2021 Judges' Letter

2021 Family and Private Business Awards judges.

From left to right:

Michael Miller, LCNB - Head Judge
Rex Wetherill, IoT Diagnostics
Barbara Fant, Clinical Research Consultants, Inc.

    Judging for the Goering Center Family and Private Business Awards is always a challenging and interesting experience. This year was no exception: great applications, interesting stories, and difficult decisions.

    As the COVID pandemic remains at the forefront of our worlds, and the traditional live awards gala event was once again not to be, the Center, as they did last year, selected the top ten nominated companies regardless of size or status as a Family or Private Business. And again, the questions pertained to the pandemic: 

  • How Connections with employees, vendors, stakeholders, customers/clients, partners, family members, community, or core business values were maintained;
  • The Lessons learned from maintaining connection and/or overcoming connection challenges;
  • What implementation of New Strategies, processes, practices, or infrastructure ensued. 

    It was interesting to see how companies responded to the pandemic’s social distancing requirements, not only to maintain and enhance current employee and customer connections, but also to benefit the community as a whole. Some true “out-of-the-box” thinking led to great efforts towards meeting the challenges of the pandemic and positively impacting the lives of those in the community. The stories presented to us confirmed once again why our applicants are among the best companies that our region has to offer in the Family and Private Business Community.

    As we were only choosing ten award winners from the many applications, it proved to be an incredibly tough challenge. We believe that our choices reflect the very best of the Family and Private Business Community. Interestingly, the top ten companies were split evenly between family and private businesses. For the top thirty-one companies, which included 21 additional businesses that we could not go without highlighting, the split was fifteen to sixteen.

    Many thanks from the judges to the Goering Center for a challenging yet rewarding experience. While we could only pick ten companies to receive our award, we are reminded once again how many true winners there are in our Family and Private Business Community.

    Best wishes for many years of continued success.

    Mike Miller

    Barbara Fant

    Rex Wetherill