- Just ahead on WTVP "Leadership Lessons for Home, Work and Life", we've got tips from younger leaders who have left the area and are returning home.

Tonight's critical conversation brings discussion for more of central Illinois's great leaders, and it all starts right now.

(bright upbeat music) Good evening, thanks so much for joining us.

I'm Amy Burkett.

For decades, young people have been fleeing rural America, chasing opportunities in larger cities with more diverse job opportunities.

I'm one of those people.

I grew up in a very small town, Uric for Ohio, population 3,800.

With the dream to have a career in television, I had to leave.

However, we're starting to see a trend here in central Illinois where our prodigal sons and daughters are coming home.

Let's meet some of central Illinois's great leaders to learn more.

Joining me now is Pete Chambers, supplier finance manager at Caterpillar.

Pete, talk to us a little bit, I want to hear your story of leaving and returning, please.

- Yeah, so I think it starts with going away to college.

I grew up here in Peoria, born and raised, and then went to the University of Illinois.

I got a degree in finance, graduated in 2010.

And knew that I wanted to continue my education, so pursued my law degree in Chicago.

Following law school graduation in 2013, I started working for one of the big four accounting firms and stayed there for a couple of years.

- [Amy] In Chicago?

- In Chicago, was in that rat race for long enough and thankfully, met a girl in my hometown who brought me home and started my career at Caterpillar in 2015.

I've been there for almost eight years now but I've actually moved again back to the Chicago land area, to the Deerfield office with Caterpillar from 2018 through 2020.

- So never a dull moment, thanks so much for sharing that story.

More from you in just a moment.

Stephanie Coad, project manager and structural architect, designer at Mueller too, also joins us.

Stephanie, talk to us, I wanna hear your story.

- So I also went to University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

I went there for my undergrad and grad school and I didn't even consider coming back to Peoria, it wasn't even an idea.

Everybody was going to Chicago, all our friends, everybody in my major was going to Chicago.

I had a degree in architecture specializing in structural engineering.

I went right to Chicago, working in structural engineering.

I had a boyfriend, a fiance at the time, who was also already in Chicago.

So it was just what we were gonna do and we loved it there.

We still love it there, we were gonna stay forever.

And we got married there about nine years and we had a second child.

And when we had our second child, suddenly it was less fun.

- You wanted some grandparents for babysitting purposes?

- Perhaps.

Things were feeling a little crowded, a little expensive, we were looking at schools and I just kinda said to my husband one day, "What if we looked at Peoria?

"Do you think we could get jobs in Peoria?"

And we looked around and we both got jobs really quickly and we were back in Peoria in just a few months.

My parents still can't believe that we're here.

And my in-laws, my husband's parents actually followed us two years later, they lived in Virginia.

So we're bringing everything back to Peoria, we're so happy to be here and it's been a surprising journey.

- What a great story, more to that in just a moment.

Rounding out our panelists right now, Tim Spears is commercial portfolio manager at Busey Bank.

Talk to us a little bit, Tim, we gotta hear your story, sir.

- Yeah, so similar I think to to Pete and Stephanie.

It starts off with college, I went to the University of Illinois at Chicago, so lived downtown Chicago for a couple years.

Actually after graduating, I did come back to Peoria for a couple years, worked a job here for about three years and then kinda had that sense of I need to get out, explore, maybe find some answers that, I wasn't really sure what I was looking for, but ended up moving out to Denver for about a year.

Afterwards, I went to Honolulu, Hawaii for about a year.

- [Amy] Tough work.

- Yeah, it was, but- - Expensive place to work.

- Very expensive, very far away as well.

So I think just that distance made me kinda realize what I really wanted, you know what was important and that's the friends and family that I found back here in Peoria.

So moved back in 2017 and have been back since.

- It's always great to have a homecoming story and especially when you have children.

So Stephanie, I'm gonna go back to you for a minute because as someone who lived far away from parents when I was raising my son when he was little and never having a babysitter, there is that pull that you're balancing the drive of a successful professional career with the balance of I want my babies to know their grandparents.

