Columbus Chamber Blog: Information about economic development, economic and business trends, Columbus workforce, programs, events and the Chamber of Commerce in and around Columbus, OH

Find out What Makes Columbus Cool at the 2011 State of the Young Professional

By Robbie Banks, Manager, Young Professionals

Young Professionals are the future of the Columbus Region’s workforce. What do they think of Columbus? Find out at the Columbus Chamber’s 2011 State of the Young Professional (YP) on Wednesday, October 26 at Embassy Suites Columbus - Airport.

As the Chamber’s young professionals manager, I invite you to join us for an epic evening that will include career and professional development sessions, as well as a program in which we’ll reveal the results of the “What Makes Columbus 'Cool' for the Young and Talented” 2011 survey.

Here are my top three reasons you won’t want to miss the Career and Professional Development event from 4 - 5:45 p.m. You can:

1. Share a room with high-level senior executives and hear their YP experiences and lessons learned.
2. Learn the knowledge, insights and perspectives you’ll need to succeed while on the job search.
3. Get to where you want to go. The sessions available at the State of the YP are meant to provide you with the resources and knowledge you need to advance your career and propel you ahead of the curve.

Your $30 registration fee includes your choice of two 45-minute sessions and a book written by a local author.

And the top three reasons to attend the State of the YP Program from 6:30 - 7:30 p.m.:

1. Connect with other members of Columbus' young and talented community during the networking and refreshments portion from 5 - 6:30 p.m.
2. Be informed. You took the survey, didn’t you? See the results and the progress our community has made since 2007.
3. Hear from leaders. Michael Dalby, president and CEO, Columbus Chamber and Mayor Michael B. Coleman will address the importance of YPs. A few of your peers, including me, will also speak.

And bonus... the networking and State of the YP program portions are FREE to attend!

Facebook Contest: Free Tickets for Career and Professional Development Program

Comment on the 2011 State of the YP note on the Columbus Chamber Facebook page and tell us why you want to attend the Career and Professional Development Event. A random company/organization/individual will be selected to receive two complimentary registrations (each valued at $30). The deadline is Sunday, October 23 at 11:59 p.m. The winner will be notified on October 24. Remember, attending the networking and program portions of the event are free to attend and all are welcome!

Register Now

Learn more and register at columbus.org/yp. The 2011 State of the Young Professional is presented by Embassy Suites Columbus - Airport, in partnership with Battelle, State Farm and Columbus Underground and with support from Shutterbooth, CYP CLUB, Columbus Rotaract and Young Professionals of Columbus. 

Member Spotlight: Option2Air

Option2Air LLC is your ‘Office-On-Wheels’ providing luxurious and productive group-travel for businesses. It aims to tap the unmet needs of business teams that presently use air-travel for medium distance travel (200 to 500 miles). It presently serves metro cities in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana.

Why We’re Chamber Members: We joined the Chamber as we consider Columbus to be a key market for us.

Fun Facts about Option2Air: Option2Air is an eco-friendly way for business travel as each of its vehicles potentially replaces several cars off the road.

Featured Product/Service: Whether you or your employees travel together for client meetings, training or conferences, you can avoid the hassles of going to the airport, parking, security-checks, lost luggage, switching off laptop and cellphone and getting squeezed in the middle seat. With Option2Air you can expect on-time, chauffeur-driven travel in a productive environment with comfortable leather seats (and no middle seats), extended legroom, high-speed wireless internet, on-board printer, wireless headphones, individual laptop/ phone chargers, laptop trays, LCD TV and on-board complimentary refreshments.

Unlike typical limousine services, it does not operate on-call basis nor provide airport pickup/ drop-off. Instead, it takes business teams from where they live or work to where they want to go. At present it provides booking of the full vehicle (and not individual seats).

For more information, go to www.option2air.com, or visit Option2Air at the Business2Business Network EXPO on Wednesday.

The Columbus Chamber member spotlights put the focus on our member organizations. To submit your member organization for a spotlight contact Michelle Bretscher.

Press Release: Columbus Chamber Reports Relatively Stable Second Quarter Employment - Columbus MSA Continues to Outpace National Average

COLUMBUS, OH, August 17, 2009 /24-7PressRelease/ -- The Columbus Chamber of Commerce is proud to announce second quarter statistics show the Columbus employment rate is stabilizing and continues to outpace the national average. The unemployment rate in Columbus is at 8.9 percent: far less than Ohio's 11.1 percent average, and still below as the national unemployment average, at 9.5 percent.

In fact, private education and healthcare have continued to experience a sharp rise, and government also reversed some of its earlier losses. Plus, education and healthcare are expected to continue enjoying large increases.

"Education and health services employment is more than 80 percent healthcare," Vice President of Economic Analysis Bill LaFayette, Ph.D. said. "This is the one sector whose growth has continued unabated during the recession - despite legitimate concerns over the ability of patients to pay for their care. Growth is expected to continue in the second half of the year."

The Columbus Chamber reports transportation and utilities also experienced growth of 44 percent between early 2001 and the beginning of the recession. The sector's decline early in the recession was worse than the national average, but the trend turned slightly positive at the beginning of the year. Assuming that growth does not deteriorate significantly, the comparison to 2008 for the full year should be much better than that for the first six months.

Professional and business services also experienced employment growth far stronger than the national average over the past seven years, and declines in the recession have been less than one-fifth the national average. Each of the three subsectors has performed much better than average since the beginning of the recession.

