teamwork

Strengthening teamwork and leadership: conference planning-style

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When trying something new we’ve not done before, it doesn’t take us long to realize that proficiency requires a dedication to practice and in most cases a good bit of patience. And, you might say that Extension professionals work in teams all the time. It is not often, however, that we work together in national conference planning.

Logo photo courtesy of: ThisisCleveland.com and Larry E. Highbaugh, Jr.

CD professionals have been practicing teamwork and leadership skills around a singular focus since June 2014. That’s when the idea of hosting the annual conference for our professional association, the National Association of Community Development Extension Professionals (a.k.a. NACDEP), was first shared. After learning of our proposal’s success about 18 months later, even more opportunities to practice really kicked. For example, as a team, we have:

  • Participated in the past three NACDEP conferences like never before (i.e., ‘What does it take to put this on?’)
  • Encouraged colleagues to serve on the national NACDEP board (thank you, Nancy Bowen, treasurer; David Civittolo, president-elect; and Brian Raison, north central representative)
  • Served on a variety of prior NACDEP conference sub-committees
  • Worked together to identify our conference location (Cleveland) and venue (Renaissance Cleveland Hotel – Downtown)
  • Brainstormed and investigated the best things to experience in Cleveland

Exploring a potential conference MLW site: Edgewater Park

With Ohio JCEP’s support, a couple of weeks ago we were able to practice our teamwork and leadership skills in a face-to-face retreat at the conference venue in Cleveland. During this two-day retreat, we:

  • Investigated potential conference mobile learning workshop (MLW) ideas in small groups
  • Explored the conference hotel and surrounding areas
  • Continued our subcommittee work focused on sessions, speakers, sponsorship, publicity, hospitality, MLWs, etc.

This work required our best leadership and teamwork by subcommittee chairs and co-chairs, MLW investigation leaders, and situational leaders too. Even better, we were able to team up with members of the national NACDEP board in this work as they overlapped their annual face-to-face retreat with our conference planning retreat at the 2018 NACDEP Conference venue in Cleveland.

No doubt, there has been much to learn throughout this conference planning process. And when we consciously make the time for it, there is much to learn beyond the ins and outs of how to produce a top-rate NACDEP conference. Every day we have countless opportunities to actively and deliberately practice our skills necessary for working with others. Opportunities to strengthen our skills and build proficiency. The work that lies ahead will require our best teamwork and leadership.

Regardless of the task at hand or the challenge you face, how you go about practicing your skills is up to you.

Let’s ‘suit up!’

Greg Davis is a 2018 NACDEP Conference planning committee co-chair and Extension Assistant Director, Community Development.

BIG Skies, BOLD Partnerships

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Visiting with a colleague recently, she shared that these uncertain times in our workplace, in our communities, and in the larger world around us require that we ask ourselves what we really are about.

For the past several days, nearly 350 practitioners, academics, and Extension professionals came together to share and learn and discuss how we can make a difference within the various communities we serve in the first-ever joint conference with NACDEP and the Community Development Society (CDS).

Big Sky, Montana, provided the conference venue for over 130 concurrent session presentations, 40 poster presentations and 3 IGNITE presentations. Five keynote presentations were included along with 8 mobile learning workshops focused on culture, local food, leadership and collaborative partnerships for economic development.

June conference surprise

Among the presentations were ten involving a dozen of Ohio’s Extension professionals. Topics and presenters (including those involving out of state collaborators indicated with an *) are listed below:

  • Credentialing Local Planning Officials: Master Citizen Planner Program (Wayne Beyea*, Myra Moss & Kara Salazar*)
  • Entrepreneurial Networking Competencies: Contemporary Perspectives on Social Capital (Julie Fox)
  • Energize Job Retention: Energy Management Strategies as a Component of Business Retention and Expansion Programs (Nancy Bowen, Eric Romich & David Civittolo)
  • Bold Partnering: Join a National Network on Leadership Programming (Brian Raison, Kyle Willams* & Elizabeth North*)
  • A New Tool for Increasing Marina Resiliency to Coastal Storms in the Great Lakes (Joe Lucente & Sarah Orlando)
  • Building Collaborative Partnership Around Critical Community/Stakeholder Issues: Watersheds, Agriculture, and a City’s Source Water Quality (Myra Moss)
  • Maximizing the Gains of Old and New Energy Development for America’s Rural Communities (Eric Romich, David Civittolo & Nancy Bowen)
  • Partnering for Community Health (Becky Nesbitt)
  • Exploring ways of using Community Arts, Cultural and Heritage businesses to stimulate Rural Community Economic Development (Godwin Apaliyah & Ken Martin)
  • Using Farmers Markets as a Tool for Economic Development: Increasing Healthy Food Access While Benefiting Small to Mid-Sized Farms (Amanda Osborne)
  •  A Dialogue Prompt for Housing and Land Use Policy in a New Administration (poster) (Anna Haines* & Myra Moss)

