The following is an open letter from Steve Ammons, President & CEO of the Birmingham Business Alliance, reflecting on the past three years he has served in this position and what’s on the horizon for the BBA.
Three years ago, you placed your trust in me to lead the Birmingham Business Alliance. As I reflect on the journey to this point I want to share with you where we started, what we have built together, and where I believe we are headed.
When I joined BBA, I did so with the benefit of perspective. I had served as a County Commissioner responsible for Economic Development, sat on the BBA Board of Directors, served on the Executive Committee, and worked side-by-side with BBA’s ED staff for years. I believed I understood the organization. What I came to learn very quickly was that there was a meaningful gap between how BBA was perceived from the outside and how it functioned on the inside.
Where We Started
The board’s charge to me was clear: continue to lead in economic development and build out the chamber function the City and the region needed. The intent was right. The starting point was harder than any of us fully recognized.
BBA had recently created a chamber division branded as the Birmingham Chamber, oriented primarily toward the City. Meanwhile, the Economic Development division remained regional in focus. The two operated in parallel rather than in concert. Staff were siloed. Priorities competed rather than reinforcing one another. The chamber function had been stood up without a strategy and without new dedicated funding. The result was internal division, exactly the opposite of what BBA needs to be.
On the ED side, the strategy from the previous administration was still on paper, but execution had stalled. Energy and direction were not aligned. We were not doing the things regional chambers do, the convening, the storytelling, the consistent member engagement. The pieces existed; the organization around them did not.
Culture eats strategy for breakfast. Before we could execute on anything, we had to fix what was broken inside the building.
What We Have Built Together
My first priority was culture. No strategy survives a team that does not trust itself or its leadership. We invested in honest conversations, clarified roles, made hard personnel decisions where they were necessary, and put the right people in the right seats.
Then we redefined what BBA is, clearly and without ambiguity. BBA is a regional chamber of commerce: one organization that serves businesses of all sizes, markets our region to attract jobs and capital investment, and creates opportunity across the seven-county region that powers one-third of Alabama’s economy.
To make our culture operational, we built a mantra the team could live by every day:
TEAM – Trust. Engage. Advocate. Market.
It is more than a slogan. It reflects how this organization has to operate, across divisions, across jurisdictions, and across sectors if we are going to be credible to our investors and useful to our region.
The progress is real.
Today, BBA functions as a unified regional chamber, and the breadth of what we now offer the region reflects that:
– We developed and launched Accelerate 2030, our five-year regional economic development strategy, built with input from regional stakeholders and approved by this board. It is not a document on a shelf. It is actively being executed.
– We brought back our Leadership Exchange trip (Big Trip) restoring a signature opportunity for regional leaders to learn together, build relationships, and bring best practices home.
– We restored a full-time Public Policy position, giving BBA a dedicated voice and capacity to advocate for the region at the local, state, and federal levels.
– We expanded our business intelligence capability and launched BHM IQ, giving BBA, our investors, and our partners the data and insight needed to make better regional decisions.
– We hired a full-time Talent and Workforce lead to address one of the most critical issues facing our region. This work is still developing, but the commitment and the capacity are now in place.
– The Small Business Intensive curriculum has been refined to meet small businesses where they actually are.
– We have consolidated onto a single integrated platform, CRM, task management, and website, to eliminate duplication and serve investors with consistency.
– Communication with the board is now consistent with updates from every division.
– We have built or deepened working relationships with the Alabama Department of Commerce, Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham, REV Birmingham, Prosper, the Regional Planning Commission, the BBA Regional Economic Development Allies, and other partners essential to regional success.
Once you’ve seen one chamber, you’ve seen one chamber. We didn’t copy a model. We built one designed for this region.
The Strategic Framework We Are Now Operating Within
With culture stabilized and operations rebuilt, we now have the foundation to execute against a real strategy. Our Organizational Strategy 2030 aligns every division of BBA behind a single mission and a clear vision:
A globally competitive Birmingham region where businesses of all sizes thrive, talent chooses to stay, and communities share in the benefits of sustained economic growth.
Accelerate 2030 is the growth engine, our regional economic development strategy, developed with stakeholder input and approved by this board. It identifies our strategic sectors, advanced manufacturing, metals, aerospace, biosciences, and IT, and the enablers that make growth possible: workforce alignment, site readiness, and business intelligence.
But Accelerate 2030 alone is not enough. Regional success depends on the full strength of the organization. That is why our Organizational Strategy 2030 is built on five integrated pillars:
1. Regional Economic Growth, Accelerate 2030 | Driving measurable growth in jobs and capital investment, advancing site readiness, strengthening business retention and expansion, and deploying business intelligence to guide regional decision-making.
2. Business and Member Engagement | Delivering a best-in-class member experience, growing and retaining membership, expanding small business initiatives, and creating a clear investor value proposition that connects engagement to regional impact.
3. Public Policy and Advocacy | Leading with a clear, data-driven voice on issues that affect regional growth, infrastructure, workforce, competitiveness, and quality of place, and mobilizing the business community as a unified voice.
4. Strategic Marketing, Communications, and Brand Leadership | Operating marketing and communications as a leadership-level capability that positions Birmingham as a unified, competitive market and elevates Accelerate 2030 from a strategy to a recognizable regional brand.
5. Organizational Excellence and Operations | Building an agile, data-informed organization with clear performance metrics, investing in staff development and succession planning, and aligning resources with strategic priorities.
These pillars are connected to six organizational goals that frame how we lead, prioritize, and measure success:
– Align the region around a shared vision for job creation and capital investment.
– Tell the region’s story, Why Birmingham?
– Create opportunities for businesses of all sizes.
– Be good at what we do.
– Build investor confidence.
– Foster regional collaboration.
Progress against this strategy will be reported to you regularly through scorecards and annual updates. Accountability and transparency are central to how I intend to lead, and central to how this organization earns and keeps the confidence of its investors.
Producing Results
Everything starts with results. Accelerate 2030 is a strong strategy, and we need the assets and the support to fully execute on it. We have the right team in place, and they are executing. As of this letter, we are prepared to announce more jobs in this year alone than in each of the last two years combined.
That momentum is real, but it is not self-sustaining. It requires continued investment, continued focus, and continued discipline from all of us.
Birmingham has every reason to be more than it has been willing to believe about itself. I intend to spend the next several years proving that, with this team, with this strategy, and with this board.
In closing,
Three years in, I am grateful, for the trust the BBA board placed in me, for a team that has given everything to this mission, and for a region that deserves far more than it has historically received. We have done the hard work of building a foundation. What comes next is the work that matters most.
I look forward to building it with you.
Respectfully,
Steve Ammons, President & CEO
Birmingham Business Alliance