Rose Jonas, Ph.D. presents: The Doctor is “IN”

Rose was a great and motivating speaker for GO! Network on July 19th.  Her no-nonsense, no-excuses methodology was an inspiring call to action for me, while still maintaining an empathy to us, her subject, that is uncommon.  Her empathy stems from her understanding that what we, the unemployed, are facing a job market that has never been seen before.  The no-nonsense, no-excuses aspect of her presentation comes from the fact that she knows that we can’t just give up – we have to step up to this challenge.  The only way to reach success is to not lie to ourselves; not in our planning, not in our actions.  Rose focused on taking steps through your fears to reach your goal – a job.  Each step should be positioning you toward your goal.  Rose was great and I encourage anyone who didn’t get to see her presentation to watch the embedded video.

Dixie “Dynamite” Gillaspie presents: From Myth to Legacy; Writing and Living Your own Success Story

Dixie ”blew” us away with this presentation on moving past our “can’t's” to “I can”.  It is through overcoming our fears that we achieve success.  Most people don’t even get started because we are afraid to fail.  The first step is to discover your passion.  Some really important questions to ask to find out are:  What is your purpose?  How do they manifest in your presence?  How does your presence affect others?  These questions are directional in finding your passion.  Doing what you are passionate about is the only real way to find happiness and fulfillment in your career.

Dixie also shared her “5 essential elements of success stories” -

• It begins with you.  Success stories derive from very personal things – “passions”.
• Your fellowship determines your level of success and the ease with which it comes to you.  The friends that you collaborate with about your passion will inevitably lead you to your success story, if they are the right ones.
• You have to fall in love and be completely clear about what you’re in love with.  When even the tedious aspects of your passion don’t feel tedious, then you know that you’re correctly aligned.
• You have to start taking steps, even when you can’t see the whole path.  When standing in the middle of a road, it looks like it goes on forever and we won’t see the side streets from a distance or if there are hills.  Avenues will open up as long as you keep walking the path.
• You have to keep reaching, even when your rational mind tells you it is impossible.

Dixie, as always, was inspirational.  Not only in her own story, but in the stories that she relates to us.  She makes you believe that you can have a story.  That you do have a story.  All you have to do is find your passion and start walking and always keep reaching.

David Hults presents: From frustrated to focused, June 28th, 2011

David provided some great insight on how you can make your resume work for you and work towards your goal.  He broke down all the different options available in layout and strategies.  These hints can make or break your opporunity when the hiring HR manager takes seconds to look at your resume.  Until you have made it to a personal interview, you are not a person to HR, thus,  your resume needs to get you past this gatekeeper.  He points out the ”do’s and don’t's” of resume writing to help get you through to the other side.  His knowledge of Human Resources is obvious, helpful, and cut-to-the-chase.  He points out that the real way to get in is through good networking.  Thanks, David, for all your help!

Nancy Whatley-Blaine presents: Dismantling the Elephant, June 14th, 2011

On June 14th, Nancy Whatley-Blaine spoke about how to confront and proactively dismantle the elephant in the room.  What Nancy meant by the elephant in the room is the unspoken confrontations that we deal with at the work place or at home.  Whether its a coworker not holding their own or someone not being respectful of your personal space, dealing with these issues constructively is critical.  If you don’t deal with them correctly, the problem could multiply; and not dealing with them at all creates the atmosphere where the negativity that surrounds that issue could permeate into all other interactions with the other person.  Some helpful hints that Nancy shared are:

• Searchlight the source – Focus on the real problem at hand.  It is common for people to use the opportunity to target all the issues that they may have with someone or to target the person themselves.  Focus on the behavior, not the person.
• Prepare the way – Run through the whole conversation, beforehand, in your mind.  This helps to keep you on task and to take emotions out of equation.
• Look for the missing choice – We often think that there may only be one or two options for solving the problem, when in fact there may be a third or more options available.  Take time to analyze the situation and think outside the box to discover what all the available options are.
• “Is that helpful?” – To evaluate those options, always ask yourself “is that helpful?” before going through with it.  Many times what we think will happen, doesn’t because we don’t consider the ramifications from the other persons perspective.  Make sure that the option is constructive and will accomplish what needs to change.
• Trust the process – We often leave things alone simply because we don’t want to deal with confrontation or are afraid of the potential ramifications.  This can only lead to greater headaches.

