Uniting the professionals of Austin Program brings together a prime networking opportunity By Eric Johnson Over the years, Austin has worked to establish a strong and ever-growing business community. That work has fallen to individual companies and entities, but is ultimately led by the Austin Area Chamber of Commerce. A variety of programs and opportunities have been generated in an effort to continue strengthening business ties, but also draw more people to Austin. To that end, the Connecting Young Professionals program seeks to work toward all of these goals. “The whole mission of it is to empower, connect and kind of grow the young professional network in Austin,” said Jaclyn Bird, president of the board heading the group. “We really wanted to focus on attracting young talent to the jobs, the opportunities, the events, everything in Austin and then retaining them too.” A major part of The program acts as Connecting Young a base in order to really Professionals is the strengthen ties within the social dynamic. business community utilizing both social events as well as personal development and community service projects. The group began in 2019, and enjoyed early successes before COVID-19 played its part. Despite good numbers, Bird said Connecting Young Professionals did see a drop when the pandemic anchored itself to our lives. “We kept it going through COVID, which was a miracle,” Bird said. “We did a lot of virtual events. We lost a little bit of interest because it was the Zoom fatigue. We’re kind of getting back to in-person events and getting people out.” Which is important, because for the Connecting Young Professional group to optimally work, it requires face-to-face interactions. Relationships are much easier forged when people can be together rather than through a computer monitor. The group, as Bird explains, is open to those who are, “21 to 40ish.” We don’t put a hard cap on it. You know, when you turn 40, we’re not like, ‘okay, see you later.’” “We do 21 just because we do events at breweries and bars and places like that,” Bird further explained. 20 | Austin Daily Herald | Progress 2022
From left to right, the Connecting Young Professionals Board: Jim Koenig, Hormel Food Corps.; Varinh Van Vugt, Austin Welcome Center; Jaclyn Bird, Jaclyn Bird-Edward Jones and John Atoyebi, Austin Area Chamber or Commerce. Photos provided
