North Central Massachusetts Chamber 2021 ACCE Chamber of the Year Finalist with Roy Nascimento

This transcript has been lightly edited for readability and to correct obvious transcription errors while preserving the meaning of the original conversation.

Episode 134 — North Central Massachusetts Chamber 2021 Chamber of the Year Finalist with Roy Nascimento
Clean Speaker-Labeled Transcript
Guest: Roy Nascimento
Automated QA: Passed

00:00.83 Brandon Burton
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. And now your host. He is amazed at the way Chambers stepped up to guide the business community through the COVID pandemic. He's my dad, Brandon Burton. Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to the Chamber Chat Podcast. Thank you for joining us today for another one of our 2021 ACCE Chamber of the Year finalist series episodes. Chamber Chat Podcast is sponsored by Holman Brothers Membership Sales Solutions. Is your chamber struggling to drive the revenue it needs to support your initiatives? It's a common problem, and one that our new title sponsor, Holman Brothers Membership Sales Solutions, knows a lot about. Doug and Bill Holman aren't just sales consultants, they're real live chamber guys with 20 plus years of chamber leadership experience. They know how to diagnose and solve member recruiting issues faster and better than anyone else, and they're ready to put that knowledge to work for you in your chamber. Call the Holman Brothers today at 619-852-1391 or check them out at HolmanBros.com. That's H-O-L-M-A-N-B-R-O-S.com. Our guest for this episode as we continue this Chamber the Year finalist series is Roy Nascimento from the North Central Massachusetts Chamber of Commerce. And Roy is the president and CEO of Of the North Central Massachusetts Chambers, and he has been since January 2015. Under his leadership, the North Central Massachusetts Chamber has been recognized among the top chambers of commerce in the country for its impact and operations. Among its many honors, the chamber was a 2017 runner-up for the prestigious National Chamber of the Year Award, the first chamber in Massachusetts and New England to have ever been recognized as a finalist.
02:05.186 Brandon Burton
The chamber also received a four-star accreditation in 2018. A 20-year veteran of the Chamber profession, Roy previously served as CEO of the New Bedford Area Chamber of Commerce from 2006 until December 2014. Under his leadership, the chamber expanded member offerings and revitalized its advocacy, economic development, and communications programs. Roy also previously led the Attleboro Area Chamber of Commerce and served as vice president at the Metro South Chamber of Commerce in Brockton. Roy is a leader with the Chamber of Commerce in the Chamber of Commerce Industry. He's a past president of the Board of Massachusetts Association of Chamber of Commerce Executives and is past chair of the New England Association Chamber of Commerce Executives and the MACCE Council of Chambers. In recognition of his leadership and record of accomplishments, Roy was awarded the New England Chamber Executive of the Year Award in 2011. Roy comes from a family of small business owners and learned the challenges and value at a young age of small business and the impact to the success of the local economy and community. He holds a bachelor's degree in political science from the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, and a master's degree in public administration. From the Sawyer Business School at Suffolk University. He is also a graduate of the Institute of Organizational Management at Villanova University and the Economic Development Institute at the University of Oklahoma. He also earned his CCE designation from ACCE. He's married to Mara and is a proud father of two young daughters. Roy, I'm Excited to have you with me today here on Chamber Chat Podcast. I'd love for you to take a moment just 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.
