Since I arrived in Central Illinois six years ago, I have had a variety of people from mayors, economic development professionals and state representatives and senators  to private business leaders and owners say something like, “Why don’t Peoria, Bloomington-Normal and Champaign-Urbana get together and promote economic development as a region?” There are other variations on that theme, such as “Why don’t the airports cooperate and divide up the air flight pie?” or “Why don’t the three communities’ largest businesses purchase more products locally?”  There a lot of well-meaning people who believe what we are doing is enough, but what does true collaboration look like? There are many ways our communities cooperate, but is there more we can do?

I’m embarrassed when people ask me that question.  I usually answer by saying that the task is too huge and my local investors and local governments may not want me spending money on these types of regional activities. But, actually, that is not true, because I have to say that my leaders are pretty sophisticated in their thinking and understand that what is good for Peoria or Champaign-Urbana is good for Bloomington-Normal, too. So, if we get it, it has to be you folks or the fine people in Peoria that are holding us back, right? My guess is that the leaders understand the issue in Champaign-Urbana and Peoria. So times a-wastin’ – let’s get going, right? There is nothing holding us back, is there?

Five years ago, we hired a consultant to do the first funding campaign we as an organization had ever done in McLean County. The first step was a feasibility study. This exercise entailed the consultant going out with a proposed plan of work and testing the feasibility of that work with local business owners and community leaders. Can the organization raise $2 million over five years? $3 million? What projects in the plan can get funded, and which cannot? Whose head has to roll before funding will occur? These are all questions the consultant asks. He gets a measure of the community: Who are the leaders? Who are the “go-to” folks? Who is going to step up in the campaign?

Our consultant came back confounded from days of interviewing up to 60 community and business leaders. He proclaimed us “bizarro world,” and before I could feel offended, he said that he could not find any hidden agendas, nobody was mad at someone else, and frankly, he couldn’t find any natural “go-to” business leaders to lead the campaign – hence “bizarro world.”  I say this not to brag, but to point out that due to a strong economy in Bloomington-Normal, we rarely have economic crises or major socio-economic issues like many of our manufacturing town neighbors who have been rocked by upheavals for most of the past 50 years.

So does the I-74 corridor represent a “bizzarro world” of sorts? Are we a community without crises? Sure, we have the State of Illinois that has, over the past number of years, represented a crisis on a perennial basis, but our overall economy along the Interstate has been pretty strong until very recently. Will a natural disaster or some major economic or industrial farming catastrophe have to hit us before we act collectively?

Our region has so much to offer: world-class universities and research institutions, Fortune 100 companies, agricultural abilities unmatched anywhere in the world and entrepreneurs ready to bust out. We aren’t and shouldn’t compete against each other. Our competition is in Bangalore, Singapore, Shanghai and Buenos Aires.  I hope we can rise up and do something soon. I‘m tired of answering embarrassing questions.

Note: This post also appeared in halfwayinteresting.com,  a new Central  Illinois Blog dedicated to issues in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois and surrounding areas.

Looking at the TED web site today I came across a video on simplicity that I though proved my last blog point might I say, quite simply.  George Whitesides is a professor of Bioorganic/Physical Organic Chemistry, Materials Science at Harvard University. Leave it to him to take complex systems and explain it to all of us. He recently spoke at TED about how simplicity is the foundation of complex systems. Starting with a light switch which uses the binary system of on and off, he layers more complex systems on top of it so that eventually he can explain the internet. It is a unique and easy way to understand something and perhaps to create new ideas.

I am always impressed by how entrepreneurs can make money selling the most simple of products or ideas. Watch this video and perhaps it will inspire you to think of something in a different way. What can you layer or as Whitesides says or what can be “stacked” to create something new?

I woke up this morning thinking about simplicity. Actually I woke up about 4:15. I think I fell back to sleep, but it was still on my mind later as I actually woke up for the day. How do we simplify things and is it a worthy endeavor? I remember in high school one of my favorite classes was Anatomy and Physiology. This class required one to memorize the parts of the body and how it all worked. What I remember most was how complex the digestive system seemed to be. I had to memorize the entire system for a test. And even though I have forgotten how the system works I do remember how I learned. I broke it down into simple steps and then recombined them later. I received a high test score and was undoubtedly proud of my achievement.

