Atlas Advertising presents the Truth About Job Fairies, at the International Economic Development Conference in Fort Worth, Texas October 21st, 2014.

1. The Truth About Job Fairies.
Changing the Debate about Whether
Economic Development Makes a Difference
For:

2. Introducing the Jobs Fairies Concept
In May of 2011, NPR’s Planet Money team attended the
IEDC Conference in San Diego. They left and produced a
piece that became known as “How to Create a Job,” or
“Job Fairies.”
In an apology piece called “Planet Money Misfires on Local
Economic Developers,” the lead journalist Adam Davidson
of NPR said of economic developers:
"I didn't think they were like evil or
anything. I just thought they're, like, not
making a big difference.”

3. Introducing Atlas
1. Denver-based marketing services company, specializing in
economic development
2. Founded in 2001, with 25 employees
3. Has worked with more communities than any other economic
development marketing services firm in the past 10 years: 140+
economic development clients in 43 states and 6 countries
4. Specialize in providing branding, marketing planning, digital
marketing, and GIS enabled websites, all for economic development
5. Pioneered the industry’s first metrics based benchmarking approach
for marketing, business attraction, and business retention: High
Performance Economic Development Marketing
6. IEDC’s High Performance Economic Development Marketing
Partner
7. Frequent public speaker and lead speaker on benchmarking
marketing, business attraction, and business retention programs, as
well as on branding, research, digital marketing, websites, and GIS.

4. About Atlas’ High Performance
Economic Development Program
1. Initially developed High Performance Economic Development
(HPED) to answer questions from clients – “What should our goals
be?”
1. HPED, in its third year, is now the the largest and longest running
collection of marketing, business development, and business
retention metrics available.
1. Hundreds of EDO’s have used the data to benchmark their
marketing, business recruitment and retention efforts and outcomes
that can prove ROI for marketing, branding and website efforts
within economic development space.
1. On Monday, October 6, Atlas launched High Performance Economic
Development Online, an interactive benchmarking tool that will allow
EDO’s to enter their data and benchmark their business recruitment
and retention outcomes by organizational staff size, budget,
community population, region, or any combination of these factors.

5. View the slides, continue the dialogue
• Continue the Conversation:
– Follow us on Twitter:
www.twitter.com/AtlasAd
– Tweet questions using hashtag
#ASKATLAS
– Join High Performance Economic
Development LinkedIn Group
• View and share the slides with
your colleagues (available now):
www.slideshare.com/wright0405

6. Introducing Ben Wright
Ben Wright
Founder and CEO
Atlas Advertising, Community Systems
benw@atlas-advertising.com
benw@communitysys.com
www.twitter.com/atlasad
– Former economic developer and tourism
marketer for the Metro Denver EDC, and the
City of Westminster, CO
– Degree in Quantitative Economics and Urban
Studies from Stanford
– Worked for a British MP who focused on urban
economic development, housing, and poverty in
an inner London Borough
– Industry speaker: business attraction and
marketing for economic development
@BenWrightAtlas

7. What We Will Cover
1. We Believe that Economic Development Makes a
Difference, but Does Everyone?
2. Trends in the Economic Development Profession
3. The History, Challenges, and Rationale of High
Performance Economic Development
4. Defining High Performance
5. Introducing the Benchmarks
6. Profiles of High Performing Communities
7. Introducing the Profession’s “Jobs Fairies”
8. How to Get Your Community’s Report

8. We believe that economic
development makes a
difference. But does
everyone?

11. Trends in the profession that make
performance tracking a moving target
1. Digital is changing the way communities are being
evaluated, and changing our roles in the process
2. Workforce is driving business location, and opening up
new ways for EDO’s to influence economies
3. The Debate about whether the profession drives
outcomes continues, even as the Great Recession is in
the rear view
4. There are more deals happening in communities, leading
to more positive impressions of EDO’s
5. The investor/stakeholder mindset is changing, as
demographics of those involved in EDO’s are changing

12. The History, Challenges, and
Rationale of High
Performance Economic
Development

13. History of High Performance Economic
Development Methods
1. EDO’s have been measuring their performance for years
1. However, with differing viewpoints, metrics have gotten
muddy and misunderstood
1. In 2011, Atlas put together its first survey of EDO
outcomes, to assist EDO’s in planning their marketing,
business attraction, and business retention programs
1. In 2014, IEDC published its “Making it Count” Metrics for
High Performing EDO’s

14. Challenges to High Performance: Why
hasn’t this been done before?
1. There is an ongoing debate about the tools that EDO’s use to recruit
and retain companies (incentives), which is really a critique of the
value of the profession.
1. EDO’s service companies that comprise a very small percentage of
their economies.
2. Often, economic developers are the only ED professional /
organization in their community, and work on economic
development tasks with non-economic developers.
1. Economic development projects have a long lead time to show
results.
1. EDO’s and EDO governing boards have multiple, and often ever
changing, priorities.
1. Each stakeholder defines high performance differently.

