Saturday, December 3, 2011

Silicon Valley Women in HR… & Friends Mailing and Event Announcement

Dear Friends,

The first part of this email is dedicated to updates and musings, so if you want to skip to the invitation, discounts, and other information, please scroll down.  Before I forget, check out our Amazon Ad Day page. 

This has been a year of loss for me including several friends and now family members. Sometimes, just when you need something to remind you of important lessons, a friend sends you an article. I was sent “Top Five Regrets of The Dying” and recommend this page.

My husband and I were in Las Vegas and went on the free one-hour culture tour at Zappos.com. They are known for having a great company culture, and they explain that culture in books, tours and even training sessions. It was fascinating to go through their building and meet people who were really excited to be at work. Both shuttle drivers said the pay and benefits were good, but the real reason they loved the company was that they were treated as family. They were valued and cared for. The company even has a coach who can meet with individuals and help them with work or personal goals, and when they reach their goal, it is acknowledged.

I’ve been a long-time listener of KGO Radio, and it’s often going in the background at work or when I’m driving. If there’s a particularly interesting topic, I’ll listen if I can or return to the archives and hear the program. Suddenly this week, they fired most of the hosts and along with those hosts went many producers and others behind the scenes. Claiming they listened to the audience, the station is going to be almost all news. (Do a search and you can find details.)

It was a brutal shock to those being fired and to the listeners. Articles, blogs, tweets and Facebook entries have been slamming the corporate decision and the way it was handled. If you’re linked to me on Facebook, you know I’m one of those who have posted. Both Ronn Owens and Pat Thurston opened their shows by exploring the topic and both mentioned that the company was giving the public what it is demanding. I’ve been on their mailing list for some time, never saw a survey about it and if you see the postings, you know that many people feel betrayed and angry. The station will lose a lot of viewers and I don’t think that’s temporary.

From my experience and perspective, this was handled terribly. Contrast that with the Zappos culture where employees are valued. In addition to being valued, they are kept updated on their finances and know when they have to work harder, and they understand the importance of customer service, knowing what the customers want by soliciting and reviewing feedback and acting on that.

Consider that great things will be relayed about Zappos but Cumulus Media, the owner of KGO Radio, will suffer a bad reputation for years.

We will continue to use this blog for our website, at least for the time being. I started this site so we could write about HR topics and people could receive HRCI recertification points for that. (Scroll down for more info.) It seemed a convenient place to put our extended mailings, and now we have the event information and registration on the site, too. There is a list of pages on the right hand side of the site, and you can explore and find most of the information we previously had up there. I’m still migrating it, and we still have the old site at www.ourhrsite.com/hrindex.html if there is something in particular you need. This site has sharing buttons on the side of the page. If you’d like to repost on some of the other sites, this is an easy way to do so.

REMINDER ANNOUNCEMENT: You can earn HRCI recertification points through blogging and I’ve set up this site so you can be an occasional blogger. You are responsible for adhering to their guidelines, and I cannot guarantee your points.
· Read the HRCI information
· If you’d like to post, write your piece to the HRCI specifications. (My first post is opinion and does not meet their criteria.) Email your post to mstein@ourhrsite.com and be sure to include the subject line, your bio and links to your LinkedIn page and/or website/s. I will not edit posts but will review them quickly if I have time. Otherwise, I’ll simply upload.
· You can subscribe to the blog, share it on Facebook or Tweet it. Let’s get this off the ground!

Join us on LinkedIn.

In addition to this volunteer work, I have to earn a living. Unfortunately, I can’t mentor you, and please don’t send me unsolicited resumes. I wish I had the time to individually mentor you, but I don’t. With the time I take for this group, my work and my books, I don’t have time left over. Come to an event and meet someone who can help. I receive a lot of unsolicited resumes (from our group and strangers) and if I’m recruiting for a position or I’m paid to work on the resume, that’s one thing, but other than that, I’ve got other things on my plate. I refer people to the forum at www.ourhrsite.com/forum. See the blog post for more thoughts.

1. HR Women and Friends Community Event: Wednesday, December 21, 2011, 6:30-9:00 p.m.
2. Discounts
3. Using our Bulletin Board (Forum)
4. Spam Filter Alert
5. To change you email address
6. Unsubscribe
7. Potential Speakers/Topics
8. Notifying us of upcoming events and discounts.
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1. HR Women and Friends Community Event: Wednesday, December 21, 2011, 6:30-9:00 p.m.
Marilyn Messer and Karen Duffy have planned a lovely dinner for us for our annual year-end party. Please see the invitation for details and the registration form.

2. Discounts and Offers – view them online. Discounts for health related products or services are solely used at your own discretion. The group and I have no responsibility for these services or products. Thanks for extending the discounts to our group!

3. Using our Bulletin Board (Forum) When you contact me regarding jobs, events, and other issues, I refer to our Forum at www.ourhrsite.com/forum. You can view all messages without registering, but you must register to reply or post a message. You are not automatically registered because you receive this email – it is separate software. Please review the Terms and Conditions available under any topic on the forum. It’s your responsibility to keep track of your user name and password, and if you change email addresses, please log in and update your profile. If privacy is an issue, please be careful when you post anything: use a separate email if necessary and you can skip your street address if you’d like.

4. SPAM Filter Alert: please add mstein@ourhrsite.com to your address book.

5. To change your email address, send your old and new addresses to me at mstein@ourhrsite.com.

6. Unsubscribe To discontinue mailings please respond with "UNSUBSCRIBE" in the subject line. If you receive mail at more than one email address, please note all addresses to delete.

7. Potential Speakers/Topics
Our volunteers select speakers and topics in January. You can still send ideas for speakers or topics with the understanding that this will be considered at the planning meeting next year. If you want to publicize an event you can do so for free on our bulletin board.

8. Notifying us of upcoming events and discounts.
If you email me right after I’ve sent a mailing, I can update the website, but I can’t send a separate mailing to the group. It will be in the next mailing. Please keep this in mind and plan ahead.

I hope to see you soon.


All the best,

Marcia

Marcia Stein, PHR - www.linkedin.com/in/marciastein

Author: Strained Relations: Help for Struggling Parents of Troubled Teens
Blog: http://strainedrelations.wordpress.com
Recruiters on Recruiting
www.tellmeaboutyourself.info
www.scribd.com/Marcia_Stein

Silicon Valley Women in Human Resources...and Friends
www.ourhrsite.com

Stein Consulting
www.stein-consulting.com