On Tuesday, May 21st the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC/DC Metro) Independents Group presents a panel of communications leaders who have grown successful businesses from the ground up and are experienced in attracting new business and scaling their companies accordingly.  They’ll address best practices for networking and working with other businesses to pitch new business.

WHEN:  Tuesday, May 21, 2013  8:00-9:30 a.m.

WHERE:  Omni Studio, 1146 19th St. NW, Suite 700, Washington DC (Red Line Metro Farragut North, Dupont Circle; Orange/Blue Line Metro Farragut West)

COST:  IABC/DC Metro Members $15; Non-members $25; Students $5 (register in advance; prices at the door will be $10 more for members and non-members, $5 more for students)

REGISTER:   http://www.cvent.com/d/_ur_79aKkke_joX2a4MDYQ/p7kg/P1/1Q?

PANELISTS:

Kate Perrin, Chief Executive Officer, PRofessional Solutions, LLC (moderator)
Kate founded PRofessional Solutions, LLC in 1994 after 20 years in public relations and marketing communications for area associations and educational institutions.  It remains the only public relations temporary staffing agency in the Washington metro area.

Joyce Bosc, President and CEO, Boscobel Marketing Communications
Since founding Boscobel Marketing Communications, Inc. in 1978, Joyce has provided a full range of communications services for high-tech companies, associations, federal, state and local governments, government contractors, real estate and utility companies. An expert in branding, she has been interviewed by and contributed stories to media outlets such as MSNBC.com, National Public Radio (NPR), Association Management and Washington Business Journal.

Shana Glickfield, Partner, Beekeeper Group
As a Partner at Beekeeper Group, Shana helps a wide array of clients with their communications and advocacy strategies, focusing on social media and online community building. She was one of five women named to Washington Post’s list of “Up and Comers in Technology” in 2009 and was recognized that same year as one of the most creative people in new media by Washington Life Magazine.

Len Johnson, President, Sage Communications
Len led JDG Communications’ 30 years of growth from a three-person design group to its present status as a leading Washington-area brand development and integrated marketing firm. After 30 years in business, he sold the firm to Sage Communications, LLC in May 2009, but continues to serve as president of JDG as a subsidiary to Sage and leads the government communications practice. He is a recipient of IABC’s “Communicator of the Year” award.

The senior associate director of M.B.A. admissions at the University of Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business is quoted as saying, “Companies select for top talent with assessments like this.  If we are selecting for future business leaders, why shouldn’t we be similar tools?”  The school’s 206-item online questionnaire screens for traits found in successful students and graduates, such as teamwork and leadership abilities.

The Yale School of Management’s 141-item test measures how well applicants might manage or understand their own emotions through questions about everyday scenarios.

This trend is an extension of the increasing data collection used to analyze the traits companies look for in hiring.  The emerging field of workforce science adds data analysis, a k a “big data” to guide hiring, promotion and career planning.

For example, Google is applying data-driven decision-making to human resource management, according to an article last month in the New York Times.  It reports that since 2007 Google has conducted extensive surveys of its work force and found “the most innovative workers… are those who have strong sense of mission about their work and who also feel that they have much personal autonomy.”

Google’s VP for People Analytics Prasad Setty explained, “Our people decisions are no less important than our product decisions, and we’re trying to apply the same rigor to the people side as to the engineering side.”

Of course, data-gathering technology raises questions about worker surveillance.  As Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center points out in the Times’ article, “The larger problem here is that all these workplace metrics are being collected when you as a worker are essentially behind a one-way mirror.  You don’t know what data is being collected and how it is being used.”

Debbi Jarvis of Pepco Holdings, Inc. mentoring a group of young communications professionals at Minute Mentoring with WWPR & Edelman/GWEN

I love planning events and have had the chance to organize many over the years, but one of the most rewarding programs I’ve ever helped coordinate was Minute Mentoring with Washington Women in Public Relations (WWPR) and Edelman/GWEN held Thursday, April 25 at Edelman’s Washington, DC office.

Much of the credit for the hugely successful event goes to the amazing group of mentors who volunteered their evening to meet with small groups of young communications professionals coming up through the ranks. Sixty mentees participated in the event and received tips on leadership and management, career path and work-life balance from communications pros at the top of their field. Mentors included:

• Alicia Aebersold, Associate Director, Aligning Forces for Quality
• Carrie Fox, President, C. Fox Communications
• Nancy Gravatt, Senior Vice President, National Mining Association
• Amy Malerba Hemingway, Senior Vice President, Edelman
• Debbi Jarvis, Vice President Corporate Citizenship & Social Responsibility, Pepco Holdings, Inc.
• Cary Lawrence, Vice President Business Development, SocialCode
• Kate Mikesell, Director Corporate Communications, Hilton Worldwide
• Barbara Semedo, Strategic Communications Advisor
• Bridget Serchak, Chief, Public Affairs, Inspector General, Department of Defense
• Debra Silimeo, Executive Vice President, Hager Sharp
• Vicki Tarallo, Independent Consultant, Korn/Ferry International

A huge thanks to the mentors and to Edelman for partnering with Washington Women in PR to make this event possible. The feedback from the mentees was extremely positive and the WWPR news feed was overwhelmed during the event with participants tweeting about how much they were enjoying the program.