04:02.958 Roy Nascimento
First off, Brandon, thank you so much for having me on. I'm I'm a listener to your podcast, as we were talking about earlier, and and really it's an honor to be on. It's it's to to be showcased nationally through this this platform. I can't tell you what it means to me. It's really really an honor. So a little bit about me, I think my my bio you already mentioned a little little something that your listeners probably don't know, is that as my bio that you read mentioned I'm I'm the child my parents were were entrepreneurs, they had businesses and but most of your listeners probably don't know is that my parents were immigrants so they actually immigrated to this country from Europe from the country of Portugal and I was born here in the United States but what most people don't know is that I have dual citizenship. I actually was a US citizen and then just a few years ago I went back and got my my citizenship from Portugal in Europe. you know, a buddy of mine who's also in the chamber industry had gotten his dual citizenship from Ireland. He applied because his I think his great grandmother or something was was originally from Ireland and and and I thought that was pretty cool and you know I'm proud of my Portuguese heritage and and thought that would be pretty neat to do. So I went back and and applied and was able to get my my citizenship there and now it's something that my kids are eligible for in the future. So if they ever want to work in Europe, you know, there's certain advantages to that. So I just thought it was pretty neat to do and something that's unique about me.
05:40.268 Brandon Burton
That is pretty neat. And I mean the whole dual citizenship thing, but also the the parents of immigrant parents to to be able to learn from them and their story and and living the American dream, you know, coming over here as entrepreneurs. That that is awesome. Well, if you would take a moment to tell us a little bit about the North Central Massachusetts chamber, kind of your size, budget, staff. that sort of thing, just to kind of give us some perspective as we get into our discussion today.
06:11.31 Roy Nascimento
Sure, yeah, we're we're a regional chamber. we cover 17 communities under the umbrella of our chamber, and then we cover another 10 communities under our economic development arm and our tourism arm. So there's a total of 27 communities that we define as north central Massachusetts that we officially cover. And our our chamber has a staff of approximately about 15. 15 FTEs. We have some some part-time folks that work at our visitor center that are in Included there, but about 13 folks that work full-time and the professional staff. Our budget's $1.1 million for the chamber, and then we have separate budgets for our our economic development arm, our tourism arm, and our foundation, and then we have a for-profit insurance affiliate underneath the umbrella of the chamber. So our our total budget's probably closer to 2.1 million, a little over 2 million, if we were to take into account all of the affiliate organizations. does that help?
07:16.204 Brandon Burton
Yes, that does. That that helps. It's always interesting to hear what type of chamber you are. So being regional and and having the tourism and economic development and the foundation all under under the the chamber umbrella. It definitely helps with that perspective and kind of how all these things are intertwined. But that'll kind of set the table a little bit as we get into our discussion today, as we focus on the the programs that were in your The program synopsis on your application for Chamber of the Year. And we will get into that discussion as soon as we get back from this quick break. Are you looking for a year-round affordable and timely shop local campaign for your chamber or CVB? Look no further. Build a custom Eat Shop Play mobile app with App My Community by visiting appmycommunity.com slash chamber chat. App My Community mobile apps are not just simple membership directory listings, they provide many more capabilities to engage with your community. Provide your residents with a robust events calendar, partner with a local fair, festival, or farmers market to provide a schedule, map, and other resources to promote the event. Run a small business Saturday campaign any time of the year using built-in scavenger hunts. Allow your membership to communicate directly to their customers via push notifications. Your App My Community mobile app will be a unique member benefit, allow you to generate non-dues revenue with sponsorship opportunities, and best of all, provide a valuable resource to your community. Please visit AppmyCommunity.com slash chamberchat now to receive 10% off your first year of an App My Community mobile app. All right, Roy, we're back. so as I mentioned, we'll be talking about the the two programs that you submitted on your chamber of the year application. if you would maybe just tell us what those two programs are and then we can dive in a little deeper on on the meanings behind them and and some of the details.
