Blogs

With the largest networking event for chamber professionals—the ACCE Convention—coming soon, this recent article from Bloomberg Business Week is a must-read. It shows how one woman made it her job to be your networking buddy, or your “professional wingman.” If you consider yourself a so-so networker or simply hate the process (you’re not alone), you can hire her for $250. She’ll accompany you to a networking event, and do the work that so many find difficult or just plain awful. The article offers important networking tips.  Read it here.

The email below from Janet Steele, ACE, IOM, president of the Albany Area (OR) Chamber of Commerce, alerted ACCE about her chamber's effort to raise awareness of the impact of creating jobs and job opportunities.

I thought I'd brag a little about our Chamber. This past Monday [June 10], seven Board members and I delivered the book The Coming Jobs War by Jim Clifton, CEO of Gallup, to every Oregon House and Senate member, plus the Governor's office. The initial reaction was very positive and we learned today that the Governor is going to read the book.

This is a book I first heard about at the WACE conference this past February. Upon finishing it I asked my Exec Board to read it, they thought so much of it that in turn they asked every Board member to read it for our strategic planning retreat in April. They spent much of the retreat discussing the relevance of the book and how our mission/vision/programs could be directed more in line with pro-job strategies. I started giving out the book to other community leaders - the president of our community college had his key leadership staff read it, our key manufacturers have read it and shared it with staff. I gave it to our City Council and County Commissioners and the list keeps growing. We know  the book doesn't have all the answers, nor should it, each chamber/community needs to decide what their vision and mission should be. But,  this book continues the conversation we've been having with our members and community around jobs. "Business is a 4 Letter word - Jobs", and "Without Business there is No Community". They are more than tag lines they are a message that needs to go out to everyone.

I know I'm preaching to the choir but - someday we hope everyone will understand how important Jobs are to our communities and how we need to work together to bring jobs back to Albany, Oregon, and the USA.

Read more about the effort here: http://democratherald.com/news/local/albany-chamber-chief-gets-proactive-about-jobs/article_df785a50-d192-11e2-b256-001a4bcf887a.html

It’s like deja vu. Late last spring I wrote a blog post praising chambers of commerce and their affiliates for dominating the list of top performing economic development groups. A year goes by and I’m writing practically the same blog post.

When Site Selection magazine released their Top Economic Development Groups of 2012 as the featured cover story for the May 2013 issue, chambers once again dominated.  Congratulations to:

• Austin Chamber of Commerce
• Baton Rouge Area Chamber
• Economic Futures Group at the Spartanburg Area Chamber
• Metro Atlanta Chamber
• Mobile Chamber of Commerce
• Pittsburgh Regional Alliance
• Siouxland Initiative at the Siouxland Chamber of Commerce 
• Southwest Louisiana Economic Development Alliance

That’s right folks, 8 out of the top 10 economic development groups in the country are chambers of commerce or are affiliate entities housed at chambers.  The dominance continues in the second 10 where half are chambers of commerce or similar private sector lead regional entities.

• Cincinnati USA Partnership
• Dallas Regional Chamber
• Greater New Orleans Inc.
• Indy Partnership
• Nashville Area Chamber

What’s the basis for all this recognition you ask? Well it’s pretty rigorous. Here’s how Site Selection describes the ranking process:

“As in past years, the top performers were evaluated on a variety of criteria, with four objective measurements counting the most: jobs, capital investment, jobs per capita, and investment per capita. In addition, Site Selection looked at creativity of economic development strategy; depth and breadth of project activity; ability to generate breakthrough deals; and the ability to properly document the contributions of the economic development organization to actual project results.”

Objective criteria, creative innovation, breakthrough deals and documented leadership… if you want to model the best in economic development, you have to look at chambers.

Tags: rankings, business attraction, Economic Development, EDC Division