Business Recruitment: Reporting to the Executive Director of Sonoma County BEST, the Director is responsible for recruiting companies to Sonoma County.  This shall include, but not be limited to, assessing the needs and desires of prospective clients; explaining the advantages of locating new or expanding facilities in the county; providing and responding to specific requests for information relating to the suitability of land and various sites for use by specific businesses and industries; transporting, entertaining, hosting, and arranging tours of county facilities; showing available real estate and buildings; and assisting the Executive Director and county/city officials in developing incentive packages and conducting final negotiations to secure new business/industry development.

Business Retention and Expansion (BRE): Coordinate the regional organization’s business retention and expansion programs.  The Director will assist with making site visits and manage the database of information generated by site visits.  He or she will work collaboratively with the existing economic development entities, elected and appointed officials, and other key stakeholders that impact the viability and job-creation potential of the Sonoma County’s incumbent businesses.  The Director will partner with local and Sonoma County officials to ensure that competitive issues identified in BRE visits are addressed by government entities.  Lastly, the Director will work closely with the Executive Director of BEST and other staff of regional and local organizations to ensure that business-development opportunities identified through BRE visits are effectively pursued.

Business Recruitment (40%)

• Conduct a business attraction campaign that identifies target industries and develops a protocol for action in obtaining new business prospects
• Identify relevant existing Sonoma County business relationships and partnerships (e.g., supply chain partners) for use in recruiting prospects
• Define Sonoma County’s portfolio of incentives for use in attraction and retention
• Develop prospect plans that result in the generation of leads for the community
• Act as project manager to ensure client needs are met during all stages of attraction and throughout the life of the project
• Develop and implement a campaign to conduct on-site visits with Sonoma County businesses
• Develop and expand the professional network of location specialists including site selection consultants, real estate developers, utilities, etc. to familiarize and sell Sonoma County
• Plan and conduct sales trips to prospective companies and site consultants
• Facilitate and host on-site visits
• Establish relationships with professional site selection consultants who can bring prospective new operations to Sonoma County
• Manage prospect tracking system, ensuring continuous response and follow-up.
• Respond to inquiries, ensuring timeliness, effectiveness and accuracy of information provided

Business Retention and Expansion:  Existing Businesses (50%)

• Coordinate the Sonoma County BEST efforts to support and align local economic development partners engaged in business retention and expansion programs
• Support existing business and industry and assist in problem resolution, retention and expansion by serving as moderator with local and state agencies to obtain available assistance, resolve misunderstandings, and negotiate settlements/resolutions
• Form an ad hoc business retention and expansion Opportunity Response team for use in vulnerable and/or opportunistic situations
• Create, manage and utilize a database of information generated by site visits
• Work closely with all existing economic development entities, elected and appointed officials, and other key stakeholders that impact the viability and job-creation potential of Sonoma County’s incumbent businesses

Other Duties as Assigned (10%)

Required Experience and Skills

• The incumbent should possess professional maturity, creativity, objectivity, good judgment, and excellent decision-making and problem-solving skills and track record of being a cooperative team player
• Able to communicate persuasively and possess a record of being a team player, forming effective working relationships, and building consensus
• Ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously
• Ability to organize, influence and work cooperatively with business, community and government leaders
• Outstanding written and verbal communication skills
• Demonstrated proactive management of sales prospects
• Ability to initiate important business contacts
• Experience with CRM systems and the use of technology to manage and track contacts and prospects

Preferred Skills:

• Extensive network base of professional contacts within the site selection/real estate development industry
• A solid understanding of factors affecting business location decisions, including sites, workforce, permits and regulations/construction
• Excellent organizational, strategic planning and project management skills
• Able to work in a fast paced, competitive and often uncertain environment
• Minimum five years economic development experience or equivalent relevant business background

Salary Range:   $65,000 to $80,000 annual salary plus benefits

Reports to BEST Executive Director

Interested Candidates Should Forward Cover Letter and Resume to:

Carolyn Stark, Executive Director
Sonoma County BEST
637 First Street
Santa Rosa, CA 95404

“Our embedded base of industry here in Sonoma County is most likely where additional jobs and investment will be created,” said Carolyn Stark, executive director of Sonoma County BEST.  “Our goal is to concentrate our efforts first on our existing business and find ways we can help them expand as well as work to resolve issues preventing their growth.”

