25-Session Descriptions
May 22, 2025
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EmailThis is a list of sessions and their descriptions for this year's Connecting Entrepreneurial Communities Conference.
| TOPIC | DESCRIPTION |
| Building an Ecosystem for Success and Sustainability of Early Stage Businesses | It’s imperative to create a supportive environment that fosters growth, innovation, and collaboration. A robust entrepreneurial environment involves building support infrastructure involving incubators, accelerators, co-working spaces, technical support, entrepreneurship development programs, funding, and networking opportunities. |
| Building Prosperity Together: Partnerships for Philanthropy and Economic Development | The Lapeer County Community Foundation collaborates with the Lapeer Development Corporation to advance placemaking, workforce development, and entrepreneurship in Lapeer County. Through initiatives like nonprofit capacity-building workshops, a Business Resource Network, and regional partnerships on child care and housing, we strengthen community impact. Join us to explore philanthropy's pivotal role in economic development, as we support local projects, address critical needs, and empower a vibrant, thriving community together. |
| Bridging Skills Gaps: Workforce Strategies for Thriving Entrepreneurial Communities | Discover innovative strategies to bridge skills gaps and empower entrepreneurial communities. This presentation explores collaborative workforce solutions that align talent development with business needs, fostering economic growth and vibrant local ecosystems. Gain actionable insights into creating partnerships that drive workforce resilience, attract talent, and support thriving small-town entrepreneurs |
| Unlocking your own inner superhero (and the hero in those around you!) | Success comes from encouraging and building the success of those around you, understanding that the biggest challenge we face is usually ourselves. This session will focus on the personal development of the entrepreneur as well as applying knowledge as a leader to develop your team through better connection and understanding. Dedication to their individual success will lead to the teams' overall success. |
| A Downtown Walking Tour: Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design | This walking tour will provide attendees with a first-hand understanding of how to identify, address and plan for crime areas, with preventive designs that can be successfully interwoven into local planning, zoning and public engagement strategies. (The tour will be co-designed in advance with Lapeer city leadership including public safety, planning, code enforcement, parks, etc). |
| How to Support Growth of Local Farms and Small Businesses in Your Area | Recognizing areas of need by talking to your local businesses, City council, community members, etc. -Link with local leaders and organizations. - Support current programming and implement any new ones where needed. -Continue to listen, learn, and pivot when needed to create positive growth in the community. |
| Relationship Matter | Local business owners will discuss the significance of relationships in business and friendship, highlighting their role in building trust, promoting collaboration, and creating networks that foster growth and success. Panelists will share how operating a business in a downtown area can place it at the center of the community, helping establish a strong local presence, increase visibility, and connect with other businesses to form potential partnerships and collaborations. |
| The Summer Intern → Engaged Resident Pipeline: How to Nurture Your Next Wave of Talent | How do we get college students and interns to see their future in our community? Recent college graduates are a hot commodity in talent attraction, and an even harder win to get. How do you convince Gen Z that they have options in your area? We’ll discuss summer intern programs, how to get companies in your area to see the value and get their interns to participate, and why every single interaction matters in talent attraction. |
| How to Transform Your Downtown with Public Art | We will tell you how to create a public art program to help the livability and feel of your town. We will include tips for funding, administration, finding artists, and more |
| Placemaking on the Move: A Walking Exploration of Lapeer | Placemaking is a central ingredient to vibrant communities and public spaces. While there are broad themes among placemaking strategies, successful implementation is linked to context, people, and community. After a 10-15 minute presentation, the Michigan Downtown Association will lead participants on a walking tour of downtown Lapeer to see first-hand how small cities can create vibrant, sustainable environments through thoughtful placemaking. Discover how Lapeer’s downtown is being transformed by art, innovation, and collaboration |
| Innovative Approaches to Building Capacity in Rural Michigan | Rural communities often operate with limited resources to accomplish everything their community needs. Recognizing this, the Michigan Office of Rural Prosperity offers a variety of programs designed to build capacity – the staffing, resources, and expertise – to achieve those goals. In this session you’ll learn about ways you can access these programs and hear from rural community leaders who are implementing innovative approaches to building capacity and in their local communities. |
| Discover Lapeers Best | This session will outline the benefits of supporting local, which is made easier by consolidating the community offerings into one app. You can find the "Lapeers Best" app on the app stores. This will give you a visual representation of what we do for the community. |
