Welcome everybody to Midday magazine for this Tuesday, April 22nd, 2025.
Have your host James J. Mailoff here, just realized it's the last time I get to say
Midday magazine.
We're changing the name tomorrow and everything.
We got a great show lined up for you, everyone.
In part two today at 430, we're going to speak with Cherika, our great friends over at
the Wisconsin Rapids Family Center looking forward to that.
Right now we always look forward to these interviews.
We've got Promise Buckingham with us, Marketing and Communications Director with our
Heart of Wisconsin Chamber of Commerce.
Promise always good to have you in.
Good to see you.
And we'll be talking with Emily in a little bit.
Emily is with the Ace Leadership Program.
She's a participant over there.
Emily will be putting you to work.
I mean, talking with you in just a little bit.
Thanks for being here, Emily.
Promise, I want to kick things off with you and some of the great events going on over
at the chamber.
If you don't mind, if we could rewind just a day, I was really curious how things went with
our friends over at El Café.
We love El Café.
They're a birthday and anniversary sponsor.
We were really closely with them.
How did the Network and Night go last night?
Yeah.
The Networking at Night last night over at El Café in Port Edwards was really good.
We saw a lot of new faces.
I was really excited about that.
I think there was at least three new businesses that are not currently members that showed
up to that Networking at Night event.
And then there was a lot of new faces where I was trying to get some of our members like
come and network with that Network at Night and they showed up too.
So I was pretty excited about that.
Their food was great.
They had chips and like four different types of dip and cheese curds and some chicken wings.
They had a whole bunch of food there.
It was really great.
The only trick with doing the Networking at El Café is anybody going to talk.
Their mouth is going to be so full of food and everything out of it.
That's great to hear.
Really good to hear.
Shout out to El Café and you guys doing that.
The Networking at Night is networking with the Chamber is such a popular event.
It's a fun one.
I know people look forward to it and I know we were talking a little bit about over here
maybe possibly sometime.
So we'll work on that.
Boy, you guys are booked when it comes to those.
For the remainder of 2025 and we're working on our 2026 list for member businesses that
will be wanting to host it.
So if there is anybody out there that's interested in hosting that, please do reach out because
we are starting to fill 2026.
Somebody right here.
I got to reach out.
Let's talk about something on the way and that is Networking Exchange for Safety Professionals.
This is an informative one and a great one happening over a mid-state.
Yeah.
So our Network Exchange for Safety Professionals is tailored to those smaller businesses that
don't really have a safety department.
So we kind of get all the safety department heads from, you know, other businesses in the
area and set them down at a round table and have open conversations about different topics.
Sometimes we bring in a speaker.
This time we are.
We're going to be bringing in Andy DeWitt from, he's the head of security from a mid-state.
He's great.
He's got a number of critical incidents and active shooters and the best policies and
practices that you can utilize in a scenario like that.
And I think that's a really great information for even some of our smaller businesses in
the area where they might not have had any kind of formal training or any kind of information
at all whatsoever covering those types of topics.
This is a free event for our chamber members.
It's happening on April 30th from 11am to 1230 again over at mid-state technical college
in Wisconsin Rapids.
Registration does close on April 23rd and we will provide a like snack for those that,
you know, can get the hangries during that lunch hour or so.
So he's a smart idea.
It was very well thought out by you guys.
Andy is really, really good at this.
Not only with certainly the profession and the security end of things, but he's a good
talker and a really good explaining this stuff and sharing that information and the knowledge
that he has like in opportunities like this is such a key thing for not just him but people
in that industry and talking security.
I love that we are in a day and age now where so much of this information, it's not about,
hey, pay me this and I'll give you this information, it's take the information, please let me
help.
I want to do some good.
I want to, you know, get this and everybody.
Local businesses that can't necessarily afford to hire an Andy to come in and look over
the shop and, you know, help them with these kind of things.
This can be so key for them.
This is another one of those things in life where, hey, hopefully you never have to break
the glass.
You just know it's there and then you have that peace of mind and that comfort for you
and your employees and your customers that you know that.
It's a really good idea to have that.
That's a really good presentation.
What are the dates and times for that again?
It'll happen on April 30th over at Minstate Technical College from 11 a.m. to 1230 p.m.
and registration for this one closes April 23rd.
Yeah, you want to get in on that right away.
That's tomorrow, isn't it?
Yeah.
It's only a second to, time is a flat circle, it's all put mesh together right now.
Yes, be sure to go to heart of Wisconsin Chamber dot com or Wisconsin Rapids Chamber dot
com to register right now.
Now we're working, networking exchange for HR professionals is the next one I wanted
to talk about with you, promise.