Organized efforts at business retention and expansion are done in other parts of the country as well as California.  Richmond, Virginia attributes the creation of 1,045 new jobs and $68 million in new capital investment over five years specifically to its business retention and expansion program.   The Sonoma County BEST program is the first county-wide business retention program in Sonoma County and has job growth goals of 2,500 jobs in the next five years.

“BEST is a public-private partnership,” said Anthy O’Brien, CEO of Top Speed Data in Petaluma, and chair of the BEST committee organizing the outreach effort.  “We are building teams from throughout Sonoma County to be the 100 in 100 interview team.  These volunteers are business people themselves, and likely will be able to connect with the company they are interviewing in ways the public sector may not be able to on their own.”

The “100 in 100” project has several goals, foremost being the identification of opportunities for Sonoma County businesses to expand as well as identifying businesses that are vulnerable to relocation outside the region.  The program also plans to collect business success stories, find out specifically how local and state regulation may be impacting growth, and gather input from the region’s businesses for the Sonoma County BEST recruitment initiative.

“This initiative is critically important,” said Carolyn Stark.  “We intend to meet, connect and build relationships with our Sonoma County businesses that will help them be successful.  And, this is only the beginning of what will ultimately be an ongoing activity led by BEST.”  The Sonoma County BEST 100 in 100 initiative will launch by the end of March and conclude by July 1, 2012.

About Sonoma County BEST

Launched in 2011, the Sonoma County Building Economic Success Together (“BEST”) is a public-private partnership operating as a 501(c)3 under the umbrella of the Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce.  Its purpose is to support business success and job growth in Sonoma County.

Contact:

Christina Olds, Administrative and Communications Director

Sonoma County BEST / (707) 545-1118 / Christina@sonomacountybest.com

Carolyn Stark

The Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce announced today the appointment of Carolyn Stark as Executive Director of the Building Economic Success Together (BEST) program, a countywide economic development organization. The BEST program was formed last year under the umbrella of the Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce as an initiative to foster job expansion in Sonoma County.

The BEST strategic plan calls for the creation of over 2,500 direct jobs and 4,100 total jobs over a 5-year period of time. BEST projects big gains from the plan for the region: $155 million in consumer expenditures, $37 million in state and local tax revenues, $87 million in bank deposits, $268 million in payroll earnings and $182 million in disposable income.

“BEST has brought together leaders from both private and public sectors in an effort to stimulate job growth in Sonoma County, and we are excited to be moving into the next phase with Carolyn’s experience and leadership,” says Carl Campbell, BEST Board Member and Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce’s 2011 Chairman of the Board.

Ms. Stark’s career has been focused on promoting economic growth and community vitality. Most recently she was in the Coachella Valley (Palm Springs area) where she was one of the community leaders creating the region’s long-term economic strategy to diversify the valley economy, develop workforce excellence through improved education, promote regionalism, and preserve the ‘quality of place’ in the Coachella Valley. That plan laid out a blueprint to bring over 8,000 new jobs to the region and is currently in its second year of implementation.

In Austin, Carolyn was CEO of the Austin Technology Council, a non-profit organization of business, community and government leaders that worked together to promote the growth and expansion of the technology business sector in Texas. Austin’s regional initiative led to over 150,000 new jobs since 2004.

“We had a national search for the BEST executive director, and Carolyn’s experience in Silicon Valley, Austin, and recently in the Palm Springs area—being a catalyst for getting community leaders to create productive and prosperous economic conditions—was exceptional,” said Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce President/CEO, Jonathan Coe.

The executive search was spearheaded by Leap Solutions Group LLC, a Sonoma County Business Management Consulting firm.

“One of the most important things within a community is to have good jobs,” says Ms. Stark. “BEST represents a terrific collaborative effort to create these for Sonoma County, and I am excited to be asked to take this initiative to the next level.”

Ms. Stark will start on the job December 1, 2011.

To view a PDF reprint of the BEST Bet article, click here.