Is Your Wealth Advisor Using AI to Give Her More Time to Work With You?

Northwestern Energy

• Career Opportunities at Northwestern Energy

  You’ve Got Jobs! Check out great career opportunities.

Great Falls Development Alliance

• GFDA Top Ten (23!) for 9/6/26

  23) We have career openings for two Business Development Officers, one focusing on growing and diversifying the region’s food, ag, and bio processing industries and one focused on Downtown Great Falls. Download our Career Opportunities. Please pass along to great candidates.

• GFDA Celebrates 30 Years of Lending

  It all started in 1996, when GFDA made its very first loan to help fill the financing gap needed to launch Pasta Montana. That first investment kicked off three decades of helping businesses, entrepreneurs, nonprofits, and developers turn great ideas into reality across our region.

Montana Business

• Montana Eyes Growth in Employee Stock Ownership Plans for Stability

  With only 34 ESOPs in Montana, advocates like Eva Villasana highlight their potential to boost retirement security and reduce layoffs. Expanding these plans could strengthen local economies and empower workers across the state.

• The Startup World Cup Montana Regional – Come join the biggest entrepreneurial challenge in Montana’s history. – 10/21 – University of Montana

  One startup from that room wins a $1 million investment prize. Why not you, o’ glorious Montana startup? You have to be in it to win it. Applications close September 25th

• Headwaters Tech Hub Summit 2026 Join Us in Missoula Sept 9-11, 2026

  The Headwaters Tech Hub Summit 2026 brings together leaders, builders, and partners from across Montana and beyond to focus on what it takes to strengthen our tech ecosystem for the long term.

• DisruptHR Bozeman 2.0 – 9/23 – Bozeman, Montana

  If you work with people, lead a team, build a business, drive innovation, or simply care about the future of work, this is your scene.

• Connor Blakley is taking on “Uncrustables” by Smuckers and winning with “Jams”. What product could you improve and build a company?

  Last November, Jams entered Target stores, and six months later one flavor began outselling its Uncrustables counterpart. Jams are now stocked in half of NFL locker rooms, and when the new football season kicks off on September 9, Jams will debut as the NFL Players Association’s first official PB&J—a title Blakley spent a year quietly engineering.

• Is Your Wealth Advisor Using AI to Give Her More Time to Work With You?

  The growth of artificial intelligence has put the would-be dinosaurs of wealth management– who employ hundreds of thousands of financial advisors and are responsible for $330 plus trillion in assets–on notice. “The next gen cares about how wealth impacts their life and the way they spend their time,” she says. “I can very quickly put together something that is completely customized to that person, and I can do it at scale because of AI.”

• It can’t be good when plastic companies write the lesson plans

  The plastics industry is offering schools curricula that cast plastics as safe, recyclable, and a source of good jobs. Critics say it’s propaganda.

• As family farms decline and the climate heats up, farmers weigh what to do with their land

  The best way to protect his farmland was to restrict future development on it by entering into what’s called a conservation easement. He still owns the property, but he sold the future development rights of his 131 acres to the Little Traverse Conservancy, a nonprofit that acquires and protects land. The organization holds those rights even if Boyer transfers land to his kids or decides to sell to another owner down the line.

• Story House Montana Lease Spaces Available in Missoula, Montana

  Right now, we have 23 offices and suites available, from small private offices around 87 SF to larger 900+ SF spaces, plus much larger opportunities for companies that need room to build, make, manufacture, store things, or generally make some noise.

• Global Seniors Outnumber Young Children for First Time Ever – The “Tipping Point”?

  The world is witnessing a historic demographic shift as people aged 65 and older now outnumber children aged 5 and under. This change, driven by longer life expectancies and lower fertility rates, will have profound economic and social impacts worldwide, including in Montana.

• Brixtel Defense Evaporates From Glendive, Montana After Promising Jobs and Investment

  Brixtel Defense opened a facility in Glendive in 2024 but abruptly closed it by early 2026, leaving the community with unfulfilled promises and economic uncertainty. Former employees and local officials describe the situation as a “short-lived dream,” with no public explanation for the withdrawal.

• From Liability Gap to 1500% ROI: Revolutionizing Workplace Safety with Missoula, Montana’s Gaize

  In an era where recreational cannabis is legal in over half of U.S. states and novel substances like fentanyl and kratom are on the rise, traditional drug testing methods are leaving employers exposed. These tests detect past substance use but fail to identify *current* impairmen

• Missoula, Montana’s CubCloud AI runs combined AI Foundations and Agentic AI workshop at Montana AI Summit

  “We spent Thursday morning sharing tools and ideas with folk from education, government, business, and beyond. There’s one thing Montana is not short on: great people and great ideas,” said Rhines.

