Takeaways from the NAM Leadership Retreat

What an extraordinary Team of Leaders!

A little over a year after I was named CEO, I appointed a broader group of top talent to take ownership of the NAM and help me and the senior staff drive innovation, change and culture at our organization. This week - seven years later - we gathered in Charleston at our annual NAM Leadership Team retreat to plan for the future, learn from each other, and hear from experts on employee engagement and team building. But we also celebrated the remarkable (and continuing) transformation of our association into a powerful, influential, trusted, effective and leading voice and resource for manufacturers in the United States and the 12 million men and women who work in our sector.

This is a spirited Team that works (and recreates) extremely well together, and our focus is – and has been – to empower our entire outstanding NAM team to continue to build on our progress. They work every day to ensure that the NAM is an indispensable investment for our members.

We leave this meeting confident that we are more effectively advancing those values that make America exceptional and manufacturing strong: free enterprise, competitiveness, individual liberty and equal opportunity. The Leadership Team members and their predecessors have driven remarkable change - and the NAM has never been stronger.

Here are some of the highlights upon which we reflected, including:

- Doubling the size (in financial terms) of the NAM in just 8 years, putting more resources into advocating for our members’ priorities while not adding to staffing levels. The last two years shattered all historical records of the association for membership growth.

- Managing multiple issue advocacy campaigns that put our members' investments to work to advance specific policy objectives through thoughtful and impactful multi-channel campaigns.

- Expanding our advocacy impact and reach by moving public affairs resources and personnel into a regional field team, and strengthening relationships with our state associations (51, up from 32) and our Council of Manufacturing Associations (270, up from 165).

- Refocusing the Manufacturing Institute to drive real solutions to the workforce crisis, with programs to inspire young people, recognize women leaders and train transitioning military personnel for jobs in the manufacturing sector.

- Reconstructing our communications team to include a campaign-style rapid response operation and more seamlessly integrate our policy and communications functions.

- Extending the reach of our messaging through state-of-the-art digital operations, enabling the NAM to receive more than 3 times as many social interactions as other similar groups that were measured.

- Providing data and results that reached more than 25 million people in one year on the positive impact of tax reform and regulatory certainty in investment, job creation and wage growth through our “Keeping Our Promises” campaign.

- Driving the news with more than 50,000 earned media articles and nearly $37 million in publicity value from earned media just last year.

- Reaching half a million students through 2,700 events on Manufacturing Day last year alone when manufacturers opened their doors to local schools.

- Launching new, tailored services for our members, including thought leadership and resources for operational excellence.

- Forging productive, trusted relationships throughout the administration and Congress, and across the political spectrum, by advancing a truly post-partisan approach to policy.

- Building and deploying a first-of-its kind award-winning nationwide NAM State of Manufacturing Tour annual roadshow to take the story of modern manufacturing to communities across the country.

- Establishing the Manufacturers’ Center for Legal Action as the unmatched advocate for manufacturers in the courts and building the award-winning Manufacturers’ Compliance Institute, which connects manufacturers to top-tier legal advice at no cost.

- Completing the landmark acquisition of the Manufacturing Leadership Council to help our members prepare for the future of digitalization through operational seminars. And, 

- Finalizing a forward-looking lease negotiation which provided thoughtful stewardship of member dollars by achieving significant savings and includes funds to modernize our office space.

And those are just the highlights!

Because of this Team’s willingness to defy conventional wisdom, break out of the traditional association mold and chart our own path through an unprecedented political landscape, we’ve achieved record membership growth, unrivaled brand strength and extraordinarily high member satisfaction - along with major legislative, regulatory and court wins.

But there’s MUCH more in store for the remainder of this year and into 2020, which will mark the 125th anniversary of the founding of the National Association of Manufacturers. Stay tuned for some big and exciting announcements to come. We love what we do, who we work for, and who we work with – and the outcome of our Team meeting is a goal to only make it better.

So proud and blessed to be able to work every day with these amazing people.