2019 Men of the Year

Editor’s note: Each of the 20 men you’ll read about below are impacting the community in their own way. Some are using their legal chops to protect us against crime or support businesses as they grow, while others are working to ensure access to quality mental health and hospice care. Springfield Business Journal’s Men of the Year award highlights the many ways people can create a lasting impact at their places of work, at home and on the broader community. There’s no one path to success. These men have each blazed their own trail, and our slice of the world is better because they’re in it. Special thanks to this year’s judges for ranking each nominee and congratulations to the 2019 Men of the Year!

—Christine Temple, Features Editor

The Judging Process

Here’s the Men of the Year selection process from start to finish:

1. Nominations are submitted from across the community.

2. Nominees are notified and given questionnaires to fill out for judges’ consideration.

3. SBJ selects an independent panel of judges to evaluate each submitted questionnaire, along with a resume and letter of recommendation.

4. Judges individually score each applicant based on their professional accomplishments, leadership/influence and civic engagement. 

5. Judges are asked to recuse themselves from scoring any nominee who would be considered a conflict of interest.

6. SBJ tallies all judges’ scores to determine the top 20, with no two honorees from the same organization.

7. SBJ announces the honorees and reveals the year’s judges.