09:23.362 Roy Nascimento
Sure. So we we identified two programs that over the last year that really had an impact in our region. one was our response to COVID-19 specifically. One of the tools we had in our toolbox was our our lending program. We have one of our our economic development arm has a has a micro loan program that typically focuses on startup businesses. and existing small businesses that for whatever reason have a challenge getting capital from traditional sources like banks and credit unions. So we've we've had a longstanding tradition of providing these loans, typically small loans of $25,000 to startup businesses as a way of generating jobs and investment in our communities. So when COVID-19 hit, we pivoted immediately and and used every tool in our toolbox To help support our businesses and our and our communities get through COVID-19. And one of the one of the that that tool, the micro lending program, we pivoted that and really immediately established. We went to our board and established an emergency loan program. We we recognized that state and federal government would be stepping up with different types of resources, but it would take time for that to happen and and businesses needed help. So we established this really with the purpose of being kind of a a bridge just to help provide capital to businesses that needed it until some of those resources from the federal government came through and state government came through. And what we found was that we were immediately overwhelmed with with the request, and we actually went through our pool pool of resources pretty quickly and actually had to had to raise some additional capital. So we ended up raising About $425,000 from donors in the community that helped us continue to provide those emergency loans to businesses. And then we also secured a loan of $500,000 from the Small Business Administration, which we used to provide as capital to provide additional loans at the beginning of the pandemic. That was during the very early dark days of the pandemic. And then later we shifted our focus because we saw that.
11:44.616 Roy Nascimento
as as the pandemic went on, that these resources started up, the PPP program, the EIDL loan program, local grants, state grants, and you know, we shifted our focus on our lending because we started to see that there were certain elements of the business community that that weren't taking advantage of these programs or didn't have access to these programs and that needed a little bit more support and a little bit more resources. And these were Typically vulnerable businesses in our community. So a lot of the data showed that a lot of minority businesses and women-owned businesses were not taking advantage of some of these programs like PPP in our area. So we started to really focus in on doing a lot of outreach to our Latino community, which is in particular our largest minority population within North Central Massachusetts. And the data suggests that they weren't taking advantage of PPP, they weren't taking advantage of these other programs. And this is an important and important element of our community. is these Latino business owners are are typically the data shows they're starting businesses at three times the rate of the general population, and we wanted them to survive, we wanted them to be able to access these resources. So we hired a person on our staff. Augmented our staff by hiring someone who's multilingual with an economic development and banking background who spoke Spanish, Portuguese, and English to help us further our outreach and really target the Latino community as well as other minorities in the region. And we partnered, we have strong partnerships with other groups. So we did a lot of great work with that outreach that resulted in connecting them with our banks and securing. You know, securing the PPP loans and securing, you know, the grants from our our local communities and from the state that were available as well. And then and then it we changed again and kind of pivoted again and and actually started providing PPP loans ourselves through our economic development arm underneath the umbrella of the chamber. It's certified as a it's called a community development financial institution, certified by the US Treasury. So that enabled us to actually provide PPP.
14:02.75 Roy Nascimento
ourselves. So altogether, since March of 2020, we provided about $2.7 million in loans ourselves through our through the chamber and our economic development arm. The average amount was just $14,000. And about half of those were half of that 2.7 was traditional emergency loans, mainly at the beginning of the pandemic. And then the other half was the paycheck Protection program loans. And that was again really targeted towards those vulnerable elements of our community that weren't taking advantage of it because for what whatever reason. And so we did a lot of good work there. And that's just the loans we provided. We also worked a lot with our banks, worked a lot with our credit unions, worked a lot with other stakeholders and partners in the community. And there are millions more that we can that were loans that were. Provided thanks to referrals the chamber made and the assistance we provided. Our team actually provided over 3,000 hours of direct technical assistance that we tracked, which is about six times the normal year. And there were just a lot of businesses that needed help and guidance getting through the pandemic and navigating all these different resources that were out there. I'm extremely proud and that's something unique about our our chamber. I d I I I know that other chambers may have lending programs, but I don't know how many really participated in providing paycheck protection program loans themselves. so that was that was one program that I think really had an impact.