Today we live in a complex and complicated world. Politics, businesses, financial systems, and various activities in the world around us seem very complex. Almost too complex to want to deal with or to make an effort to understand. We rebel against these complex systems. Why? because we understand the simple things. Yes, our brains our powerful and wonderful biological pieces of machinery, but they we really can only understand the simple things first and then build them up into complex systems.

So maybe before you get caught up in a complex world that stresses you out follow these simple steps:

1. Take what seems to be a complex matter and begin to break it down into separate simple steps.
2. Understand the relationship between these simple steps or issues.
3. Begin to recombine them to gain a better understanding of how it all works.

See, now wasn’t that simple and obvious? Yes it is obvious and yes you been thinking too hard about it. This  may be a prescription for living. Living “simply” may make the more complex moments in life easier to understand and to deal with. Breaking away from all the difficult issues and scraping away the complex by breaking them down may reduce or eliminate the stress. Give it a try. I know I will.

The Illinois development council recently had it’s annual conference her in Bloomington Normal. The IDC is a professional group of economic developers in Illinois whose purpose is to provide education to its members and improve the conditions of their individual communities by learning from each other.  I was fortunate enough to be the chair of the conference committee and therefore was able to determine with some input the type of conference theme and sessions we were going to have.

I told everyone from the start that I was not going to propose or put together a conference that covered the same mundane topics, although we did have a few of those.  What I hoped was to have a few topics that were out of the mainstream as economic development goes, but pertinent nonetheless.

One session called “Art and Economic Development” was designed to show my peers the value of art in an economic development program. Using local artists and artists from the University we showed the assembled members how art can have an impact in the community. Art is everywhere we look. Whether it is a painting on the wall, or graphic design in a logo or part of a brand, art touches our lives every day. In the major cities and unfortunately not enough in the smaller towns and burbs art plays a major role in parks and public areas. While we still see art being used in public places it seems less and less common. Our Airport, the Central Illinois Regional Airport (CIRA) got it right when they built their new building a number of years ago. There is art everywhere. One that everyone loves the is the Adlai Stevenson bench in the terminal. One can sit next to  or more appropriately “on” the locally grown politician’s sculpture while waiting for a plane.

Is art a business? Yes, art provides an income and jobs for many people. One example is Randy Ried who teaches  at the university. While he is an artist, he is more widely known among artists as  one who can help them put their projects together. Randy is involved in helping artists pour bronze castings. An artist involved in sculpture, for example is only often interested in producing the clay piece that the ultimate bronze is based on. Randy makes sure it gets from finished artist piece to bronze statue. Randy provides the logistical and engineering that makes art viewable. Randy told us that he could work full time pouring bronze for statues artists.

Eaton painting, "If Life Were This Easy"

Herb and Pam Eaton are gallery owners in Bloomington. Herb is the artist and Pam is his wife and local physical education teacher, but also his business partner. While Herb paints beautiful paintings depicting the nearby Mackinaw river valley, Pam makes sire people  are traipsing through their gallery in downtown Bloomington. From starting a small local artists group all withing walking distance of downtown Bloomington to having small music events, parlor discussions, and even painting classes, Herb and Pam’s goal is to get people to come to the gallery, get familiar with art and feel comfortable buying it.  Their entrepreneurial outlook helps in making art a business and a toll for prosperity.

Art is an important part of everyday life in a community. Consider what art can do for your quality of “place” in a community. A community that embraces the arts will be considered a community of higher quality and attract business and residents. The bottom-line is that art is just great to look at. Weather it is a landscape, modern color tone paintings, a perfomance by a symphony orchestra, or a dance performance art is living alive and will keep you and your community on an even keel.

I once heard someone say, “I seek beauty in every thing”. I like that phrase. That could be said about art. the process of seeking the beauty in art can be applied to everything you do. Even economic development.

Note: The photo that appears in the post is a painting by Mark Rothko

When I was in high school I paid little attention to my English classes. I loved to read. I had always been a reader. Every summer my mother took me to the local branch library.  I was required to check-out and read books all summer. Later, I was allowed to ride my bike to the branch, or to the  locally parked bookmobile.  With all this reading it makes one wonder why English class didn’t interest me.

Foremost, I think it was the rules that I didn’t like. Then diagramming  sentences. Why do we have to diagram a sentence? Punctuation was also confusing. So between my first serious sentence diagram in fifth grade to my graduation from graduate school, I got by with writing very little and usually paid someone to read and make corrections if I was actually serious about something I had written.  After reading these first two paragraphs, you may say to yourself that I  still can’t write. Maybe so, but you are still reading, right?

