Leadership Washington Co. is a non-profit organization that was formed in 1998 as a cooperative effort between the United Way of Washington County and the Washington County Chamber of Commerce.

Leadership Washington Co. has grown from the vision of a few individuals into a major part of the revitalization of our community. Our success has permeated the framework of the non-profit community and has influenced a new generation of volunteers to take up the causes of those in need.

We have graduated 246 leaders in 16 classes who are now active in Washington county and in their own communities.

The Alumni Portal will serve two functions, first to provide a way for past alumni to stay connected with the organization and second, to provide an opportunity to match alumni with non-profit organizations. LWC alumni will be able to connect and network with other LWC alumni in the community as well as have access to management teachings, articles, TED talks from past classes to reference for themselves and their work team. In addition, the alumni portal will also provide other professional development opportunities within the community to further their management skill sets. We feel this will provide continual learning opportunities for them, and will keep them engaged and motivated to help serve their community.

For the first time in our organization, LWC will be able to establish the capacity to effectively provide opportunities for our alumni to directly connect with non-profit and community organizations that are in need of well prepared and engaged leaders. The development of an online Alumni Portal will facilitate this process allowing us to engage the greatest number of leaders and organizations to meet the growing needs of our community. With this tool, both the LWC alumni and the nonprofit organization will be able to facilitate searches to find the best match for each. LWC will also strive to place, at a minimum, 50% of each graduating class with a non-profit or community organization within two years of graduation.

The portal works as follows: Upon graduating, all LWC alumni sign up for an RCC profile. Within that profile, they list their areas of expertise as well as the causes that they are interested in. Nonprofits are allowed to create profiles as well. Their profiles contain information about their organization. Nonprofits can also create "open board positions", where they describe exactly the type of person that they are looking for to fill the position.

The LWC alumni can then search the open board positions for something that would interest them. The nonprofits can also search the profiles of the alumni to find someone whose interests align with theirs. Once a potential match is found either way, an invitation for a conversation to happen takes place. If both parties agree, contact information is provided by the RCC system.