Leadership Rowan is a year long program that the Rowan County Chamber of Commerce puts on.  Many chambers across the nation do similar programs.  They are designed to provide community leaders with experience and knowledge about how their local county, government, economies work.

My participation in this program changed my life.

I’m grateful to GCS for giving me the chance to be involved in this program.  I’ve grown both professionally and personally and come out of the experience with 20 new best friends and contacts that I KNOW will benefit me (both personally and professionally) in the future.

I am fascinated with how things work. Always have been, always will be.  So when I heard from a good friend about Leadership Rowan, I thought “Day long field trip once a month where I get to go to all kinds of cool places and do and learn awesome things? Yes, Please!”  I mean, who knew!  There are some things that make me jump around like a 12 year old on Christmas and the prospect of being involved in this program was one of them.  And that was BEFORE I went through it.

I’m not going to give away any big secrets about the program, but I will say that each day has a particular focus, like Healthcare, Education, Local Government.  I honestly enjoyed each day thoroughly, but found the most informative days to be the ones that covered aspects of my life and community that I had no previous experience with.  Criminal Justice day was an eye opener (believe it or not, I’ve had no experience with our justice system aside from the odd speeding ticket).

That’s all to say…. you should SIGN UP!

Last night we graduated and received plaques to hang on our office walls.  I feels as if I’ve been inducted into a secret society.

And then, I was completely surprised and humbled by my classmates to receive a collective gift from them….. I take my camera with me almost everywhere I go.  So taking pictures of our experiences during Leadership Rowan was nothing out of the ordinary for me.  I posted a couple write ups on our company blog (I thought the people who sponsored me to go through Leadership Rowan would appreciate knowing that I’m learning something) and made galleries of all the pictures for my classmates to see (for selfish reasons ~ I simply enjoy documenting important events in my life) and they appreciated it so much they chipped in and bought me large (huge really) print of our graduating class that I can hang in my office.  I can’t wait to put it up! To look at their smiling faces every day will certainly make me happy.