Most every seat was filled for a business summit conference on Tuesday in Augusta.
With the theme “The Power of You,” the conference brought together speakers presenting topics useful across all industries and career levels.
“I’ve been very blessed to be able to travel around the country and do conferences and participate in conferences, and we just don’t really have anything like that here,” said Amy Richardson, President and CEO of Richardson Professional Solutions, who spearheaded the event. “Talking to other business owners, they may not have the means or the opportunity, so I really wanted to bring that high-end conference experience here.”
Richardson said all the speakers were local to Augusta. It was an opportunity to showcase what Augusta has to offer to business owners, employees, and entrepreneurs. However, the topics were also to help attendees better in all areas, as a professional, an employee, and a co-worker, even as a parent.
“It’s not just about how to be a better employee and hire a better team, but it’s also about how to avoid burnout for yourself, how to be a better leader, how to manage multiple generations in the workplace,” she explained. “We had a session on financial basics for you as a business owner. That’s also important for a lot of people in the room. It was really important for us to have that empowerment thought process through the entire agenda.”
Among the more than 100 people who attended was Jessica Anderson from Lamar Outdoor Advertising. She told ABD they look for any opportunity to network, learn new ways to be better leaders, and advance their business.
She added that the breakout sessions that were part of the conference were also valuable.
“I learned values are based on your own experiences, which really resonates with me, because I’m a military brat, so a lot of the leadership comes from being military driven,” she said. “My entire family is military, so I didn’t realize that’s where I might be getting these things.”
Richardson said she and the planning committee owed much of the success of this year’s conference to the large cross-section of event sponsors.
“It’s not just higher education, it’s not just small business, it’s not just big business,” she said. “We have representation across multiple industries and multiple levels of businesses, and we couldn’t do it without them. It was really our goal as a planning committee to be able to keep our ticket price down, but we had to have boots on the ground to find sponsors to help bridge that gap.”
Sponsors and vendors included Troy University, BNI (Business Network International), Durham Bray Law Firm, NY Life, Augusta Staffing, Buona Coffee, Summer House Realty, ABD, SRP Federal Credit Union, and Managed Nerds.
“I wanted to see the conference succeed; they need sponsors to help provide a little extra funding boost, but also to provide an awareness boost,” said Sharon Martin, co-founder and CEO of Managed Nerds and an ABD contributor. “I was doing it because, as a sponsor, I was hoping to get more local businesses to come. I sponsored the event last year as well, and I met a lot of good businesses at the event, and I wanted to see a broader distribution this year, so I sponsored again this year.”
Although looking forward to a break following the conference, Richardson said she is already thinking about next year’s conference.
“The conversations are already happening about next year,” she said. “We’re always looking for people to join our planning committee and to be a sponsor for next year. Last, we had people come up to us and say, ‘I really want to be involved. I really want to get engaged. What can I do? How can I be involved? I want to be a sponsor.’ So hopefully we’re going to have that same excitement this afternoon.”
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