What have you seen has been that pivot for you in hitting that sweet spot back here at home?

- Well, so it's even more interesting, my in-laws moved into our neighborhood when they came here.

And then my parents actually just this year also moved into our neighborhood.

So not only do we have the grandparents nearby, we have the grandparents, my kids can walk, you know two minutes one way, five minutes the other way to the grandparents.

And it's really something I honestly didn't think very hard about, this relationship, but now that it's happening, I can't imagine it any other way, their relationship.

And also, like you said, I'm a working mom and we need the help and it's so great.

It doesn't feel like we're farming them out or anything, they're happy to go, they love to go over to the grandparent's house either way.

So either, there's two different directions, pick a grandparent, where do you wanna go?

- Good for you and the burden, I mean, it's true mama guilt is real.

- [Stephanie] Sure.

- But having grandparents nearby, do you see that that helps lessen that stress that we sometimes have as being working mothers?

- Absolutely, absolutely.

And because it's good for the children and it's fun for the grandparents.

Everybody's having a good time.

So, oh, maybe not all the time.

I'm sure there's some naughty moments but yes, absolutely.

You know hiring out nannies like we were having to do in Chicago, it can be fun but it is exhausting.

There's a lot of logistics , you never really know who your kids with.

So just having this village here in Peoria has been just this wonderful blessing that we really didn't fathom how great it would be.

- Pete talked to us a little bit, your story beyond the grandchildren, which I've been told, I don't have any grandchildren yet but I've been told that grandchildren are the gift for not killing your children.

And so I bet the grandparents are pretty excited but what else do you see as that strong fit for coming back home?

- I think the work-life balance in the Peoria area, we have this great Midwestern mentality in Peoria so we treasure the time that we get to spend outside of the working world.

And it's not something that I got to experience very often in the Chicago area, even outside of work, it was still a stressful situation.

And to Stephanie's point, I have my parents in the area as well and we moved closer in Peoria to my wife's family.

The lighting up of their eyes when they get to be with their grandchildren, it almost is a little glimpse into how they raised you when you don't have those memories and it's such a relief as parents to just sit back and relax and kinda take a little bit of time off.

Now I will say, grandparents are giving out sweets a little more frequently than we as parents would want to do but that's kinda their job.

So it's just a plethora of reasons that the comfort level of the Peoria area or just being back home brings to someone professionally and personally.

- Let's talk about commutes, who wants to grab this?

'Cause I don't know, if you lived right in center city of Chicago, maybe you didn't have much of a commute then but if you were commuting in and out, the commute anywhere around the Chicago land is a nightmare versus the commute around here in Peoria seems a lot more manageable.

Anyone wanna tackle that one?

Jump in.

- So I have an office, I work for a, most of the people I work with are in Chicago and sometimes I'll complain about having to drive more than 15 minutes anywhere.

And they're like, "Did I mishear you?

"You're complaining about a 15 minute drive?"

And I was like, "Yes."

My commute is 10 minutes to the kids' school and then two minutes from the kids' school to my office.

And I mean it, when you do the math, it's just more time that I have every single day and that's huge and less stress.

- Contributes to your quality of life.

- [Stephanie] Absolutely.

- Tim, what about you?

- Yeah, I think very similar.

You know in downtown Chicago, it's easy to walk to many places but not everywhere, right?

So if you wanted to go maybe up north to a baseball game or something, you're hopping on different trains and buses and it just takes a while.

I remember the biggest pain actually was grocery shopping.

Having to carry your groceries back home rather than walking or even take the bus.

So I think here in Peoria, as Stephanie is saying, pretty much everywhere is 15 minutes away.

You know, whether it's downtown north Peoria, just hop in the car and it's a very quick, easy drive, really no matter where you are or where you're going.

- So we've talked a little bit about that commuting.

So Pete, I'm gonna come back to you and I'm gonna say it all seems to add to a higher quality of life.

