During a recent lunch with an entrepreneurial friend to discuss a new business venture, he kept repeating, “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.”
This colleague is a very smart man with an engineer’s mind, yet he believes that sentiment and runs his business that way.
The “who you know” theory is echoed throughout this publication. It’s especially gratifying as I hear several of the 12 People individuals say they need to get to know the others on the list.
Now is your chance to get to know the 2013 class of Springfield Business Journal’s 12 People You Need To Know. Among this group, you’ll find:
• The man with an entrepreneurial plan for Missouri State University and private enterprise interests.
• A regular on Baron’s magazine’s top financial adviser rankings, placing 11th in Missouri, and the highest female adviser, in 2012 with $425 million in assets under management.
• A fundraiser extraordinaire who will be making Journey of Generosity a household name locally.
• The first name synonymous with frozen custard in Springfield and increasingly across the Midwest.
• The godfather of Springfield-style cashew chicken, which turns 50 years old in October.
• A Springfield foodie who is staking The Food Channel’s claim in social media and on television.
• The health care executive getting to intimately and quickly know CoxHealth.
• A new big man on Drury University’s campus, succeeding a business-minded former banker as president.
• The distributor of utilities and the defender of water and electric use in the city, when supply might be getting scarce.
• A mother of seven adopted children, who has now adopted the staff and clients of Isabel’s House in the last chapter of her career.
• An artist by trade who is drawing up new plans for the Springfield Art Museum.
• A nationally recognized influential woman in health care and the No. 16 wealthiest working women, with compensation of $10.2 million in 2008, according to CNNMoney.
Now in its sixth year, our selections introduce up-and-coming professionals, businesspeople who have relocated and are building their southwest Missouri resumes, instrumental yet behind-the-scenes personnel and notable names with whom readers would like to get up close and personal. I have the honor of sharing their stories during monthly breakfasts that feature live interviews.
Come out and join us, you never know who you might get to know.
Springfield Business Journal Editor Eric Olson can be reached at eolson@sbj.net.
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