Speakers at the Oct. 20 Northern Nevada Business Summit

Speakers during the breakout sessions at the Oct. 20 Northern Nevada Business Summit come from a variety of industries and will present their insights to Cultivating Change.

Speakers include Darrell Plummer, owner of Sierra Nevada Properties’ Cory McGuire, president chief engagement officer and CEO of Dale Carnagie Training of Nevada; Greg Haupert, executive drector of BNI Northern Nevada; Sharon Chamberlain, CEO Northern Nevada Hopes; Paul Klein, partner and creative director Argentum Partners; and Andrew Ladd and Vick Wowo, leadership at Whitney Peak Hotel.

The NNBW was able to catch a couple of the busy speakers to talk about the Summit.

“We wanted to bring in speakers to deliver that message of how Reno is changing and how they can be a part of that change,” said Wowo, who is also the chair of the chamber committee putting on the event.

Wowo and Andrew Ladd will talk about Cultivating Company Change.

Wowo started with Whitney Peak in March 2015 as a regional sales manager. Very involved in the community, he serves as the chair for the membership value committee for the Reno-Sparks Chamber, the vice president of the Reno-Tahoe Young Professional Network, the vice president of public relations for the College of Business Alumni Association, He is also on the board of directors for the University of Nevada, Reno Alumni Association and The University of Nevada Reno Young Alumni Chapter.

Ladd has more than 13 years of experience in the hospitality industry. Prior to joining the team at Whitney Peak he worked for Hilton Garden Inn and the Peppermill Resort Spa Casino in various sales and business development roles.

Sharon Chamberlain, CEO of nonprofit Northern Nevada HOPES, will talk about Cultivating Community Change.

HOPES is a nonprofit that delivers healthcare services to an estimated 10,000 people in the community, Through HOPES and other community organizations, Chamberlain has been in the midst of promoting positive change in the community.

Plummer is also a board member of The Chamber of Reno, Sparks, Northern Nevada, host of the Business Summit. He gets involved with organizations he feels passionate about, which include Western Industrial Nevada, and industry organizations in addition to the chamber.

Plummer’s real estate firm has been around for 37 years, although under different names and sometimes as a franchise and sometimes as an independent real estate office. His father started the firm in 1979 and Plummer took it over in 2001.

As a real estate professional, Plummer has seen and adapted to a lot of change, including self-driven change.

Plummer has a reputation for seeking out different ways to do things.

“I look for ideas that are outside my industry,” he said, adding that most companies in a single industry copy from each other. He finds it ironic that, once his new ideas prove successful, others in the industry copy from him.

A key to making change work for you, he said, is listening. “You arrive at better answers when there are more people inputting.”