LETTER: Leadership summit a well-rounded, well-represented event

Locally, there was a 50 percent increase over last year.

Leadership counts

“Everyone wins when a leader gets better.” — Bill Hybels’ quote from the Global Leadership Summit (GLS16), simulcast Aug. 11-12 to Port Angeles from the Willow Creek Association

The Global Leadership Summit is a two-day event that is telecast live from Willow’s campus near Chicago every August to more than 550 locations in North America.

Throughout the fall, summit events take place in an additional 675-plus cities and 125 countries and are translated into 59 languages.

This year, GLS16 featured 13 world-class leaders, including Hybels, event chairman; Alan Mulally, former chairman of Ford Motor Co.; Melinda Gates, Gates Foundation; Dr. Travis Bradberry, award-winning author of “Emotional Intelligence”; Patrick Lencioni, author of “The Ideal Team Player”; Chris McChesney, Franklin Covey Institute and best-selling author of “The 4 Disciplines of Execution”; John Maxwell, Inc. magazine’s 2014 world’s most influential leadership expert and author of “Intentional Living.”

The good news is locally, there were about 150 leaders from small businesses, nonprofit institutions, churches and students attending, a 50 percent increase from 2015.

Noticeably absent were prominent members of the media, larger businesses and government officials with one exception: the Port of Port Angeles, which was well-represented.

Thank you, David Walter, board chairman of the Composite Recycling Technology Center, for organizing this event.

Kudos to Independent Bible Church in Port Angeles for providing the venue and to the project team that professionally put together an outstanding event.

Leadership matters.

We can all improve regardless of the size of our organization.

What a novel concept.

How appropriate for our economically and divisively stressed communities.

Richard G. Kott,

Port Angeles

EDITOR’S NOTE: Kott, an organizer of Global Leadership Summit, is the former mill manager of Crown Zellerbach in Port Angeles, now Nippon Paper Industries USA, and the retired owner of Atlas Trucking.

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