15. How To Vote Via Texting

16. Poll Question:
As a practitioner, how much do
you think you impact the overall
economic activity in your area?

17. “Economic development organizations increasingly
operate under much tighter budgets at a time when
the need for economic development programming
is becoming more crucial to the continued vitality
and competitiveness of a community.”
International Economic Development Council in
“High Performing Economic Development Organizations,” 2011

18. Defining High Performance
Economic Development

19. Defining High Performance
1. What corollaries are there in the world to measure
performance?
1. Definitions provided by an international trade
organization for economic development
1. The metrics that Atlas High Performance Economic
Development focuses on, and our criteria for choosing
them
1. Defining what High Performance means for each key
audience
1. Should we measure outcomes or not?

20. Corollaries for High Performance

21. Why do ED trade organizations believe
the industry should measure itself?
"That which is measured improves. That which is
measured and reported improves exponentially.”
- Karl Pearson
International Economic Development Council in
“Making it Count, Metrics for High Performing EDOs,” - 2014

22. Four Ways the International Economic
Development Council Defines High
Performance
1. Internal Segment (Employee
satisfaction, funding sources)
1. ED Program Segment (Business
Attraction, Business Retention,
Business Creation)
1. Relationship Management Segment
(Relationships with internal and
external stakeholders)
1. Community Segment (Community
well being, in terms of
demographics, workforce,
household income, etc.)

23. Atlas High Performance Economic
Development Focuses on the Relationship
Management Segment, plus Outcomes from
those Relationships.
1. Internal Segment (Employee
satisfaction, funding sources
1. ED Program Segment (Business
Attraction, Business Retention,
Business Creation)
1. Relationship Management Segment
(Relationships with internal and
external stakeholders)
1. (Community well being, in terms of
demographics, workforce,
household income, etc.)
Outcomes for jobs
announced and capital
investment announced

24. Our Analysis of the Data,
2013/2014

27. 2013/2014 EDO Performance,
Benchmarked by Population

28. 2013/2014 EDO Performance,
Benchmarked by Staff Size

29. 2013/2014: EDO Performance,
Benchmarked by Budget

30. Who are the Highest Performers in
Terms of Jobs, by Population Size?

31. Who are the Highest Performers
Across Other Categories?

32. Who are the Highest Performers
Across Other Categories?

33. Poll Question:
Did your organization set
measurable goals for your
marketing, business development,
and business retention programs
this year (2014)?

34. Profiles of High Performing
Communities

35. Organizing Performance by
Organization type:
Capacity Building EDOs
Promotion Driven EDOs
Relationship Focused EDOs
Community Building EDOs
Balanced EDOs

36. Loudoun County, VA
Leadership: Buddy Rizer, Director
Geography: A 520-sqaure mile suburb of
Washington DC.
Catalyst initiative in 2013: The retention
of the Telos Corporation, which represented
a $5 million investment and 460 jobs
Inspiration: Loudoun Virginia is one of the
most dynamic places in the country...always
among the fastest growing in population and
jobs, a top technology location, and home to
a great international airport.

37. Loudoun County Scorecard

38. Southwest Michigan First
Leadership: Ron Kitchens, CEO
Geography: Southwest Michigan
comprised of the counties of Berrien,
Branch, Calhoun, Cass, Kalamazoo, St.
Joseph and Van Buren and representing
more than 780,000 community
members.
Catalyst initiative in 2013: Our team
believes in an open information strategy,
meaning that we want to be the
teaching hospital version of an
economic development corporation
Inspiration: When I was just four years old, tragedy struck our family when my
father was killed in an accident at work, leaving my mother as a nineteen-year-old
widow with two sons, ages four and two. Oftentimes, food was hard to come by,
meaning endless meals of rice and beans. One Christmas gift from a church food
basket—mandarin oranges—that I hid in my desk, became my personal symbol of
education and escaping poverty. Today I still keep one, as my daily reminder of my
responsibility to create positive change by bringing jobs to my community.

39. Southwest Michigan
First Scorecard

40. Questions/Discussion

41. Discussion: Should we use
outcomes to measure
ourselves?

42. How to Benchmark Your Community Using
Atlas High Performance Economic
Development
1. Take the survey here:
2. View your report online, starting Monday October 6, here

43. After this session, are you
more, the same, or less
convinced that you can make
a difference in your
community?

44. Thank you!
Contact information:
929 Broadway
Denver, CO 80203
Contact: Ben Wright
t: 303.292.3300 x 210
benw@Atlas-Advertising.com
www.Atlas-Advertising.com
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