Taylor Batten, editorial pages editor for the Charlotte Observer presents Tuesday morning to the Joint Leadership Expedition.
Charlotte, NC – More than 300 business and community leaders from Kentucky’s largest cities – Louisville and Lexington – are getting ready to board planes back to the commonwealth after studying best practices that can be used to build on the current collaboration between the two cities and strengthen the region as a part of the 2014 Leadership Expedition.
The second such joint leadership trip between Commerce Lexington and Greater Louisville, Inc., the chambers of commerce for the cities, started in the early morning hours of Sunday and have continued through Tuesday morning topped off by an unscheduled visit and presentation from Bank of America’s founding president and one of Charlotte’s favorite city fathers, Hugh McColl.
Trip attendees heard from speakers such as Charles Bowman, Market President-North Carolina, Bank of America; a talent attraction and retention panel with relocated businesses about what brought them to Charlotte including an executive from Chiquita which relocated in recent years from Cincinnati; a session speaking about the partnerships growing along I-64 with Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer and Lexington Mayor Jim Gray; and Mark Pringle, Vice President, Siemens Charlotte Energy Hub with Mary Vickers-Koch, Dean, Central Piedmont Community College to discuss innovative education and business collaboration initiatives.
“Our steering committee has assembled an exciting agenda that allows us to learn from Charlotte’s recent successes and gain insight into the challenges,” said Ken Sagan, Chairman, Stites & Harbison PLLC and 2014 Expedition Co-Chair. “From regionalism and key economic drivers to talent, workforce development and business collaboration, there are many similarities between our communities and an abundance of learning opportunities.”
In addition to hearing about what has made Charlotte grow by leaps and bounds in the past few decades, participants from the two cities talking about the issues that impact residents and businesses in both home communities, leveraging power in the legislature, encouraging personal and corporate philanthropy, expanding arts and culture, benchmarking growth in the relationship between Lexington and Louisville since the first join trip to Pittsburgh in 2010 and more.
Business Lexington
Read the July edition offor more on the outcomes of the trip.