Moving Ohio forward won’t be easy, but Gov. John Kasich believes he has the right skills to get the job done.

During a March 24 speech before the Wayne Economic Development Council, Kasich discussed how his 18 years in Congress, during which he lead the 1997 charge to negotiate the “first balanced budget since man walked on the moon,” and his experience in the private sector lead him to the decision to seek the governorship after a 10-year absence from politics.

Kasich describes the time he spent in the business world as a banker as “one of the most critical times in my life,” because it gave him the opportunity to travel the country and work with Silicon Valley entrepreneurs such as the founders of Google, PayPal, Yahoo and YouTube.

“That was an incredible experience because that was about how things get created and how when things are early-stage how people are able to fertilize them to get them stronger and bigger,” said Kasich. “When you are in an environment like that you really become quite comfortable in trying to see the future.

“My experience as a banker let me understand how people really make decisions. You begin to understand bottom lines, about what corporations and small businesses put up with…and the impact of what government can do to you,” said Kasich.

It was the combination of those experiences that led him to realize he had “the tools to do this job.”

“I got a sense that this is what I should do,” said Kasich of his decision to run for governor.

“We were, as a state, under great siege,” said Kasich. “People are running for the exits,” and they are taking their wealth and jobs with them.

“People have called Ohio…a fly-over state. They fly over and never even look down...We’ve got to get them to stop flying over and start landing here so they can understand what we’re all about.”

That was Kasich’s motivation for implementing a series of policy changes for state government.

“We have a Department of Development that moves at the speed of the statute…I decided it was important that we are able to move at the speed of the market, not the speed of lawmaking,” said Kasich of his decision to transform the department into a public/private partnership.

To attract more businesses and jobs to the state, Kasich is working to lower the cost of doing business in Ohio by systematically repealing unnecessary regulations “that clog up the ability of small businesses to function and for entrepreneurs to actually get a business off the ground” and reducing the state’s tax rate below six percent.

Kasich is bullish on Ohio’s future.

“If we can lower our costs, energize our job creation operation, align our universities…with the real needs of businesses, we can strengthen businesses in this state. If we can put all this together we’ll knock it down,” said Kasich.

Mark Kvamme, Kasich’s director of job creation, is also enthusiastic about Ohio’s future.

“You have an amazing product to sell and you just don’t talk about it enough,” said Kvamme. “We need to bring together everyone in the state and all the regions and start talking about this fabulous product.”

For Kasich it has been a long road from his modest upbringing as the son of a mailman to the governor’s mansion.

“I got to be the governor. I wasn’t even in politics for 10 years and this happened,” said Kasich.

He also feels a sense of responsibility to use the experience he has to benefit Ohio.

“I feel like you’ve got to use your skills, your talents, to give back,” said Kasich.