Yesterday was Connection Camp Part 2. In Part 1 we covered the question of “Who do you want to be talking to?”. In Part 2 we covered the question of “How do I open the conversation?”.
In that discussion we covered:
Opening the Conversation
Understanding Your Audience
Crafting Your Message
Asking for Help
Timing
Face to Face Networking
Linked In
Email
Phone Calls
Social Media
Lots of great questions and lots of great interaction.
At the conclusion of the class, people all felt like they learned something new. They also thought that the class was a great value.
Special thanks to all of you who participated – Elizabeth, Roberta, Joy, Shean, Jim, Emmett, Ann, Greg, Holly, Tim, Ruben, Ed and Jyothi!
Tuesday was the official launch of the Bridge ATX Connection Camp. In Part 1 of this 2 part class we started the discussion of “Who do you want to be talking to”. Along those lines we presented a variety of different tools that can be used to help assist you in your job search. Some of these tools were familiar already to the participants of the class. However, everyone was able to leave with ideas of how you might be able to use the well known tools (like Linked In) more effectively. Participants were given the opportunity to play with some of the different tools in the class and ask questions as they came up. Crucial for the next part of the course – we discussed how to determine if a targetted company is hiring as well as defining which job titles they need to target within a company.
All participants were asked to define 28 companies that they are to research over the course of the next week (4 a day). From that list they are asked to trim down to 10 companies that we can target as well as the paths that may lead them to open a conversation with individuals at that company.
Part 2 of the Camp will take place next Tuesday. At that time we will begin a discussion about how to open a conversation with people in order to help them get their perfect job with their perfect company.
Date: Wednesday, May 27, 2009 Time: 12:30 PM – 5 PM Location: Norris Conference Center Address: 2525 W. Anderson Lane Austin, Texas 78757
Scott Ingram (www.networkinaustin.com) and I decided that we wanted to do something for all of the job seekers in Austin. We wanted it to be high energy and highly motivational. Thus, the idea for the “Get Hired – Job Seeker Strategies that Work” event was born. (www.budurl.com/gethired)
The idea was that we would have a keynote speech followed by a round table discussion with an expert of the job seeker’s choosing. At the beginning of the event Job Seekers choose from sticky notes to identify which speaker they would talk to in each round. During the round, the table (which contained 7 job seekers and an expert) would have a mini discussion on a variety of topics designed to help the job seeker. This process was repeated with 2 more keynotes and 2 more round table discussions.
The topics at the table were:
Monica Carson – The Ginac Group: What’s Your Story? How to Define Your Brand Catherine Jewell – The Career Passion Coach: New Resume, New Career Donna Fox – Fox Career Mentors: What Should I Be When I Grow Up? Keith Quackenbush – HCI International: What’s Your Product? Julie Lara – Lara Executive Image: Appearance is Everything: Making a Great First Impression Stan Tyler – Champions Edge: How to Expand the Value of Your Job Search Brian Massey – Cardboard Resume: Using Cardboard Resume to find Your Champion Kim Brushaber – BridgeATX: Effectively working with Staffing Agencies
If you’d like to hear Brian’s Discussion on “The Champion Strategy- Why didn’t I hear from you” you can go to his blog at – http://marketformebook.com/job-seeker-why-havent-i-heard-from-you/ . It’s a good lecture and well worth listening to. As an extra bonus – at the bottom of the page you can click under my picture and hear me talk about “Networking your way to your next job” - or click here to just pull the mp3 file. Unfortunately we couldn’t record Casey and Christine’s lecture because there were two of them and only one mic for recording. Oh well, next time we’ll plan better!
We received some great feedback from both the experts and the job seekers. If you went I’d love to get your testimonials as comments on this blog.
All in all I think it was a great event and met all of our expectations.
Thank you to all of the job seekers who attended as well as all of the experts who were able to participate. We couldn’t have had the event without you!
Of course, I also need to express my greatest appreciation to Scott Ingram – without whom I could have never pulled this event off.
The May Bridge ATX Networking Event was just as much fun as the April one. Over 100 people showed up to network and the event is now taking on its own personality.
I knew that I wanted to have a group where my friends from other networking groups could come together and network. However, the group has turned into a connections group. Frequently people will be having a conversation with someone and realize that that person MUST be introduced to someone that they met 15 minutes beforehand.
