Nick Masino is the President & CEO of the Gwinnett Chamber and Partnership Gwinnett, located in Duluth, Georgia. Masino joined the Gwinnett Chamber and Partnership Gwinnett in 2007 and most recently served as Partnership Gwinnett’s Chief Economic Development Officer where he oversaw the business recruitment and retention efforts for Gwinnett, as well as the implementation of the Partnership Gwinnett Strategy.
To create this community-focused economic development (ED) organization, Masino worked with public and private leadership to commission ED studies in 2011 and 2016; and spearheaded the implementation efforts of the initial plan in 2007, which has since brought approximately 250 company expansions or relocations, more than 23,000 new jobs and more than $1.7 billion in investment to Gwinnett.
Over the past 12 years, Masino has led his team in significant accomplishments, including major project wins such as Asbury Automotive (2007); Hisense (2010); Primerica (2011); Mitsubishi Electric Trane HVAC US (2012); Comcast (2015); Kaiser Permanente (2017) and Hapag-Lloyd (2018), as well as International Economic Development Council (IEDC) Excellence in Economic Development Awards (2010, 2012, 2014, 2016, 2019). In addition, Masino has been awarded Georgia Trends Most Notable Georgians (2015-2019); 40 under 40 Georgia Trend magazine; 40 under 40 Atlanta Business Chronicle; and International Person of the Year Governors Award Finalist Atlanta Business Chronicle; The 2019 Power 100: Most influential Atlantans Atlanta Business Chronicle.
A leading authority on local and state economic development, Masino is regularly sought after for prominent speaking engagements throughout metro Atlanta and Georgia. In addition, he has spoken internationally, in Incheon and Seoul, South Korea and Wuxi, Chongqing and Qingdao, China, representing Georgia on government, economic development and international business subjects. As a result of his extensive expertise in the economic development arena, Masino is a preferred interviewee for regional and local television, radio, newspaper and magazine outlets.
Prior to his economic development leadership role in 2007, he ended his eighth year as one of Georgia’s youngest Mayors for the City of Suwanee. Prior to this post, Masino spent twelve years in Division, Regional and Territory Management within the recruiting and staffing industry attaining the position of Professional Services Division Manager for Ablest Staffing Services, a national staffing agency.
A graduate of Ohio State University, Masino holds a bachelors degree in Interpersonal and Organizational Communication. He and his wife, his high school and college sweetheart, Suzanne, are the parents of three children, Anna, Vincent and Julia.
Connect with Nick on LinkedIn and follow the Gwinnett Chamber on LinkedIn and Facebook.
What You’ll Learn in This Episode
- Nick Masino’s background and what led him to the Gwinnett Chamber.
- What makes GCOC’s story a compelling one?
- What attracts companies to Gwinnett?
- How the Chamber keeps the companies once they are in Gwinnett?
- New initiatives the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce is working on.
Transcript
Intro: [00:00:01] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Atlanta, it’s time for Customer Experience Radio, brought to you by Heineck & Company, real estate advisors specialized in corporate relocation. Now, here’s your host, Jill Heineck.
Jill Heineck: [00:00:19] Welcome to Customer Experience Radio. I’m your host, Jill Heineck. I’m a business owner, real estate advisor, and customer experience enthusiast. I’m excited to share the success stories of top business leaders who are prioritizing the customer experience as a legit business strategy. Today, I’m super excited to have Nick Masino, CEO and President of Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce, joining us in the studio this morning. Welcome.
Nick Masino: [00:00:42] Thank you so much. I’m excited to be here.
Jill Heineck: [00:00:44] We are too. So, we want to talk about the wonderful explosion happened here in Gwinnett County, and talk to us a little bit about how you got to this position, give a little bit about your background in economic development, and then what led you to this position?
Nick Masino: [00:01:02] Sure. I am very excited that in July of last year, I accepted and began the role of President and CEO of the Gwinnett Chamber, the largest suburban chamber in the United States. And we’re very proud of Gwinnett and the Gwinnett Chamber. I previously was in the chamber. I’ve been in the chamber for 14 years. I was leading the economic development efforts in an effort called Partnership Gwinnett, which is a collaborative effort between Gwinnett County government, our 16 municipalities, our school system, our private sector industry, and the chamber. And it was the chamber’s initiative, an idea in 2006 to work on this collaborative effort. And I was really very happy to to begin that process.
Nick Masino: [00:01:47] I knew the chamber because, previously, I had been on the chamber board representing the municipalities of Gwinnett County. I was an 8-year mayor of the City of Suwanee from 2000 to 2007 and knew the chamber presidents very well, the current ones at the time, the previous ones, and I had business acumen because I was in the recruiting and headhunting industry for 12 years. And I led divisions in Metro Atlanta. My last two and half years, I was leading a national division of a publicly traded company. And they needed someone that both had the political experience, and know how the local background, but then also had business knowledge and could speak to a CEO.