"This sector should be one of the first to benefit from economic recovery given its labor intensiveness and the likelihood of employers to increase their hiring of temporary employees as a response to early increases in demand," LaFayette said.

Leisure and hospitality employment declines in the Columbus Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), including Delaware, Fairfield, Franklin, Licking, Madison, Morrow, Pickaway, and Union Counties, have been less than average since the beginning of the recession. Statewide employment growth has been slightly positive, despite some weakening in recent months. Along with retail, local restaurants have benefited from the stronger-than-average Columbus MSA economy, while hotels in Columbus and elsewhere in Ohio, have benefited from the tendency of travelers to stay closer to home.

Other services - including various personal services, religious organizations, and professional and social associations - along with education and health services are experiencing higher employment now than at the beginning of the recession. Although the budgets of nonprofits have come under pressure, the services sector was growing much more weakly than average for several years before the recession hit.

The news is not all positive. Despite the marked economic growth reported by the Columbus Chamber, the implied Gross Domestic Product (GDP) decline would rank this recession as one of the two worst of the postwar period; its length is far greater than any of the 10 previous postwar recessions. U.S. employment is expected to decline through the year and into 2010, though at a much smaller rate. It is predicted that the national unemployment rate will reach 10 percent by December 2009 and will still be at 9.5 percent in December 2010.

More than two-thirds of the 51 economists in The Wall Street Journal's monthly survey expect the recession to end no later than the third quarter, with modest output growth in the second half of 2009.

For more information about the Columbus Chamber's economic update, visit www.columbus.org.

About the Columbus Chamber of Commerce
The Columbus Chamber of Commerce leads and supports economic growth and development in the Greater Columbus community. It supports a membership of 2,700 businesses. Learn more about Columbus at www.columbus.org.

The Pickaway County economy

I was honored to be guest speaker Wednesday at a Pickaway County Chamber event.  Part of my talk included some analysis of the Pickaway County economy.  I always enjoy these deeper dives into local economies because of the significant economic differences among the eight counties of our region.  Pickaway County’s economy is driven by manufacturing.  The 2,450 manufacturing jobs in 2007 represented almost 17 percent of the county’s total employment – a concentration 63 percent greater than the U.S. and twice that of the Columbus region as a whole.  As is true of other manufacturing-oriented areas, efficiency increases and consolidation among producers caused employment declines for Pickaway County earlier in the decade.  Manufacturing lost more than 2,000 jobs (46.5 percent) between 2001 and 2006, which led to a total loss of nearly 1,900 jobs (11.6 percent) over that period.  Unlike most other manufacturing-based economies, though, Pickaway County has enjoyed strong growth more recently.  The county gained 100 manufacturing jobs (4.2 percent) between 2006 and 2007, and about 40 more in the first three quarters of 2008.  As a result, Pickaway County’s total employment increased 2.7 percent in 2007 – twice the rate of the Columbus region and the U.S. – and declined only marginally in the first three quarters of 2008 relative to the same period of 2007.  The earlier employment declines and current recession, however, have led to a May 2009 seasonally-adjusted unemployment rate of 11.3 percent.

State government is also important, contributing more than 10 percent of employment.  There are two sectors that, while still below average in terms of employment share, are growing nicely and becoming far more important: professional and business services and private education and healthcare.  Transportation and logistics has declined since 2001, but has a bright future thanks to the recent opening of the Norfolk Southern Intermodal on the county’s northern border, and the completion of the Heartland Corridor rail project next year.

Getting Results with Social Media II: The Presentations

Thanks for everyone who attended "Getting Results with Social Media" last Thursday at Columbus State Community College's Center for Workforce Development, our sponsors (GREENCREST, Anthem, TechColumbus and CSCC), and of course our speakers (Bill Balderaz, Lara Kretler, Kevin Pfefferle, Gary Moneysmith, Matt Dickman, Bobby Whitman, Stephanie Busack, Shawn Morton,  and Matt Yuskewich).

Our presenters shared a lot of great insights, tips and cases on using online tools to accomplish business goals, so we wanted to make sure everyone had a copy of the slides and a direct connection to our experts. The slideshare pack is available below.

| Get your Presentation Pack

First Quarter Economic Update - Things Could Be Worse

The Columbus MSA continued its better-than-average employment performance during the first quarter.  Although preliminary March statistics show that the region lost 4,600 jobs during the first three months of 2009, the 0.5 percent loss was less than one-third the 1.6 percent U.S. decline.  Employment growth in most individual sectors was also stronger than average.  The worrisome decline in transportation – a crucial sector for us – paused, with a net gain of 500 jobs (1.0 percent) .  Most other individual sectors turned in better-than-average performance, including retail, financial activities, and professional and business services, each of which registered small net gains locally while continuing to decline nationally.  Since the beginning of the recession in December 2007, the Columbus MSA’s job loss has been 1.9 percent – little more than half the 3.7 percent national average. Read the full quarterly economic update here.

Columbus Moves into Top 10 Best Cities for Business

MarketWatch recently announced their top picks for the best cities for business. Both Dallas and Columbus moved into the top 10.

As a resident of the city, I was excited to see Columbus, Ohio ranked 7th this year.

MarketWatch mentioned Columbus being the home of the Ohio State University, Limited Brands and Big Lots Inc. As well as the addition of the financial firms Diamond Hill Investment Group and ProCentury Corp.

This is what else they had to say about Columbus.