A undergraduate English teacher I had required us to write stories. I loved that class, because I was never without a good story.  After each assignment, he would read his favorite stories, usually two or three. He almost always read my stories, and when he would pass out the papers he would always come to my desk, let out a big sigh and say, “I love your stories, but you really need to proof-read them, otherwise I have to mark them down. Your punctuation and grammar is awful”. I loved that professor because he liked my stories, and largely ignored his pleadings.

Years later I have come to love writing. I noticed that I have posted 203 blog posts on this blog and probably 16 book reviews. So you see, I still read and now I write about what I read. I am still learning and trying to absorb tips from anyone who will give them to me. I have learned that the best way to get better at something is to do it. Do it often.  Having been an athlete, I should have realized that my writing could be improved if I practiced. So this is what I do.

What do you want to get good at? What is your weakness? Try practicing something. Take some time this week to identify something you want to get good at and practice. A friend of mine who owns an art gallery with her husband swears she is social media illiterate.  I always tell her to to just dive in and play around with the stuff. Practice and it will come with you. Play and it will be fun. You will be better for it.

Food is important to all of us. I have recently become interested in this thing we call food. I am a bit overweight and need to loose some pounds. I started adding weight about 8 years ago and haven’t quit. My excuse is that I have a tough schedule that requires a lot of eating out for lunch, dinner, drinks and all types of gestural frivolity. So it’s not like I just discovered food. Food has been a very important part of my life for a long time, as is just about anyone who is alive and ambulatory. It’s just that recently I have become more concerned about what exactly I put in my mouth and where it came from.

The other day I was at the store and saw this beautiful string of garlic. The garlic looked so good it almost looked fake. When I picked it up, wrapped up in it’s little yellow plastic mesh holder I read the label attached. Grown and shipped from CHINA! I am not kidding. Our local grocery store sells garlic from China. China! Do you understand what this means? I am not sure I do, but seriously, why should I buy garlic bulbs from China. Isn’t the concept of garlic being grown in China and shipped in a boat across the ocean and then 2/3 of the way across the country to a grocery store in central Illinois just a bit preposterous? I think that is why the “local food” movement is gaining strength.

One really good reason not buy garlic from China is that you can buy Garlic from farmers who grew them right here in Central Illinois. I am an economic development professional and my job is to help the local economy prosper. So I say buy local garlic!

The video below is about food and hunger and obesity. Ellen Gustafson is an activist interested in changing the food system in America and eventually the globe. You can see more about her Project30 at her website, or learn about it in the TED video of the week:

What are your local food habits? Why don’t you give a local farmer a break and buy some food at a farmer’s market. It is one small step to change the food system in America. Buy some garlic.

I recently attended a retreat at the Edward Lowe Foundation in Cassopolis, Michigan. The retreat center was created by the same guy who created Kitty Litter and made millions on the product. Fortunately all those cats pooping in boxes of clay got us beautiful retreat center where the foundation spends time helping businesses and entrepreneurs grow their businesses and help organizations like the International Economic Development Council (IEDC) develop plans and meet to create new agendas for research as we just did  a couple weekends ago.

One of the things they always have us do at the retreat center is to think about how to relax, be creative and think about things just a little bit differently. The first night we were there we saw this TED video about how to listen to classical music. I like to listen to classical music, but it is always great to hear people talk about how to do it. I don’t know the history or have knowledge about the great composers and how and why they composed a piece, or how they constructed something.

When you are done watching this video, ask yourself, do you go through life playing “your music” on one buttock? Watch and you will understand the question:

Now go listen and enjoy!

This post is for all my economic development friends in Illinois who are members of the Illinois Development Council (IDC). The IDC is a group of voluntary members who are interested in furthering the economic base of the State of Illinois. The IDC has officially started a new year and I am honored and lucky enough to Board Chair for the next twelve months.

Thank you to those who think enough of me to lead this organization and thank you to past chairs and officers. I look forward to filling your shoes.  A special thanks to Ed Sitar of Commonwealth Edison who saw fit to select me as his co-chair. Thanks Ed, for all the work you did this past year.

