Longtime coach advises Ephrata businesses
Longtime coach advises Ephrata businesses
Chamber moving to new location
EPHRATA — The speaker at the Ephrata Chamber of Commerce's 82nd annual banquet warned his audience he would tell them how to mind their businesses.
After all, Marty O'Brien said, "Most of you sat up in the fifth row, the 12th row and 30th row and told me during my coaching career what I was supposed to be doing when I was coaching."
As speaker at the banquet Saturday, O'Brien, teacher and coach of baseball and basketball at Ephrata High School for 22 years and founding partner in TBI Baseball Camps, explained how the things he learned in coaching also apply to business.
One needs vision, commitment and teamwork to be successful, he said, relating a story about something his father told him on how he might approach coaching.
"He said, 'Son, if I ever became a coach, if I was in charge of kids, I would never pat the All-American on the back, I would always pat the kid who was not the All-American on the back,'" O'Brien remembered. "The All-American's always going to get enough pats. It's the kid that's not the all-American that counts. In development of a team, a business or a family, the individual who needs the most support should get the most strokes. The one that has the most independence, needs the most guidance."
A good coach and business person also scouts how other people coach or run their business, he said, and listens to their people.
O'Brien emphasized the importance of a positive attitude, pointing out how parents of participants in the seasonal baseball camps - who hail from such places as Connecticut, Texas, Wyoming, California, Korea and Japan — love the reception from Ephrata's downtown residents.
"How you can walk into a business downtown and people smile at you, say hello," he relayed. "They like the idea that they can walk down the street and somebody will look them in the eye. Somebody will nod at them. One lady said she liked the idea that most every boy or girl in this town wore their baseball cap this way (facing forward) instead of over here, up here or that way. So there is a point that you as a community have such a positive attitude. That's why we're so successful as a community and that's why we'll continue to be successful."
Prior to O'Brien's speech, chamber President Rita Witte outlined the organization's efforts over the past year, and said the office's move to the corner of Division and Basin in downtown Ephrata would benefit citizens and the community.
"It's going to be a safe, comfortable place, especially for people coming through town," Witte said of the chamber office's new location.
Witte also singled out the chamber's Business After Hours program, scheduled through March, and a newly renamed Christmas celebration, Miracle on Main Street.
The chamber bestowed Citizen of the Year honors upon Jim and Dorothy Weitzel, and named Bernie Martin's Four Seasons Farm Service Business of the Year. Judge Evan Sperline served as master of ceremonies. The chamber also welcomed its new board members.
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