15:45.346 Brandon Burton
It's very the seems very unique to be able to as a chamber in economic development to be able to provide those loans and the the financial resources. I haven't come across other chambers or economic development that have done, I'm sure they're out there, but I just I haven't come across it yet. what really stood out to me is the ability to to pivot as you see these different markers in the community or different data feedbacks and points to be able to say, okay, now we need to shift. We need to focus here. Okay, that's kind of accomplished. Let's pivot and go over here. And not, you know, chasing, you know, a a distraction, but seeing where those needs were and really helping to fill that gap and helping to sustain these businesses. I think that's wonderful. I didn't mean to cut you off though. So we'll we'll let you
16:31.148 Roy Nascimento
No, no, no, no. you know, the the the lending program was was just a great tool in our toolbox. And but we did, you know, we we shifted everything to, you know, support our businesses and and our communities. So we used many other tools in our toolbox, our marketing efforts, our our tourism arm. obviously, you know, COVID, you know, we we you know we weren't gonna be promoting trying to attract vi visitors and tourists and groups to our to our region that would be We weren't tone deaf and and obviously with restrictions in place. So we shifted all of our marketing to support shopping local and and really educating the public on COVID and educating businesses. we created a hotline during the beginning of COVID. we all of our advocacy really was focused around supporting businesses and their needs, and we had regular meetings with the administration and with our local leaders. s our programming we shifted immediately to online programming and and hosted nearly a hundred online programs ranging from how to apply for a PPP to, you know, HR concerns, you know, you name it, like a lot of chambers we were providing and a lot of different resources and just information, you know, just being a a a source of of information. You know, there's you know, things were changing. it was a very fluid situation, especially the early days, those dark days of of COVID nineteen. I recall things were changing, it seemed daily and hourly at times. So so businesses really were hungry for a a a a good source of information and our communities were hungry for that. So and we provided that we really have s very strong kind of platforms and communications platforms and we're able to get information out to businesses that helped hopefully help them survive COVID-19. Yeah.
18:30.184 Brandon Burton
Absolutely. Definitely made an impact, I can tell. so why don't why don't you tell us about the other program that you guys submitted on your application and we can dive into that.
18:42.926 Roy Nascimento
So the other program that we submitted is an initiative that we started prior to the pandemic, although it really took off after COVID-19. And that was our online resource, a jobs resource called WorkNorthCentral.com. And what worknorthcentral.com is, is it's a basically a jobs board. It's a regional jobs board, highly localized. Towards the 27 communities of North Central Massachusetts. And our our chamber, like many chambers, have been deeply involved in education and in workforce development. and it seems like we're getting more and more involved in that given some of the workforce challenges that our nation has and our region has, and how critical that is to the advancement of our region and our country. So we've been very, very involved in in in those Those efforts. And what we wanted was to create a tool, just another tool and resource in our portfolio of kind of workforce development programs that could help connect job seekers and employers. Now, you know, we'd have conversations, you know, some employers, some of our members get it. You know, they understand the importance of being involved with the K-12 school systems and with our universities and then others. you know, maybe some of those transactional members you know, they're they're like, that's great, but what are you doing for me now? You know, I have a problem right now, I need workers right now. So we were kind of looking for some kind of tool for our toolbox. And so we decided to create this this jobs board and commit some resources and I and I was a little apprehensive at first because you know, there's all these big jobs boards and and how can we compete with those and are we really gonna make much of a difference and
20:34.158 Brandon Burton
I was gonna ask you about that. What what is the difference in w in the approach that you guys took on that?