Three Ohioans were also installed as officers on the national NACDEP board: Nancy Bowen (re-elected Treasurer), David Civittolo (elected President-elect), and Brian Raison (elected north-central region Representative).

Two OSUE NACDEP members were also recognized with national and regional awards. Raison received regional and national recognition for using educational technology in developing  ‘A Virtual Farm Market Pilot’ and creating materials for ‘Top 10 Ways to Improve Online Teaching and Learning.’  He received regional recognition in the category ‘Excellence in CD Work’ for his effort, ‘Establishing an Impactful Local Food Council.’ Romich received regional recognition (honorable mention) in the category ‘Distinguished Career.’

Sunrise over Big Sky

Leadership, teamwork and collaboration were celebrated and cultivated throughout the conference. And after a very moving final keynote address by Sarah Calhoun of Red Ants Pants, we were reminded again that working together we truly can move mountains. See you next year in Cleveland, June 10-13!

 

 

Greg Davis is a Professor and Assistant Director for OSU Extension Community Development.

The power of a single snowflake

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We journeyed north to Alaska for our family vacation this year. And as odd as it might sound, while in that remote, spectacular, unspoiled wilderness, I couldn’t help but think about the concept of community.

Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska. Credit: Becky Nesbitt

Glacier Bay National Park, Alaska. Credit: Becky Nesbitt

I see myself as a lifelong student, so when I’m interested in something, I want to learn more about it. As we were traveling past the ice fields and across the Aleutian and Alaska mountain ranges, I was reading about the early explorers who made their way into that part of the world. John Muir, a 19th Century author and naturalist, was one of the first non-native souls who trekked into that frozen, unforgiving place.

As Muir hiked over and around the tallest, snow-capped peaks in North America and gazed into the turquoise blue depths of massive glaciers, he marveled at the powerful forces of nature. And in those moments, when the only sounds ringing in his ears may have been humpback whales breaking the surface of the water or the wind whistling through the Western hemlocks, I think he was thinking about community too.

Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska. Credit: Becky Nesbitt

Glacier Bay National Park, Alaska. Credit: Becky Nesbitt

While canoeing near glaciers in what is now Glacier Bay National Park, Muir wrote that he began to think about how those massive bodies of ice were formed from delicate snowflakes. He observed that a single snowflake, on its own, is fragile and powerless; but many snowflakes, gathered together, over time, formed a glacier. And those slow-moving rivers of ice carved mountains, created deep valleys, and gave birth to breathtaking fjords and great fresh water lakes.

As I was reading about his adventures, I thought about how a person, alone in that unfriendly wilderness, was a bit like a snowflake. Individually, of course, a person can have much more impact than one snowflake, but when one person becomes two or three or more, a “community” is born. Helen Keller remarked, “Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.” People seem to be at their best when they work together, gathering around a shared goal or living peacefully in a common area. When we live and work together, we must face our similarities and our differences; we must harness our strengths – allowing each person to contribute an individual effort to a combined outcome. Just like those snowflakes within a glacier, each of us can be one part of collective force that might one-day move mountains.

To learn more about OSU Extension’s educational programs focused on community development, visit go.osu.edu/seekexcellence.

Becky Nesbitt is an Assistant Professor and Extension Educator in Community Development with OSU Extension.

15 minutes could save your … strategic plan

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We’ve all experienced it, or heard about it. A team spends weeks or months developing a strategic plan, and nothing happens with it after the glossy document gets printed. Why does this great new plan just sit on the shelf gathering dust? Business scholars over the past two decades have been researching why plans fail to be implemented.1 The overarching theme of their conclusions: people resist change. How do we address this challenge? Through a structured plan for execution. Your team needs to commit to the plan, yet they are busy with their daily duties (the “whirlwind”) and they don’t take time to focus on the strategic plan.

WIGs 2018-02-04An effective execution plan starts with committing to a series of 15-minute segments on planning and implementing the strategic plan. Franklin Covey’s 4 Disciplines of Execution (4DX)2 is one formula to follow. The four disciplines are:

  1. Select one or two “wildly important goals” (WIG) that drive your strategic plan and can be measured and tracked.
  2. Identify the activities that lead to achieving the WIG(s), ones that your team can influence.
  3. Create a compelling scoreboard: simple, visible to the team, shows the lead and lag measures, and tells immediately if you are winning.
  4. Establish a weekly cadence of accountability in which each team member commits to working on one or two of the lead activities as well as reports on the efforts toward the WIG.

This 4DX plan is easy to implement by committing to 15-minute segments for each discipline:

  1. 15 minutes to identify and establish your WIG from your strategic plan. If you need two WIGs, spend another 15 minutes on the second one.
  2. 15 minutes per WIG to list all of the leading activities required to meet your WIG.
  3. 15 minutes to determine how you will show (scoreboard) the team’s progress toward leading activities and WIG and where it will be displayed.
  4. 15 minutes per week – the same day/time each week – for the accountability meeting.

We facilitated a strategic plan for one of our clients a year ago. After following up with them to see their progress, they reported that the leadership team implemented a few goals but felt they needed our help to really drive the plan throughout their organization with all employees. They embraced 4DX and are starting to see results.

This works! Try it, and let me know how it works for you.

If you need help in setting up your 4DX plan, the Alber Enterprise Center can show you how. Call 740-725-6325.

(Submitted by Myra Wilson, Program Director, Alber Enterprise Center at Marion)

1:

Govindarajan, V., & Trimble, C. (2010). The other side of innovation: solving the execution challenge. Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing.

Gudmundsson, H., Ericsson, E., Tight, M., Lawler, M., Envall, P., Figueroa, M., et al. (2012). The role of decision support in the implementation of “sustainable transport” plans. European Planning Studies, 20(2), 171-191.

Hahn, W., & Powers, T. (2010). Strategic plan quality, implementation capability, and firm performance. Academy of Strategic Management Journal, 9(1), 63-81.

Kotter, J. (1996). Leading change. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.

Larian, L., Day, M., Backhurst, M., Berke, P., Ericksen, N., Crawford, J., et al. (2004). What drives plan implementation? Plans, planning agencies and developers. Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, 47(4), 555-577.

2:

McChesney, C., Covey, S., & Huling, J. (2012).  The 4 disciplines of execution: achieving your wildly important goals.  New York:  Free Press.

LOOK! Emerging Youth Leadership in Clermont County

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Building youth leadership in Clermont County starts with the LOOK to Clermont program facilitated by the community partnership with the University of Cincinnati – Clermont College and Ohio State University Extension – Clermont County through collaboration within all four Extension program areas. This tight-knit partnership came to evolve from a nearly twenty-year-old program that was formerly operated by Clermont 20/20 in partnership with the Clermont Chamber of Commerce. Also, featuring an adult program called LEAD Clermont, these adult LEADers aide in the learning experience for the Clermont County youth of the program.

LOOK! Clermont County 2015-10-15 Blog #1 The LOOK to Clermont program is a series of classroom and practical learning experiences. Here high school students from throughout the county meet monthly to develop and enhance leadership skills while increasing awareness of critical issues within Clermont County. Embedded in this program is a course where students receive college credit through the College Credit Plus program. Juniors receive credit from the University of Cincinnati – Clermont College, while seniors receive credit from The Ohio State University for the COMLDR 3530: Foundations of Personal and Professional Leadership course in the College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences.

In addition to individual assignments and class time experience, the students participate in community projects where they are able to add value and positively impact Clermont County first hand. Students practice speaking by sharing information gleaned from local research and exposure to local leaders in action. The ultimate goal of the program is that through strong community partnerships Clermont County high school students are prepared to be tomorrow’s community leaders.

LOOK! Clermont County #2 - 2015-10-15Not only does the LOOK to Clermont program facilitate community development through partnerships with other organizations and local citizens, it unites the Extension program areas in collaboration. Each monthly class has a theme, such as teambuilding, history and agriculture, civic engagement, education, personal finance, safety and justice, community development, or envisioning the future. Depending on the theme for the particular day, the county educators work closely to utilize their personal networks to engage the students in a learning experience that will best benefit them while giving exposure to the individual or group within the county that may be hosting or presenting the class. This allows a Community Development rooted program to nurture the countywide network through Family and Consumer Sciences, 4-H Youth Development, and Agriculture and Natural Resources. Further, the students gain knowledge in a wide array of topics relevant to Clermont County in a short period of time.

