In her first month as president and CEO of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce, Ashli Watts has taken the association’s agenda across the state to touch base with business professionals on the group’s plan for 2020.
It’s a whirlwind tour, with events planned at 25 local chambers over the course of four weeks. Watts has been using the opportunity to discuss a broad platform of policy initiatives for the 2020 General Assembly session and to reintroduce herself as the new but familiar face of the chamber’s leadership. Despite the busy schedule, Watts said she’s never been happier.
“Getting out in the state, talking about policy and government, and hearing about what’s going on across the state—I love that,” said Watts, who describes herself as a people person by nature. “It’s a good way, as I start this chapter in my career, to hear what businesses are thinking and what they want to see from the Kentucky Chamber.”
The new chapter for Watts is also turning the page for the state’s largest business association. Watts, previously the association’s senior vice president of public affairs, took the helm on Nov. 1 as the Kentucky Chamber’s first female president, following the retirement of longtime Chamber President and CEO Dave Adkisson, who led the group for 15 years.
Only about a half-dozen of the state chambers of commerce across the country are currently led by female presidents, with three hired in the past year. Watts is excited to be among them. As the Chamber’s youngest president ever at 37, and a working mother of 7-year-old daughter Emma and 4-year-old son Carter, Watts sees her appointment as a reflection of the changing face of Kentucky’s business community.
“There are many CEOs in Kentucky who are women. We are getting more and more women in our ranks at the chamber and on our board. Hopefully, this is a bridge to the next generation of our workforce,” she said. “It is exciting to throw a little chip in that glass ceiling.”
Watts emerged as the ideal candidate for the job following an extensive executive search process conducted by a third-party search firm, said Nick Rowe, the president of Kentucky American Water and 2020 Kentucky Chamber of Commerce chairman.
“She brings a passion for the state chamber that we could find nowhere else,” he said. “As we move forward in 2020, I look forward to working with Ashli and our high-performance chamber staff for the continued advancement of business advocacy issues for all member companies. In addition, we will work to continue strengthening our strong relationships with local chambers throughout the state for the betterment of the commonwealth.”
For Watts, advocacy and association management has been at the heart of her work for almost the entirety of her career. She first arrived in Frankfort as an intern for the state legislature during her senior year at Campbellsville University. She earned her master’s degree in public policy and administration from the University of Louisville while working for the Kentucky Bar Association and joined the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce in 2012.
“I came to the Capitol, and I never left,” she said.
Prior to being named as president, she led the chamber’s lobbying efforts on significant legislation such as right to work in 2017, workers’ compensation reform in 2018 and reinstating arbitration agreements in 2019. That extensive policy advocacy experience, along with her relationship-building skills and her knowledge of the issues that affect Kentucky business, makes Watts a strong asset, according to Commerce Lexington Inc. President and CEO Bob Quick.
“The Kentucky Chamber of Commerce is in good hands, as its leadership transitions to a new era,” Quick said. “She has good instincts and organizational skills, the respect of legislators and business leaders across the state, and she has worked collaboratively with the metro chambers on key issues over the years. Commerce Lexington Inc. looks forward to continuing to work with her and the Kentucky Chamber team to advance issues that improve Kentucky’s competitiveness for jobs.”
Now Watts is revving up the chamber’s team to tackle a broad scope of issues in the coming year, ranging from infrastructure investment to workforce development to sports wagering and the opioid crisis.
In terms of achievable goals for the 2020 Kentucky General Assembly, Watts said the chamber will be pushing hard to gain some bipartisan traction on infrastructure investment this year. Kentucky has made progress in terms of modernizing its tax climate and passing laws such as right-to-work and worker’s compensation reform to improve competitiveness, she said, but the state’s infrastructure is in danger of quickly falling behind.
“Every state around us in the last three years has increased infrastructure investment through raising their gas taxes and also raising some user fees, such as registration fees,” Watts said. “We have not, and this upcoming year in 2020, we will lose quite a bit of federal dollars that go toward infrastructure, specifically transit.”
Better aligning Kentucky’s workforce with high-demand positions in growing industries is a continual challenge for the state, Watts said. While Kentucky’s low unemployment rate has been a positive sign for the economy and the state’s overall business climate, many businesses struggle to find high-quality employees.
“The top thing we hear from every business owner in Kentucky, whether it’s a small business or a large business, is workforce,” Watts said. “We often say we have too many jobs without people and too many people without jobs.”
The chamber’s approach to its mission of representing the state’s business interests has widened in recent years, Watts said, as businesses across the state face new challenges and opportunities. One of the association’s recent initiatives has been helping businesses to address the state’s crippling opioid crisis. The Chamber recently hired two new employees through a public-private partnership to help businesses navigate the related challenges within their workforce and their communities. (See Ashley McCarty’s BizIQ article on Kentucky Chamber Opioid Response Program for more.)
“It’s something that many employers have never had to deal with before, and yet I think we all know someone who has dealt with this crisis here in Kentucky,” Watts said.
“I get to wake up every morning and advocate for the business community all across Kentucky and be their voice while they are busy running their businesses. I’ve never been so busy, but I don’t think I’ve ever been happier.” —Ashli Watts, CEO of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce
The chamber is also in favor of legalizing sports wagering and additional criminal justice reform—specifically helping more businesses to become “second chance” employers by addressing associated business liability concerns. Fully funding education across the state is also a key objective for the chamber during the upcoming budget year, Watts said.
“We’ve made great strides in education over the last couple of decades, however funding has really plateaued,” Watts said. “We want to make sure we are investing in it.”
One of Watts’ key messages to business professionals during her recent visits has been the importance of advocacy and active participation at both the state and the local level, a point she said was emphasized during this year’s gubernatorial election. The Kentucky business community has strength in numbers, she said, and the ability to influence outcomes in Frankfort and in their local communities. Representing the interests of the chamber’s membership, and those of large and small businesses across Kentucky, is what makes her new job satisfying, Watts said.
“I get to wake up every morning and advocate for the business community all across Kentucky and be their voice while they are busy running their businesses,” she said. “I’ve never been so busy, but I don’t think I’ve ever been happier.”