WXW Forum12: Now we’re talking
Thursday, September 13, 2012
Washtenaw Community College
Morris Lawrence Building
4800 East Huron River Drive, Ann Arbor, MI 48105
8:00 AM – 6:00 PM
Price: $69 until June 30, $89 prior to event, $109 at the door
The Women’s Exchange of Washtenaw (WXW) hosts an annual day-long conference called the “Now We’re Talking” Forum, where we engage the business community in conversation about the challenges women business leaders face in growing and improving their companies.
Join area businesswomen for an exciting day of workshops, panel discussions and exchange sessions! We can Empower Michigan! This year’s panel features Amy Cell, Senior Vice President of Talent Enhancement at Michigan Economic Development Corporation, along with other influential women from the Southeastern Michigan region. Expect discussion around the many opportunities available and brainstorming on how we might work together to “Empower Michigan.”
Agenda
| 8:00am – 8:30am |
Registration & Continental Breakfast |
| 8:30am – 8:50am |
Welcome |
| 8:50am – 9:50am |
Exchange Session |
| 10:00 – 11:45pm |
Morning Workshops |
| 11:55pm – 12:40pm |
Lunch |
| 12:50pm – 2:35pm |
Afternoon Workshops |
| 2:45pm – 3:45pm |
“Empower Michigan” Panel |
| 3:45pm – 4:00pm |
Wrap-Up & Door Prizes |
| 4:00pm |
Happy Hour |
Featured Workshops:
Live beyond your social media means
Facilitator: Jordan Miller, University of Michigan Social Media Director
Hopefully by now we all know that social media isn’t free. But that doesn’t mean you have to spend millions on Facebook campaigns. All you need is love, creativity, and spare time you think don’t have (you have more than you think to do this — promise!). Learn from what we’re doing at the University of Michigan to scale up quickly; what’s worked and what hasn’t. It’ll be fun, too. Please bring a computer/smart device if possible. Tweeting is encouraged!
PR Boot Camp: How to Build Media Relationships and Maximize Coverage
Facilitators: Jacki Halas, PR/Event Coordination and Logistics for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan and Nikki Little, Social Media Manager for Identity
How do you build relationships with media and secure interviews to tell your company stories? How do you best prepare for those interviews to ensure you communicate clearly and effectively to share your company’s message(s)? What do you do after the story runs to maximize and give a longer shelf life to that stellar coverage?
We’ll cover all that and more in this interactive workshop that will explore the end-to-end public relations process. Participants will learn how to build meaningful and lasting media relationships, master interviews, leverage online channels for additional exposure and show PR value to upper management and potential clients/customers. We’ve got a plan that will get you covered — in more ways than one.
Visual Storytelling Phenomenon: A Picture or Twitvid is Worth a Thousand Words
Facilitator: Jacki Halas, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan
In today’s fast-paced, over-networked world, your brand’s content is vying for eyes. Stand out by telling your story through visuals. With the advent of popular websites like Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr and YouTube, the emphasis on visual storytelling is heavier and more important than ever. Learn how investing in and sharing compelling images and video can help your company quickly tell its story, drive traffic to your website and help you rank higher in search engine results. In this session, participants will learn how they can create compelling visuals; how, where and why they should share them online; and how to effectively build multimedia and visual storytelling into their overall communications and marketing strategies.
Succeed Now: Suttle Shifts for Breakthrough Results
Facilitator: Marilyn Suttle
Discover the career breakthroughs that will take you further and get you there faster than ever before. No more leaving money on the table and opportunities in the dust. The Suttle Shift System™ will catapult you to the top of your game. Avoid the top mistakes you don’t even realize you’re making, that prevents you from being taken seriously by leaders and influencers. Discover the competencies to advance your career in half the time. Give up the struggle and start seeing results. This session will help you let go of the waiting, worrying, and frustration, and get you into action to turn your desires into achievements.
A World Café: Mentoring, Sponsorship and Networking. What’s the Difference?
Facilitator: Sonya Jacobs
In this session participants will engage in meaningful, collaborative dialogue about mentoring, sponsorship (where one advocates for your career growth) and networking and the characteristics that differentiate these relationships. In addition, participants will connect perspectives to address challenges and opportunities related to mentoring, sponsorship and networking and be introduced to new paradigms in mentoring and networking.
Women’s Journey in Shifting Careers Forward
Facilitator: Diana Wong
Career transitions offer exciting possibilities for new adventures on the horizons. We have opportunities to create and compose the next chapter of our lives. While standing at the crossroads can include anxieties and frustrations, we often don’t make sense or appreciate those moments of choice until well after we take steps down one of the roads. But reflections in glancing backwards often include lingering questions of ‘what ifs?’. This workshop holds space for the moments of sitting at the crossroads to excavate deeply embedded career themes that inform our life’s journey and to explore ideas for the next chapter in composing our lives. We will have an opportunity to explore possibilities to shift our careers forward.
Money: Lies and Truth
Facilitator: Ginny Victory, Money and Business Coach, CPA
Are you managing expenses? Or growing revenue and keeping more profits? No matter where you are in your business growth – start-up to million dollar business owner - Money: Lies and Truth addresses the money issues that all entrepreneurs face on their way to financial victory. Join us in this interactive workshop to learn the lies that are keeping you stuck, spinning or cash strapped. And what it will take to align your decisions, plan and actions with the truth to boost your energy, effectiveness and earnings.
Good Old Boys Club to Gen Y – How to Communicate Effectively with Anyone
Facilitators: Lori Byron, Founder of FamousinYourField.com and Kelli Gilpin, Success Catalyst with KelliGilpin.com
In this session, participants will share their challenges with communication in the business setting: being taken seriously, asking for what you want, and giving feedback to correct poor performance. Together, we’ll build communication skills, presence & confidence, so that you “own the room”, whatever room you find yourself in. You’ll leave this interactive, high energy workshop with proven strategies and specific “how to’s” you can implement immediately to increase your influence and impact.
Communicate, Train, Engage! (Oh, and make it fun, too!)
Facilitator: Megan Torrance, TorranceLearning, Inc.
We have all the tools at our fingertips these days… wouldn’t you think it’d be easier to get everyone on the same page? How is it that people can spend all day in a training class, then go right back to their desks and do things the same old way they’ve always done it? Actually, it’s easier – and less expensive! — than you think to communicate, train and engage with employees with tools like YouTube, Facebook, Yammer, email & text messaging. You just need a plan for what the learning industry calls “blended learning” and a few technology street smarts. In this session, you’ll explore different ways to use new (and old!) media to improve communication & training, and we’ll see lots of examples. Then, you’ll make a plan for using these tools yourself to solve a problem in your own work, get feedback on the plan, and identify the first next step to get started. This session will be most useful for women with training &/or leadership responsibility for a group of people.
Using Type Preferences to Improve Communication and Resolve Conflicts (based on Myers-Briggs Type Indicator – MBTI)
Facilitator: Catherine Lilly, Senior Advisor to the Executive Vice President/CFO of the University of Michigan and Senior Organization Development Specialist for the 3,000+ people who work in central administration at the U-M.
What is it about human differences that we find both appealing and problematic at the same time? How do we take advantage of others’ strengths, (particularly if different from our own) when those very strengths can become sources of conflict and irritation? In this experiential workshop you will identify your own Type preferences and better understand your strengths. You will directly observe key differences that impact communication and leave better prepared to diagnose sources of conflict with customers and between team members, family and friends. Finally you will leave with specific strategies for how to flex your style in ways that will enable you to communicate more effectively both with individuals and in groups.
Check out highlight videos from previous Annual Forums.
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