I spent the end of last week attending the Iowa Chamber of Commerce Executives (ICCE) annual conference in Clear Lake. It's always great to get time networking with peers across the state, sharing ideas, success stories and learning opportunities. In addition, we generally have some pretty great speakers and this year was no exception. We heard from a variety of folks, but there were two in particular that really resonated with me.

Jay Handler owns a company called Membership 180, and focused much of his presentation on chamber member engagement - something we've been working on much of the year, and will continue to gain a better action plan throughout the coming year. Jay is very well-known and respected in Chamber of Commerce circles, and it was great to get some one-on-one time with him to talk about ideas and opportunities for us to continue to strengthen our work. 

The other speaker that really inspired me was Andy Sokolovich (pictured at left), a Gallup-certified Strengths Coach from the Clinton, IA area. If you've not heard of Gallup's Strength Finders poll before, it's essentially a personality assessment that helps identify your strengths, and correlating themes between those. I had actually taken the test a few years ago to identify my 'Top 5 Strengths', but it was wonderful to hear Andy speak about the importance of knowing your own strengths, and the strengths of your team (co-workers, board members, volunteers, etc.) to best work with one another and be more productive as a team by simply knowing one another's strengths in the workplace. If you've not heard of the poll before, and are interested in learning more you can find information here: http://www.strengthsfinder.com/home.aspx. I encourage you to take the assessment as it's a great tool to gain insight into the way we work with others.