This one's very similar to the safety professionals.
It's all, they're all tongue twisters.
They're all tongue twisters today.
The same as the safety professionals one is again, a round table of, you know, if you're
a business owner and you don't have an HR department or an HR director, and you want
to make sure that you're getting the right information from people in the area, you
know, what are the laws that we need to comply to?
What are some of the issues that you guys are seeing in the area?
This was really helpful during COVID with a lot of people wondering, you know, how to
address that.
This one is happening on May 14th over at Express Recycling Solutions from 11.30 to 1
pm.
And there will be a light lunch at that one as well.
Yes, nice.
We're going to have attorney Dietrich covering the recent HR law changes and anticipated
policy changes under the Trump administration and what that's going to look like as we move
more into those changes in our area.
This is free for members.
The registration does close for this one on May 7th as well.
And this, again, this is a really great one for like those small businesses out there
that are not familiar or don't stay updated with all these different changes that he's
implementing.
Yeah.
And to be fair, these changes, I mean, could be happening right now as we're speaking,
they happen so often and so frequent and infrequently.
So it's understandable if a business out there, especially smaller mom and pop businesses
don't have all the key information on this.
But this is one where I talk to and I've seen this happen where it's so hard to get a
business up and running and then to make it successful.
And then it falls apart or it closes shop because of an HR issue and that's a wide variety
of things that that could be.
But imagine working so hard to get to this point and then it's all gone because of one
thing that you could have helped.
And having an HR department or just at least having an update on what these rules and
these regulations are and understanding that.
There is no downside to that.
There's no negative to that or anything.
Have that information.
It just makes your employees that much safer, more comfortable, which makes them better
workers and makes you more money, et cetera, et cetera.
This is a wonderful domino effect with literally no side effects to it.
Now I do think that it takes some time and some energy to put into and understand these
things, but that's all right.
Yeah.
Time is money.
If you want to look at it that way, if you're a business and everything and you're investing
in your employees, you're investing in your company by doing this.
And it's one of these things, too, where I've seen this more in the restaurant industry
than any others, but the person that, you know, I try to save a buck or two here or there
or I try to save an hour or two here or there and then you lose your business.
You got to put that effort in and whether we're talking about the safety of your business
or we're talking about the HR end of things and people just wanting to come to work and
join work.
That goes a lot farther than I think we realize unless you think about it as you were
an employee once because all of us were employees once and we all kind of get where we're
going with that.
And it's an opportunity to do all of this and you get a nice lunch.
You get a nice lunch along with it.
I mean, you can't go wrong there.
I definitely plan on attending this one as well because I just like to stay informed,
you know, even though I'm not an employer, I just like staying informed.
So that way, you know, I know what's going on.
Yeah.
I'm a tyrant as a boss.
So I like to know, no, I'm kidding.
I'm with you.
It's never a bad thing to know these things and sometimes, you know, as much as I think,
oh, I'm pretty good at this or this or this or this, I'll hear something.
I'll learn something.
Oh, I didn't know that or I didn't think about it from that angle or something.
So you just never know what you might also really be able to take in and apply to your
day-to-day life.
I think that a lot of people could be, you know, really benefit not only from this, but
certainly their business could be benefited from it too.
It has quite a big impact to it.
The dates again for that one promise.
Network exchange for HR professionals is happening on May 14th over at Express Recycling Solutions
from 11.30 a.m. to 1.00 p.m.
Also, I forgot to mention that if you do plan to have a tour of the facility that you
need to wear closed-toes shoes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Good call.
Good call.
And I mean, you know, it should have a pair of those anyway.
Yeah.
Those are good to have.
Good to have.
We're speaking with Promise from the Heart of Wisconsin Chamber of Commerce.
We'll be speaking with Emily, the ace leadership participant in a moment.
But we want to get to coffee with the Chamber.
And these are always fun to talk about Promise, but this one seems like a big one that you guys
got lined up.
Yep.
This coffee with the Chamber is probably our most popular coffee with the Chamber throughout
the year.
This one is our Wood County Economic Development Updates.
So we're going to have a lot of different speakers provide brief updates on all different
types of topics.
Stacy Kiwi is going to be there giving updates from the Chamber.
Kayla Rumbalski will be there from Extension Wood County giving updates on that.
Jason Grunenberg, he's planning and zoning.
He'll give us a brief update on what's going on with that department.
Mary Ann Lippert, she owns a consulting business and she's been helping us with some of our
broad band issues in the area.
She'll be giving us updates on that.
Kelly Barchart, with child caring, child care is a huge issue in the area right now.
So she'll be able to provide updates with that as well during coffee with the Chamber.
And Kyle Kerns, he'll cover some, you know, what's going on in the Wisconsin Rapids community
with the development of, you know, some of the projects that are coming in.
And Kayleigh Mingle, she's from the Wood County Health Department.
She'll be providing updates there as well.
This one, it's a great one for anybody who is owning a business or operating a business
or as a manager of a business that needs to be updated with these different types of
things because all of these areas that they're going to be covering impacts every single
business and community member in the area.
So it's great information.
This is happening on May 28th and because it's such a popular one, we had to move the
location from the Chamber Boardroom and we were going to use the Wood County Jail Courthouse
their new boardroom there.
So the County Boardroom, it's really big and beautiful and have you been in there yet?
Yeah.
No, I haven't seen the new part yet.
No, no.
And I've heard great things though.
And this is a great opportunity for individuals out there to maybe even see that along with
taking this in.
If I could just agree with everything you said, promise you nailed this every time.
But if I could just piggyback on what you're saying a little bit, if you are a person
out there thinking of starting a business even, I would encourage you to do this.
But especially if you have businesses up and running or getting ready to open your doors,
all this information you're going to need.
Where else can you go where there?
It's one stop shop.
And every one of those things, if you have quite follow up questions, I have been fortunate
to talk with every one of these individuals on this show and all of them are great.
They're all really good talkers.
They know their stuff.
And if you throw them a curveball on something, they're going to want to look it up just
as much as you do.
So it is really truly a great place if you are a business, even just a curious individual
in the community who has thought about this.
I think it's a great opportunity to reach out and be a part of this great coffee with
the Chamber event.
But this one too, there's also a great opportunity here, I think, for understanding how the
health of our community and economically, especially.
I know that we're really close to this, so we don't always see it in everything.
But I talk with, and I have so many people that live outside of the area, and I do another
job and have a lot of work that takes me out of the state.
And I don't think it's understood as deeply as I would like it to be, of how economically
strong this area is, especially compared to some surrounding areas.
And even you look up and down the state, I'm not saying that there isn't improvements
that don't need to be made that we can't fine tune things or anything like that.
I'm not saying anything's perfect necessarily, but I also think that we need to take a moment
sometimes to really appreciate where we are and where we've come and how great things
are and how the progress that have been made and these businesses, these nonprofits,
this community, and it's a whole and the work that's been done.
Not a lot of people, not a lot of communities, and you don't have to look very far from
here.
I'm not going to name names, but you don't have to look very far from here to see a communities
that have not bounced back from the pandemic very well.
Or have not really, to be honest, have not really come together.
Here, our nonprofits work together, our community works together, and again, not saying it's
perfect.
Not saying we're all going to go outside and hold hands and sink home by ya, but we don't
need to do that.
We need to get along.
We need to be able to work together as businesses, as people, and this area does this very well.
This event is a really great example of that.
Yeah.
So one of the other great things about this too is that it gives you an opportunity to
ask the questions that are burning in the back of your mind.
So whoever's up there speaking, if you have a question, you can get answers right then
and there as well.
Yeah.
That's a great point.
Yeah.
Again, this is coming up.
It is May 28, 830 to 930, over at the county boardroom in the Wood County jail, a courthouse.
And is this one that we want people to register for as well?
Yes.
Registration is now open.
We've had a handful of them register since we opened it.
And oh, caribou coffee will be sponsoring the coffee too, so bring your coffee cup.
That's my jam.
I love that place.
That's awesome.
Promise, we're going to talk a little bit with Emily now for the ACE leadership participant.
She's an ACE leadership participant.
Before we do, would you mind reminding our audience what the ACE program is?
So the ACE leadership program is a program designed to develop staff from our member businesses
into more of a leadership roles that they might be looking to pursue or even like some
of our companies put some of their staff in there because they're looking at them for
a potential candidate to move them up.
So they kind of see that they need to be a little rounded in areas, so they put them
in the program and they get to go through all these different days and learn different
things about the community.
And then they also learn leadership skills, you know, how to handle conflict, how to communicate
effectively.
There are different things like that that round out a leader in our area.
And we've seen some really great people go through the program and become, you know, leaders
in, you know, even different companies too, further down the line.
Some of the people that I was in the class with, I've seen them take different positions
in the community at nonprofits that where they had a leadership role and it was like the
program is really great.
I just love it.
So, you know, it's a great program and everybody we have on to talks about it speaks very
highly of it as well.
And we're going to speak now to one of those participants, Amy, Emily Wyler is joining
us from Paper City Savings.
Emily, maybe the most important question I asked, did I say your last name right?
Wyler, yes.
Wyler?