Members and prospective members can network and mingle with the new 2013 WWPR Executive Board, learn how to get involved and win a chance for a wine and chocolate prize. Committee chairs will be available and Director of Public Relations and National Spokesperson for Goodwill Industries International, Lauren Lawson-Zilai, will welcome attendees and share her personal connection to WWPR and how it helped shape and change her career.

The WWPR Open House will be 6:30-8:00p.m. at Ketchum’s DC office.  And men are welcome to become members of Washington Women in Public Relations, too.  Registration is now open.

As reported in Washingtonpost.com, when 4,800 fake resumes were sent in response to 600 job openings, the researcher found that employers would rather call someone with no relevant experience but who has only been out of work for a few months to interview than someone with more relevant experience who’s been out of work for more than six months.

This makes part-time, contract and temporary work even more vital because it keeps resumes current, demonstrates that skills and current job knowledge are not being lost and can provide permanent job-seekers with new contacts and additional areas of experience.

Nomination instructions and more information can be found at http://wwpr.org/events/emerging-leaders-awards/. The deadline for submissions is May 31.

I thoroughly enjoyed serving as a judge for the 2012 Emerging Leaders Awards and can’t wait to meet this year’s finalists! Be sure to save the date on your calendar for the event on Thursday, July 18, 6:30 PM at the National Press Club. Hope to see you there!

• For women, don’t wear open-toed shoes. Choose a conservative, closed-toe heel.
• Avoid strong fragrances. Don’t wear perfume or cologne and don’t eat pungent foods before interviewing.
• Choose simple jewelry, nothing too large, trendy or noisy. Wear no more than one ring on each hand, one set of earrings and no noisy bangle bracelets that could distract the interviewer.  
• Remove visible body piercings and cover tattoos. You may view them as showing your creativity but the interviewer could be negatively influenced by them.
• Don’t have unkempt nails, chipped polish or wear dark or trendy colors.  
• Avoid wearing anything low cut, sheer, too short or too tight.   

Ketchum CEO Rob Flaherty, who will be addressing the AMEC (International Association for the Measurement and Evaluation of Communication) Fifth European Summit on Measurement  in June, believes that industry measurement standards need to be created to answer “three fundamental questions”: 

1-      Did you reach the right people with the right message?

2-      Did their behavior or attitude change?

3-      Did, your effort produce some economic benefit?

Fleishman-Hillard president and CEO Dave Senay says that “Many agencies have their own proprietary forms of measurement. There was no standard before, so a lot of agencies had to invest in creating their own,” and adds “The industry will in time realize moving away from proprietary measurement and adopting a standard is in its best interests.”

PR Week reports that the Coalition for Public Relations Research Standards, created by industry stakeholders including the Institute for Public Relations, is seeking feedback on measurement to use in creating a toolkit of consistent, reliable, and comparable PR metrics.

You only have moments to make a good first impression so here is our advice on what to wear to get off to a good start when interviewing for a communications position:

1. A suit is always appropriate. It conveys the message you are a professional and will take the job seriously. Choose a conservative color-black, navy or grey-which won’t distract the interviewer from focusing on your conversation and skills.
2. It is better to be overdressed than underdressed for an interview, no matter what the culture of the organization and its dress code.
3. Clean and pressed counts. The right suit, shirt or blouse can make the wrong impression if it’s wrinkled or has food stains.

For examples of what to wear to a communications job interview:

The devil can be in the details when it comes to making the right choices about what to wear to an interview. After selecting the right clothes, try to avoid some of these accessory pitfalls:

• For women, don’t wear open-toed shoes. Choose a conservative, closed-toe heel. For men, wear black, not brown, shoes.
• Avoid strong fragrances. Don’t wear perfume or cologne and don’t eat pungent foods before interviewing.
• Choose simple jewelry, nothing too large, trendy or noisy. Wear no more than one ring on each hand, one set of earrings and no bangle bracelets that could distract the interviewer.
• Remove visible body piercings and cover tattoos. You may view them as showing your creativity but the interviewer could be negatively influenced by them.
• Don’t have unkempt nails, chipped polish or wear dark or trendy colors.
• Choose a neat, simple hairstyle.

  Save edgy hairstyles for the weekend.
• Avoid wearing anything low cut, sheer, too short or too tight that could distract from your skills.

For examples of what to wear to a communications job interview: