A Great Half Day Learning About Aligning Career, Corporate Culture and Communications Styles

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Jill high resolution
On November 21, I attended the half day “Master Series” offered by TSHRM – the Triangle Society for Human Resource Management. The session was titled ““S.H.A.Z.A.A.M…..Your Career, Your Culture and Your Corporation, Aligning Personal Career Pathing, Employee Engagement & Leadership Communications” – yes, a long title. The speaker was Jill A. Kopanis, who in addition to being an inspirational speaker is a proven successful HR leader for a graphics and digital solutions firm in Ohio.

Jill covered three major themes, a whole lot of territory, in a very well organized and dynamic fashion:

THEME 1 – the importance of first effectively driving your own personal career development. She used the acronym of “SHAZAAM!”

S – Setting your own goals, priorities and dreams Shazaam
H – Hold backs not allowed
A – Attitude will determine your altitude – how high and far you will go
Z – One check, are you staying in your comfort zone? Why?
A – Adjust your sails, your direction, if need be to reach new heights
A – Apply yourself and begin to soar
M – Make it happen!!

THEME 2 – As Human Resource Professionals, once we are in control of our own careers, we can lead the work to greatly impact employee engagement within the companies we work. Instead of demanding a seat at the table as HR leaders , we must earn that seat at the senior leadership table by providing extraordinary value add. Jill used the acronym “Race Toward Engagement”
• Recognize the value, the importance of engagement
• Acknowledge each individual employee
• Champion a culture of engagement
• Engage the entire workforce
I myself have frequently blogged about how personnel is often the largest investment and competitive differentiator within a company (see blog on this discussion), and I offer my unique Total Engagement Career Mapping services to energize employees through engaging them in career development based on successful examples from within their company.

THEME 3 – Effectively Using Communication Styles. Jill ended the session by reviewing four very different communication styles that people have. The critical learning from this session is that if we understand our own communication style, and then the various styles of others, we can then make the necessary adjustments to more effectively lead, build bridges and establish a culture of trust.

*****

TO CONTACT JILL: As a speaker, Jill combined both an engaging and entertaining style with well organized, meaningful, practical content. To explore her as a speaker, contact Jill, SHAZAAM Communications, at [email protected]. Note – Jill will be a speaker on Employee Engagement at the 2014 SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management) National Conference on Wednesday, June 25, 2014. Link to her session info.

Investing in 2014 – Part 2 of 2 – Opening Up a New Market!

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In Part 1 of this series, Investing in Organizational and Personal Career (link) I explored the need to focus on career development both within your organizations for all your people as well as for your own personal growth. In addition I introduced a new affiliate relationship and featured links to two interesting articles on the web – on why people hate their jobs and career and financial advice for young professionals. Link to last week’s blog to get caught up on this topic. Now looking ahead to 2014, part 2 of this series is about opening up new markets in 2014, and I want to propose a focus on one of the fastest growing and most dynamic segments, the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) market.

Are you prepared to serve this two lesbian customers with dignity and respect?

Are you prepared to serve this two lesbian customers with dignity and respect?

Just looking within the United States alone, many diversity market place studies place the LGBT disposable income at between $700 – $800B! Even though the number of LGBT people may be smaller than numbers of Asians, Blacks or Hispanics in the US, the disposable income is in the same range. The primary reason is that at least for now, a smaller percentage of LGBT people are raising children (which costs a whole lot of money), which provides more money available for other purchasing decisions. Maybe you should plan to expand into this market in 2014!

One other very important point about the LGBT marketplace is that it is frequently more “brand-loyal” to companies that reach out to them and treat them with respect, and more “brand-punishing” to those companies that do very little to recognize the LGBT community or that even treat them negatively. It seems that on a monthly basis, there is some company that is highly publicized for a misstep with the LGBT community, or one that has done something very special to support the community.

But it goes beyond just the end-consumer! This LGBT market discussion is also important to consider in B2B (or business to business) interactions. Companies that primarily sell to other companies need to be acutely aware that key decision makers they are calling on could be LGBT or strong supporters. Plus an increasing number of very large firms look at potential suppliers’ diversity policies as part of their buying criteria. And many include LGBT-owned businesses as part of their supplier diversity mix and are corporate partners of the NLGCC (National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce.)

I am now an affiliate partner of LGBT Marketing and Communications expert Jenn T. Grace, offering "How to Authentically Market to the Gay Community"

I am now an affiliate partner of LGBT Marketing and Communications expert Jenn T. Grace, offering “How to Authentically Market to the Gay Community”


Through my consulting practice, I can assist you in your LGBT corporate diversity strategy and training; take a look at my services (link) and also take my 13-question GLBT Diversity quiz to see how your organization rates as LGBT-inclusive.

And now through an affiliate partnership with Jenn T. Grace – you can gain the marketing and communications expertise via the “How to Authentically Market to the Gay Community.” Check out the details on my affiliates web page (link) or to start now, link to Jenn’s free introductory video series.

I am hoping to see the economy to continue to improve in 2014, but in addition to growing with that wave, don’t you want to grow faster than the market? Consider a special effort to court and win LGBT business in 2014!