Hartford Business Journal

By Matt Pilon mpilon@hartfordbusiness.com R ecruiting companies to Connecticut with the help of private-sector ambas- sadors was a key piece of Gov. Ned Lamont's economic strategy when he took of- fice in 2019. But the COVID-19 pandemic has presented new and unforeseen chal- lenges to that effort. Heightened uncertainty about the future has delayed or canceled many companies' relocation and investment decisions, and traveling to meet with company executives or tour prop- erties has largely been put on hold. Meanwhile, taxpayer-funded man- power normally dedicated to recruit- ing efforts was diverted during the spring to help respond to the unfold- ing pandemic. However, as COVID-19 vaccines start rolling out in a matter of days and Connecticut inches closer to what many hope will be a post-pan- demic world, the state's recruitment and business development machinery has been freshly oiled and is back in service. That's according to Peter Denious, CEO of AdvanceCT, which under Lamont's direction last year was restructured, infused with indus- try leaders and given an expanded relationship with the state's economic development agency, the Department of Economic and Community Devel- opment (DECD). "We are back at it," Denious told HBJ in an interview this month. "We are laser-focused on taking the assets we have and being super aggressive, in partnership with DECD, on helping businesses that are here to grow and expand, and recruiting new busi- nesses." While the pandemic has required constant attention and hurt business- development efforts, Lamont said in a recent interview that outside recruit- ing with the help of AdvanceCT — a group he called "an enormous plus" for the state — remains a key piece of his strategy. "We had a lot of momentum before COVID, we had a number of compa- nies that were ready to go," Lamont said. "As you can imagine, a lot of things are on pause right now but we're getting knocks on the door again." With an influx of new residents into Connecticut from places like New York City over the past six months, Lamont, Denious and others are all hoping some businesses will soon follow suit. While Connecticut and many states have long sought to draw new corpo- rate blood, Denious said the current approach is akin to a more targeted rifle shot, deliberately aiming for prospects seen as having higher odds of expanding or moving here, whether due to customer relation- ships, workforce needs or industry af- filiations. By tapping local companies for advice on potential prospects, the state is trying to avoid a less precise approach of "throwing spaghetti at the wall outside the state," Denious said. "We're trying to turbocharge what the state was doing and is doing and essentially be an extension of DECD," he said. Lamont has long said he wants to reduce up-front grants and costly incentives to lure companies to the state, and his position has not changed during the pandemic. DECD Commissioner David Lehm- an said the administration during the 2021 legislative session plans to push for various reforms to the state's eco- nomic incentive programs that will move toward a pay-as-you-go system, meaning employers won't reap state incentives until they create a certain number of new jobs. "I thought for the last 10 years that we relied too much on incentives, just almost trying to bribe people to come to Connecticut instead of leading with our strengths," Lamont said. Pencils down Last year, AdvanceCT, then known as the Connecticut Economic Re- source Center, struck a deal with the Lamont administration to reconsti- tute its board of directors, installing the former CEOs of Webster Bank and PepsiCo as co-chairs, and hiring Denious, a longtime private equity and venture capital executive, as CEO. Headed into 2020, the organization had been gaining steam. It was helping the state prepare a long-term economic strategy that had been set for publication this past spring (but is now on hold due to the pandemic), it announced its new name and brand in February, and was also involved in talks with Indian technology and outsourcing firm HCL, which ultimately decided to establish a new Hartford office to serve area manufacturing clients like Stanley Black & Decker. Daily corporate recruiting efforts quickly came to a halt in March, as AdvanceCT was called on to gather intel and input from Connecticut employers to help inform the Lamont administration's response to the unfolding coronavirus crisis, Denious said. "For three months we were basically pencils down on our day job, so there was nothing really happening on the recruitment side," he said. AdvanceCT also played a key role in a reopening advisory group Lamont formed in the spring, led by board co-chair Indra Nooyi (the former Pepsi CEO) and Yale epidemiologist Dr. Albert Ko. Back to business As Lamont began to allow more businesses to reopen or expand ca- pacity over the summer, AdvanceCT started to transition back toward its core mission: creating jobs and capi- tal investment through high-impact economic development. Denious said the daily work of talking to companies and prospects both near and far is crucial to filling the state's deal funnel, and he believes some of those prospects are going to become wins down the road. "We have metrics that are focused less on the results and more on the actions that lead to the results," he said. "It's eyes and ears, it's conversa- tions, it's relationships." Getting a final decision from a recruiting prospect can take months, Denious said, and those timelines have only been stretched further by the uncertainties of 2020. 18 Hartford Business Journal • December 14, 2020 • www.HartfordBusiness.com HBJ FILE PHOTO Peter Denious, CEO of AvanceCT, says Connecticut's corporate recruiting efforts are getting back into the swing after pandemic-related delays. Fresh Start After pandemic pause, CT powers up its biz recruiting machine Gov. Ned Lamont with AdvanceCT co- chairs Indra Nooyi and Jim Smith.

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