Thanks for being here, Emily, appreciate it.
We send a big shout out to Paper City Savings as well.
Love our friends over there, by local support local, we've worked with them as a radio station
for many years.
Great people over there.
Emily, I wanted to put a focus on the exploration day of the program, can tell us a little
bit about that.
Yeah, it was a great day.
We went to Black River Falls and we visited the whole chunk nation.
And so we just got to tour everything that they have to offer to the different areas and
just the different community pieces that they have.
And it was a really fun experience to see it all.
I have never been that way.
I mean, I've passed the casino, but other than that, I hadn't known what was all there.
So it's one thing to hear about it, but to see it was really cool.
Yeah, I can hear it in your voice.
I had an impact on it.
Yeah.
It meant something to you.
It did.
Yeah.
It was just things you don't know about their culture in general.
And then to see it is fun.
And there's certainly an empathy part of this that we want to create and have more of
in our society with individuals and people that don't know as much about each other.
I think that that's great.
That's always an advantage.
I think that there's certainly a positive too of just understanding cultures more and
especially ones that we don't know.
Part of where hate resides in non-information and not knowing things.
The more you know about something, the less likely you are to dislike it.
I've said for many years as an ethnic person, I look forward to a day where people just
don't like me because I'm a jerk, not because of my religion or race or something like that.
These kind of things create that this program has so many different levels to it and here's
one of them that we kind of get with this program or with this part of the program.
I would agree.
We did a culture diversity program earlier this year.
So this kind of tied back into that.
We had heard a little bit about the whole chunk in their culture but then when we got
to go back and you heard it again, just kind of really dives into how important it is to
understand it and appreciate where they come from because for them to be welcoming of
us and to let us come into their community, I thought was just a really special thing.
Now this is really important and very beneficial in business and in working with people.
I've mentioned this many times, Ben and Jerry's had the most popular ice cream in the world
and they decided to wait a minute.
There's a whole section of people we're not hitting.
We should make vegan ice cream and now they got a whole other market.
Imagine a business that is well, I'm not going to sell to these people.
I'm not going to sell to these people or something like that that doesn't make any logical
sense.
That doesn't make any business sense.
Understanding other people in other cultures, just going to make your business that much
stronger and that much more better and it's also just humanity wise.
I think the right thing to do.
It's also kind of cool, like learning other cultures and I find it really interesting.
That's cool to hear.
Yeah, it's great.
I just think as working towards a leader, you get to understand where they come from so
that you know how to deal with them and approach them and just work with them collaboratively.
Well said.
Have you been enjoying the program?
Have you been having fun with them?
I have.
It's been a really great program just to learn not only as growing in my leadership career
but just as a community member.
There's things that you just, I've lived here my whole life but you just didn't know until
you get out and you hear it and it's been a great experience.
There's a couple of consistent things promised that we've heard from guests that come in
from the program and I would say one of them is all the friends I've made or oh I got
to meet somebody so and so and everything and I love that part of it any time you can
have that but that's the other part of it too I think Emily is well I've been living
here for a long time or I've lived here my whole life and I didn't know that this was
here or I hadn't ever talked to somebody at this business before it.
We live in a medium sized community and I think we feel like we all know each other but
we don't and this is a great opportunity to learn that and everything and get to know
people.
Right and then you kind of even learn how you might have been connected that you didn't
know.
It's a small world and you start realizing just how small it can be but you make new
friends and great connections.
It's like a good inside joke when you find that like oh you know so and so I can't tell
you how many people I have come in here for this show and like I went to school with
your brother or something like that it's great and Emily to businesses out there to
people that would participate in this you encourage them to do this program to be a
part of it.
I would I think it's a great program learning leadership community involvement I think
it's a well-rounded program I think the adding things with mid-state and that collaboration
with the classes I think that's been a really big benefit to the program so I can appreciate
what the chamber has done with this program.
Appreciate that Emily and appreciate you being on with us this will be the last time though
you're too good at them.
You've got a great voice you're too good at I need this job but seriously so thank you
very much for joining us.
Please say hi to the team over paper city say thank you for having me.
Promises we're wrapping up just a quick reminder to everybody to register for these events
that we have and be sure to look into the AC leadership program and how you can get
your employees or maybe even yourself a part of it.
If you want to find out more reach you how can they do that.
They can always check out our website which is Wisconsin Rapids Chamber dot com or they
can give us a call at our front office at 715-423-1830.
Emily thanks again for the time appreciate you.
Promise always good to see you we'll talk again real soon.
And we'll have more midday magazine coming up for you right here at 97-5 FM 13-20 AFWFHR
we are locally grown radio.
