Amherst Chamber of Commerce Strategic Plan

Ready to Launch

By: Colleen DiPirro, President & CEO

The Amherst Chamber staff participated in a Strategic Planning process throughout the summer.  A distinguishing factor of the ACC is our commitment to changing processes as the marketplace dictates.  Certainly our menu of products and services has been realigned in the past three decades.  When I started in the early 1980's, we got a dozen calls a week for maps.  Now directions are a click away - does anyone keep a map in their glove compartment anymore?  To ensure that our organizations goals and objectives are fluid and responsive to our members, strategic planning is a necessity. 

Our mission: To advance our region's economy, improve our quality of life and enhance our member's success, doesn't change, but how we get there does.

Our vision:  To provide the products and business services that nurture the prosperity of our members and provide economic stability for the organization and the region, remain consistent but the tools we use and the resources we dedicate can be altered to adjust to societal and technological advances.  For example, 20 years ago the most successful training program we offered was Introduction to Computers.  Today, our most successful workshops revolve around the utilization of Social Media in marketing your firm.

Strategic Plans are only successful if they are utilized.  We always use our prior plan as the foundation for refining our new and improved strategy.  And, we believe every plan is better than the one before.  While the substance of the plan is consistent, the actions relative to achieving our goals change.  Input from the staff, the Board of Directors, our Investors and members and our community partners are all solicited and incorporated into our plan.  Once approved by the Executive Committee and Board, the plan is a work in progress for the staff.  We are dedicated to providing performance management measures, timelines and benchmarks for each of our goals to assist us in staying on task and evaluating our progress.  At the end of the day, this is a community plan.  If we meet our goals, everyone in our geographic service area can benefit.  In addition to providing business services that assist our members in growing their individual prosperity, our public policy collaboration and leadership results in a better quality of life and the expansion of the regions wealth which is truly what the Amherst Chamber of Commerce is all about.

The Critical Goals we have identified are to advance the region's economy, to enhance our member's success, to provide leadership development and recognition and to maintain the organization's sustainability.  If you would like a copy of our 2012-2015 Strategic Plan, please email me at cdipirro@amherst.org.  We invite your feedback.