QC business community welcomes U-Connect 

Holly Katko remembers growing up on the farm in Durant, Iowa. Her father wanted her to stay on the farm, so he offered her a big gift. She had other plans. “He said ‘I will give you 300 acres to stay.’ But I wanted to see the world,”she said. Shortly after that, she left Durant […]

Holly Katko remembers growing up on the farm in Durant, Iowa. Her father wanted her to stay on the farm, so he offered her a big gift. She had other plans. “He said ‘I will give you 300 acres to stay.’ But I wanted to see the world,”she said.

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Shortly after that, she left Durant in 1979 and soon found herself in Manhattan, New York, selling life insurance. It was a culture shock, but she loved it. “I only had my stuff stolen a couple of times,” Ms. Katko said with a laugh. That trip to New York started her on a long business journey that has taken her around the world. In addition to New York, she lived in Chicago for 30 years before coming back to Iowa. The former Durant farm girl, who now lives in LeClaire, is now CEO of a company called U-Connect, Inc. It provides a wide variety of services for businesses. Some of them include finding health insurance for small groups, and many types of business training. “It’s about building infrastructure for companies. … helping them find resources when necessary,” Ms. Katko told about 20 people from the business community on Wednesday afternoon, May 22, at the Quad Cities Chamber of Commerce office in downtown Davenport. The business leaders gathered on Wednesday for a ribbon-cutting ceremony to officially welcome U-Connect to the community and the chamber. U-Connect doesn’t have a traditional brick-and-mortar office. Ms. Katko runs the business out of her home and on the road. She is often on the road to meet and help clients around the world. She has also attended job fairs to meet with local students. For instance, during the first Student Success Symposium at the RiverCenter in downtown Davenport last month, she gave away copies of her book “Entrepreneur You,” which gives tips to start and run a company. “I wanted the students to realize that they can do this; they can start their own businesses,” said Ms. Katko, who is now working on another book on mastering business leadership. During Wednesday’s brief ceremony, the LeClaire woman gave the crowd an overview of the services offered by U-Connect. Many of them center on business training for sales, customer service, leadership development, online courses, tips for getting and retaining employees and much more. “Our passion is to help owners and management by engaging their teams in a training process designed to increase the most critical areas of business,” the U-Connect website says. The company, established in 2000,  specializes in “building and creating a dynamic and consistent system that allows clients to take the message and quickly plug it into their own organizations for maximum utilization,” according to information from the company. On Wednesday Ms. Katko told the crowd she plans to become more involved with Quad Cities Chamber events, and she loves being back in Iowa. “(Years ago,) I told myself I was never going to come back to Iowa. Guess what? I am back here for life,” she added.