Next Gen. Summit in Cedar Rapids connects leaders with young professionals

CEDAR RAPIDS - Business executives and young professionals compared notes on their careers, management styles and organizational cultures Wednesday in roundtable discussions at the third annual Next Gen. Summit.

About 360 people attended the all-day event, the most in its short history, according to Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance spokeswoman Pam Hinman. That number included 38 business executives, who led the 30-minute roundtable discussions.

The roundtable discussions are new to the summit, which was held at the DoubleTree by Hilton at the U.S. Cellular Center.

Participants discussed the advantages of working in the Corridor, generational differences in how executives and young professionals approach their career paths and the experiences of women in business.

The Corridor's people help make it attractive for businesspeople, said Lydia Brown, president and CEO of Ascent Iowa, an advocacy group for women-owned businesses.

'People matter here,” she said. 'My daughter goes to school in Boston, and people think there's something wrong with her because she's so friendly.”

Morgan Guge, a Van Meter Inc. employee and young professional sitting at another table, said she had tried to persuade her peers not to leave a job too soon.

'I have a lot of friends who are like, ‘This is not for me,'” Guge said. 'I'm like, ‘You've been there three months. Calm down.'”

That sort of frequent movement can hurt a career, said Kaplan University President Susan Spivey, the leader of Guge's discussion table.

'As someone who looks at resumes, I can tell you that's a turnoff as a manager,” Spivey said.

Other female executives discussed their experiences in male-dominated industries.

Kelly Homewood, the director of Fusionfarm, said she was often the only woman in the room in her previous career as a retail executive. Fusionfarm is part of The Gazette Company.

'I would go to these meetings and it would be 40 men and me,” Homewood said.

Spivey predicted that those typies of experiences will change dramatically in the coming decades.

'I think in 10 years you're going to see a huge jump (in the number of female executives),” Spivey said. 'And in the 10 years after that, you're going to see a major jump.”

The summit also included speeches from Tana Goertz, a reality TV star, motivational speaker and entrepreneur, and Mike Draper, owner of the Des Moines-based apparel company RAYGUN.