This year’s Emerge NNY Summit, to be held July 26 at the Edgewood Resort in Alexandria Bay, will teach young professionals how to develop practical leadership skills they can use on the job.

Registration information for the daylong event will be released this month by the Greater Watertown Jaycees, an organization for young professionals that is hosting the event for the sixth time.

The summit will showcase speaker Harvey Young of FranklinCovey, a national training company for professionals. A business executive for 30 years, the Philadelphia native held leadership positions with the city of Pittsburgh, Howard Hanna Financial Services, Western Financial Services and Fannie Mae. He also served in the Air Force for eight years.

This year’s theme will be the “Four Imperatives of Leadership,” focusing on qualities that define well-rounded leaders. Topics include inspiring trust, clarifying purpose, aligning systems and unleashing talent. The event will include a range of group activities and exercises to get participants actively involved, along with a luncheon to split up the day.

“Leaders need to understand how to be productive, efficient and to unleash the talent of their team,” said event organizer Taylour L. Scanlin, a Jaycees member.

The summit also will highlight today’s leadership difficulties caused by a shift from the industrial age to the “knowledge-worker age.” Challenges include managing a work force with historically low levels of trust, strategic uncertainty caused by today’s hyper-paced technological age, a shortage of experienced leaders and a competitive war to hire talented employees.

The program offers a different theme each year to keep professionals coming back and to bring in new crowds. About 150 professionals attended last year’s summit in Clayton, Ms. Scanlin said. “We want to expand every year and bring in speakers with topics relevant to this area,” she said.

Organizer Leslie M. O’Hara, also a Jaycees member, said the summit was started in 2006 by young professionals who saw the need to promote Jefferson County’s business community. Several businesses now pay to send their employees to the seminar to sharpen their professional skills and groups receive a discount on admission.

“There were several companies last year that sent a whole list of employees, and not just young professionals,” she said. “The need for professional development is across the board, and with this series we’re able to expand across the generational divide.”

Registration information on the 2012 Emerge NNY Summit will be available later this month at www.emergenny.com and www.watertownjaycees.org.

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