One attendee of the event was giddy when he was able to connect two people who then went on to have a 30 minute conversation. He made a connection! This might not seem unusual except for the fact that this individual is a very shy individual. For him to be able to talk to someone he doesn’t know is effort on his part. However, at this event he felt as comfortable as if he were the host of the party.
Smiles were seen throughout the event. Conversation flowed from one group to the next group. People naturally migrated from one conversation to the next.
Something must always go wrong at an event. This time it was the fact that I completely forgot to follow up on getting pictures taken for the event. Oh well, next time!
A special thanks goes out to Travancore Analytics for sponsoring the event:
360 Nueces Street,
Unit 1801,
Austin, TX, 78701
Cell: 817-501-7684
Testimonials from the Event
Kim is a “queen of Austin Networking” as there is hardly a soul who doesn’t know her in this town. She was instrumental in getting me connected to the Austin social scene when I started my business earlier this year. I have met many, many good people through Kim that I currently conduct business with, and I look forward to many more to come. If you are looking for a “relater” and a “connector” for business dealings, make sure to check out Kim’s Bridge ATX events!
Lamar Romero
Romero Capital and Funding – Chief Funding Officer
I have attended more than a few networking functions in my life, but hands down, Bridge ATX has them all beat. In the past, there is always that awkward initial feeling one gets, as your stomach feels like it’s in a vice and the palms of your hands begin to perspire as you walk through the door, realizing you know no one. To put you immediately at ease however, Kim and her staff’s easy going manner, make you feel right at home. Once inside, you are struck by how friendly everyone is. This is largely due to Kim’s adroit orchestration, as she effortlessly weaves her way among the guests, making sure everyone is interacting and introducing those who appear outside the loop.
All in all, it is a most enjoyable event, made even more so by the high professionalism of the people you meet. I have been amazed each time I attend just how many business cards I come away with and realizing how many more contacts I have accumulated by attending. It is certainly a bright spot in my job search and one in which I look forward to each month. Who knows, maybe I’ll keep going even after I get a job.
I was having a lot of difficulty trying to figure out how to effectively market the Get Hired event. I took my normal steps of making sure that it was out there on every calendar that I could possibly be aware of. Yet, something was missing.
Today, Casey and I got up in front of 300 people at Launch Pad Job Club to talk about the event. Afterwards the questions that came gave me my answer.
1) People wanted to know how we were different than other events – Well, we aren’t there to try to sell you anything. We put this event together because we truly believe it’s going to be a great service and a great value for job seekers. We worked really hard to get high energy experts to come and participate in our event. The idea came in place because we wanted to do something to help all the people who are currently out of work. We wanted a “Get Motivated” seminar for Job Seekers – hence – “Get Hired”.
2) People wanted to know why the price was so high - Simply, we have to be able to pay for the venue. We didn’t want to do it through high dollar sponsorships because we didn’t want to taint the event with high pressure sales. We also plan on donating some of the money to various job seeker causes out there. And, if you give an event away for free people won’t value the event nearly as much – the crowd becomes just another place to go and hang out for an afternoon. The price is $49 but we dropped it for one day only (May 22nd) for attendees of Launchpad Job Club to $39 (www.budurl.com/ghsp).
3) People wanted a face to go with a piece of paper – There were so many pieces of paper out there advertising things to be sold to job seekers. Why would someone want to react to yet another piece of paper. Both Casey (who will be speaking about Interview Tactics) and I (speaking about Networking) got up and looked into the eyes of all of the people in the audience and showed them our passion for this event. It also helped that Kathy Lansford gave us a big plug and huge kudos before the event.
It was truly wonderful to have the opportunity to interact with everyone at such a personal level. I was already excited about this event on Wednesday, but now I’m elated! It’s going to be a great event!
I think we can call the first Bridge ATX Networking Event a success on all accounts – at least from the attendee’s perspective. Smiles were plentiful and many new acquaintances were made.
The Little Challenges In Life
Of course, there are always little hitches behind the scenes that no one sees.
One of the major hitches was the fact that the event was advertised as having Bands performing. Um.. There were no bands. Although, I know a lot of musicians around town – most of them were unavailable.
One of the musicians who was able to attend had to back out at the last minute due to technical difficulties. She had told me that she needed an AMP/PA to be able to perform. Union Park does not have one to provide. I had one secured via a friend. Then at almost the final hour we discovered it was unavailable.