Nick Masino: [00:02:30] And so, I was blessed that I had those experiences when they had a need. And absolutely, when I came to work at the chamber in 2007 to lead economic development, it was absolutely just so great for me. I loved the organization, I loved the community, and I’ve really enjoyed it. And then, to have the opportunity after 13 years in economic development to lead the chamber, I feel very lucky. We have an incredible board, incredible staff, and I’m really having a great time.
Jill Heineck: [00:02:54] I’m so glad to hear that. So, what intrigues me a lot about the Gwinnett Chamber is (A), the explosive growth; but (B), I want to know a little bit more about how Partnership Gwinnett, where does that puzzle fit in to the overarching economic development strategy?
Nick Masino: [00:03:11] Sure, sure. By the way, I love the explosive growth of the Gwinnett Chamber too. So, we’re aligned there. Okay, Partnership Gwinnett is exactly as its title is, a partnership of all things in Gwinnett from the public, private, nonprofit, community driving jobs and investment. There’s nothing better for any community, any individual to be gainfully employed, and all that that resolves if there’s issues in your life working is fantastic in regards to family, everything. It’s a very positive thing. So, the community decided that the chamber alone, the county alone, working to recruit and retain jobs would not be as effective as if we all did it together.
Nick Masino: [00:03:55] So, not only did the initiative started, it’s a funded initiative by most all governmental organizations in Gwinnett and many of the top leading private sector organizations. And so, the chamber, it was their idea, their strategy, every five years, including in 2006, they did a one-year fully comprehensive interview of everybody in the community, every stakeholder on what do we need as a community, where should we be focused. And since 2006, every five years, and we’re coming up next year in that five-year cycle, we will spend six to nine months going through that large process. We’ll hire a consultant to make sure we understand what we’re doing, who we are, where we’re going, what we need to be focused on. And that effort’s ultimate goal is to recruit, retain, and expand jobs in our five targeted industries.
Jill Heineck: [00:04:48] Right. So, that’s a big job.
Nick Masino: [00:04:51] Yes, it’s-
Jill Heineck: [00:04:52] That’s a huge initiative.
Nick Masino: [00:04:53] It is. And we have 10 people inside the chamber embedded on our second floor in the Partnership Gwinnett Division. And they get up every day to-
Jill Heineck: [00:05:01] Are they undercover?
Nick Masino: [00:05:03] They’re-
Jill Heineck: [00:05:03] You said embedded there, so I-
Nick Masino: [00:05:03] They’re embedded. They have covert titles. They use secret project codes. I can’t even see their calendars half the time. We’re laughing but, actually, all of what I just said was true. There’s things that they work on that have secret codes, and I just know that they’re working on a coded project of which they’d sometimes tell me the name of the company, but then I forget it, I just remember the sexy code, Project Jaguar.
Jill Heineck: [00:05:31] I love it. So, for Partnership Gwinnett, you have to be a member company in order to benefit from what’s happening with that program?
Nick Masino: [00:05:40] So, the Gwinnett Chamber is obviously a membership organization. Traditionally, what you think of a chamber, we are, we’re just much more exciting than what you might be thinking. Partnership Gwinnett is is a separately funded public/private initiative. And so, you could join the Gwinnett Chamber for $495 if you’re a small business. There’s just not that opportunity to engage in Partnership Gwinnett at that level. I mean, their average investor is $10,000 to $15,000 a year-
Jill Heineck: [00:06:08] Makes sense.
Nick Masino: [00:06:08] … on the governmental size. Some of them are hundreds of thousands a year. They’re dealing with literally flying around the world, recruiting companies to Metro Atlanta and Gwinnett.
Jill Heineck: [00:06:19] Yeah, that sounds exactly right. So, I just wanted our listeners to understand where they might be able to get involved, at what level?
Nick Masino: [00:06:26] Yes, thank you. And the Gwinnett Chamber has a lot to offer from our general membership to our exclusive chairman’s club membership. And there’s lots of ways to engage. And at GwinnettChamber.org, you can learn all about it.
Jill Heineck: [00:06:39] Well, that’s fantastic. I think, what I would like to delve into a little bit is what makes your chamber’s story so compelling, and why, and how that is attracting and retaining member companies in the Gwinnett area.
