Steve Montgomery said he is excited to be the new CEO at the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce.
Excited, because “it feels like I’ve been training for this position my entire career.”
Montgomery, 59, received his degree in political science from the University of Texas at Austin, then worked on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., and spent time at the state Capitol in Austin. He’s spent years working for large employers and in a startup software company. Six years ago, he got into the consulting business working for himself.
“I just felt like I had a public and private sector experience that all came to bear, and it’s sort of the intersection of business, public policy and my community is what I’ve been spending my career doing,” he said. “It seems to me that’s exactly where the chamber resides, right at that intersection.”
Montgomery officially takes the reins on July 31, but he is already planning.
He’s familiar with the chamber, having had the business organization as one of his clients for several years.
“I helped them on the legislative front, in Austin,” he said, starting in 2021.
After the legislative session, he then helped the chamber with local government work.
Changes at Chamber
Montgomery takes charge after several months of change at the chamber.
Former president Brandom Gengelbachn left in February. In March, the chamber named Robert Allen, the former president and CEO of the Texas Economic Development Corp. as the leader for the newly formed Fort Worth Economic Development Partnership (FWEDP), a 501(c)(6) organization, to focus on economic opportunities through business development and attract for Fort Worth and the surrounding areas.
That left the chamber with a focus on workforce development, infrastructure and transportation, business retention and government relations advocacy, leaving economic development to the new organization.
Additionally, Montgomery will drive membership development efforts. By offering networking opportunities, access to research and resources, and advocacy on behalf of its members, the chamber aims to enhance its value for businesses of all sizes in Fort Worth, he said.
Montgomery said he and Allen are already meeting weekly before Montgomery officially takes over on July 31.
“We’ve already articulated the division,” he said. “We’ve already devised how we split the revenue or the funding. and so I see it as very collaborative in that regard. We’ll be making a lot of calls together.”
The hiring of Allen was one of the reasons Montgomery said he was attracted to the job.
“We have kind of similar backgrounds from our experiences in Austin,” he said.
The chamber needs to get back to some of the fundamentals that it has offered in the past, Montgomery said, but it also needs to innovate.
“By fundamentals, I mean, leadership, engagement, professionalism, customer service, orientation, membership value, that’s kind of the overarching theme,” he said, adding that he plans an emphasis on advocacy for various business issues.
But the chamber needs to do things differently, Montgomery said.
“The old approach, the value they bring is still there, but just the way we deliver that value is different,” he said.
One area where Mongomery hopes to innovate is by offering some business intelligence to the chamber’s members.
“There’s data tools out there that can compile data from all kinds of sources from census data, market data from workforce data, all manner of existing data, and also some qualitative data and quantitative data from our own membership,” he said. “But I’d like to bring that in and apply some analytics to it and make that available to our members.”
Montgomery has received plenty of support following the announcement of his appointment.
“I feel like there’s a lot of folks that are eager to see this thing succeed,” he said.
Bob Francis is business editor for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at bob.francis@fortworthreport.org. At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Disclosure: Hillwood is a financial supporter of the Fort Worth Report. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
Republishing is free for noncommercial entities. Commercial entities are prohibited without a licensing agreement. Contact us for details.