- Absolutely, I was just gonna intervene and say how many of us were waiting on the L train to go to work or school and the train pulls up and the doors open and there's no room and there was multiple instances of that which would make you late to work, would start your day off with stress and instead I get to hop in my car, take my son to school, which is on the way.

You know we listen to Disney songs and then when he gets out of the car, I can flip it over to whatever I would like to listen to; Greg and Dan or something of that nature.

And it's just a much more enjoyable experience.

I come into work brighter and more excited about my day than having to to deal with the cattle cars going by and not even having room to take you to your workplace, so.

- It sounds like with each of you, you made that decision to return home.

What involvement is there of your parents maybe trying to bring you back home?

'Cause it's hard to visit a lot, does anyone have a parent story of, what advice could you give me as my senior in college, one and only son is about to graduate and wants to move very far away and I know I need to be still and let him have that and hope that maybe at some point he'll come back to mama.

- Yeah, I think, at least in my experience, it's one of those things that I had to find out for myself.

You know, kinda one of those no matter what, either say, you know I'm different, I felt this way or that way and so I'm very happy I did that but my mom was always dropping those hints of, "You know if you just come home, we can do this.

"Or if you work here, it'd be easier."

And not that that was necessarily the reason for coming home but it's definitely an advantage of being back here now is having that family, that network, it's really a big difference maker.

- So Peter, I'm gonna ask you this question.

It seems like you each shared how excited you were to go to Chicago 'cause that's where all your friends were headed.

Still drivable.

One of you lived in Denver for a while.

And what advice do you have for the parents out there so that we don't, I'm really seeking for myself so that I don't give too much begging to come back so that he has the wings to fly and do his thing and then we'll maybe drop a hint that he could come home.

- Yeah, I think it's as Tim said, I think that each individual wants to discover on their own what's important to them but your values that were partially instilled in where you were raised are always in you.

And you know, that drawback to the Peoria area for one reason or another, we all act as if we had some sort of a bad childhood in Peoria that we have to leave.

And the exact opposite is true, is you don't understand what you had and how good it was until you're gone and you face some of the challenges of the real world in a big city.

And I think that allowing your son to experience that for himself, no matter the time period that he has to do that, even if he ends up not returning to where you want him to be, I think that he'll treasure coming back and visiting even more so and you'll really have that special time.

But I tend to find that a lot of my peers, even those that were from the Chicagoland area, of course, when you have a family, it's unsustainable to live in the city.

I mean, there's plenty of people who do it but it's trying.

And so those friends of mine have even moved out to the suburbs and so they claim that they're still in the Chicagoland area but I don't consider Naperville Chicago, so.

- Let's talk a little bit, Stephanie, about the economic opportunities that have grown and changed back here at home that might not have been that way when you first left.

- Well, when I first left, I didn't even look for an opportunity here and I'm really not sure why, I think it's just kinda the theme we're going back to, you know you're young and you wanna make your own path and make your own way.

And a lot of us also thought, "Oh, Peoria, that was so boring, "I can't believe I had to grow up in Peoria."

And then now that we're older and more mature, like, "Oh wait, this was a beautiful, wonderful place "to have a childhood."

So I really only started looking when I came back and was surprised, I'm in structural engineering and architecture and obviously, there's a lot of that going on in Chicago, so that was a great hub to be at.

But there's a lot of it going on here too.

And I think it's important for our central Illinois, for our infrastructure and buildings that we're engaging with central Illinois architects and engineers and not just going up and having firms from Chicago that might not care and might not understand how our urban works, urban environments work differently than in Chicago.

So those opportunities have been really exciting in my career here that I was surprised about how much there is to do, how much there is to develop, and how much there is to give back to the community here.

- That sense of giving back, Tim, talk to me a little bit about using your skills and talents to give back to your hometown.

- Yeah, well, I intentionally made it a purpose of when I came back here for the last time that I said I want to give back to my community.

And I was fortunate enough that at the time Mayor Ardis was able to appoint me to the Tourism Reserve Fund Committee here with the city.

So we were able to give monies to different causes that try to attract people here.

Whether it's a softball tournament coming in that brings hundreds of teams from out-of-state to the Peoria area.