The Economic Development profession is going through tough times. Budgets are being cut and projects are fewer than they have been. Many private companies that are usually seeking expansion opportunities have decided to wait and we are just beginning to see a glimmer of improvement  in the economy. This is the time that all economic development professionals should be gearing up for economic improvement.  All professionals should be ready for growth. Not highly leveraged cheap money growth, but a good long steady period of growth. The growth of the past ten years was highly leveraged and financed using dubious methods. Banks are lending much more conservatively and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. But growth will occur. What can we as economic development professionals do? How can we improve our abilities? How can we serve our communities better?

As your Board Chairman this year I want to concentrate on  making the member better at what they do. Whether you are an Executive Director of a small community based public-private partnership, or the primary contact for economic development at a utility or railroad, the IDC should make your membership valuable. At the end of the year your membership in the IDC should provide you with a “value-added” experience. Here are my goals:

1. Education– We need to provide members with more opportunity to learn about the profession. The IDC can do a better job promoting classes, seminars and programs throughout the State and beyond. We don’t have to be the creator or developer of every program, we can partner with other organizations to promote professional learning. In addition, the IDC could  offer webinars and other distance learning opportunities so members can budget their time and valuable dollars. Also, let’s be relevant about what we are teaching. Let’s align ourselves with the 21st Century tools and methods that really work and help communities prosper.

2. Marketing — The State of Illinois should be marketing the State. And we should market our communities. The State has had its share of financial troubles, we all recognize that. So let’s not hold them up to something they cannot deliver right now. But let’s all work together to make sure the right industries and clusters are prospering in our communities. Yes, the IDC has had a marketing program and thank you to the volunteers who step-up to the plate to manage these programs. However, we need more coordination, and we must look to the State to play that role. So let us step up as local leaders and ask our State partners how we can help them, which in turn will help us.

3. Government Advocacy– This is the most difficult issue to manage. How about instead of trying to be all things to all people, let’s develop one or two “BIG” issues we all think will be of benefit to our members and let them guide us. We can’t possibly manage every legislative issue that comes our way. But we can be voice for the one or more issues that are important to all economic developers. And if we do want to spend more time on issues, candidate’s and other specific ideas, then perhaps it’s time for a political action committee (PAC). Then those who want to be involved in the issues of the day can engage with their dollars, and others who don’t or can’t are free and clear then perhaps it’s time for a political action committee (PAC).

4. Partnerships — Both Mark Williams and Ed Sitar along with help from our Executive, Mike Lane have done a great job developing partnerships with allied organizations such as  the State Chamber, IMA, Illinois Municipal League and others.  We need to continue to do this and be allied for a strong state government with a sound tax policy and ethical, open government. Only then, can we change the perception of  the State and make our jobs that much easier.

Nothing earth shattering here. Just plain simple relationship building, communication, and development of programs that serve our membership. Doing this will increase our numbers, increase our revenues, provide value for our members and strengthen our numbers. I hope you along for the ride with me.  Call me, write me, respond on this blog, but let’s talk about what we can do, together to be more productive.

Thanks and one more thing, let’s have a good time doing this, and don’t forget to smile!

When I was a kid, my parents insisted that we try new foods. They always taught us that we should try something at least once. “Taste it at least once and if you don’t’ like it you don’t have to eat it”,  they would say. You will never know if you don’t try. I like that idea. Here are the things on my list that I’ve tried and and don’t care for:  Olives, black or green, blue cheese (although I am still open to it), and those Greek things wrapped in grape leaves. I have no idea what they are called.  I also don’t like chicken wings. I know everyone else does, and it isn’t necessarily the taste, but all that mess and work for just a little bit of meat, doesn’t seem worth the effort (crab legs fall into this category too).

So when I hear people sit around proudly boasting that they have no time for that “Facebooking thing” or Tweeting, or social media in general I have to wonder, have they tasted it? How do they know if they don’t want anything to do with it. Maybe they tasted it, but it wasn’t cooked right.  Maybe they are missing something that might be helpful. Maybe they will like the taste of it and gobble it up.

Truthfully, I think a lot of people who are not using social media and act as if it is such a bother or a big issue and then boast of their ignorance do so because of several reasons. For one, they are often the type of person who will not adopt a new technology or method of doing something until the very last minute. “Late adopters” might be a term to use as opposed to “early adopters”. Second, they feel like they are too late in the game and might feel foolish if they don’t quite understand something right away.  Instead being critical or ridiculing social media is easier. It is easier to criticize something rather than be open to it. Last,  if it is not cheap easy and convenient it can’t be worth anything.