| Harnessing Rural Potential: Curating Future Leaders in Our Communities | The River Country Chamber of Commerce and Newaygo County Economic Development Partnership both saw a need for leadership development and, unbeknownst to each other, took action. Each organization created a leadership program in 2024, offering a cohort style program to 25+ individuals. In the short time since the programs began, these individuals have seen new job opportunities, promotions and additional civic engagement. Launching the program was easier than anticipated and eagerly accepted by the community. |
| Cultivating Food Entrepreneurs: A Focus on SE Michigan | A food scene is a tourism and economic driver in itself. This session will share entrepreneurs experiences in opening a brick and mortar food establishment, as well as business model, financial needs, and regulatory considerations. Chamber, local government, and NGOs will leave the session with a better understanding of how to foster food businesses in their community. Attendees will gain an expanded network, as well, of food industry resources and programs specific to Southeast Michigan. |
| Partnerships and Collaborations Make Summer Youth E Camps Successful | Learn of models and tips for making summer youth entrepreneurship camps successful. Agendas and helpful hints will be shared based on the long standing relationship between MSU Extension and Southwestern Michigan College. From 3-5 day experiences, online or face-to-face, ideas along with lessons learned will be shared |
| Empowering A Community: The Impact of Nonprofit Outdoor Events on Bicycle Shop and Trails | Explore the transformative journey of establishing a local cycling and running nonprofit, which became the backbone of a thriving ecotourism hub centered around our scenic trail system. By fostering community engagement and promoting outdoor activities, we helped launch a sustainable bicycle shop featuring a healthy juice and smoothie bar. This initiative not only supports local runners and cyclists but also stimulates the economy by empowering nearby businesses, creating a vibrant and interconnected local economy. |
| Finding Your People in 2025! | M R Products, Inc. has had minimal turnover and few job openings over the past three years. We have accomplished this through various means, including HR initiatives, empowering employees, and, most importantly, finding the people who want to grow with us wherever they are in their employment careers. Attending this presentation will give you knowledge and feedback on how to make this happen within your organization |
| Downtown Partnerships - Working together to strengthen Downtowns in Lapeer County | The three communities (Lapeer, Imlay City, and Almont) will talk about how connecting monthly has led to the creation of a partnership aimed at growing downtowns in Lapeer County. The three communities work together to encourage Economic Development, partnering on promotional efforts, business recruitment, retention, collaborations, and more. |
| Empowering Young Entrepreneurs | Engaging young people in exploring entrepreneurship as a career option. Come learn about ways to prepare youth for success by developing an entrepreneurial mind-set. Curriculum, resources, and innovative programs involving youth in hands-on learning about business creation will be shared. A great opportunity to network. |
| Regulation Options for Short Term Rentals (STRs) | STRs have opened opportunities for entrepreneurs to become hosts. The number of STRs has increased causing some Michigan communities to review their plans and policies to ensure they reflect the community’s vision and needs. This presentation will explore trends, research, and data sources related to STRs and an overview of policy approaches, regulatory tools, key STR court cases from Michigan and practical tips from enforcement from local government staff. |
| How to Transform Your Downtown with Public Art | We will tell you how to create a public art program to help the livability and feel of your town. We will include tips for funding, administration, finding artists, and more |
| A Downtown Walking Tour: Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design | This walking tour will provide attendees with a first-hand understanding of how to identify, address and plan for crime areas, with preventive designs that can be successfully interwoven into local planning, zoning and public engagement strategies. (The tour will be co-designed in advance with Lapeer city leadership including public safety, planning, code enforcement, parks, etc). |
| How Rural Neighbors Succeed: Case Studies from Northwest Michigan | Rural townships throughout Michigan are finding it more difficult to recruit volunteers to boards and commissions, while also maintaining capacity for zoning administration. As planning and zoning become increasingly technical and community-driven, something has to change. This presentation builds on research conducted for MSU's University Center for Regional Economic Innovation, to discuss how collaborative zoning can be a boon for rural Michigan's social, economic and environmental well-being |
| The Magic of Identifying and Understanding Your Community Assets | Similar to a magician using the skills of their art, a downtown organization can use the tools available through Main Street to foster district and organizational success. Learn how Lapeer Main Street has synthesized information about their district and community assets to create strategic initiatives including bolstering economic vitality, district marketing, stakeholder engagement, and image building. You will learn best practices for collecting community data and strategies for immediately using the information in your community. |
| Leveraging Visitor's First Impressions to Drive Innovation and Growth - A DIY Session! | Community and businesses can innovate on shoestring budgets by engaging their visitors in creative ways. Andy will share several examples and strategies and reasons why that by simply asking a few questions to first-time visitors, you can garner a plethora of new ideas that might be a silver-bullet needed to revitalize your community and/or businesses |