There's art guilds down on the river.

And so it's a really cool way that we're able to disperse tax money to attract others to come to the city and show off just how great Peoria really is.

That actually led to a couple other opportunities, the Liquor Commission of the city as well.

And then just volunteer opportunities with causes that I take to heart.

So yeah, I think just being back here, that sense that Pete was saying of growing up, it instills these values in you, you just wanna give that back in whatever way you can.

- Pete, talk to us about your perception of the economy here, perhaps when you first left after college to what you see as a vibrant economy now.

- Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, coming from the Chicago area, we had opportunities to attend sporting events and go to restaurants and give back our dollars to the community and to small business owners and things of that nature but some of which weren't even feeling like you're small business owners and I think that as Tim was kinda talking about, Peoria takes a real pride in its small business owners and it's almost as if, one of my best friends who I lived with in Chicago started and owned The Blue Duck Barbecue Tavern, he just sold it down here on the riverfront and it felt like my Cheers Bar and I don't think I ever had that feeling in the Chicago area.

And it's not just the Cheers Bar and Restaurant, right?

It's the cheers shop that you wanna go to to get baby clothes.

Where you know the owner and they're giving back to the community.

And it's rewarding to see Peorians continue to invest in their community and and to start small businesses.

And I hope that we continue to bring people home who have that itch as well as those who decided to stay here who decide that you know, I can make it in this community.

There's a strong enough sense of community and commitment to give back your hard earned dollars to small businesses that they'll continue to grow and thrive.

- Let's talk a little bit, we're gonna put our Chamber of Commerce hats on for a minute and our marketing skills.

How would each of you market Peoria to bring back other prodigal sons and daughters?

I'm gonna start with you Stephanie.

- Well, a lot of things we've already touched on, the commute is a great one.

I remember in Chicago, I just told my husband, I wanna go somewhere where I don't have to look at a traffic app before I leave the house.

So that's great, you don't have to look at traffic, you can just go.

Cost of living is great.

I'm into architecture so I was really excited to buy an older home and really fix it up and renovate it just the way I wanted.

Pretend like I was on HTTV, it was so fun.

- [Amy] Oh, how exciting.

- So that has been some of our favorite parts.

- [Amy] Pete, I'm gonna go to you next.

- Yeah, I recruit for Caterpillar and so this is an easy one for me.

Stephanie touched on the cost of living.

One thing that I think is undersold is our access to nature.

So Forest Park Nature Center and the river and in its amenities, the riverfront, especially with kids, going and doing and going to all of our great parks, Donovan Park is a great example, right?

So it's got the perfect blend of if you're a dog owner, you can go for a walk.

If you are an avid runner, you can run the cross-country course that Rich who was in Notre Dame now call home.

There are cross-country skiers out there, well, we haven't any snowfall yet this winter but I expect to see them soon.

And then for us adults, we've got one of the best restaurants in town, Insids, so we can go and enjoy live music and still be one with nature.

So that's really important right now to, I think the generation that's thinking about where they wanna live and I don't think we should lose sight of all the amenities that we have here in central Illinois.

- Tim, you get to wrap up this part of the conversation with your marketing hack.

- Yeah, well I think, they certainly made, touched on the big points that a good reason to stay here.

But I think also a lot of people leave because they don't think that there's a lot to do here.

You know it's, "Oh, I wanna go to the city "'cause there's a lot more to do, get out "and go to ball games "and bars and restaurants and all that."

Well, I think we do have that here and I think that we just need to kind of show it off more.

I think Discover Peoria actually does a great job of having this website that promotes all these different activities that you can do here in central Illinois.

So I think just getting that word out more and having people become aware of Discover Peoria and what they're promoting.

- So one of you mentioned that you had spent time in Denver, where was my- - [Tim] Right here.

- Yes.

- So it seems like every young person, no matter what part of the United States you live in, they all wanna flock to Denver.

So let's do a little compare and contrast for a moment.

What did Denver have that drew you that you actually realize you have right here in Peoria as well?