Nick Masino: [00:06:54] Yes. Well, thank you. And I’m excited to share with you. What I hear from members the most is the ability to connect with both the members and the staff of what sets us apart. And I love all of my partner chambers in this region from our great friends at the Greater North Fulton Chamber, the Cobb Chamber, the Metro Atlanta Chamber, we all get along very well. We communicate on a literally regular basis, sometimes weekly with my good friends at the Metro Atlanta Chamber. But I think what sets us apart is a little bit about what sets Gwinnett apart. We are this incredibly gigantic community, almost a million people. We’ll surpass Fulton County in the next five years. We will be a million people the next two years, and we will be the largest community in Georgia. And what I think sets us apart from like Fulton County is Gwinnett does feel … if you live and working in Gwinnett, you feel that we are one community. We are the most diverse community in the southeast United States. There is a 78.6% chance of two Gwinnettians meet. They’ll be from a different ethnic background. You’ve never heard Gwinnettian before, right?
Jill Heineck: [00:08:01] No. The fact that we’re talking about matchmaking.
Nick Masino: [00:08:04] Oh, right, two random Gwinnettians, right?
Jill Heineck: [00:08:04] Right.
Nick Masino: [00:08:07] And so, we are incredibly diverse. Twenty five percent of our population was born outside the United States. I mean, we are a soup of the world. We are the United Nations of the Southeast. And people have embraced it. And it’s really exciting. And really, the reality is, maybe 90 percent of Gwinnettians are not from Gwinnett. They’re from around the United States. I moved from Ohio after graduating from college. And half of our staff, if not more than half, are not from Gwinnett. And so, it’s just really interesting to be new somewhere and to be welcomed, and then feeling that welcomeness, and then paying it forward. So, that’s just something really unique. And we feel that at the chamber and we do that.
Nick Masino: [00:08:48] The chamber has well over 250 events on a daily and weekly basis that are repetitive programs, networking events that happen on Thursday mornings and Friday mornings. But then, we have huge large-scale events like our record setting State of the County that happened last week with over 900 people. It’s the largest State of the County in the region. It happens on an annual basis. Our annual dinner just took place a few weeks ago. Again, almost a thousand people. And there’s a little bit for everybody. Maybe you don’t want to dress up and go to the annual gala, which I call the Gwinnett Prom for adults, but maybe you want to go to a networking event and eat with 50 people that are like-minded. And we have something for whatever you’re looking for.
Nick Masino: [00:09:33] We are very business-focused. We’re super focused on lead generation for our members. We want to put people together that can benefit each other. And we like to have fun. We have a business after hours nine times a year, and we will have 250 people. It’s a very casual networking environment. And 250 people is a lot of people. And it’s after hours, as the name would describe. And it’s fun. And so, we definitely like to have a good time. We take our job seriously. We don’t take ourselves super seriously. There’s a lot of laughing that’s going on both in the office and in all of our events. We really try to entertain.
Jill Heineck: [00:10:12] So, you’re at about 2000 member companies right now?
Nick Masino: [00:10:16] Yes. Yeah. We’re probably over 2000 specifically, I think we’re probably at 2000 general members and about 200 of our chairman’s club members, which is our exclusive highest membership.
Jill Heineck: [00:10:25] Right. So, the makeup of your member companies give us an idea like from small business to big business.
Nick Masino: [00:10:32] Sure. Not a surprise, 80 percent plus of our members are … the federal government would say they’re small business. Fellow governments says companies under 250 employees is small. That sounds pretty big to me. But where we are made up as is the rest of the United States is made up of small businesses. We do have two Fortune 500 headquarters in Gwinnett County. Both of them are members. They’re not super active. They’re there when they need us. They’re dealing with things on a federal and global level. And where we do, we do work with them and help them where they needed it and vice versa, they help us. But I’d say general member is the owner or leader of a company that has 50 employees. That is a very common person at the table that represent. Most of my board members probably have 50 to 100 employees.
Jill Heineck: [00:11:22] Nice.
Nick Masino: [00:11:22] And the thing that’s really fun is because 25 percent of our population born outside the United States from all over the world, there’s global discussions that happen every day. And our makeup of both our staff, our members literally look like the world too. It’s really fun. And if you’re interested in traveling the world, but you can’t afford it, come spend some time in Gwinnett. Between restaurants and culture, we have it all.
Jill Heineck: [00:11:49] It sounds like it. So, what I’m hearing is that there is a member retention experience strategy in place, you may not call it that, but with the events to cater to your different members, it makes sense and it keeps them engaged.
Nick Masino: [00:12:06] Yes. What a wonderful thing to ask. I appreciate you asking. When I started on July 1st, I had my number one goal was employee engagement and retention because if the staff isn’t totally focused on what the goals are. And so, I did a lot of listening. At the time, we had 34 employees, minimum one hour with each employee at my office, 34 meetings over about 40 days. Some of them, we did a part two And some of them, we did a part 3 because they had a lot to share. And I just generally and jokingly say the Gen Zs and the millennials are super positive and their outlook on life is so amazing. And I was so inspired. And myself as a Gen X and the boomers at our office, we’re all just totally over it and we’re super negative. We’re not negative, but we’ve experienced-
Jill Heineck: [00:12:53] Release that positive energy. Bring the positive energy in.
