I recently saw this opinion piece and found it provocative enough to do some fact checking on my own.
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2015/05/13/why-dont-believe-april-jobs-report.html
What I discovered after pulling the April jobs data is that the author is factually correct in computing the statistics presented here. While it is unclear what this actually means for Texarkana, I can tell you that our present Business Retention and Expansion Surveys are showing much more optimism. Over 3/4 of the businesses surveyed are introducing new products and are hiring new employees (or plan to do so in the next year). Very few project a decline.
While our national job picture may be in doubt, Texarkana USA is again bucking the trends and shows signs of real optimism.
- Bill
Monday, May 18, 2015
Thursday, April 2, 2015
HOW TO MAINTAIN EFFECTIVE LEADERSHIP IN YOUR COMPANY.
Cisco’s CEO, John Chamber’s, shares about what an
established company should do to maintain effective leadership. Chamber quotes,
“ If you’re going to lead you have to listen.” Chamber explains you have to
listen to your employee team, your customers, you have to get market
transitions right, and you have to have the courage to see things coming and
make changes before its obvious to others.
Here are three reasons how company’s get into trouble,
according to John Chamber.
1. They miss market transition.
2. They keep doing the right thing for too long.
3. They fail to reinvent themselves either as leaders or
within the company.
This is a really profound topic to think about and it could
have a huge impact on the direction of your business.
Click on the link below to hear more about John Chamber’s role
as CEO with Cisco.
http://fortune.com/video/2015/03/16/how-cisco-survived-5-leadership-transitions/
Tuesday, March 17, 2015
Red River Army Depot - 2015 Veterans' Expo
In the next five years, between 1 and 1.5 million members of
the U.S. Armed Forces will leave the military, according to the Department of
Defense. Many of these veterans will be seeking new careers; by a great margin,
veterans cite finding employment is their number-one need when returning home.
Our community is fortunate to have Red River Army Depot who will be sponsoring
the Wounded Warrior Expo on Wednesday, March 18 from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Truman
Arnold Student Center located at Texarkana College. The event will focus
primarily on Wounded Warriors, AW2, soldiers under medical review, veterans,
family members and caregivers. The expo will provide information regarding job opportunities,
community information and support services available to them within the region.
Businesses, community organizations, and area service providers are encouraged
to participate. Workforce Solutions Northeast Texas will be participating in
the event.
For more information, contact RRAD’s LEAD Office at (903)
334-2640 or usarmy.rrad.usamc.list.lead@mail.mil
Thursday, March 12, 2015
How do you empower your leaders?
How much does it matter to have engaged, empowered, enthusiastic employees? Sometimes it can make the difference between success and failure. It's not about people who are good at what they do, but people you can trust. As an employer it’s important to have the vision, and it's up to your employees to buy in to become a successful company. Trust comes into play when individual team members believe in that challenge and put their skills to use to meet it.
So, how do you create
empowered employees?
1. Make sure they
care about what you care about.
Hire people who can buy into
your vision
2. Make the path to
advancement clear.
If someone does their work
well, will they be able to move up within your company? And if not, will you
help them move on to a better job someplace else? Giving employees a career
path is especially important in a small or startup company where they must regularly
pitch in and do work that falls outside their traditional job descriptions.
3. Challenge them.
Give your employees an
opportunity to expand their skill set, this will help your company too.
4. Tell them how
they'll be measured.
You can’t become better
unless you’re being measured. Have a conversation about what your employee’s
responsibilities are and how they will be evaluated.
5. Get out of their
way.
If you trust your employee
enough to give them a certain role give them the opportunity to fulfill that
role. Give your employees general goals and let them figure out how to reach
them.
Thursday, February 26, 2015
Our Downtown Matters
Hopefully we are all
familiar with the recent efforts to revitalize downtown Texarkana. Thankfully
we have an outstanding Main Street program who works continuously to bring back
the life of our downtown area. Our Main Street has focused on the Economic Development
of this area through preservation, re-purposing, education and community
involvement by providing technical assistance and expertise to the Texarkana
area. Our Main Street is a proven strategy for revitalization and a
powerful network of linked communities. Along with Main Streets efforts they have partnered with another organization that is
taking part in these revitalization efforts, Better Block Texarkana.
Better Blocks mission is to provide an experiential hands on look
at what Texarkana's downtown could become. Their events are temporary in
nature, but designed to create a ground swell of support for downtown in our
community. Lee Medley with Better
Block Texarkana wrote a blog recently, “State Line Avenue is Texarkana’s GoldenGate Bridge,” discussing his insight of Texarkana and our State Line.
There is no denying that our State Line is one of the most recognizable things
we have going for us and we need to take better care of it including our
entire downtown area. Lee expounds upon the idea if we embraced the idea of
interacting with the line we could receive potential benefits along the way in
our city. According to Lee Medley, “State Line defines us. It is our GoldenGate Bridge, our Gateway Arch, and our Statue of Liberty.” It is this type of attitude that is going to
make difference in our city. There is so much potential growth for
our Economic Development for Texarkana if we continue in our efforts towards
our downtown. Texarkana is definitely on the highway to a better
downtown area and we are fortunate to have all of the support of those who are
working on these efforts.
Coming soon, Better
Block Texarkana and Main Street Texarkana are bringing back “Better Block” May
16, 2015. We hope that you will take a part in this endeavor to bring more
attraction to our downtown. We need your support!
For more information on
how you can get involved you can visit www.betterblocktxk.com or
contact Main Street Texarkana at (903) 792-7191.
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