As for the other musician who was able to attend. Originally he was going to come with a group, but the group was in a state of flux. So, to be kind to me – he was going to come with his Tenor Sax and perform solo for me (for 2 hours if I needed it). Unfortunately, he is not over 21 and they were not going to let him in – even with a legal guardian present.
So, no music.. Which turned out to be a good thing – because it was WAY TOO HOT to go and sit upstairs on the balcony where they would have performed.
The other technical difficulty was in the way that EventBrite indicates that tickets are no longer available for purchase online. I had shut down the online ticket sales at 10 AM so that I would have enough time to print nametags and prepare for the event. I had several frantic calls and emails from people who wanted to make sure they could get a ticket. People were able to purchase tickets at the door. However, the EventBrite confusion caused many people to give up and not attend. ON the brightside of this one, people thought that the event was so great that it sold out – which means they will buy early for the next event.
Congratulations
Congratulations to Chris Rudd from ITT. He was the winner of the door prize for the 2 Bellagio Gift Certificates!
Special Thanks
Special thanks to my friends who helped me work the door – Loren Guerra (Recruiting Bad Ass), Mike McGee, Chrissy Zupfer (Pure Romance), Beth Santasiero, Jessica Falscroft, John West and Wesley Faulkner. There’s no way that I could have done this without you.
Special thanks to Liz Handlin for being the event sponsor. If you are looking to have your resume professionally recreated contact her at www.UltimateResumes.com.
Special thanks to Cindy Feyereisen for providing some of the yummiest dips ever. If you are looking for a caterer contact Cindy at www.prettydishes.com.
Special thanks to Steven Noreyko for coming and taking some amazing professional headshots. Not everyone was able to participate due to the fact that they didn’t come prepared to be photo’d. Watch for my new headshot to appear soon on Facebook, Linked In, Twitter, etc.
Pictures
I did have a few very unprofessional pictures taken at the event. Most of them came out very blurry. I’m not sure if I need a new camera or just need to adjust it to Auto Focus better. Or, maybe it was the person taking the pictures. Anyway, next time I’ll get someone much more professional to take the pictures. I apologize for the blur.
My Thoughts
I would love to gather everyone’s thoughts and comments in this blog regarding the event. I think it was a huge success for everyone. I was surprised by how many people were waiting at the door to come in at 5PM. I was also surprised to see how many people were still hanging out and having a good time when I left at 9 PM. Both, very good signs. In fact, I saw many a Facebook comment this morning about festivities lasting late into the night.
Several times I looked around the room and saw people smiling and deep in conversation. I knew I had achieved my dreams for the event when I saw this.
I had someone come up to me who couldn’t quite remember how he had heard about the event. Even though he was a master networker in town – he didn’t know anyone at this event. A brand new untapped resource for making new friends and business partners.
I had one friend who doesn’t frequent a lot of networking events. He was in awe at the end of the night. He was going home with 15 cards in his pocket all for people he was going to be able to do business with.
Now, the only question is when should I do this again? Is May too soon? What fun!
I am involved in a lot of different organizations in Austin.
One of the common issues that I see come up is trying to define exactly what the organization is and what the organization does for its members. An equally trying challenge is defining what the organization is not. Sometimes organizations have defined charters – but over time as officers and interested parties change the organizations change away from their charter. Or, the charter is reinterpreted.
I was just talking to a friend of mine. She was considering rejoining an organization for a very large amount of money. She was weighing out the pro’s of being a member versus just being a non-member and paying that price to attend the events. What she didn’t know was a recent discussion that I had had with the leader of that organization.
Recently, I was contacted by the organization in question because there was a sponsor for one of their events that was a competitor of mine. The sponsor had requested that no competitors attend this event. This organization had never made such a request of me (or anyone else that I know of). I have been to countless other events within this organization that were sponsored by competitors (there’s lots of recruiters out there).
This request upset me because the organization (which I also paid a hefty amount to become a member) had a tradition of holding networking events every month. However, due to a leadership change, there had been no networking events for several months. The only one so far this year (which was to be held late in April) was the event that I was asked not to attend. So, basically I had paid a bunch of money to not get to go to the only events that I wanted to attend.
I told the leader of this organization that he/she was sitting on a critical pivot point for their organization. This was supposed to be an organization that served its members. Now, all of a sudden in a blink of an eye the organization was now serving it’s event sponsors instead of its members. Sponsors were now being given the right to tell the organization which members could attend and which could not attend.