What is really interesting is listening to people be critical and proud of their social media ignorance in front of me, knowing full-well that I am deeply interested and open to working with the medium. Recently I was in a discussion with intelligent well- meaning people when they started in on what me termed a “social-media dumb down”.  I said nothing. If they really feel like social media is that stupid, I decided, let them feel that way. Nothing I say in that situation will help them understand or learn. In fact I think they were disturbed that I didn’t defend myself and my GenY prowess.

Go ahead, don’t taste the fruit. You will never understand how delicious  it might be.

Bishop Hill Tower

I went to Bishop Hill, Illinois the other day to see and visit a restaurant of a friend of mine. She has a unique little place that is the highlight of the community and provides visitors with homemade country cooking  along with Swedish favorites. Bishop Hill is situated just east of Galesburg Illinois and about 90 minutes from Bloomington-Normal.  It was settled by a group of religious Swedes back in the the 1840s’ and their communal style of living lasted only 15 years before things broke apart. However their efforts included a number of beautiful buildings which still remain and have  received National Historic Site status. The town has a number of beautiful 150 plus year old buildings in various states of upkeep and repair. But for a small town in the middle of central Illinois, they have done quite nicely for themselves.

But this isn’t a story about Bishop Hill, but more appropriately Trish Nusbaum the proprietor of the Red Oak Restaurant. The Red Oak is in a former farm house and consists of three small dining room that each holds about 30 people and a couple of outdoor seating areas. Trish has managed over the fourteen years she has owned the Red Oak to create quite the enterprise of restaurant dining, pies and comfort food casseroles delivered to your home via pre-order, and mail order to anywhere in the United States.  So the Red Oak is a burgeoning enterprise in the middle of a small metropolis of 150 people somewhere in Illinois. However, if you met the owner, you would be overtaken by the enthusiasm, friendliness and tireless work that goes into her passion, the Red Oak.

Trish is one of those people who put most of us to shame when it comes to work ethic. After a long day, I usually sit down and fall asleep watching a mindless TV show. Trish is probably falling asleep at her desk thinking about how to improve her styrofoam packaging so she can ship her casseroles to the east coast without it costing an arm and a leg. When I came by on Saturday, she was manning the front of the house, taking reservations and seating people. I had a delicious meal of Swedish meatballs with homemade noodles. They were thick and chewy and the white gravy (sauce) was perfect. With it came a salad and some good Swedish Rye, no doubt made in the kitchens of the restaurant, and also available at the Farmer’s Market. I washed it down with Lingonberry lemonade, but found it a bit sweet. I wish I would have had the Lingonberry iced tea, which looked more refreshing.  The whole meal was topped off with one of the Red Oak’s famous pies. I had the quadberrry pie, which came with four berries. Don’t ask me which berries, (as if it matters) as the pie was just perfect and the crust melt in your mouth. It was topped off with homemade vanilla ice cream.  The pies are old news for me. I manage to buy a pie or a mini-pie every time Trish comes to the Farmers Market. I bought  a cherry pie for the Fourth of July party I was planning to attend, but it never made it. Trish told me that she would be available after 2:00 and I went to stroll the antique show and village. When I came back at two, Trish was still at it, and held me off by giving me some of the Lingonberry Ice Tea that had coveted earlier.

The Red Oak Restaurant

The restaurant operations are spread out in two buildings. One for the restaurant and a carriage house for the pies and casseroles. Trish, like many innovative and creative entrepreneurs has managed to develop her operations, not from a well laid out  plan, but from necessity and using the assets and tools she has on hand. If there is room for one more refrigerator than she will find a way to squeeze it in. If she needs another shelf, somewhere, somehow she will get one built. Please, don’t get me wrong, her hodge-podge “fit-it-where-you-can” style is not careless, it instead seems to have a sense of karmic order and simplicity.

I want everyone who reads this to do one of three things, or all three. First stop by the Bloomington Farmer’s Market on any Saturday morning and buy a pie or a casserole and say hi to Trish. She will be one of the nicest people you meet there. Second, ask her for a delivery menu and place an order for a delivery right to your doorstep of fine comfort food. Last, go to her website and order a nice comfort food meal and have it mailed to your Aunt in Keokuk, or you r best friend that just had a baby in Dubuque. One day, when Trish products are as big as Omaha Steaks and you see Oprah giving away casseroles as one of her “favorite things”, you can say, “Hey, I knew the Red Oak back when they came to the Farmer’s Market”