Armers Moncure presents: Identify Your Workplace Passion

On May 31st, Armers Moncure gave a “passioned” speech about not cheating yourself of the opportunity to not just be passionate about your work, but to work in your passion.  He said that fear may put a strangle-hold on us and prevent us from even trying.  The fear of losing stability, control, and continuity.  The fear of failure.  He has an enthralling true story about how this happened to him.  Like us, he was forced into it.  It is actually easier to take a risk like this when you have nothing, than when you think you are putting all your chips on the table and knowing it could affect not just you, but your loved ones as well.  When you have that steady income, but it is from doing a job that is not your passion, it is very hard to jump ship to the unknown where you could lose your house, your car, your life, if you fail.  Armers does have an answer for that:  You can’t fail if you are doing what you love and give it everything you’ve got.

By Dustin Cronin

“No Sweat” Communication with Fred Miller

If you’ve ever had to give a speech or presentation, then most of you know that all of the little nuances that the communications professor told you about to control yourself and give a good speech seem to fall out of your head the moment you stand in front of the crowd.  You get nervous, sweaty palms, quivering voice, speech information gets tossed around in your skull like dice.  I’ve given quite a few presentations in my life and I’ve always thought of myself as an above-average presenter.  That is, until I see the person who put in the preparation and practice time combined with good presentation skills.  That person always blew my presentations away.  On Tuesday, May 24th, Fred Miller definitely helped me understand the steps that I was missing to reach that level of presenting.  He also gave some great pointers on how to keep people enthralled through proper make-up of your speech, speed, and voice fluctuations.  This presentation not only can be handy to the person who is giving a presentation, but to everyone who has to give an interview.

by Dustin Cronin

“Genuine Engagement”.  An Entrepreneurship Forum with Brian Vent.

 -by Donald Nations.

As David Greenwalt reminded us at the Tuesday, May 10 meeting of GO! Network, entrepreneurs started many of St. Louis’s largest and most-recognized companies.  World-class  companies like Monsanto, Emerson, McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing), Sigma-Aldrich, Enterprise Rent-a-Car, World-Wide Technologies all started out small; from one or two people with an idea.  Today these companies employ tens of thousands of employees.  Not just locally, but worldwide.  How does one become an entrepreneur?  Or more importantly, how does one become a successful entrepreneur?  For the GO! Network audience, how are these factors important to the job seeker, or even the non-entrepreneur?

Build-a-Bear is another one of those St. Louis companies that started out small and has blossomed to more than 400 stores in the U.S. and in about 20 countries across the globe.  Former Chief Operating Officer, Brian Vent, shared some of his insights on entrepreneurship during an informal conversation with Greenwalt on the GO! Network stage for the first half of the Tuesday session.  “Ever since I was a child, I had wanted to run my own business,” Vent said.  Through a chance meeting, he became acquainted with Build-a-Bear founder Maxine Clark.  Vent said the Build-a-Bear concept “grabbed” him when he saw that the excitement of a 7-year-old boy building his own Teddy bear, was echoed in the same instance by a 50-year-old man doing the same thing. The entrepreneur process, Vent said, can take place anywhere, but the environment must be conducive to creating new ideas.  “We are truly a product of our environment.  We can create a good
environment to learn and grow.  Yet, how do you create an environment where people can be great?”

Vent said that what really matters is finding ways to enforce the company’s greatness in everything you do.  You need to operate in a way that always leads forward.  But as an individual contributor to the corporation, Vent said, “It is important to know where your strengths lie.”  One needs to evaluate his or her skills versus where the company wants to go.  This, he added, is extremely critical in a company that is constantly evolving, while trying to remain profitable in a turbulent economy.

“Either you get hit by the bullet or you get out of the way,” Vent said, and added that the biggest obstacle to individual success is fear.  “Fear causes us to miss our gifts.  Giving ourselves permission to say ‘what the hell’ is the largest fear.  “Do you have passion?  Can you see a way to contribute your unique gift to the mission of the company?  If you can answer this question positively, then this company will be a great place to work.”