Nick Masino: [00:12:55] So, it’s really nice to have a mix of all for those generations. If we hadn’t one or the other, we probably wouldn’t be as effective as we are. But in doing so, we really got into lots of great discussions about our culture. And I think culture is literally the number one thing any CEO needs to be working on. And if they think it’s not an a top one, two or three, I would argue that they’re probably in the wrong role because culture is what is king in any organization.
Jill Heineck: [00:13:20] Absolutely.
Nick Masino: [00:13:20] Public, private, non-profit, it doesn’t matter. So, I feel like we have done very well focusing on culture. We literally have a committee. They actually have their first meeting next week, which is the employee engagement committee. And you would not be surprised that every Gen-Z and millennial wanted to be on the committee. And so, we mixed it up between generational gaps.
Nick Masino: [00:13:45] And so, once I felt like we were on the right road, and we have a great leadership team in place, we then started focusing on what you brought up, which is member engagement and member retention, which member retention for any chamber in the United States is super important because right off the bat, you’re going to have … in Gwinnett, because we have 25,000 businesses, we literally could have 250 new businesses starting in a year. Actually, we probably have over a thousand start a new year. They know we’ve all been trained as you go join the chamber.
Nick Masino: [00:14:14] Well, as effective as any chamber is, not every business was a good idea in the first place. They may not make it. And so, you’re just going to have natural turnover in that 10 to 20 percent of any chamber anywhere in the United States because the companies just may not be there. But it’s that 80 percent that we really are focused on in regards to if you can get someone to renew the second year, you may have them for life.
Nick Masino: [00:14:39] And our chairman’s club, which is our high value, it’s $5500 a year. That’s a high-value membership. We are spending a lot of time and effort asking our members at all levels what they think, what they’re looking for. We have just recently, two weeks ago, hired a concierge manager focused specifically on our board members and our chairman.
Jill Heineck: [00:14:59] So smart.
Nick Masino: [00:15:00] Thank you. And I have not had a unique, interesting idea any time in my life. I just simply ask-
Jill Heineck: [00:15:07] I doubt that.
Nick Masino: [00:15:08] I just stand by that comment. Literally, I ask smart people. I never stop asking my members, other great organizations, like some of the ones I’ve mentioned. Two of the ones that we’re going to emulate as much as we’ll be allowed to, YPO, Young Presidents Organization, and EO, Entrepreneur Organization. I speak to them. I have many friends that are members or past members, and they talk about the exclusivity of those programs in those organizations. And we want a partner where we can with both of them, and then emulate them where we can with our chairman’s club. And then, with our general member members, we really are focused on what is in their best interests, what is their value. And there’s no better way to find out than just asking.
Jill Heineck: [00:15:50] Correct.
Nick Masino: [00:15:50] So, we’re asking a lot of questions, listening, and then putting our plans together.
Jill Heineck: [00:15:54] Interesting. So, would you call it your member experience strategy or is it more about retention?
Nick Masino: [00:16:01] No. Well, is it one or the other?
Jill Heineck: [00:16:02] They’re hand-in-hand. They are hand-in-hand.
Nick Masino: [00:16:04] Yeah.
Jill Heineck: [00:16:04] But it’s interesting to hear what different companies call it and how they position it inside the organization to, then, impress upon the team and the culture around delivering that experience, right? So, I’m just always curious as to what you call it.
Nick Masino: [00:16:20] Yes. In the chamber world, member retention is very common.
Jill Heineck: [00:16:25] Member retention.
Nick Masino: [00:16:25] And without a great engagement strategy, your number will not be high. And so, I’m a huge KPI fan. I have a BA in Communications. So, I’m not analytical per se. But how do you measure anything without KPIs? And so, you asked me a question. What you said was, “Do you have about 2000 members?” And I was a little not super clear. I didn’t say yes, because I’m unclear about some things. I’m unclear about exactly how many members we have. You think that would be an easy answer. And so, we’re drilling down on that. And so, if I don’t know how many members I had last year and this year, how do I have an exact number of member retention was.
Nick Masino: [00:16:25] So, we’re looking at all of those things. And literally, my chair, Tammy Shumate, this year, she said, “Nick, I appreciate what you’re doing. You’re literally going through every single thing, and you’re asking why. And we shouldn’t do things just because we always have.” And so, one of those is why how do we calculate these things, what’s our internal systems. And so, we’re looking at everything. But I do believe we have to measure it, and we have to set goals once we actually have a measurement.