20:38.284 Roy Nascimento
Yeah, so so our approach is, you know, we've got several objectives. Well, one is, you know, we want we're this is a a a a niche jobs board. It's just jobs here in north central Massachusetts. And we've tied it into our economic development objectives as well. So we want to promote, you know, we want to promote our our region, the jobs in our region. We want to keep more of our labor force here locally and we don't want them leaving and going to we've d we have the data and we know that that we have a lot of our workers. that that are leaving our region and going to other regions. And you know, we need to retain them and we need to promote the good jobs. And we also want to tie this in and leverage it and maybe tie this into to promoting careers and working with the schools. So but we wanted to start off with this online resource. We also wanted a member benefit. You know, we have those members that you know some of them are mission driven members. They get it, they want to be involved with the schools, they see the big picture. We have some of those that are transactional. They want something now. And so we wanted something that would fit in. And we recently had made a transition to tiered memberships. And so we wanted something that would fit in with our tiered memberships. So we created this online jobs board, dedicated resources to it, including a staff person that works you know half their time on the jobs board and really did a lot of research and created this Work North Central jobs board. And it's absolutely free for any member to post jobs. And then what we did was we built it into our tiers so that our premium members over a certain level get premium job postings on there on the jobs board. And and so but it's it's it's done well. We were we really had pretty modest goals. We were I was always gonna be happy with you know 100 jobs being posted on there and I thought that would be good and we've we've currently have about 1300 jobs posted on the jobs board and we promoted it's and we've had over five thousand jobs since we launched it last time i checked was a few months which was a few months ago and and a lot of that has been in two tw over the last year really and employers are coming to us or posting the jobs on the jobs board for them and and on the back end
23:04.15 Roy Nascimento
Know we look at the data and we're seeing that it's getting pretty good traffic. there's a button on our on our chamber homepage that directs people to the to the jobs board. That is the most clicked on button on our homepage. And we know based on the on the back end, the data that we're seeing is that visitors are going to the jobs board and they're spending a lot of time on it, and much more than other pages of our websites, which which indicates to me that they're using it and and searching through the jobs. And which is which is a positive and and and it's a fairly still fairly new initiative and we're hoping to continue to to leverage the jobs board and do connected to the work that we're doing with the K through twelve school systems. and we're looking at doing for one of the one of our goals is to do a face-to-face big jobs fair. So we have one scheduled for September. Called the Work North Central hiring event, September 28th. And we're really excited about that. It's going to be a big mega regional jobs event with employers. And you know, we're going to be spending a lot of resources on advertising that. And we we've scheduled it for September strategically because the the COVID-19 special unemployment assistance from the federal government is going to be ending in September. And our schools here in Massachusetts, you know, typically start up in September. And so we know that there's a lot of folks in the in the workforce that are maybe staying out of the workforce because of child care issues, because of the schools and because a lot of the childcare that's that's connected to the schools, like the before and after care that that is provided by schools. and a lot of that wasn't taking place over the last year, even once our schools reopened. the before care and after care wasn't available. So a lot of that will will kind of settle down by the fall, we believe. So there'll be a lot of workers coming back into the workforce. And so we're gonna be promoting the heck out of this jobs fair and the jobs board to encourage these job seekers to check out local employers and consider local employers working locally instead of going outside of the region and and
25:23.744 Roy Nascimento
wouldn't mind picking up some workers from outside of the region as well. So that'd be great to attract some of them to to North Central Massachusetts.
25:30.572 Brandon Burton
That's right. It's the the ones that are already there though, that you don't have to sell them on on how great your area is. You know, they're already there. And I I don't know, maybe they think the grass is greener on the other side just because they haven't experienced it. But it it seems like it it should be easier to to keep the people you have there rather than trying to attract new people all the time.
25:50.668 Roy Nascimento
Right. But we know from from things like the Horizons report that, you know, i i labor is mobile, you know, and and they labor can go anywhere and it and there's there's competition for it and there's a lot of challenges that we have. We we're having a lot of people leaving the workforce because they're retiring, you know, baby boomers, and we just don't have enough people coming into the workforce, new people coming into the workforce. So we're trying to trying to deal with that multiple ways and and this jobs board and jobs fair. is is just one element of of our strategy to deal with this and and just trying to promote these jobs and and we know that there are workers that maybe are attracted and going outside a lot of we know based on the data a lot of them are going east towards greater boston and that's a big you know business center and and they're going there probably attracted to higher wages because it it offers higher wages but it's it's also more expensive. And it's also a law much longer commute. And and who knows, now that we have COVID, there's been a lot written about it and talked about how COVID is changing, potentially going to change in the future how we work, where we work, how we where we live, you know, how we shop, you know. So we're an attractive region, affordable region, not far from Boston. So people can continue there. But they if they have an opportunity, they'd perhaps like to work a little closer to home. and you know, and and so we're really trying to showcase those employment opportunities that we have here in the region and the great opportunities that we have.