The excuse that was given to me was that the sponsor had paid a lot of money to sponsor the event. The sponsor has paid this money each year for the past 3 years. So, since this sponsor had been such a valuable sponsor they were going to meet the sponsor’s demands. How about the large sums of money that were being paid by its members?
I asked the leader of this organization whether the organization was there to help it’s members or whether it was there to provide a pool of people whom sponsors could pick from. I was given no clear answer other than the sponsor had full authority to do it for this event and the leader would go back to the board to find out what the policy should be going forward. I have not heard any response on this policy.
The other thing that is truly upsetting is that non of the membership of this organization know that a decision has been made in favor of a sponsor over an individual member. Slowly but surely this organization is changing out from under its members.
Yes, this organization does have other events. However, for a lot of other reasons the other events either don’t interst me – or I’m not allowed to attend because they are for a specific sub group of the membership to which I do not apply.
This particular organization had involved me in a discussion in December about how to increase membership. Lots of smaller businesses showed up to participate in the discussion. Our main complaint was that small businesses needed to have some way to be able to participate without having to shell out all the money that large businesses could easily afford. At that point I asked whether the organization was truly there to help small business members.
This organization is in crisis. In reality, this organization has been in crisis for some time.
I write this blog not to cause any ill will towards this organization. I have been very careful to leave out any details that could help you determine which organization it is.
Instead, I’m writing this to warn organizations how terribly important it is to define the mission for your organization and stick with that mission. If you stand by your mission, then people really can’t argue with you about what your organization is trying to do. You take it or leave it but you understand.
When you start to make decisions that are not in line with your mission, it causes bad blood and causes many people to become very upset. We all know how I feel about burning bridges.
It will be interesting to watch what happens with the organization in question over time.
I really wasn’t sure what to expect with BarCamp. I had read the wiki on what BarCamp Austin III had been like. I was very confused and lost. All I really understood was that I needed to show up at the old Paradox Nightclub (at 5th and Trinity) at 9 AM because Whurley said so.
When I arrived, I ran into a friend of mine from college – Elliot Oshman. We both had the same vague idea of what we were doing their and thankfully had each other to start navigating our way through it all.
The nightclub was divided into 5 seperate areas for discussion. There was a big wall that outlined what was going on in each room at what time. Time intervals were divided into 15 minutes or 30 minutes depending on the room. You were handed giant sticky notes to write your idea and then you stuck it up on the wall at the time and location that you wanted to speak. At first there was nothing on the wall. However, people quickly caught on and lots of ideas started coming into place.
I had decided to take 2 chances at the mic. At 11:15 (the second slot on the mainstage) I got up and started talking about the Tech Job Market today. I didn’t have anything prepared I just started talking off the cuff. I briefly gave people my credentials on the topic (having been in Austin since 1994 and currently working as a technical recruiter). I assured people that companies were still hiring but WHAT they were hiring for was key. Then I let people start asking me questions.
They were curious about which industries were growing (creative, renewable energy, etc) and which were dying (manufacturing and semiconductors). They were curious about what the salary market looked like (I gave a few examples of salaries for job titles in Austin – and then emphasized that recruiters are the ones who know what going market rate is – not everyone was from Austin). They were curious about which technologies are hot (.NET, Ruby, C++) and which are not (Webmethods, Cold Fusion, etc). They were curious about what to put on a resume and how to get their name out there.
All in all I think it went well the first time out of the gate for me. Several people stopped me over the course of the day to ask my opinion on things.
My second topic was at 2 PM in the MTV room, this time I had 30 minutes to speak. Based on the success of the previous topic I spoke about “How to network your way into a job”. I asked the group simple questions like “What do you want to do?”, “Who do you want to work for?” and “What tools are you using to find a job?”. The answers pretty much came back as “What I was doing”, “I don’t know” and “Monster.com”.
After we quickly determined that the group had some serious thinking to go back and do – we moved on. I introduced people to the idea of “Linked In” and how to use it effectively. Of course, my Linked In connections are very different because I love meeting people and making connections. However, I was quickly able to show them how a simple search of a company name could start driving people towards a job within a company. I also encouraged them all to think carefully about who they wanted to connect with over Linked In. Contrary to popular belief, Linked In is not a popularity race. Adding meaningless connections simply grows numbers and does not add value.
