News & Resources

It’s no secret that the recipe for economic success usually includes generous portions of innovation and technology. That has been part of the economic development story for many years in such places as Boston, Seattle, the Research Triangle, and Silicon Valley. But just as you can find more and more cutting-edg...Continue Reading

As the world enters its third year of COVID-19, site selectors are doubling down on predictions they made a year ago. From reshoring and supply-chain tightening to remote working and worker shortages, site selectors are telling us that the trends exacerbated by the global pandemic will become even more pronounce...Continue Reading

Dual Credit and CTE programs allow high school students to take college-level courses in conjunction with local colleges. In addition to satisfying high school requirements, students also earn college credits. These programs are gaining in popularity. Students get a taste of more challenging material while also earning college credit, whic...Continue Reading

Students on the brink of graduating from their community college, university or vocational technology school don’t necessarily know whether their state ranks well in workforce development relative to other states. Military personnel ending a tour of duty at a base and transitioning to the private sector are likely in th...Continue Reading

Covid-19 ravaged our economy and American businesses, workers, and communities are still working to recover. The crisis also further highlighted long standing inequities in our society, but also presents a key opportunity to build back better than before. Just last week, President Biden signed the Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal, and negotiation...Continue Reading

Texas’ largest corporate tax incentive program is set to expire at the end of next year after lawmakers opted against renewing it for the first time in its 20-year history. But the impending termination of the Chapter 313 program is expected to set off a rush of applicants as the state’...Continue Reading

Congratulations. Your business is growing! Revenue is up, and you just launched a new product that is flying off the shelves. The only problem is you need to hire more people and you have no place to put them. You have hired a site selector, and they have found th...Continue Reading

In August, Rocki Rockingham was named Chief Human Resources Officer for GE Appliances. Area Development’s editor recently asked her about the company’s strategy to build upon its recent global “Great Place to Work” recognition and to create a workplace culture that attracts and retains top talent. Area Development: Despite the hig...Continue Reading

As the U.S. economy emerges from the 2020 recession, the U.S. labor market remains an area of concern for occupiers, investors, and the commercial real estate industry. The impact of the pandemic on the labor market has been sharp and severe, especially within urban areas. Although the economy is no...Continue Reading

Even as state and regional education systems and business coalitions roll out reams of computer, tech and STEM skills certification and boot camp programs, Big Tech behemoths is doing the same. Companies such as Google, Intel, Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, LinkedIn and beyond have developed their own academic portfolios in orde...Continue Reading

The first release of 2020 U.S. Census data has been made public and confirms a trend that  demographers and interested observers (including site selectors) have been watching develop for several decades: The U.S. population is growing more slowly, aging more rapidly and continuing to diversify. Here is a snapshot of som...Continue Reading

The holiday season is upon us, and small businesses have an opportunity to take advantage of pent-up demand and the overall rebound of the American economy in the post-Covid world. Consumers are ready to spend, and Small Business Saturday promotions will help lure holiday shoppers back to brick-and-mortar stores. Small Busines...Continue Reading

In Midland, Texas,  business owners are crucial to our thriving community and economy. The mission at Midland’s Economic Development Corporation is to create opportunities for businesses and families located within Midland. The MDC was created in January 2002 to promote business expansion, job creation, and capital investment to diversify an...Continue Reading

This week, leaders from the G20 (or Group of Twenty), an intergovernmental forum of 19 countries and the European Union, are meeting on a number of issues related to the global economy. One critical item is an international tax agreement on a global minimum corporate tax rate of 15% fo...Continue Reading

Texas business executive Sanjiv Yajnik can aptly be described as a caring and innovative leader, a modern day Renaissance man. Aside from Yajnik’s position as president of the Plano-based Financial Services division of Capital One, he chairs the Dallas Symphony Association; serves as treasurer of NAF, a nonprofit that helps ensur...Continue Reading

AUSTIN, TEXAS – In September, Texas added 95,800 total nonagricultural jobs, and the seasonally adjusted Texas unemployment rate was at 5.6%, a decrease of 0.3 percentage points from August 2021, according to data released Friday by the Texas Workforce Commission. Texas has added a total of 711,500 jobs since September 2020...Continue Reading

Freedom is a magnet. We saw more evidence of that when Tesla recently announced plans to move its headquarters from California to Texas—joining a growing list of companies that have made the same move. The fact is, Texas is by far the most popular destination—a decade-long distinction—for company headquarters leaving Californi...Continue Reading

A lot has been written and said about companies and people relocating from California to Texas, but I wanted to know what it was really like for a CEO who actually made the move. Recently, I had the opportunity to visit with the leaders of two Fortune 500 companies who di...Continue Reading

In my last post, I described how the COVID pandemic has irrevocably changed the practice of corporate site selection and economic development. This has also been fostered by large business media outlets telling many new stories of how COVID has disrupted and enabled new ways to replace traditional business practices.  Fas...Continue Reading

Have you ever had a meal, gone on a date, or enjoyed a vacation so good it made you never want to repeat the lower quality experiences you’ve had in the past? Why would you want to eat bad food, date a loser, or suffer scratchy hotel sheets when yo...Continue Reading

Too often, we talk about fear as if it were only for people destined to fail. Cowards who never had the courage to succeed. But, if we're honest, we can admit that we all feel some fear. In particular, we have all feared that we are not good enough an...Continue Reading

There’s been much made of an impending “turnover tsunami” lately, with the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) being one of the first to sound the warning bell for organizations working hard to fill open positions and, especially, to recruit talent for hard-to-fill roles during a pandemic that continues t...Continue Reading

“You win or lose based on the talent you have and the culture you create that allows your talent to thrive.” That’s the word shared by Steve Presley, chairman and CEO of Nestlé USA, and it’s wisdom with which most successful corporate leaders would agree. Presley says his company found th...Continue Reading

Site selection professionals travel all over the United States, looking at hundreds of potential sites for development with a goal of finding suitable sites for their clients. What does it mean to achieve success? Ultimately, they must be incredibly efficient in evaluating and narrowing site lists, while balancing a seemingl...Continue Reading