27:24.684 Brandon Burton
Yeah. Well it just makes such so much sense to have a local jobs board, you know, promoting locally rather than these big, you know, nationwide or worldwide, you know, websites, database. I mean, you've got all the big names out there, but to be able to hone it down, like you said, you have the data, you have the connection with the employers, it just makes sense. Even for a chamber who doesn't have the economic development responsibility in your community, it's still being that connector. For the employers to the community, to those job seekers. It makes a lot of sense to me. so Roy, I wanted to ask, and this may not even be related to anything that you had on your your Chamber of the Year application, but I wanted to see from your perspective what what's something that that you guys are doing there at the North Central Massachuset Massachusetts Chamber that you feel you guys are doing really well, or maybe differently than what other chambers are doing that. that maybe makes you stand out a little bit. I mean, you guys are at the top of your game right now as a a chamber of the year finalist. So we'd love to learn from you.
28:31.662 Roy Nascimento
So it it kind of goes back to where we started where you're asking about our organization. We're really very, very dynamic, and that's because underneath the umbrella of the chamber we have this 501c3 economic development arm that allowed that we're able that we do our lending through and our economic development work. We have another 501c3 arm that focuses on on tourism, also economic development, but it's just a different aspect, more destination marketing and Really trying to attract, you know, folks with a little jingle in their pocket to our communities, because then they're going to spend those dollars in our communities and that generates jobs and tax revenue. And then we have another, you know, 501c3, our foundation that's focused on the on the schools. And and then we have this this insurance arm, small insurance arm that helps us provide insurance with an insurance intermediary. So all that combined makes us very dynamic, I think, and we're involved in a lot of different things and we can provide added value to our communities and to our our our businesses. So that makes us a little unique. I know there's other chambers that also have tourism and economic development. But what makes us really unique is I think the lending piece. So our economic development arm is really especially over the last five years really grown and and really invested in our commitment to providing micro loans to startup businesses into existing businesses and to provide more and more technical assistance, direct technical assistance, one-on-one counseling to businesses that need assistance. And I think that that we're I mentioned we're a community development financial institution certified by the US Treasury, we're a community advantage lender, there's a s a certification from the SBA. We're we're a certified micro lender of the SBA. We're an EDA lender, Economic Development Administration micro lender. So we have all these certifications under the umbrella that that development corporation providing those loans. So that kind of makes us unique. And I think within the chamber world. I know here in Massachusetts, I'm not sure nationally, I have heard of other chambers that do get involved in kind of the lending work, but building up that kind of entrepreneurial
30:55.212 Roy Nascimento
small business ecosystem within our our region, I think we've been really made really a strong impact. and then the other thing I'd mention is is just being kind of a a thought leader and kind of a change agent in our our community. I think this this circles back to you know the work of ACCE with their Horizons report and really you know we're we're big believers, you know, we we drink the Kool-Aid that ACCE is is serving, you know, the Horizons report, all those trends that are happening, you know, we're we're we're seeing them and and adjusting to them and and incorporating them into the work that we do and and that that theme of kind of catalytic leadership, you know, we've embraced that and we want to be we want to help our communities and our members really respond to change that's happening and look at opportunities and and so part of that is we this year prior to the pandemic we actually started this but this a lot of this took place during the pandemic but we we we really underwent a really thoughtful comprehensive regional economic development planning process where we you know over 18 months did a deep dive on the data to really understand our our region We did a lot of the stakeholder stuff doing the listening sessions. You know, had to be all all online, but did lots of focus groups, lots of interviews, surveys. We did benchmarking. We benchmarked ourselves against other regions in our state, as well as regions, similar regions outside of our state. and to better understand our own region as well as you know what we could do to improve. We brought in a consultant to to look at our organization and the the economic development ecosystem here in north central Massachusetts and let us know what what was missing and what can we do better as a region. And ultimately we developed a hundred and fifty-four page economic development blueprint for the region to help guide our efforts over the next ten to fifteen years. And we're really, really excited about this. We're trying to provide some bold leadership in the region. the last time we went through this, you know, we we we did economic development plans every year, but