LOOK! Clermont County #3 - 2015-10-15Earlier this month the LOOK to Clermont program held the history and agriculture day. The students met at the Extension office where they discussed the rich history of agriculture in Clermont County with the Agriculture and Natural Resources educator, Gigi Neal. Next, the group toured the county with stops including: Carney’s Feed Mill, Grant’s Farm and Greenhouse, Cornwell Farms, and Shaw Farms. Along the way the students were able to learn about a historic family-based feed milling business, a grain farm and greenhouse in full production, water quality and its importance through a Conservation Innovation Grant Basin and reduction in nutrient run-off.

For lunch the Family and Consumer Sciences educator, Margaret Jenkins, arranged a nutritious picnic-style meal. The day ended with a stop at an agritourism farm where the students were able to use their leadership skills to navigate a corn maze. The corn maze activity was aided by the Real Colors® program previously facilitated in part by the 4-H Youth Development educator, Kelly Royalty, where students were mixed with different colors to see how different personalities work together. This class day is just one example of how the LOOK to Clermont program works to nurture the many networking opportunities given on a daily basis to positively impact Clermont County residents.

Currently, the LOOK to Clermont partners are working to measure the true reach of the program on Clermont County individuals and families. Positive impacts can be extensively seen through the success of previous program graduates. For more information on LOOK to Clermont, visit the Clermont County Extension page.

(Submitted by Trevor Corboy, Student Assistant, Community Development State Office & Clermont County; Margaret Jenkins, Extension Educator, Family and Consumer Sciences, Clermont County; Gigi Neal, Extension Educator, Agriculture and Natural Resources, Clermont County; and Kelly Royalty, Extension Educator, 4-H Youth Development, Clermont County)

 

Turning the Golden Rule on its head

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Golden Rule 2015-07-30

Treat people the way you want to be treated. It’s the golden rule – or so we’re told. But perhaps a deeper, more effective way to interact with others is to treat them the way they want to be treated. Reading one self-help book or attending a Myers-Briggs workshop will quickly illustrate that people can be motivated by and comfortable with very different things. So, choosing to relate to others only in a way that is comfortable to you, might actually be a bit short-sighted.

A few years ago, I learned this lesson the hard way – by completely blowing it. I was teaching with a respected colleague who has a personality and teaching style that are very different from mine – and I enjoyed that balance when we worked together. For about a year, we met monthly with a difficult group of participants. Most of these folks didn’t seem interested in what we were sharing; however, they were required to attend these classes to receive food vouchers for participating, so they would reluctantly show up for the sessions. We had a new group of participants each time, so it was difficult to build rapport with them. When the class would roll around each month, I found myself dreading the experience, and I knew from our conversations that my colleague felt the same way.

After each class, I would be sure to take time to thank my coworker for her effort. I expressed how grateful I was to have her share her expertise with the group. Since I knew that teaching these classes could be challenging, I wanted to be sure that she knew how much I appreciated her willingness to continue to work with the less-than-friendly participants. I thought that pointing out my continued gratitude would be motivating and would let her know that her efforts were well-appreciated – at least by me.

One afternoon, after about six months of these classes, as I was packing up our materials, I thanked her again for her efforts. She stopped what she was doing, turned to me and said, “You know, you don’t need to thank me each time we come here.” She continued, “And actually when you thank me every time, it makes me feel uncomfortable. I’m just doing my job. I know that you appreciate me, and I really like working with you. So you don’t need to continue to thank me.”

That was such a profound teachable moment for me, and I was very grateful to her for sharing her feelings (although I refrained from expressing my gratitude). Her honest, well-expressed comments helped me realize that I had only been thinking of my own patterns of communication – what I liked and positively responded to. I hadn’t really taken into consideration her personality and how to effectively communicate in a way that resonated with her. In other words, I wasn’t treating her the way she preferred to be treated. While my intentions were good, my execution was all wrong.

