Revisiting the 'jobs mantra'

Three things we've learned in 30 years.

In 1980, community leaders met regularly in the basement of the American National Bank building downtown to plot Kalamazoo's future. Never mind that a group of economists in Nebraska had already predicted, pretty much regardless of what we did, that our local economy would grow about 2 percent through the year 2015, which is looking like it will come to pass. Those same economists forecast more robust growth for Grand Rapids.

Calling on their experiences of the 50s, 60s and 70s, Kalamazoo's leaders in 1980 did what leaders were doing all over the country: they applied organizational management techniques and logic to community development. Here, as elsewhere, then, our leaders were pounding on the table, declaring "jobs, jobs, jobs" as the key to the region's future.

Since that time, community leaders have never had a hard time lining up support for efforts to attract and retain jobs. This type of focus by community leaders is understandable because, what is a community leader but a focused organizational leader with a desire to help his or her community. And what is an economy without jobs?

The essence of organizational leadership, of course, is to rally support, and to create clarity, around an understandable and measurable internal cause, or mantra, no matter how complex the issues or the environment. Stryker's 20-percent earnings growth focus isn't a bad example.
The 1980 experience, though, hatched ironically in the bowels of the banks and manufacturing operations, notably Upjohn, had an extra dimension: inclusion. Citizens from every walk of life weighed in on what the future could and should look like.

Organizational development and community development, we were beginning to learn then, would prove to be two different animals over the next three decades. Not to take anything away from the jobs logic, which is still a big piece of the puzzle, but even then the question was asked: "What would happen if people could connect electronically around the world and place less emphasis on traditional communications and transportation?"

Keep in mind that the folks in Palo Alto were just developing the mouse and -- perhaps you�ve forgotten -- the fax machine was not in common use, let alone email.

Fast forward to 2006 and 2007 when a completely different set of community leaders was gathering in a different basement in downtown Kalamazoo. Jobs, over the decades, remained an issue, but the mantra had died down, and replaced with a growing belief that: 1. Education, not job creation, may be the most relevant driving force for long-term community development. There�s almost a direct correlation between a community's educational achievement level and its economic vitality. 2. It helps to reinvest in "cultural infrastructure" and quality of life. The New Museum, the revitalized library and major drives for the KIA, the Symphony, the Civic Theatre and the Epic Center, along with the development of the Gilmore Keyboard Festival, helped stimulate patterns of stability in the core community that otherwise could have taken a Rust-Belt dive. 3. It pays to leverage diverse community and economic resources, without a single jobs focus, and put more than the conventional "community leaders" into play. Alleviating neighborhood concerns, preserving green space, making traffic improvements and finding state funds for an Engineering School -- not job creation, per se -- were the trump cards in the development of the Business Research Park, where some nice jobs have been created.

When our community leaders gather in 2040, what will they say about what we knew as we plotted our future in 2008?

Coming next: Where did the 20-somethings go?

Curious about why those Nebraska economists thought we were destined for flat, not booming, growth? Click here.