Jill Heineck: [00:17:30] So, in terms of member retention, I mean, what kind of feedback are you getting from your current members as to what would keep them either renewing every year or what would make their membership more valuable to them? What are you hearing?
Nick Masino: [00:17:42] Sure. Well, right off the bat, one of the most interesting things is our communication team was very clear about this, and they had been hearing it for some time. But we were probably over communicating. And our chamber was, I think, famous. It was kind of a joke of a punch line in Gwinnett about getting a lot of e-mails from the Gwinnett Chamber. So, they put a strategy in place based on data, based on research, and communicating to people. And so, we’re communicating more appropriately. You can sign up for our weekly e-mail, a daily, or a monthly. It’s your choice.
Jill Heineck: [00:18:10] I like it.
Nick Masino: [00:18:11] And we literally had a lot of fun. We did a little video. It was kind of my first hello to the membership. I was speaking from my desk, and I had my monitor behind me, my laptop and my monitor. Then, I had my iPhone, and I had my iPad, and all had a giant spam can. A can of spam on the thing.
Jill Heineck: [00:18:29] I love it.
Nick Masino: [00:18:30] And it said, “I’ve heard that we’re over-communicating. Some people might call it spam.” So, I don’t really ever refer to-
Jill Heineck: [00:18:37] Did you come up with that?
Nick Masino: [00:18:38] No. Again, I’m not creative. We have great people on our communications and marketing team, and they did it.
Jill Heineck: [00:18:43] It’s good.
Nick Masino: [00:18:43] And it was awesome. And literally, I’ve never done anything in regards to video or e-mail except when I’m on RadioX that people don’t say I have never said more about that thing, about that specific video. And it was fun to do, but it was effective, and people signed up to the appropriate communication that was in their best interests. So, we’re communicating effectively.
Nick Masino: [00:19:06] And then, in regards to what we’ve heard is – and this is not a surprise – people want to do things that are interesting, entertaining, but effective. They love experiential learning. They want to be involved. They don’t want to sit in a lecture hall and be spoken to or talked at. And so, we’re really trying to focus on everything that is interaction. And we used to do, I would argue, a very, very boring 45-minute chamber orientation. And sometimes, it would be an hour and a half. No one wants to be spoken to like that. And so, now, it’s five minutes, “Welcome. We’re excited you’re here. You’re now going to move between five tables over the next 45 minutes, and you’re going to interact. It will be two minutes of an introduction, and then we’re gonna talk about what you want to talk about.” And that started for me, also, in my first leadership meeting. We have a new leadership team in place. We had some people that retired, and I was able to promote from within. We had a lot of A players.
Jill Heineck: [00:20:07] Beautiful.
Nick Masino: [00:20:07] Top talent. Actually, we had not brought one person in at a leadership role from outside. And that was intentional because we had strong leaders. So, we promoted the team, and we start off every staff meeting. I don’t lead the staff meeting. We start with, what are the most important things to affect you in the next two weeks in our organization? And that’s the agenda. And we vote. If there’s too many things on the agenda, you can only recommend three things. And so, we’re leading as a group, and it’s not a dictatorship, but we’re also constantly communicating. We do a 50-second huddle every morning on the leadership team in my office, and we stand, so we don’t stay very long, and we’re just listening and focused. And so, we have a very strong internal feedback loop between the staff and the leadership team where we’re communicating through the leaders. And then, we’re hearing back what’s going on. So, I think the communication is important for us to be able to respond to our members.
Jill Heineck: [00:21:05] Everything you’ve just said, that’s where the magic is, right? So, your leadership, you have a cohesive team who, then, the other parts of your organization sees that, feels that, that’s where your culture is. And so, they’re gonna help really deliver at a fantastic level an experience that your members are going to love and continue to come back for more, right?
Nick Masino: [00:21:27] Right.
Jill Heineck: [00:21:28] So-
Nick Masino: [00:21:29] And can I say one thing?
Jill Heineck: [00:21:30] Yeah.
Nick Masino: [00:21:30] Again, and I’m not trying to self-deprecate by any means, but I’m happy to always. Everything I’ve just said, many of the listeners have heard these principles. I didn’t create any of them. Patrick Lencioni, these are really bright people have been preaching these things for decades. You can write books. I mean, you name them. Andy Stanley-
Jill Heineck: [00:21:57] Of course.
Nick Masino: [00:21:57] I mean, what a fantastic. That’s a great podcast, his leadership lessons. And I’m not inventing anything. I’m just implementing things that I’ve heard from great leaders.