33:20.268 Roy Nascimento
Not in this kind of comprehensive fashion and and big kind of undertaking. And the last time we went through this was back in the nineties. And so much came out of that that is still driving our economy here 30 years later. Like our lending program came out of that. And our our regional tourism marketing program came out of that because our economy was we have a local military base that was downsizing at the time. We're losing 7,000 jobs. We had big employers that were downsizing. The economy was really in rough shape. And the chamber, working with our community leaders, came up with this plan and said, hey, let's we have to support homegrown businesses. Let's start a lending program. Let's start a technical assistance program. Hey, we have a beautiful region. Let's look at tourism could be a driver in our economy. So let's look at maybe a regional marketing strategy to promote the area to visitors. And that we we were We grew from virtually nothing to a hundred and fifty-nine million a year in direct visitor spending and two hundred and fifty million in and include indirect spending. And we we now have about a thousand jobs that are directly, and that's a very conservative number, a thousand jobs that are directly attributed to tourism in our region. so we've we've had tremendous made tremendous inroads there. There were infrastructure projects that were identified that that have occurred since then and and that helped drive our economy here locally. So we wanted that kind of impact. You know, that that was that was that was 30 years ago. A lot of things have changed. And so we thought it was time to to to undergo that process. Regions that put in the work, that do that kind of strategic planning are typically the ones that are positioned for success. And so we want our region to be positioned for success. My hope is that you know I'm I'll be retired in 20 years. And I hope some, you know, my my successor will look back and say, boy, that you know, the chamber was really visionary and and undergoing this process and and being a leader in the community. And so much came out of that process, just like I look back at that that that process we went through in the 90s and and just am in awe of everything that we've accomplished from that process.
35:42.87 Brandon Burton
Yeah. that is great. So I wanted to ask you, what might be one tip or action item that a listener could take to help take their chamber up to the next level?
35:58.766 Roy Nascimento
So I actually a couple of things. I know you just asked for one, but first off I'd I'd encourage I I'd encourage it goes without saying I'd encourage you know chambers to to get involved with the industry and and learn from from your peers. get involved in ACCE, get involved in your state association or or regional association and and I've been involved in all of them. We're members of every association around chambers and and economic development and and it's great. and you learn a lot and you develop a lot of a lot of access to resources and just best practices and you learn from your peers. So I think that that is so important. and it's been so instrumental in my career. my my second piece of advice is I think be entrepreneurial. You know, every you know what's the old saying? If you've seen one chamber, you've seen one chamber because every chamber is different, they're reflective of their communities. Every community is different, every region's different. When we talked about our lending program, our lending program may not necessarily work for another chamber. You know, they may already have someone that's doing a CDFI or or someone, some alternative lender in their community that's meeting this need in their community. but there might be some other need, you know, and look back to your mission and and it's to advance your businesses and to advance your communities and look at your your market. You know, what is your community missing? What is the big challenge? And the entrepreneurial, find a solution for that. And that'll help drive your organization when you're when you're the change agent, when you're out there providing the resource that's invaluable both to your businesses and to your communities.
37:44.888 Brandon Burton
Good, good answers, good tips. Be involved and be entrepreneurial. so Roy, I I ask everybody I have on the show this question that as we and you've mentioned Horizons a couple of times, but as we look to the future of Chambers, how do you see the future of Chambers and their purpose going forward?