- Yeah, and actually to Pete's point, the parks, I love going out and hiking and just being out in nature.

Growing up in Peoria, that's something I never did here but I've definitely done that a lot more whether it's the Nature Preserve Center, Donovan Park, but just knowing that those are options here and that's probably on me growing up of not knowing that.

But that's something that after coming back I was like, "It's right here in our backyard."

- Stephanie, what have you found here that you didn't think was here when you first moved away but you've been pleasantly surprised that you've enjoyed that quality of life?

- Well, one of the things that Tim mentioned is there's so much going on here.

There's more to do than we have time to do ever.

And that was something when we were young and teenagers like, "Oh, there's nothing to do here."

Maybe it's different but there are activities for all ages, all different types of people happening all around the city all the time.

So that was a big surprise that there's more to do than we thought.

- Pete, more to do than you thought, a favorite thing that you didn't realize was here the first time you lived here?

- Well, I'm a parent now so that's a little different.

But the access- - [Amy] Quality of schools, let's talk about that.

- Quality of schools, absolutely, quality of schools is an important one but I was gonna actually touch on access to zoos and the Children's Museum and Caterpillar Visitors Center.

I have to put a plugin for my company.

Just took my son, my four and a half year old for the second time in his life to the Caterpillar Visitors Center.

The first time he was a bit too young and I could not keep up with him.

He was running around, he wanted to get on all of the equipment.

I had to tell him, whoa, hold up, I can't pay for this so don't take it easy but I that's what they want you to do, is they want you to grow and discover.

And to Stephanie's point, a lot of my activities, I'm sure with you as well, do revolve around our kids and whether it be going to Discover Peoria's website or the Peoria Park District website and looking on a Saturday morning thinking, "What are you going to do today?

"And it's, oh my gosh, "we have a list of six different things."

Tanners, Tanners is the best apple orchard that I have ever been to, right?

And it's just in our backyard.

You know folks from far away come in to Tanners and even my friends from Chicago, if we're looking for something to do when they're visiting and if they have kids too, it's a no-brainer that we're gonna head out to Tanners in the fall, so.

- Stephanie, talk to us then again, we're running out of time but I want people to understand and maybe see how they can attract our young people and do you think it's possible to keep them or do they have to go and come back?

- Well, I think that depends a lot on the person but for me, I think going and coming back was a really important part of my personal journey and my career too.

I got a lot more experience when I came back.

I knew more what I wanted in a career, what I wanted for myself and also that just enriched kind of our whole family experience.

We still like to go back to visit Chicago, we're glad that we lived there.

The kids like to see, "Oh, here, we took you to this restaurant "when you're a baby, this was your favorite, "this was the first place we took you "when we got you home from the hospital."

So for me that was important.

I think it might be beneficial for others.

I'm glad that we spent a little bit of time outside of Peoria, just to get a little bit more experience and also I think, being back, I appreciate it way, way more than I would have if I had never left.

- Tim, you get to have the last word, my friend.

Talk to us, did I not give you a chance to say what do people need to know?

- Yeah, at least for me personally coming back, the biggest advantage of course is the family and friends but just the network.

I actually was able to get a job because my neighbor growing up, her daughter was in finance and so she floated my resume out and I think that just doesn't happen in other places, right?

It's more of a dog eat dog world whereas Peoria, I think it's really about the community and that's what I really love about here.

- Such a beautiful thing.

Thank you to each and every one of you for the great stories and I'll just end by saying welcome home.

Well, we've had another great conversation and we also always wanna thank our panelists for the awesome information that they shared and the wisdom with us.

Well, next week on "Leadership Lessons "for Home, Work, and Life", we're talking about the term permacrisis.

Over the last three years, we've gone from a worldwide pandemic to skyrocketing inflation.

We've got leadership tips to help you when you feel like you're in a permanent crisis.

You definitely don't wanna miss that conversation.

Thanks so much for joining us.

Always appreciate your time and look forward to seeing you back here again next time.

Goodnight my friends.

(bright upbeat music)