CEO Tim Priest of Greenlight Greater Portland Promotes and Brands the Region
Published Mar 24, 2008
Tim Priest is the first chief executive officer of Greenlight Greater Portland, a privately funded, four-county economic development organization established in January 2007.
In 2007, Greenlight Greater Portland took the stage as the region’s first privately funded group focused entirely on economic development strategies. Here’s why the organization’s first full-time chief executive officer, 38-year-old Tim Priest, left a similar role in the nation’s capital to parlay Portland’s prosperity into still greater things.
Q Why Portland?
A My wife and I met when we lived in Oregon, and we had always planned to move back. I had just gotten an award for being one of the Top 10 economic developers in the country (at the Greater Washington Initiative) shortly before I got the call from Greenlight. We thought about it, and it seemed like a great opportunity to have a different quality of life and raise our kids in Oregon. Also, I thought Portland is one of the best-kept secrets.
Q What are Portland’s labor force advantages?
A A lot of people don’t know about the great workforce in the Portland-Vancouver region, and we have a lot of opportunities in marketing it.
Regions across the country are specializing in their labor force. Athletic apparel design, with Nike and Columbia Sportswear and adidas and many others, gives you a strength to market in the Portland region. Also, I think having a high concentration of silicon manufacturing – although a lot of that is on the [research and development] side – gives you something huge to market, with Intel having 15,000 people here and [Hewlett Packard] having two big facilities, and a lot more like that.
There’s also a fast-growing alternative-energy cluster. SolarWorld, a big solar manufacturing company, is going to set up a facility here. And that’s something you can really build on, because the solar panel itself is a silicon product.
Q How does Portland’s quality of life figure into the jobs equation?
A You have a lot of energetic, creative people who come here. There’s so much going on, whether it’s skiing or a short trip to the ocean or local recreational activities. And there are great cultural opportunities. It just depends on what a person is interested in. But we’re going to make sure the region makes business sense for prospects, and then the personal and cultural stuff is going to be a very easy sell.
Q What are Greenlight’s chief roles?
A There are two. One is to help promote and brand Portland and increase awareness of this region and its attributes around the world. The other is the attraction and retention of companies. There’s a third element that supports those two, and that’s research – research on the economy to make sure we’re getting exposure on what’s going on here and to make sure we’re helping companies identify the trends.
Q How do you harness Portland’s reputation for being progressive?
A That’s something we can really market – this idea of suburban-planning best practices and sustainable-living communities. Others want to learn from all of that. We’re way ahead of the rest of the country and are really thought leaders in sustainable development and sustainable products.
Story by Gary Perilloux
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