeah.

Brandon Burton 13:43
All right. Is there any specific industry or type of business you feel like would be an ideal candidate for what’s on a former Department of Energy? Land?

Sandra Wilson 13:56
There are some that are, you know, Newt, mislaid, nuclear clean energy potential for small modular reactor. I mean, right now we’re identifying those and who would consider coming here, there are a lot of fuel fabrication, a lot of things that are really all new to us, as a as a chamber, that we’ve been able to work with the context that we built through the many years that we’ve been involved with the Department of Energy to know who they may be. Right.

Brandon Burton 14:24
Now, as I think of a chamber of the year finalists, we’re really looking at chambers that are making a big impact on their community. And what you guys are focused on here with this Department of Energy land, this can be a huge impact to the economy in the Paducah area and just a change of atmosphere, if you will, depending on how that goes forward. So that I see it being a huge impact in the community.

Sandra Wilson 14:51
Thank you. I would totally agree. The decisions we are making today and that we are identifying for the future really are Setting our community for the futures for the next 50 years and beyond. Because it’s so critical that we diversify our economy here, we’ve had this Department of Energy site for 60, year of 5060 years, it was a great employer of some of the best jobs in our community they employed, you know, way over 1000, they still do that. But it’s sometimes in the peaks, I’ve been up to 1800 to 2000. And so we became really reliant on that, because we had such a good base. But it’s important that we continue to diversify all of that economy, you know, community, our size is not a huge geographical large county. So that is available land that we need to focus on for economic development for the future. We have said before, when we’re meeting with the Department of Energy, we don’t want to be part of just their history, we want to be a part of their future. And they have a lot of programs available for working with companies that are looking at the future of energy projects. Our state, for example, we had in our advocacy efforts for 2024, with the state priorities was all quite a bit about nuclear energy. And our state has a set aside, established a new nuclear Working Group advisory board that will be run out of the University of Kentucky. And you know, there’s identifying criteria for making a community nuclear ready. Prior to that our community had already identified and adopted resolutions by our city government or county government, our chamber economic development, our community reuse organization, stating that we are a community that’s a nuclear ready. And by that we meant we’ve been in this arena for many years. We understand it, we know it, our workforce knows that we’re ready to go for the next step. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 16:59
that’s great. I love what you said about, you don’t want to just be a part of the their history but a part of the future as well. So I love being forward thinking like that.

Sandra Wilson 17:11
Girl is also I’ll just say what he’s really put me out in the and a national forefront. I was able to speak at a waste management symposium earlier this year, and was on a panel out there where there were I think 3000 People now wasn’t I didn’t speak to that hopeful 3000, I spoke to a panel on a panel specific about cleanup of the Department of Energy side. But it’s put me in a whole new arena, really talking about that. And I also believe that it is putting a chamber chambers of commerce across the country in a new arena where you can show that you adjust to what your community needs are. And we saw this as a really strong need, we embraced it, we were very intentional on how we would move forward with it. And we are going to deliver the best product that we can for the Ark communities path forward, we call it our roadmap for the community. So that whoever picks it up at the end, knows exactly the next steps for land transfer, who the economic development prospects are and has their contacts and knows what they would want for infrastructure needs, and knows what the workforce would need to be. So we’re preparing our future at the community now.

Brandon Burton 18:24
That’s great. I love it. Love it, love it. Let’s shift gears a little bit into the second program that was submitted on your chamber that your application if you introduce that to us and kind of the the origins and how that’s developed?