Sam Silverstein presents: “NO MORE EXCUSES”. A Demonstration on Accountability in Life. -blog by Donald Nations

I just figured something out:  “NO-XQSS” would be a perfect personalized license place for our latest GO! Network speaker, Sam Silverstein.  (But I digress.)  A native St. Louisan and member of the National Speakers Association, Silverstein brought his trademarked phrase “No More Excuses,” and a strong message about accountability to his presentation on Tuesday, May 3.

The question that accountability draws is “who are you accountable to?”  Are you accountable to your boss?  Your coworkers? Your family members?  To yourself?  Where do they fall in your priority of accountability?  These are parts of the broader question of holding one’s self accountable that Silverstein clarified for me in a way that had been dormant in my consciousness.  To illustrate, he described an example of a scheduling conflict when he agreed to a 8 a.m. speaking engagement in Washington, D.C.  the day after his daughter’s evening high school graduation.  Silverstein agreed to and received payment for  the early morning D.C. presentation months before he realized that his daughter’s commencement ceremony was set for the night before.  Now this is the “No More Excuses” guy, right?

Silverstein could not let down his D.C. audience, nor could he disappoint his daughter and other family members by flying out of town instead of attending the graduation.  “Until I am accountable to myself, I can’t truly be accountable to my daughter or to my customer,”  Silverstein said.  This story enabled Silverstein to launch into the ultimate point of accountability:  Your SELF and the VALUES you embrace.  So, it is our values that guide the choices we make.  If we can create a process to determine what our individual values are, then apply discipline to hold to those values, it fuels our personal integrity.

“It puts us in a better place because we know who we are accountable to and what we are accountable for,”  Silverstein said.  “It takes self-discipline to live our lives with morality and values.  The only thing we own are the choices we’ve made.”

“How To Keep Your Personal Brand Intact and Become More Employable” with Scott Ginsberg. -blog by Donald Nations

What is the best, highest version of yourself that you hope to present to the world?  If you ever appeared on CNN, what would the tagline state under your photo?  These are the kinds of questions Scott Ginsberg, the Nametag Guy, encourages people of every stripe to answer.

“Branding” is a term that Scott said makes him a little uncomfortable – something that happens to a product, not a person.  It
is an overworked term, to be sure, and among some of the ways Scott explained branding is that ” it is how people experience life in relation to you.  It is what you are known for.”  He encouraged businesspeople in transition to ask themselves “What are you known for?  What are you the only -(blank)- that you know of?”

As part of his unconventional style, Scott even encouraged the GO! Network audience to text-message him live with personal definitions or descriptions of branding.  Some of the responses he received likely will, by Scott’s own admission, end up in one of his blogs and/or articles on this topic.

Perhaps one of the more important aspects of building a brand is capturing “heart share.”  Scott described this as “the level of emotional responsiveness your brand commands.  Always retain the emotional connection to your brand.”  In creating that “brand
tag”, Scott advises “Make your mission more than a statement – live it.”

Ginsberg, a St. Louisan, and Green Trails School (Parkway) alum, is the author of 12 books in the career motivational/inspirational genre, a blogger (http://www.hellomynameisblog.com/), and a motivational speaker-for-hire, to name but a few of his talents.  In addition to his blog site, he is accessible on the Worldwide web at http://www.hellomynameisscott.com/; http://www.stuffscottsaid.com/; and http://www.hellomynameisscott.com/rent-scotts-brain.  Scott also writes articles for career search sites such as www.theladders.com.

Craig Jung of St. Louis Green Presents: “Seeing Around the Green Corner” -blog by Dustin Cronin

Green employment opportunities are out there.  Craig Jung gave a great presentation that educated everyone on the Green initiatives “budding” in St. Louis and how those initiatives are driving new jobs into the market.  This education also dispelled some false ideas about the proliferation of these jobs and the relevance that a business professional has in this field.  For some of these jobs all that may be required are a training class or two, which people can get assistance with through SLATE (GO! Network has a SLATE orientation after every Tuesday presentation).

About Our Presenter:

St. Louis Green, Inc. founder, Craig Jung, developed a passion for the outdoors and the environment at an early age. With the continuing growth of sustainability and green, particularly in the St. Louis Region, Mr. Jung created www.stlouisgreen.com, an online resource for everything green in the St. Louis Region and Greenside Up! Productions, a marketing company.  He enjoys spending time with his daughter, Addison, attends Greentree
Community Church in Kirkwood, and volunteers throughout the community. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Horticulture and a Masters of Management.