After we finished talking about Linked In – we started in on a discussion about Facebook. I personally like Facebook because it allows me to keep a personal touch with business contacts who I have developed a good level of rapport. I’m one of those people who loves to remember people’s birthdays. I feel terrible when I go to meet with someone and I can’t remember how old their kids are or even how many kids they have. Facebook has allowed me to keep up with people and how their lives are growing and changing.
This discussion ran right up against the next presentation in the room. Jon Lebkowsky was coming in to talk about Social Media and Coworking and adding value to your cyber relationships. I thought it was a very nice bookend – or rather – I was a nice warmup act for him.
At BarCamp I learned about an interesting Bacon Company (www.bacn.com). I learned more about OneSpot (www.onespot.com) and how they are revolutionizing gathering data that you are interested in quickly. And, although the topics were interesting, I did what I always do and spent time meeting really cool people.
Whurley and his team pulled off feats of magic converting the old Paradox Nightclub to a “Non-Convention” center in a little more than a week. Sweat Leaf Tea and Red Bull were free flowing. Lunch was provided by Wahoo’s. Dinner was really yummy “Dillo Dogs”. At the end of the celebrations we all celebrated with Red Bull and Vodka and a very interesting Hip Hop show.. Oh and - did I mention the free temporary tatoos!
The only hitch that I saw was regarding the wireless access. Everyone at BarCamp had brought their laptops and were tweeting away on Twitter or researching whatever they had just heard about in a discussion. I thought they had it all covered with their 2 (and then later 4) free wireless access points. However, it appears that SXSW over at the convention center did not have as reliable internet access and so people were stealing the BarCamp Bandwidth. I had heard that there were over 1000 users on the two access points at one point in the afternoon. So, while BarCamp was prepared for all of their users, they didn’t even think about accounting for all the hijackers… Next year, they’ll have to post passwords on the walls for internet access.. Or, just provide wi-fi for all of SXSWi.
Giant kudos to the team that put this all together! It was an awesome event!
For more information about TiE – The IndUS Entreprenuers you can go to http://austin.tie.org/
The idea behind the organization is to foster entreprenuership through mentoring, networking and education.
The March Event featured Manoj Saxena who is currently working at IBM but has had the pleasure of starting several successful small businesses. He was willing to share his thoughts on “Building a Successful Venture in Challenging Times”. While I can’t possibly recapture this amazing presentation, I will try to share some points that I thought were interesting.
Defining where you fit in the entreprenuerial picture
“Corporate Jailbirds” - can’t currenly leave the organization that they are in due to financial or personal constraints
“Freedom Fighters” – out there fighting the fight
“Young Guns” – just starting their new businesses
In 2008 there were only 6 venture backed IPOs vs 55 in 2007
“Good Entreprenuers do not put themselves in risky situations. Instead they understand the risks that they are getting into and then take out the pieces of risk systematically.”
His advice on why you should start a business today
There are still big problems to be solved
There are very exciting opportunities on the horizon
You can create a great business culture with financial prudence and highly qualified candidates
Federal investments are available in some growing industries
Still the best avenue to personal and financial freedom
It takes 2 – 3 years to build a solid business model, starting today allows you to be in a good spot when the economy turns around
“Money is just a scoreboard – you have to do it because you want to be in the game”
Who should wait to enter the market
Someone who is the Sole Bread Winner in the family and/or you do not have 2 years worth of living expenses saved
Someone who does not have a “Life Plan” in place
Businesses that are focused on a space that is capital intensive
Businesses that do not have a clear way to bring in service revenues in the first 2 years
Someone who is doing it without passion and/or as a measure of last resort
Passion is the requirement to get your business into a stable space
Someone who doesn’t realize that the journey is the destination
Founding principals
Build a Company with a soul and a greater purpose
Goals whould be way larger than you
There is never a bear market for good ideas/offerings
Great teams build great companies
Beer buddies make terrible partners
Don’t be nasty in choosing founding partners or distributing equity
Instill core values of intellectual honesty, frugality and keeping promises
Validate, validate and re-validate the market
“If you put fences around people you will get sheep”
“A players hire A++ players, B players hire D players”
He also went into some discussion regarding what it takes to get funded and work with venture companies. All of this information was very helpful for people who are looking to go that route. However, I’m looking to bootstrap it so I’m not really interested in that aspect at the moment. Basically the gist was that it’s hard to get money right now and you have to do a lot of due dilligence to put yourself in the running.
Or, maybe it was the person taking the pictures. 
