The Albany Area Chamber Foundation Restructure

A FOUNDATION

STORY THE ALBANY AREA CHAMBER FOUNDATION UNDERGOES RESTRUCTURING TO ALIGN TO CURRENT COMMUNITY AND BUSINESS NEEDS

THE ALBANY AREA CHAMBER FOUNDATION HAS EXISTED FOR THE PAST 30 YEARS WITH THE GOAL OF SUPPORTING COMMUNITY ADVANCEMENT AND SUPPORTING THE ALBANY AREA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE.

But as Albany has evolved and changed, so, too, has the Chamber, which meant the Chamber foundation was past due for some adjustments, too.

“Just as (with) the chamber, the ‘why’ has remained constant,” said Barbara Rivera Holmes, president & CEO of the Albany Area Chamber of Commerce and the Albany Area Chamber Foundation, the Chamber’s 501c3 affiliate. “The why we exist remains, (but) the what we do and how we do it has changed. We adapt what we do in order to continually meet our why or our purpose, and so what we have with the Foundation is an alignment with our strategic goals to the environment.

“It’s a purpose-driven organization. As the chamber executes its #ImpactABY2023 strategy … one of the goals was to take a deep look at the Albany Area Chamber Foundation and redesign it in a way where it aligned to current community needs, business needs, and really operate it in a way that would extend beyond the business community’s normal reach. We’re talking deep societal challenges and opportunities.”

“Through a process working with our … Foundation Board of Directors and strategic consultants, learning from peers and really digging deep with our investors and stakeholders and understanding community issues, we restructured the foundation. We wrote a new strategic plan and we’re implementing it.”

“We have a really good board who really got in the weeds and tinkered with

BARBARA RIVERA HOLMES, PRESIDENT & CEO OF THE ALBANY AREA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE AND THE ALBANY AREA CHAMBER FOUNDATION

this Foundation for the last two years to make it as impactful an organization as it can be,” said Matt Reed, 2021 chairman of the Albany Area Chamber and current chairman of the Albany Area Chamber Foundation. “As we kind of poke our heads up after being dormant for so long, we’ve got a board who believes in the organization, and all the board members are investing in the Foundation, individually and through their companies as well.” ON FIVE MAJOR AREAS: TALENT,

EDUCATION AND LEADERSHIP; BUSINESS AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP; DIVERSITY, EQUITY AND INCLUSION;

COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT AND BRANDING; AND ORGANIZATIONAL EXCELLENCE. “Some of these same titles are reflected over on the Chamber’s strategy,” said Holmes. “The Foundation approaches it from a very different way, and in a way that synergizes with the Chamber and catalyzes some of that work. We have already identified, and are in various stages of implementation, with programs for each of those areas.”

Two of the programs the Foundation is taking on are the annual MLK Dinner and FLEX ABY, Albany’s first youth entrepreneurial competition.

“Marion Fedrick, the president of Albany

State University, and I, we co-chair the King Day Celebration Committee,” said Reed. “We have not been able to do a large-scale event due to COVID in the past several years, so as we thought about reinvigorating it and bringing more folks to the table, carrying the Chamber Foundation with the resources the Chamber has in executing events … it just seemed like a (good fit). “Then the work that (Chamber Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Division Chair Jeretha (Peters of Wells Fargo) and her DE&I committee have been doing and the relevance they’ve brought, it just seemed like a really good partnership to bring the two together. … The kicker with all of that was being able to get Venessa Harrison, the president of AT&T Coastal States, to come and (and be our honored speaker at the MLK Dinner). We’re looking forward to a fireside chat with her, which I think will just be awesome.

“We’re really excited about that, and it’s really just kind of a reset of that event. … That’s my goal: To bring in some really high-quality speakers to talk about Dr. King’s legacy and how they or their organizations are driving that legacy and how we can (in) Albany as well.”

FLEX ABY, or Foundational Leadership and Entrepreneurial Experience Albany, is a youth entrepreneurship competition.

“We launched that in partnership with the Commodore Conyers College and Career Academy and the Albany-Dougherty Economic Commission, and the goal is quite simple,” said Holmes. “It’s to spark an entrepreneurial interest and drive in our students. The backbone of the American enterprise system, the backbone of America, is entrepreneurialism. Through FLEX ABY we are helping build ventures, livelihoods, dreams and community. This is an incredible program that we’re glad to be able to tap into and launch here in Albany.”

The program starts with students writing business plans, and the students MATT REED, 2021 CHAIRMAN OF THE ALBANY AREA CHAMBER AND CURRENT CHAIRMAN OF THE ALBANY AREA CHAMBER FOUNDATION

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are connected with business mentors. Students in Albany will go through three local rounds, which will conclude with one local winner in March. That winner will go on to compete at the state program in Fitzgerald, where the program originated.

“WE ARE TAPPING INTO STUDENT CREATIVITY, AND WE’RE TAPPING INTO IT IN A WAY THAT LEANS ON THEIR OWN TALENTS TO BUILD SOMETHING THAT IS THEIRS AND IS

NEEDED IN THE MARKETPLACE,” SAID HOLMES.

“It’s a lot of competency and confidence and courage that students have or develop through this process, so there’s this ownership piece at the end of it.

“We want our students … to be able to understand and correlate the concepts in school or an educational setting to the real world, to business settings, and the competition does just that. The 4CA has a variety of different career and college pathways; if you’re in a marketing class at 4CA and you’re going through a program like FLEX ABY, you can see the correlation between what you’re learning, in terms of the curriculum, and then the applicability in real world situations. There’s that correlation and then that relevance that’s so important to anyone learning something new or experiencing something.

“Ultimately, we want to grow our own. We want to grow our talent. We want to grow our businesses as well, and so this is another way where not only are we supporting students, but we’re also supporting their entrepreneurial ideas and their entrepreneurial dreams. Some of them will hold, and our hope certainly is that these students, through the support of their networks and the program and our community at large, will be successful business owners. We know that in today’s (time) many people who have traditional full-time work also have their own businesses. It’s not (like) you can only do one thing. This program expands the opportunities for our students, and, ultimately, the economic opportunities for Albany.”

Reed also talked about the desire and need to work through the Foundation to do more cohesive, community-wide branding in the same vein as the “Only One Albany” campaign.

“I think we need to also do a better job of talking (about the positive),” said Reed. “So many times we’re talking about the negative of Albany, but we have so many things that other communities would kill for. We need to talk about those things more. I hope that (with) the Chamber Foundation we can have some sort of marketing and branding and content piece that will help be the voice on that, too.”

Whether it’s through DE&I events such as the MLK Dinner, programs such as FLEX ABY, community branding campaigns, or other strategic initiatives, the restructured Foundation aims to better the city of Albany and meet community needs, according to Holmes and Reed.

“What we’re working on and doing is a very strategic and well thought out plan off how we can continue to drive positive change in Albany,” said Reed.

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