There were lessons aplenty for Acadiana leaders to reap from their recent visit to Lexington, Kentucky. The visit involved 70 Louisiana visitors encountering a mountain of Bluegrass Region evidence of success, some data-based, some anecdotal.
Know this: Lexington, Kentucky has good things going on. So do we.
The point of the One Acadiana-led Leadership Exchange was to mine their lessons and bring them home. Here were lessons worth packing into Acadiana’s southbound luggage:
-Gray matter’ matters. That means K-12 and higher education and it means not settling for “good enough” or someone else’s definition of an “A.” It means reaching for “world-class” status, fostering schools that look and perform at elite levels. For higher education, it means pursuing research and developing expertise in a few knowledge areas.
-Environment matters. That means protecting your historic buildings, polishing your downtown, developing your community in ways that make you proud and put a bounce in residents’ steps. In Lexington, that means rescuing and refashioning an historic bank into a boutique hotel and art museum. In outlying reaches, it means protecting pristine, rolling hills where horse farms rest like jewels in the countryside.
-Culture matters. In the Bluegrass Region, that means raising majestic horses and distilling magnificent bourbon and revering your roots. It means knowing who you are, hanging on to that and presenting it to the world in a cogent message.
Those are mere surface messages, though. You could see all that in the Bluegrass Region by circling over it in a plane or by driving through it on the bus. Here are other, deeper lessons:
-Lexington thinks and then it does. It talks and then it acts. Mayor Jim Gray, who made his mark in private business, suggests a bias for action, a penchant to produce on big ideas.
-Lexington built partnerships. Landlocked, it needs rural partners. Interstates and U.S. highways link the core city to its suburban and rural nearby neighbors. Business and industrial recruiters comfortably shop the whole region to outsiders, certain that success in one community will foster opportunity for every community. The region built public-private partnerships, inviting private sector partners to not just write checks, but to join in the vision creation.
-The Bluegrass Region is mature. Eight distinct, regional counties sometimes clash, come to agreements and move ahead. There is push back, yes, but also resolution. Partners do better together than alone.
-Lexington thinks big, not “best-in-Kentucky” or “best-in-the-South” big. Lexington measures itself against the nation and world. It’s a “university city,” small enough to be greatly influenced by its campuses. Its workforce is 11th-most educated in the U.S. Affordable, it beckons young people. It encourages entrepreneurs.
Their strengths are not necessarily our strengths. But their attitude can be.
Think, then do. Be a team. Aim high.