Jill Heineck: [00:22:07] Which is a huge step in the right direction because we do hear a lot of leadership that talks a lot about these things but doesn’t actually take action, or empower the team to take the action, or have the team feel part of the action, or have the team fail part of the decision making with the actions that are happening. So, from an engagement perspective, I think you’re going at it from all levels.
Nick Masino: [00:22:29] Well, thank you.
Jill Heineck: [00:22:29] That’s very exciting about it to me.
Nick Masino: [00:22:31] Yeah, I don’t have a crystal ball. And so, I’m just listening, and then implementing things. And I will tell you, in regards to staff meetings, they’re so good. But at a point in my career, they were really bad and stale. And I brought in a Patrick Lencioni consultant, and I said, “None of us feel like our meetings are effective.” This was about four years ago when I was leading the economic development office. And he said, “It’s really interesting.” We did these assessments, and the team loved the team and the team culture. I mean, we’re off the charts, but we didn’t like to meet. So, who loves working together, but they don’t like to meet. It’s because our meetings were stale and boring. And I was talking too much. And so, they came in, they blew it up. And now, we still love the culture. It’s awesome. And we actually have an effective meeting process.
Jill Heineck: [00:23:21] So, when you meet, where is the meeting?
Nick Masino: [00:23:24] The meeting happens … well, the senior leadership team meets every Monday at 9:00 for 60 minutes at the most. Sometimes, we wrap up-
Jill Heineck: [00:23:31] Around the air hockey table.
Nick Masino: [00:23:34] No. Yeah, the Gen-Zs have not taken over completely. No, it’s a boring wooden table. And then, we have another room, a granite boring table, but it’s effective. A conference room. And we do sit.
Jill Heineck: [00:23:49] And you talk?
Nick Masino: [00:23:50] And we communicate. It’s crazy.
Jill Heineck: [00:23:51] And those meetings aren’t lasting hours on that.
Nick Masino: [00:23:53] No. Only one hour. And we’ll vote. We’re like, “Hey, we we need two more minutes for this or five minutes for this.” And the other thing though that was super effective that I’ve got a problem with is I don’t put my phone down. So, we leave our phones out of the office.
Jill Heineck: [00:24:09] Nice.
Nick Masino: [00:24:09] Or we keep them in our pockets, and we might pull them out just to use the calendar to choose a date. But it’s rude anyway. And I’m labeling myself as many times I’m using my phone when I shouldn’t be. Again, this is all just communicating. And there’s nothing off topic. So, I’ve been called out, and I’ve encouraged people to call me out if I’m on my phone when I shouldn’t be.
Jill Heineck: [00:24:32] Understood. That’s the culture we’re in.
Nick Masino: [00:24:34] Yes, yes.
Jill Heineck: [00:24:34] Right? That’s where we-
Nick Masino: [00:24:35] And we have to lead by example.
Jill Heineck: [00:24:36] Right, exactly. So, talk to me a little bit about a couple of initiatives that you’re real excited about happening,you have in the pipeline for 2020.
Nick Masino: [00:24:46] Sure.
Jill Heineck: [00:24:47] What’s the team working on?
Nick Masino: [00:24:49] Sure. The one that just it’s so fresh right now because on Monday, a young man named Paul Oh, he just started. He’s my Manager of Public Policy and Community Affairs. We haven’t had a staff person focused on public policy in seven years. Paul worked up until last Friday with Congressman Rob Woodall of the 7th District. Paul went to Pope High School in Cobb and went to Georgia Tech. He did a small stint as an intern with the Georgia Chamber. And he started with us. He literally does public policy committee affairs, and he’s my administrative support.
Nick Masino: [00:25:28] So, I don’t need full time support, but because of my political background and engagement, Paul and I are going to work closely together. And right off the bat yesterday where he introduced himself to all of our General Assembly members in Gwinnett, shared our public policy agenda that’s put together internally. Our marketing team does a great job. They’re very creative. And he shared it with all them. I know we’ve had a public policy agenda. I’m unsure if someone ever shared it with anybody. But we are sharing it with both our federal delegation, our local delegation. And then, next week, he’s going to share with every mayor and every city council member and introduce himself.
Jill Heineck: [00:26:05] Awesome.
Nick Masino: [00:26:05] And so, we, as the Gwinnett Chamber, represent the business interests of our community. And we will unapologetically defend them when it comes to bad legislation, current legislation that might exist that needs to be changed, and legislation that needs to be proposed. One of those items, if I could share, is Gwinnett, I don’t know if you live in Metro Atlanta, you might have realized we have a congestion issue.
Jill Heineck: [00:26:29] Really?
