Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Strong downtown to recruit jobs

There was a story in the Winston Salem Journal today about how Winston-Salem is a prime spot for data centers. Here is a link........http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2010/jun/09/090201/winston-salem-prime-spot-for-data-centers/news/

The news story by Richard Craver of the Winston-Salem Journal is based upon a recent release of a national study that was released by The Boyd Company, a Princeton, NJ site selection consultant company. Here is a link to the company website http://www.theboydcompany.com/

In the story, there is a compelling quote about downtown....John Boyd, Jr. said he expects that some data-operation decisions will be made in the next six months, with Winston-Salem and the Triad in the mix because of the lower overall operating cost.

"You also have available land, quality available work force, and an attractive higher-education system," Boyd said.
Still, he said, there are areas in which Winston-Salem can spruce up its brand and recruitment packages to prevent more runner-up finishes.
For instance, downtown-revitalization efforts have proved important for not only attracting young professionals, but also the companies that want to hire them.

I was happy to see a nationally respected site selection consultant actually acknowledge the importance of downtown to job recruitment efforts for a city.

I thought I would add a link to two other recent stories that I have read that I think are compelling.

http://www.workforce.com/section/06/feature/26/09/72/index.html

http://hbr.org/2010/05/back-to-the-city/ar/1

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