Photo by Howard Owens
NOTE: This is the fourth of seven stories The Batavian will publish today and tomorrow (Friday and Saturday) about this year's Chamber of Commerce award winners. The awards will be presented on Saturday evening at Batavia Downs. Tickets are still available for the event.
A talk with Peggy Marone, longtime director of Leadership Genesee, first meant a history lesson of her parents’ impressive local civic and professional lives: dad was chief pharmacist, the only one, at the former Genesee Memorial Hospital, and mom was a teacher of grades four and six at St. Anthony’s and became the hospital’s medical librarian.
Her mom, the late Esther Marone, was instrumental in the founding of Literacy Volunteers in Genesee County — by now, one may wonder what any of that has to do with Peggy’s recent accolade from the county’s Chamber of Commerce. While these people certainly served as role models and inspiration for her, they also delayed the inevitable for the modest leader, preferring to give credit to others than to herself.
"I knew that a very important value for me was fair and equitable. I put those two words together because it's really something that, it's been a touchstone of mine for a long, long time,” she said during an interview with The Batavian, sharing that’s in part how her folks influenced her. “When people aren't treated fairly or equitably, it really rubs me wrong. So I knew I wanted to do something along those lines.”
There will be no evading the limelight during the Wolcott “Jay” Humphrey III Excellence in Community Leadership Award presentation on Saturday during this year’s 53rd annual Chamber Awards Ceremony at Batavia Downs.
Named after Humphrey, who was president of the former Wyoming County Bank, this award exemplifies how he was extremely involved in the community as a volunteer who encouraged his employees to develop a commitment to volunteerism and community. He was a visionary who could see the big picture and made real improvements to his passionate beliefs, chamber staff said.
Marone remembers when she met him, albeit for how briefly they knew each other.
“He was pretty instrumental in getting Leadership Genesee going,” she said. “The next day, he died. I served on the Humphrey Symposium Committee for one or two years.”
After high school, Marone went on to St. Bonaventure for psychology (if for no better reason than because a guy she was dating was a psych major, she said), and it would seem as though all of those courses paid off in how she relates to people.
She got into Human Resources “by accident” and discovered how, in lieu of being the big boss talking to a group from the front of the room, she wanted to “draw out of people” their personalities, thoughts, and gifts.
“I learned how to get the best out of people,” she said.
Marone had a string of jobs, opening up hotels, finessing her organization skills, working in Human Resources for Chapin and at Marriott in Amherst.
“Whatever I was doing, I was learning. It was as if the stars aligned,” she said of the offer to take on Leadership Genesee. “I tell people all the time I've looked at everything I've done, I may not have gone after a job specifically because I thought, Oh, that's it. That's the one I want. Except this one. This was the one that I knew was what my life had been preparing me for.”
Was there a learning curve, or did you take the ball and run with it?
“That's a good question because when I started, my marching orders were to run it like my own business. There was really no template. What I started off doing was spending time with the other leadership programs, leadership Buffalo, Rochester, Niagara, and I would go and spend a day with them on their day session and watch what they did. What did their agenda look like, how did they interface with their participants? How do you keep your alumni involved? I just went and asked tons of questions of everybody,” she said. “And then when the first class graduated, I interviewed every single one of them, and I asked them how the year went for them. What were the hits, what were the misses? How did it affect you personally, and where do you think we should go with this?
"So I knew I had to develop an organization. So I had committees from the first class and design teams, and we would write learning outcomes and goals and action plans," she said. "And so we kept ourselves really on track to create things for the next year. So we recruited a class. You know, we just did one thing after another, left, right, left, right is what we did.”
She tried to glean the best advice from leadership directors in those neighboring counties, while staying true to what Genesee County needed. Those groups had memberships of up to 90, which Marone deemed too large to be valuable for each participant, so class size was kept to 30.
As she likes to say: “left, right, left, right.” Just put one foot in front of the other and keep going.
Talk about trial by fire — Marone began the day before 9/11. Not only was that a frightening and confusing time for folks, but also a difficult period to begin a fundraising program and rally people’s motivation.
“I had to double my efforts and ask people not to give up on us,” she said at her second-floor office. “I was always recruiting. I've recruited out this window, because we had some guys working out here. One of them had been an alum. His brother was out here with him. I opened the window. I said, 'Who is this?' That's my brother Pork. Pork, when are you gonna do Leadership Genesee, your brother went through Leadership Genesee, when are you? And he did.”
Those dreadful Covid days were the most rough and tumble of them all, she said, but they continued on — left, right, left, right — having Zoom sessions with “wear a funny hat” day and other silly things to keep morale up and for a laugh, she said.
Primary goals are to encourage their leader within and recognize their own value system, she said. Attendance dipped during the pandemic, and it’s already back up to steady numbers of 25 to 30 per class.
What has been key to the success of the program?
“All the alumni,” she said. “So we pretty much get new alumni that join committees or stay on or participate. It’s a core group that enjoys what they’re doing.”
As for her values, those terms “fair and equitable” have been a touchstone to guide her path. That’s what instantly drew her to become a “Star Trek” fan in college, watching episodes in the skeller with a beer after dinner.
“Because of the diversity and inclusiveness,” she said, her back to her computer’s Trekkie screen saver. “They were so brave to do that in (the 1970s). It was awesome. I really like people. I really do, and I care very much about them. I care very much about, you know, how people view themselves. I always want them to feel good about themselves.”
Leadership is a year-long class that provides people with opportunities to network, volunteer, and learn about the county and its offerings while encouraging each individual’s leader within.
“And the biggest thing is … what is your value system and how do you live the values that you have?” she said. “I don't think people think about their value system either, but that's my organizational development kind of mind and HR mind that I encourage people to do that.”
There are 627 graduates so far, and each class is framed and hung on Marone’s office wall, and hand-decorated beads, strung together and sitting in a bowl on her desk, represent each of those class members that represent a success story.
What do you get out of this?
“Oh my gosh. A real sense of accomplishment. I mean, if I can affect one person's outlook on themselves to be more positive, to help them, you know, help connect dots for them, I mean, that's awesome. It’s really about them,” she said. “And for the community, I want to see Genesee County be in a better place as much as possible, so it keeps going for the generations to come.”
She lives with her daughter Nikole Marone in Batavia and also works part-time as a business manager at St. Joseph’s Regional School.
