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Kathryn Paugh
Executive Director

Following a national search for a candidate to succeed Chamber Executive Director John Butterfield, the Chamber's board of trustees named Kathryn R. Paugh to the post beginning Jan. 1, 2008.

Chamber board chair Zita Hunt, of Whalen & Company CPAs and Consultants, announced that Paugh, a local business owner, resident and longtime Chamber supporter, was chosen to succeed Butterfield, who retired after 11 years as executive director.

A search committee of Chamber trustees, chaired by Hunt, conducted a two-month executive search process, advertising the position nationwide and through local, state and national associations of other chambers of commerce. Four series of interviews, narrowing the field of approximately 50 candidates, were conducted before the selection committee presented two candidates to the full board of trustees for final selection and approval.

“The search committee and board were pleased with the high caliber of applicants who sought our Chamber’s executive director position and are delighted that Kathryn will continue providing leadership to our organization,” Hunt said.

“She has a proven track record of successful leadership and has shown strong teamwork and high goal orientation and performance with integrity in all of her various roles with our chamber."
Hunt added, “She has the interpersonal skills for developing meaningful and productive connections among businesspeople, community groups, government officials and school leaders.”

Hunt added that Paugh has demonstrated “a strong commitment to helping individual members succeed and to the growth and development of our organization. Her dedication to the Chamber, her enthusiasm and creativity, her understanding of the needs of members and her connections with other business and community leaders were factors that led to her appointment.”

A marketing communications professional, Paugh owned KRP Communications for 16 years. Her clients included nonprofits, membership and trade organizations like the Chamber, as well as health care companies, Fortune 500 firms and public sector clients. Previously, she had 17 years’ experience managing communications departments for major health insurers, hospitals and nonprofit health agencies. From June to December 2007, she also served the Chamber as marketing and membership sales consultant, helping the Chamber pass its 700-member mark.

She earned a master’s degree from the Scripps School of Journalism at Ohio University and holds two bachelor’s degrees from Otterbein College.

Her company has been a member of our Chamber since 1995 and a Sustaining Member since 2004.
Paugh has been an active volunteer since 1998, when she helped to launch the Chamber’s major fundraising event, Reds, Whites & Desserts.

In 1999 she was named the Chamber’s Small Business Person of the Year. She served on the Chamber’s board of trustees from January 2000 to December 2007, chairing the board in 2003.

As a volunteer, she recruited more new members than any other Chamber member.

Paugh has strong relationships with the libraries, schools, the city and community groups who are key partners of the Chamber. She served seven years as a Worthington Libraries trustee; was a founding board member of Leadership Worthington; co-founded Worthington Area Business & Professional Women; was a member of the delegation signing Worthington’s Sister City agreement with Sayama , Japan; and has served on school-business partnership councils and task forces for many community groups.

In 1998 she won the Ohio Association of Community Leadership’s Outstanding Community Leader award, and she was the recipient of the Leadership for a Lifetime Award from Leadership Worthington in 2006.

She has been a resident of the Worthington School District since 1979, is married, and has a grown daughter.

 

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