Nick Masino: [00:26:29] Yes. And we’re not going to be able to build roads out of this problem, but we need to have alternatives. There is no alternative to driving in Gwinnett County. And I have had people in the past foolishly say, “Well, you could ride your bike or you could walk.” The walkability and bikeability score, I would argue anywhere outside of just a couple of small pockets in our entire region is pretty, pretty poor. And so, we have to give Gwinnettians an alternative. And that is going to be, and it’s going to cost money, and we will have a bond referendum, hopefully, in November. We’ll be able to vote to increase-
Jill Heineck: [00:27:03] Nice.
Nick Masino: [00:27:03] … our ability to tax ourselves. So, Paul is going to be driving that issue for us internally at the chamber. I’ve not spoken to a CEO, by the way, that doesn’t want that. And I’ll share that we’re in a building that WestRock is headquartered, and they are no longer in Gwinnett because one of the reasons was because they didn’t have access to transit. And WestRock’s, a global company, and they need access to Hartsfield-Jackson Airport. And when you have one option, which is a car, that doesn’t give you any options.
Jill Heineck: [00:27:37] So, now, from a recent win perspective, you have anything in that 2019 or in recent months or weeks that you can share with us?
Nick Masino: [00:27:45] Sure. And you’re referring to economic development projects?
Jill Heineck: [00:27:48] Sure.
Nick Masino: [00:27:48] Okay. Well-
Jill Heineck: [00:27:48] Whatever you want to talk.
Nick Masino: [00:27:50] Sure. Thank you. So, last year, actually, interestingly enough, now that I’m out of the way in the economic development arena, and it’s now led by Andrew Carnes, they actually had a record year. Our goal is about 2000 new jobs in our targeted industries. So, these are high-paying, high-value target industries. They had, I think, 3200 new jobs, which was led by … I’m sure you’ve read about a giant Amazon fulfillment center just in Gwinnett County on the border with DeKalb in the shadows of Stone Mountain. And this is a multi hundred million dollar development, three stories, robotics, hundreds of employees, millions in investment. It is one of the most modern logistical centers that Georgia will have ever seen. And so, that was-
Jill Heineck: [00:28:39] Incredible.
Nick Masino: [00:28:39] Thank you so much. And that was a great project between Gwinnett County, the State of Georgia, and Amazon. And it was a real partnership between everyone involved.
Jill Heineck: [00:28:49] That’s a big boon for the area.
Nick Masino: [00:28:51] We’re very excited. Very excited. And so, we already have 15 additional announcements to announce this year. But out of respect for these private companies, they have to dictate when they’re going to make the announcement. They could be expanding, but they could sometimes be consolidating, and they need to notify people in other parts of the world. We’re really blessed at Metro Atlanta because this is where people want to be when. Even during the horrible recession of 2008 to 2012, many of our companies actually expanded in Gwinnett and in Metro Atlanta because of consolidations.
Nick Masino: [00:29:26] So, if you have an office in Boise, and I don’t want to pick on other places, but you think of a random place, and you’re like, we need to consolidate, Atlanta is pretty awesome. Not only do we do we have a growing population, and in the worse depths of the recession, Atlanta’s population still rose. I mean, Gwinnett County, in our worst, worst year during the recession, we still had 6000 new employees. There are multiple states that lost population.
Nick Masino: [00:29:52] So, this is where people want to be. Obviously, thanks to Hartsfield-Jackson Airport, more direct flights to any other place in the world. It’s an incredible airport, incredible asset. It’s reason why we have well over 600 international businesses have an operation based in Gwinnett. And about 200 of them, it’s their America’s headquarters because of Hartsfield Jackson. Obviously, airport, just is an easy way to get around.
Jill Heineck: [00:30:17] It really is. So, tell me maybe one or two of the wow experience that you might have had recently with an organization or a company that you really thought, “I could really adopt some some kind of culture point to my organization because of the experience I’ve had with them.”
Nick Masino: [00:30:39] Okay. You’re totally putting me on the spot on that one, but I’m going to do the best I can. So, as we have revamped our membership, and I mentioned our new position, our concierge service, that came to light when we were really focusing on the word concierge, when we did our annual board retreat at the Ritz Carlton Reynolds Plantation.
Jill Heineck: [00:31:04] Oh, perfect.
Nick Masino: [00:31:05] Yeah. And we’re really lucky to have multiple Ritz’s in Metro Atlanta and Georgia. And then, obviously, the headquarters of Chick-Fil-A. When you think about customer services, customer service excellence, those two organizations with the “My pleasure.” And really, as we were designing that position, we had that in mind. Not even mine, we talked about it. And literally, in our job description, we referred to Chick-Fil-A and Ritz Carlton. And we were trying to set the standard for customer service. I mean, Ritz-Carlton, you can feel it when you walk in the door, and it’s a very expensive, high-end caliber place. And then, Chick-Fil-A’s, let’s be honest, it’s a fast food restaurant selling chicken. But you just feel special every time you interact. And that’s what we wanted our chairman’s club members to feel like.