Interacting with people in meaningful and fulfilling ways requires us to observe, ask, listen and learn about the folks who fill our lives. The process of relationship building can be complicated, confusing…and wonderful. Connecting with another person involves empathy, understanding and, many times, the need to move outside of our own patterns of behavior, thought or comfort. Opening ourselves to the complexity of others, without judgment, enables us to recognize that while we may have many similar traits, experiences and beliefs, we are indeed individual and unique.

Visit go.osu.edu/seekexcellence to discover the educational programs and resources that can help you and your team learn more about building strong relationships.

(Submitted by Becky Nesbitt, Assistant Professor and Extension Educator, Ohio Valley EERA)

Coaching made me a better boss

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When I was hired as program director for Alber Enterprise Center in December 2011, I thought I knew how to be a manager and leader. After all, for two decades I studied the best authors – Drucker, Collins, Covey, Buckingham, Friedman and dozens more. I witnessed a myriad of management styles in private business and public education, and listened to their employees’ reactions, praise and complaints, then eventually began teaching leadership development courses. I knew the importance of listening, team building, problem solving, performance management and conflict resolution skills; especially their role in engaging employees and moving the organization forward. Yes, I felt confident in my abilities to lead my own team.

Well, I learned there is a difference between knowing and doing! My personal style of working entails rolling up my sleeves and digging in, taking full ownership of all details while visioning the future. My new team was great, helping me understand our center’s history with clients and excited about the opportunities to develop updated programs. After three years, we were holding our own but I knew we had so much more potential to make an impact. Sensing we had stalled, I found myself wondering about my abilities as a leader. Then a phone call from a certified coach transformed our team into a high speed powerhouse that doubled the number of delivered programs in six short months.

He called me in hopes of becoming one of our center’s educational partners; a partner in delivery of leadership training and coaching. I decided that the best way to assess his qualifications was to try him out on our team. He facilitated our strategic plan and provided follow-up coaching to help us implement our goals.

Coaching 2015-04-30What did the coach do for each of us?

  • Confidentially identified behaviors each team member wished to strengthen
  • Assessed our current level of skill in each of those behavioral areas
  • Assembled a plan of action for improvement
  • Monitored our progress through feedback and other objective means

I learned two key lessons during my coaching sessions that have helped take our center to a new level of performance:

  • Let go of the details and delegate them to others – stay focused on the big picture instead of getting “tangled in the weeds”
  • Empower others to take ownership of their jobs by using the coaching techniques I learned – listening more and speaking less, asking questions rather than directing, rewarding positive behavior and sharing successes as a team

This external (and objective) assessment not only made me a better leader and manager but has also elevated the performance of our organization and its members in the process.

(Submitted by Myra Wilson, MS, SPHR, Program Director, Alber Enterprise Center)
You want SUCCESS . . . We have SOLUTIONS!

Imagination: The Key to Making Positive Change in Groups, Organizations and Communities

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What we forget about groups, organizations and communities is that they are human inventions just like moveable type, the steam engine, the automobile, the airplane and the atomic bomb. There is of course a huge difference between inventing a social system like an organization and creating an inanimate object like an automobile. The parts of an automobile do not have cognition. They can’t think. They don’t wonder if they are doing the right thing or doing the thing they have been asked to do correctly. They are not looking to be recognized for doing a good job or looking for a promotion and salary increase.

Humans, however, can and fortunately do think. Their thinking leads to meaning making, values, ethics and emotions. It is the human thinking and feeling that make organizing and all the good things that come from working together possible. At the same time human thinking and feelings make organizing enormously complex. The complex social arrangements created by humans since the beginning of time have led to our current way of life. Those complex social arrangements created by diverse people in different parts of the world lead to very different ways of living and working together. Those different ways should not scare or threaten us. Not all bridges are built the same, but they all have the same purpose.

Ideas 2015-04-23Obviously some of our social inventions for working together, resolving conflict, sharing resources and living together have not worked so well. We still settle some of our differences through violence, and there is still racism, prejudice and greed. There are far too many people who live in poverty, lack adequate food, water, education and medical care. However, looking at the facts we can see a decline in all these categories. In the area of hunger we now produce enough food to feed everyone in the world but not everyone has enough food, so we need to invent a new worldwide food distribution system. What we forget is that we invented the current worldwide food system and that the only thing that limits our ability to create something new is our imagination.