38:05.358 Roy Nascimento
So it it's a great question and I think it it goes back to Horizons, the Horizons report and and the work that ACCE and so many in our industry have done and and the industry has changed so much. I've been in the industry twenty-five years and it it has has changed so much, and I think it it all goes back to being mission focused. And I I think especially COVID nineteen really showed that the leadership coming from chambers and the relevancy of chambers. And so I think that's how it's changing. We're becoming less and less these organizations that do events, business events, you know, like business after hours. We're less and less networking groups and more and more leadership groups and groups that are are engaged in the big issues in the communities. It's kind of getting back to our roots. I think, you know, when we look back at history of chambers, know, in and the history of our country, so chambers in the business community were so involved and so instrumental in in accomplishing big things. And somewhere along the lines we started becoming more transactional. And so I think that's the future, is getting back to our roots and being more kind of mission focused and and accomplishing the big things and and in one word, providing leadership.
39:27.734 Brandon Burton
I think you're absolutely right as far as getting back to the roots. And as you're giving that answer, I was thinking somewhere, I don't know, you know, how far back this goes, but somebody got the great idea of let's introduce this program at our chamber of this networking group. And it just took off everywhere. And some chambers that just became the staple go-to value proposition for their their membership was this networking and And the the potential that a chamber holds is so much more than that that we gotta realize that's just one very, very small part of that big issue, those big issues that a chamber can tackle.
40:05.262 Roy Nascimento
And I and I don't want to diminish the impact and the importance of networking. You know, networking is very important. Connections are important. and we offer a lot of networking programs. We offer still a lot of events and business events, but and those are important. but just don't lose sight of the mission and and everything all of the events we do circle back to our mission. And and we're not we're not doing the downtown parade. Not to say that's not Important, you know, and if there's an economic impact from that, and it circles back to the chambers mission, they should be doing that. But we're not doing those big community events. we do one event that we're involved in directly, and and there's others that we support in our role as a destination marketing organization, as economic development organization. But all of our other events are all we only do because they're circle back to our mission. There's an economic development focus, an advocacy focus. Or maybe there's a networking focus, but that's not our main purpose.
41:02.934 Brandon Burton
Yeah, very true. Well, Roy, I wanted to give you an opportunity to put some contact information out there for anyone that has any questions about anything that you covered in this episode. you did talk about some very unique things, especially under the economic development part with the lending. what would be the best way for a listener to reach out and connect with you?
41:23.79 Roy Nascimento
Sure. So I think the best way to reach me is to email me or actually feel free to call me as well. All my contact information is on my website, the chambers website, which is northcentralmass.com. Again, it's northcentralmass.com. All my contact information is there, including my phone number. And I always welcome any phone calls from any chambers. happy to help in any way that I can.
41:53.932 Brandon Burton
Very good. We will get all that updated in our show notes for this episode, which will be found at Chamberchat Podcast.com/slash episode one thirty-four. But Roy, I enjoyed visiting with you. You guys are doing some unique things there. I really yeah, I took a lot of notes here. If you can see my we're on Zoom so you can see my notes, but lots of good stuff. So I appreciate you sharing your knowledge, your experiences, and wish you and your chamber the best of luck with chamber of the year.
42:22.644 Roy Nascimento
I thank you so much. We're keeping our fingers crossed and really we're honored that we were a f finalist and obviously we'd like to win and and if we won, we would be the first chamber in in Massachusetts and New England to ever have won the chamber of the year. So so we're we're awaiting anxiously awaiting the results next week, but but we are honored and we recognize that that there are some really great chambers. the other finalists in in all of the categories are are very, very strong and we're honored to be in the same in the same category as them. So very much appreciated. And thank you for having me on your show. And hopefully this was of some value to your listeners.
43:05.536 Brandon Burton
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