About 10 days ago the Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors met for our annual Planning Session. Rather than a three-day, out-of-town off site session filled with getting to know you games and exercises, we met for a full day at Canyon Oaks Country Club. (No, not on the golf course, in the meeting room). Beginning at 7:00 AM and working straight through lunch, the Chamber Board of Directors broke through the barriers of "we've always done it this way" and talked almost exclusively about what we value, who we represent, how we measure success and how we move ourselves forward.
It was an interesting and inspiring day, although it started out with a "start"! One of our directors is a professional trainer and corporate coach. He was all set to facilitate the day and had worked hard on an agenda and power point presentation to help us focus. For my part, I was simply to bring the board up-to-speed on our current financial situation, staffing and reorganization of activities. No problemo....I'm all set! Until the phone rang at 6:30 that morning just as I was packing up to head out the door. It was Scott reporting that he had the flu, including a temperature of 102. He wisely chose to stay home and would be keeping his germs to himself.
YIKES!! Facilitating the day just fell to me and I wasn't ready. Crikey...I'm in scramble mode.
Drove QUICKLY to my office to download an e-mail from Scott containing his PowerPoint slides. Drove QUICKLY back to Canyon Oaks to set up the program and projector. Said a little prayer and dove right in.
Thankfully, I have a very understanding Board of Directors, many of whom I've worked with in various capacities for many years, and several more that I have incriminating photos of, so all in all, they were ready to WORK WITH ME!
Long-story-long, we came up with the Top 3 Things We Value, the Top 3 Measures of Our Success and our list of The Best Idea We Heard All Day. In the next few weeks, I'll be blogging about these things in detail focusing primarily on the things we value.
Some folks might not realize that the Chamber of Commerce has a value system by which we judge the things we do. Values are important to our board and to me. It's my job as CEO to make sure we are living those values every day and I take that job seriously.
I hope you'll tune in and read about our values in the coming weeks. Not really a cliffhanger as exciting as who shot J.R. Ewing, but it should be interesting nonetheless.
Stay tuned.....