Sandra Wilson 18:40
Well, when I talk about economic development, let me just say we say it all the time, it happens one job at a time. It’s great when you have a new company come in and they’re announcing three to 400 500. But you have so many small businesses in Riyadh in reality Chamber of Commerce for us. In located where we are about three fourths of our members are considered small businesses. And they’re reliant on the big employers around them for the customers and the you know, the activity that comes in for them. But they are truly what we would call economic development at its finest. And we have a small business cohort that had we’ve graduated 40 from the program, and we see how they are hiring people. They’re expanding. They’re opening new locations, because of the programs that they have seen that can be successful, how they can develop it and make their own business more successful through what they’ve learned in our small business cohort. We have all kinds of seminars, we have a lot of programs that go on, we get calls every day that how do you do a business plan? How do you get this will central to that was our Small Business Development Center, that chamber How does it how’s that but we have a close relationship in partnership with the Small Business Development Center. The way it is structured in our state is that I have to raise it was it was restricted a little bit where they had to raise the funding locally to keep their program open. When you have somebody that’s supposed to be advising small business owners, I didn’t, we didn’t want them to have to spend their time or decided that the chamber. And we went out in the community and the chamber, first of all, and we went to our economic development, our city or county and our local organizations that benefit from having small business development center in our community. And we were able to raise the money that was needed to keep that program open, and that you’re continuing to be a close partner with us and everything that we do for our small businesses.

Brandon Burton 20:42
So I’m curious and how you went about raising the money? Was it about just getting the the awareness out about what the need was and making strategic assets? or was there some kind of event or fundraiser I had, what was the approach to raising those funds?

Sandra Wilson 20:57
First of all, our Small Business Development Center had a great track record, so they could show the businesses that they had helped, and what it involved with jobs and with economic development, so when you go and talk to a mayor, or a county judge, and you can show them the benefits and the success that they’ve been having, it really helps a lot. And we were able to do that. So it was strategic meetings, and some phone calls. But we did go to a lot of meetings in person. Most all of them were our members, primarily, we did work with an adjoining county that had some support as well. But we that adjoining county is a really close partner with our own county and with our chamber, they’ve been very involved with us through the years. So we had built those relationships. I think everyone that we asked knew that they could trust us as well, that we wouldn’t be behind it if we didn’t know that it was going to be a very successful program. And so that that’s what we did, we mostly, I would say, went one on one with meetings. But it wasn’t an impossible sale, where it was more of an education. And let’s face it, everything at the end comes down to making the ask closing the deal. Yeah.

Brandon Burton 22:11
So you didn’t do like a mass email and say we’re collecting funds, it was more strategic and gave some intention behind that. So

Sandra Wilson 22:22
we knew that their partners were, we knew who the small businesses that they were helping with we’re working with, we knew that overall, no one wanted to lose this resource that we had in our community. I think that was someone the number one thing that we all agreed on. It was just how do we make sure that we’re doing the steps that we need to and somebody has to take the lead on anything that you’re going to do somebody has to take the lead to make sure that it’s being done, it’s being done in a timely way it’s being reported, and that everything that needs to be done, when you’re looking at raising funds, it was going to the University of Kentucky, that everything that needed to be done was was completed the way it should be. So

Brandon Burton 23:09
the raising of the funds, is that something that needs to be done on an annual basis for the Small Business Development Center? Or is it what what kind of interval was that where they need to come up with the funds to justify staying open, we

Sandra Wilson 23:21
set it up on a two year program. So everyone committed for two years, I believe at the end of those two years, we will not have any trouble continuing with that, because he’s already met his goals for the year right now, you know, and halfway through the year, so he’s got the rest of the year to continue. You know, just to build up on that and expand, the one thing that he probably needed to do was be able to expand into other counties. A lot of his work was being done in our immediate area in Paducah and the immediate surrounding area. But there are other counties in our community that did step in our West Kentucky Regional Chamber Alliance stepped in and made a nice contribution to help with them. And they represent 14 counties in West Kentucky. So it was a really opportunity to allow that this service to be expanded as well. Yeah,

Brandon Burton 24:11
that’s fantastic. Guys came in as heroes.

Sandra Wilson 24:17
So I mean, in regionalism, and how important it is that if our county is successful, it’s overflowing into other counties. And if our county next door has businesses opening, more than likely, you know, we’re going to benefit from that in some way. And so, really show the strength I think of working together to support something in your region that you know, is vital and is very important. What was

Brandon Burton 24:43
key to me is how you mentioned it was it was all built upon the relationships that you guys have built over the years to be able to go make those asked to make those connections build lean upon the county next door and to be able to make this happen and it is it’s what chambers do is convening and building those relationships and That’s, uh, you guys executed well on that. So great job.