Everything that goes on in every group, organization and community is something that humans have invented and the only thing that limits our ability to create something better is our imagination. We forget that we are the inventors, and therefore we can reinvent anything that is not working. The interesting part is that research shows that the best way to reinvent a social process is to start studying what is currently working. That gives us a shared understanding of what is making organizing possible and allows us to imagine new and yet undiscovered organizational possibilities.

(Submitted by Chet Bowling, Associate Professor and Extension Specialist, Community Development)
Note: Chet will be retiring from OSU Extension on April 30. We thank him for his many years of dedicated service to Community Development work and look forward to continuing our working relationship with him in the future.

Leave it better than you found it

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It was late and cold, and by that point, I really just wanted to be home on this particular Friday night in October. Instead, I was standing in the field adjacent to the high school football stadium, waiting for my daughter and her fellow band members to finish loading their instruments and uniforms into the band truck. As I saw the final carts rolled onto the vehicle, I expected the band director, an energetic, disciplined young man, enjoying the first few months of his newly minted college degree, to dismiss the group for the evening. Instead, he gathered the kids around him, and then surprisingly dispatched them into the area around the parking lot with the instructions, “Let’s leave this place better than we found it.” The teenagers happily (really, they actually seemed happy) fanned out into the field and returned with their arms full of empty pizza boxes, tattered candy wrappers and half full bottles of Gatorade. They were carrying trash that they didn’t create – garbage that had been carelessly left behind by others who had enjoyed the night’s activities.

Leave it better #2 - 2015-03-05Let’s leave this place better than we found it. I realized that those nine words communicated many of the ideals that I hope to instill in my daughter: respect, service and commitment to something larger than self. Imagine if each of us began every day with that goal in mind. At work, at school, in our communities, our homes, within our groups and families, if we each made the promise, in any way large or small, to leave this place better than we found it.

It’s easy to begin to generate a list of professionals who focus on improving people and situations – folks in the medical field, educators, architects, highway crews, just to name a few. Their “improvements” are often large, measurable and easy to see. But sometimes, the opportunities we have to improve something are more like a nudge than a big transformation. A remarkable teenager, Anne Frank, born generations before my daughter and her band friends, wrote in her diary, “How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” How wonderful indeed.

Seek Excellence Logo - blogIf you’re looking for a little inspiration and a lot of solid, research-based information to help improve your world, be sure to check out the educational programs and resources offered by OSU Extension’s Community Development professionals at comdev.osu.edu/programs/leadership-development/seek-excellence. We are eager to work with your community, group or business to help you discover ways that you can leave your world better than you found it.

(Submitted by Becky Nesbitt, Assistant Professor and Extension Educator, Ohio Valley EERA)

Is YOUR community ready to attract new investment?

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While many communities have assets that are attractive to those who currently live, play and conduct business there, do these communities have what it takes to attract new residents and businesses? Major corporations and others may invest millions of dollars in a community and don’t take the decision lightly.

According to economic and community development consultant, Carol Johnson, most communities all say the same things. She says what site consultants and prospects fear most when they visit a potential site is the local team will talk too much and waste their time!

Site Prep 2014-12-18According to Johnson, to be prepared “The local team needs to understand that every facet of your site is quantitatively ranked and each industry, each project will rank you differently.” In other words, the local team needs to convey the unique things they have to offer each individual prospect and be able to prove it. Corporations are obsessed with “risk avoidance” which means the local team must remove any mystery or perceptions of risk.

Successful communities have created a team that includes the local experts in the areas of:  utilities (e.g., gas, electric, water and waste water), industry, infrastructure, workforce, taxation and incentives. It is key that the local team can convey credibility and expertise when responding to prospect needs. It is especially critical that the local team can stand behind their commitments to meet project timelines and ensure project confidentiality.

So where might a community begin? Start first with an understanding of community assets. Second, be able to document these assets – how do the assets meet requirements of the prospect? Third, understand the key drivers of the prospect’s decision. KNOW THEM, UNDERSTAND THEM and CONFIRM THEM several times; prospects often change their minds. Last, understand that prospects make final decisions based on return on investment and their ability to minimize or overcome risk – perceived and real.

Are you SURE your team is ready?  Learn more on this topic at: ohioline.osu.edu/cd-fact/pdf/1504.pdf and ohioline.osu.edu/lines/comun.html#econdev.

(Submitted by: Cynthia Leis, Extension Educator and Van Wert City Economic Development Director)