Jill Heineck: [00:31:54] Excellent.
Nick Masino: [00:31:54] And then, I actually mentioned already, EO and YPO. And their members, they just gloat almost when they’re talking about their organization. And I literally looked at some of the step. I was like, I got three EO members together, and I said, “Tell us about it.” And we were just listening. And they were gloating about how great it was. And I thought, “Okay, could you imagine someone describing us that way? That is our goal. We want people to just brag, ‘We’re in this and you’re not.'” And so, I’ve joked with the staff, if we can get our service levels, we won’t even have to sell anything anymore. We’ll just become order takers.
Jill Heineck: [00:32:30] That’s the idea.
Nick Masino: [00:32:31] Yeah, that’s the idea. I mean, that’s the aspiration and the goal, right But that’s where we want to be. Hopefully, that was helpful in answering your question.
Jill Heineck: [00:32:38] No, no, yeah. So, you enjoy a real Ritz-Carlton experience, right, every time you’re there.
Nick Masino: [00:32:43] Oh, my gosh. Yes, every time.
Jill Heineck: [00:32:43] We had-
Nick Masino: [00:32:45] Let’s go right after work.
Jill Heineck: [00:32:46] We had Horst Schulze. We had Horst Schulze here last year.
Nick Masino: [00:32:50] He’s fun.
Jill Heineck: [00:32:51] And he was-
Nick Masino: [00:32:52] Sounds so cool.
Jill Heineck: [00:32:52] … fantastic talking about how he empowers his team in order to deliver that top guest experience, so that you do have lifelong guests. That’s the whole point. And so, I think it’s a fantastic kind of example. And as long as everyone in your organization can actually experience it in order to then be able to deliver it.
Nick Masino: [00:33:14] Okay, that’s great. So, now, we got to take the entire team to the Ritz Carlton. Thank you.
Jill Heineck: [00:33:18] I’m just saying.
Nick Masino: [00:33:18] Thank you so much for that.
Jill Heineck: [00:33:19] And they can thank me.
Nick Masino: [00:33:21] Yes, of course. Well, I think we should invite you to join us.
Jill Heineck: [00:33:25] But I think that’s the way. When you experience it, then you better understand it..
Nick Masino: [00:33:28] Right. And I got a better idea. We’re going to start with Chick-Fil-A.
Jill Heineck: [00:33:31] Perfect. Not knocking it. We also had Dee Ann Turner, formerly of Chick-Fil-A. She was here right after Hortz came. And we had a fantastic conversation with her also about when she was in the organization, she’s now on her own speaking about what she was doing there, and one of the things she mentioned is that we really want to make sure everybody felt like they were cared for and part of this team culture, so that it trickled down to the customer experience.
Nick Masino: [00:34:00] Yes. Yeah.
Jill Heineck: [00:34:00] So, you’ve already spoken to that point. So, you’re on the right track.
Nick Masino: [00:34:04] Thank you. Actually, I spoke to both of your guests. You know what they said about the show? They said it was their pleasure to be here.
Jill Heineck: [00:34:12] Of course, they did. That was a good one.
Nick Masino: [00:34:14] Thank you so much.
Jill Heineck: [00:34:16] Well, I have enjoyed you so much today. Thank you so much for fighting the traffic and coming to see us.
Nick Masino: [00:34:22] My pleasure.
Jill Heineck: [00:34:23] We really appreciate it. So, for our listeners, we can go to where to find out more about the Gwinnett Chamber?
Nick Masino: [00:34:29] GwinnettChamber.org.
Jill Heineck: [00:34:29] Excellent. And again, thanks, Nick. And this has been Customer Experience Radio.
Nick Masino: [00:34:36] Thank you.
About Your Host
Jill Heineck is a leading authority on corporate relocations, and is highly sought after for her real estate industry acumen and business insights. As a published author, frequent panelist and keynote speaker, Jill shares her experience and perceptions with people from around the globe.
Jill is a founding partner of Keller Williams Southeast, established in 1999, and the founder and managing partner of Heineck & Co. Her real estate practice specializes in corporate relocations, individual relocations, luxury residential, and commercial properties. Jill’s analytical approach to problem-solving, along with her expert negotiation skills and sophisticated marketing, deliver superior results to her clients. Her winning strategies and tenacious client advocacy have earned her a reputation for excellence among Atlanta’s top producers.
While Jill has received many accolades throughout her career, she is most gratified by the personal testimonials and referrals she receives from her clients. Jill’s unwavering commitment to the customer experience, and her focus on the unique needs of each client, serve as the foundation of her success.
Follow Jill Heineck on LinkedIn.