Sandra Wilson 25:06
It was really fun, because it actually put us out in the community back meeting with our own members. But you know, the underlying factor too is we knew we really couldn’t continue our own small business development programs that we have, if we didn’t have that resource. It was critical for us to have that. So it was a great investment. Right? And resources.

Brandon Burton 25:29
Yes, yeah. So I like asking, especially as we have you on as a chamber, the year finalist for chambers that are out there listening, what kind of tip or action item might you share for a listener who’s interested in taking their chamber up to the next level?

Sandra Wilson 25:46
There are a lot of resources out there that are very beneficial. And I think you have to look at your own region to see how what what’s needed the most. And then you can rely on for us, we rely on our State Chamber, the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce a lot. I mean, we work very closely with them, we rely on the US Chamber of Commerce and rely on them. And as a chamber executive, we rely on the association of Chamber of Commerce executives, there are great resources available, that if you just will take the time, that and I’m just gonna say that’s probably some of the hardest thing. That’s the hardest that you have to find. Because as a chamber, executive, chamber staff person, you’re managing a lot of different tasks, no day is ever the same. No crisis is ever the same. No, celebration is ever the same. And so you have to really be always looking to see what someone else is doing. And then the chamber rolled, you know, I think we call it r&d, the RIP and duplicate, and you make it your own. And we do that, and we’re honored when another chamber does that from something that we’re doing, if they can, if we can help them to be more successful. That’s awesome. Because that’s helping more communities to be successful, more Chambers of Commerce. So identify what’s needed in your community, look around and see how you what would be the best organization for you to align yourself with on any particular issue. And it’s going to vary from issue to issue.

Brandon Burton 27:21
I love that fact, as I introduce what chamber chat podcast is all about to chamber professionals, I’ll use the tagline that it’s your weekly r&d resource, right? So every week, you get new ideas that you can rip off and duplicate. So I love that learning from others. As we look to the future of chambers, how do you see the future chambers and their purpose going forward?

Sandra Wilson 27:47
I’m gonna go back to the fact that I think you have to identify what’s important in your community, because we’re all different. We all have different challenges and different opportunities, and identify what is going to help your community and I didn’t make a determination if that’s something your chamber should be the lead on, should maybe be the second play the second roll in and pushing, sometimes you just have to push, who maybe it’s a different organization, or maybe it’s the government that should be in the lead, and you’re the one pushing them to help them better understand that there are times that you’re going to need to be in the lead and look to others to help you with that. But you’re going to have to stay relevant in your own community.

Brandon Burton 28:32
I like that trying to figure out what your role should be and what your community needs. I think a lot of chambers just jumped to the conclusion oh, we need to be the lead. And like he said, oftentimes be in that second role and helping to push it along and explain why things are important is very helpful. You’re still leading but you don’t have to take that that main charge and carry that that weight that comes with it as well. So great, great piece of advice with that as well. Well, Sandra, before we let you go, I wanted to give you an opportunity to share any contact information for listeners who’d like to reach out and learn more about how you guys are doing things there in Paducah, what would be the best way for them to reach out and connect with you. Okay,

Sandra Wilson 29:11
that’s great. I always appreciate sharing information and I can tell you that I call others all the time to ask for their advice. So you can reach us at PaducahChamber.org And my direct email is swilson@paducahchamber.org. And let me spell Paducah, Pa d u c h Paducah. And wire info if you can’t remember as well send info@PaducahChamber.org. We’ll get you through to ours and we’ll answer you.

Brandon Burton 29:41
That’s perfect. And I’ll get it in our show notes for this episode as well. So somebody can pull that up and find your email and website and all that good stuff. But Sandra, this has been great to have you back on chamber chat podcast and again, big congratulations to you and your team for being selected as a finalist for the great work you guys are doing. Under the Paducah area, and I wish you and your team Best of luck as chamber the year. Thank

Sandra Wilson 30:05
you, Brandon. Thank you for all you do for the chamber profession. We really do appreciate it. Thank you.

Brandon Burton 30:10
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