Connectedness builds opportunity: Reflections from Chicago’s IHCC Conference

By Dr. Willis H. Thomas

JA Contributing Writer

Part I

Last week, I walked into the Illinois Hispanic Chamber of Commerce Business Conference and Expo at Chicago’s Navy Pier. I expected to hear about business growth, contracting and entrepreneurship. I left thinking about something larger: connectedness. The future of workforce development will not be created by one chamber, one community, one college or one employer working alone. It will be built when we connect people to skills, businesses to contracts, students to careers and communities to one another.

That lesson was visible throughout the conference. In conversations with business owners, corporate leaders, educators and construction professionals, the same needs surfaced repeatedly: access to practical training, stronger talent pipelines, trusted relationships and a clearer path from opportunity to execution. Networking matters, but connectedness goes beyond exchanging business cards. It means creating relationships that continue after the conference and produce training cohorts, apprenticeships, supplier partnerships, mentoring and contracts.

The economic case is compelling. The U.S. Census Bureau reported that Hispanic-owned employer businesses grew from 406,086 in 2021 to 465,202 in 2022 – a 14.6 percent increase in one year. Those firms generated an estimated $653.5 billion in receipts, employed 3.6 million people and paid approximately $143.2 billion in annual payroll. More recent Census data count approximately 496,000 Hispanic-owned employer firms with $730.3 billion in receipts. These are not businesses at the margins of the economy. They are employers, taxpayers, innovators and community anchors.

The numbers also reveal why this conversation belongs in a Black newspaper. Census data identify approximately 201,000 Black-owned employer businesses producing $249 billion in receipts. Another 4.4 million Black-owned firms operate without employees. Hispanic- and Black-owned businesses represent different histories and communities, but they often face similar barriers: limited access to capital, smaller professional networks, difficulty entering major supply chains and too few opportunities to grow from a small enterprise into a large employer. Progress should not be framed as a competition for a narrow slice of opportunity. Our greater strength is found in expanding the table together.