• Missoula Economic Partnership Annual Meeting – 10/7 – St. Pat’s Hospital

  We invite you to MEP’s Annual Meeting for a look at where our economy stands today and what’s ahead for Missoula. Join us as we elect new board members, reflect on the past year, look forward to the year ahead, and connect with business and community leaders in our region.

Funding and Building your Montana Business

• Get Better at Work

  A series on the habits, behaviors, and strategies that can help you stand out at work and build your career.

Montana’s American Prairie

• Federal Court Blocks BLM Order To Remove American Prairie Bison From Public Lands

  “The court found that American Prairie’s bison qualify as livestock under the Act and that we have demonstrated a likelihood of success on the merits. That is a significant finding, and we are grateful that the court has allowed the bison to remain in place while this case moves forward.”

Hellgate Venture Network

• Hellgate Venture Network – September Monthly Meet-Up with Michael Gardner Founder of True Penny- 9/17 – Missoula

  Come join the networking and meet new contacts and learn about what’s going on in Missoula’s entrepreneurial community.

YOUR MONTANA CAREER

• 3 AI Questions To Ask At The End Of A Job Interview In 2026

  I detail the top three questions I recommend you ask the interviewer for your upcoming interview, along with why these questions are critical and what to look out for when they respond.

• 21 Elite Colleges Where Middle Class Students Go For Free

  Families earning up to $250,000 can qualify for free tuition as wealthy private schools up their grant-only aid and use it as a marketing tool to lure students scared off by a $100,000 annual tab.

Montana Energy and Transportation

• This California City Has a New Alternative to Uber and Lyft: $3.50 Rides

  Sunnyvale’s new rideshare service pairs über-cheap fares ($1.75 for seniors!) with an all-electric fleet and average wait times of just 10 to 15 minutes. ‘We think people are really going to like it,’ one official says.

Montana’s 21st Century Education Initiative – “You Should Care…”

• The New Ivies: 20 Great Employer-Friendly Colleges Embracing AI

  The job market has already been hit by tremors from the artificial intelligence earthquake. These 20 colleges—10 public and 10 private—are preparing and graduating the talent that employers will seek in this new era. “So we’re really leaning in hard on this idea of you need good foundations in something and then we focus on creativity, curiosity, problem solving.”

• The Value of Higher Education by Dr. Jeremiah Shinn, President University of Montana and Dr. Brock Tessman, President Montana State University

  You place a high level of trust in us to help Montana’s students achieve these goals and more. And in the spirit of this season of beginnings, we want reaffirm to our students, their families and our fellow citizens that our unique, dynamic and innovative campuses will continue working to ensure that you, your employers, your communities, and this incredible state we call home realize the dividends of the time, talent, and resources invested in Montana’s public colleges and universities.

• Nvidia’s Jensen Huang Thinks Young People Are Overlooking the Skill That Will Matter Most

  While Huang believes AI will ultimately transform jobs, he says this ability will remain at the center of innovation.

2025 Montana Legislature and Politics

• Forest Service Closes 23 Research Stations to Cut Costs and Consolidate

  The U.S. Forest Service will close 23 research stations and relocate its headquarters to Salt Lake City as part of a major reorganization. This move aims to reduce expenses while maintaining key scientific activities and could impact Montana businesses through shifts in partnerships and resource allocation.

• Missoula, Montana Postal Machine Removal Threatens Mail Delivery Speed

  The U.S. Postal Service plans to remove a key sorting machine at the Kent Avenue center, risking delays, job losses and impacts on the upcoming elections. Postal workers warn this could impact timely mail service across western Montana.

• Quantica Executives Fund Montana Politicians Before Data Center Proposal

  Two Quantica leaders donated to nine Montana candidates before unveiling a large Yellowstone County data center. These contributions preceded legislative wins favoring data centers despite local opposition and a failed ballot initiative.

VR/AR, Blockchain, Bitcoin, Artificial Intelligence, The Internet of Things and Montana

• Has Your Community Had an Explanation of Data Center Development Like This? Are You Selling Your Children’s Future?

  AI is not profitable, its not actually AI yet. Its all a fugazi.
  Everything being sold is a lie until it might not be.

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