BusinessResourcesCenter

Lake-SumterCommunity College

Advisory Board Meeting Minutes

November 15, 2007 – 10:00 a.m.

LSCC Magnolia Room

Present:Dr. Wes Estey, Vice President, Educational Services, LSCC

Russ Sloan, Director, BusinessResourcesCenter, LSCC

Ray SanFratello, Chairman, BusinessResourcesCenter Advisory Board

Gwendolyn Manning

Everett A. Kelly, President & CEO, ThomasLangleyMedicalCenter

Ken Branwell

Jan Zacharchuk, Executive Director, Leesburg Area Chamber

Robert Johnson, Vice President, Gov. Affairs/Investor Relations, CommercePark

Bob Jones, Business Development Manager, WorkForce Central Florida

Gerry M. Marim, Business Development Manager, WorkForce Central Florida

Tom Popieski, Area President, BankFIRST

Lanny Huesbo, President, Husebo Advertising

Al Haliday, CPA, Haliday, Blair, Hux PA

John Mittermaier, SCORE

Martha Moses, SCORE

Shannon Elswick, Vice President, Orlando Regional Health Care

Barbara Shaw, Key Accounts Manager, SECO

Drew Davis, State Farm Insurance Agency, Inc.

Lucy Torman, Assistant Director, BusinessResourcesCenter

Bob Vehmeier, Manager of Training Services, BusinessResourcesCenter

Noela Banta, Enrollment & Reporting, BusinessResourcesCenter

Robert Bone, Attorney At Law

Welcome and Introductions

  • Russ Sloan, Director of Business Resources Center, opened the meeting welcoming.Ray SanFratello would be attending the meeting a little late because of an important meeting with the Impact Fee Committee.

Plaque Presentation

  • Barbara Shaw will be stepping down as a member of the BusinessResourcesCenter. Russ presented her with a plaque in grateful appreciation for her dedicated services. Barbara is one of the founders of the BusinessResourcesCenter.
  • Martha Moses was introduced as the new Score Chapter Chair, and talked about a new program with American Express and SCORE.

Director’s Report

  • Entrepreneurial Institute– There are 48 people enrolled in the course. The attendees have the opportunity to hear from people that have been immensely successful in launching a business. There has been tremendous positive feedback from attendees. Graduation will be December 11th in the Magnolia.The next Entrepreneurial session will held at the South Lake Campus beginning Wednesday, March 19th.
  • Corporate visitations – Russ and Bob Vehmeier continue to visit Area Corporation along with the area Chamber Executive, a County Economic Director and the areaCounty Commissioner. Russ has found from past experience that about 70% of the problems are government related to some degree.
  • Business to Business luncheons– At this time we have had 3 luncheons. Each time we invite 5 businesses at Random for an informal lunch and discuss their business and community needs, and how the BusinessResourcesCentermight be able to help. We plan to do 30 luncheons in Leesburg, and 20 in SouthLake.
  • Russ was offered by the Daily Commercial, to write a column, each Wednesday,exposing the BRC and the College’s role in helping businesses and the economic development.
  • Executive Training Room– Should be ready by January, 2008.
  • Chair sponsorship – We have 30 executive chairs to be sponsored at $250 a chair. We have 9 chairs sponsored at this time. The High Tech Executive Training Room will be available not only for the Business Resources but for our Business Community as well.
  • Online courses- Are up and running on Edtogo.
  • Additional business awards–There has been a lot of brainstorming going on to create a Lake County Business Hall of Fame. The award would be a career achievement award offered to a business man or woman with 20 years achievement presence in LakeCounty. It would acknowledge no more than three businesses a year.
  • Robert Johnson informed us that the Chamber Alliance is also interested in a Business Awards Program.Robert approached the Community Service Awardsand suggested gather the program under one umbrella. After a positive meeting with the League of Cities, it was suggested to put together an Exploratory Committee which included:Jim Meyers (League of Cities), Russ Sloan, Robert Johnson and Ron Wallace (Community Service Awards).The Committees conscience is to havethree Hall of Fame Awards, for Outstanding Business of the Year in three categories:

(Small) A Business with less than 10 employees

(Median) A business with 11 to 40 employees

(Large) A business with over 40 employees

  • LakeCounty reports that 95% of its businesses have less than 15 employees.
  • The Hall of Fame Awards will be ratified this week and nominations will be in the Chamber Alliance Flyer, December 1s.t.

Staff Reports

  • Lucy Torman, Assistant Director, BusinessResourcesCenter, reported that this is the BusinessResourcesCenter’s busiest time of year.
  • Lucy reported that many small companies have been sending 2 or 3 employees to join open enrollment courses with the Computer Institute.
  • Lucy and Bob Vehmeier are working with Lake County Schools to developtraining programs for customer service in their maintenance dept.
  • Out pouring demand forEd2Go online courses and training
  • Ongoing training on Vista and Windows 07 for LSCC employees.
  • Bob Vehmeier, Manager Training Services, BusinessResourcesCenter, reports that he has been working with Life Stream, on customer service training and retail training. Sumter County Rescue unit has been meeting with him to start an EMT unit.

Topics for Discussion

  • South Lake Campus will be housing the SmallBusinessDevelopmentCenter, which is out of Orlando and serves 6-7 counties. To better serve LakeCountythey needed a physical presence. They will be used for a back up and supplemental addition to SCORE and BusinessResourcesCenter. Russ will invite them to attend our next Advisory Board Meeting to explain their role in the community.
  • Russ introduced Bob Jones, Business Development Manager, WorkForce Central Florida, who emphasized thevarious training programs available to serve our area businesses.
  • Committee Structure and Agendas for 2008 will be address after the 1st of the year regarding:

Micro Loans

Strategic Planning

Finance

  • Russ is asking for recommendations on addition and replacement board member.
  • Dr. Estey thanked Russ for the steps that have been taken through this Advisory Board and how it has strengthened the bond of partnerships in the community.
  • On the Academic side, Advisory Committees have been formedto look at specific subject program areas and explore the best methods for staying up to date with the curriculum so when LSCC students go out into the community they are the best you can employ. Lake-Sumter’s record still stands, graduates are either meeting or exceeding in every discipline of the native students at the university. Dr. Estey went on to explain other programs of the college.
  • Motion to approve minutes of August 16, 2007
  • Russ brought attention to the Board that our greatest partners for what we do here at the BusinessResourcesCenter are the Chambers of Commerce.
  • Meeting Adjourn
  • Next Advisory Board Meeting - Thursday, February 21, 2008

1