A few months ago I asked the Board of the Illinois Technology Association to begin a search for new leadership, and I am thrilled that they have completed that task. Effective immediately, I’m stepping down as Chairman of the ITA, and my day to day volunteer efforts there.

I’ve been an entrepreneur since I was 15 years old, which is to say most of my professional and personal life has been fused. I’ve never known normal working hours, never left my work at the office, and have generally always been on the clock. Occasionally, my work allows me flexibility that benefits my family. Too often, my work has spread me thin, at the expense of my family.

I was raised to value public service, and my time with the ITA has been a good outlet for servant leadership. Sometimes, my for-profit businesses have suffered from my volunteer efforts, but I have few regrets.

My sister died too young, leaving behind two beautiful girls for my Mom to protect and raise. Now, in the wake of my Mom’s unexpected death (also too young at 60), I’m making more life changes, partially to spend time with family, and partially because life is too short to stand still. I’m more interested in creating, and less interested in coasting along with what I’ve already built.

I pulled a broad group of people together in 2005 to create the ITA, and a few months later recruited my partner Fred Hoch to join and help me lead the organization. Our goal was to build a more connected, collaborative tech community in the region. Today, nearly 700 member companies get real value out of this organization, and collectively the organization is able to do very good work in the community. I’m particularly proud of the various initiatives that take a long-term view of how talent will develop and flow into Chicago over the next decade.

I’m leaving the organization in the best financial health it has been, though I am also proud that we started the ITA with almost no capital, and managed through nearly seven years of very strong growth (in some very challenging times). There are a bevy of leaders at the table, some of whom can easily step up to fill the gap, but in truth the ITA long ago grew beyond the little startup with a couple of guys guiding it.

Just like most startups, there comes a time when the founders step aside to make room for other people to take things to the next level, and I’ve overstayed my time with ITA. I’m glad Jim Gagnard has stepped up to take the mantle… He has a great history taking over for founders and leading companies into the growth stage, and is well suited for the job.

I’ll remain involved and supportive of ITA as Chairman Emeritus, but my primary community service around Chicago will be focused on the Chicago Tech Academy and seeing that through to success. I cofounded that school in part as an example to encourage others in our community to take on servant leadership, and find ways to help other people. I’m of better use to that effort today, than I am of need at the ITA.

There are interesting new venture ideas percolating, and I’ll continue to support TechNexus and the venture collaboration that has happened there. With more than 100 successful startups grown within those walls, there is much that can be done there.

So, while my family steps up to take the highest priority in my life, and my time leading ITA comes to an end, I’m not moving on, just moving forward. Stay tuned.

The Illinois Technology Association and leading technology companies have partnered in an aggressive initiative to retain the best talent from the state’s top universities, and take back talent that has left the state.  The ITA Fall Challenge Presented by BigMachines is a call to action to keep the great talent in our state and in our industry.  To find out more, check out the program at http://illinoistech.org/story.aspx/302801 – and it’s not too late to get involved!  Partner with our sponsors including BigMachines and Allscripts to keep our technology talent in Illinois!

Last week I went to the University of Illinois and interacted with 120 students in the Computer Science program. Fifty of them took a computer science aptitude test for me, and gave me their resume for jobs with Chicago tech companies.

ITA already identified at least 50 really, really bright students from U of I. the kind of kids that Microsoft and Oracle and Ebay are usually recruiting away to the coast long before Chicago area companies have a chance to grab them. We’re interviewing the best kids, and pre-screening them to pass along to some of our members.

Over the next couple of weeks, we’re doing the same sort of outreach at IIT, University of Chicago and Northwestern.  In November, we’ll assemble the brightest from all four schools for another competition/test, where one of them will win $5000, and all of them will be connected with potential employers. We call this program ITA Fall Challenge.

We’re going to repeat this program again next year, expanding to other universities, and increasing the talent pool that we attract on behalf of Chicago companies.   This is a real guerrilla-style effort, and it’s uncovering talent for our community in a very effective way.

We need sponsors to help us keep the momentum behind this program, and we would like to have companies to highlight when talking to the students. Sponsors to the program will get priority exposure to the students and the schools, and they will get first look at the brightest candidates that we identify.

This is a great program for our members and the community, and we’re excited to be rolling it out this year.  If you would like to participate, please visit the Fall Challenge page on the ITA website.