Keith Shirley

Carlow Enterprise Board are promoting a new workshop for those looking for a new direction to their careers. It’s to be held at Enterprise House on 9 June 2009 and is free (but you must register in advance).

The aim is to receive practical advice on finding and applying successfully for work and looking at other alternatives such as starting your own business.

I met one of the speakers, Yanky Fackler, at Bizcamp earlier in the year and enjoyed his talk. He has recently published a book which I have yet to buy (I’m refusing to buy more until I read what I have).

The opportunity to speak with Brian McQuaid from IT Carlow’s Lifelong Learning dept should also not be missed - there are also some accelerated programs at the IT which might be interesting (although not directly in his department I believe).

Click on the pictures of the flyers for the full size version:

Carlow Chamber and the Carlow Enterprise Board have a conference coming up this Friday at the Mount Wolseley Hotel. I went to last years event and it was a resounding success. Not only were the presentations informative – but the event gave me an opportunity to network with exactly the kind of business owners I needed for my business and my career.

I’ve been asked to blog about it – which means there are some spaces left. Unfortunately it conflicts with another event I have on – The IIA Conference for the Social Media Working Group.

You can download a pdf brochure and booking form for the conference – glass-half-full-economic-conference

Let me know what I missed.

The IIA has published the Social Media Working Groups (SMWG) guide to Blogging for Business. I’ve mentioned it a few times before – the working group is focusing on how various types of Social Media Tools (Blogs, Podcasts etc) can be used in a business environment. My work with them has focused on blogs – resulting in this whitepaper. Other guides will be published in the near future.

The guide is free for all until May 6th at which point it will be available to IIA Members only. You can doanload it from http://www.iia.ie/smwg along with the results of the survey we ran. There will also be weekly case studies available. You can see all the the blog postings for the SMWG on the IIA website.

The guide includes sections

• explaining the fundamentals of blogging;
• investigating why businesses are adding blogging to their communications and marketing strategies;
• analysing the results from a survey of Irish business bloggers about their motivations and objectives and how they measure those objectives;
• with key advice on managing blogging resources, comments and content;
• and numerous links to further information and recommended reading for those who wish to take it further.

We’ve got to try our best to fight the recession but sometimes we can’t help but cut back and let people go. As employers we have a social responsibility to try and help our employees. If we can’t keep their jobs open then we can help soften the landing.

County Carlow Chamber and Skillnet are providing workshops that will help with the transition from employed to hopefully re-employed. I’ve received the following mail from them and asked if I could reproduce it here:

As Businesses in County Carlow go through periods of major change including downsizing and restructuring, inevitably some employees will be put on short time or indeed sadly laid off .

Making the transition for these staff as smooth as possible is the trademark of an employer of choice, particularly when some of these staff have been taking care of your business for many years.

By way of support to companies facing such challenging times County Carlow Chamber through the Skillnet training fund has developed the Outplacement Workshop programme. These placement workshops begin with a comprehensive one-on-one interview with your employees to define unique skills and experience and to identify employment options which may include a similar job, a totally different position and/or self employment.

Often a career option may include re-training or a period of full time study. The emphasis is upon ‘self-help’ and personal motivation, with direction and guidance provided by experienced professional people.
The significant benefits of providing this intervention to your staff during these very difficult times are:

• By looking after your staff at this sensitive time, you ensure your staff leaves your business on good terms and with dignity.

• Employees retained will have more respect for your organisation and the management team

• Future employees looking to join your organisation will have a positive view if they are aware that you have previously supported staff who were released

• Having a well managed Outplacement Programme helps reduce the impact of any significant loss of knowledge and productivity during the changes to the business

Our approach puts your employees at ease from the start by showing empathy and building trust to make for a successful working relationship, resulting in a smooth transition for your staff and your company.
Depending on the situation, if you are releasing one person or a small team of people, we can take the pressure out of the arrangements for you by liaising with your people direct to customise a outplacement services programme to include:

• Successful CV’s and Self Marketing Letters
• Job Search Strategies and Job Applications
• Winning @ Interviews
• Self Marketing, Networking & Selling Yourself
• Career Planning & Options
• Career Values & Needs Assessment
• Self Employment & Portfolio Careers
• Business Start Up
• Image & Personal Branding

We can run workshops and or 1:1 sessions either on site or off site at venues to suit you and your staff plus also provide the option for telephone/email support The objective of this intervention is to focus on encouraging people to think positively about change, seeing redundancy or short time as an opportunity rather than the end of their career. Where you have groups of employees who may be looking at career change or even self employment options, our successful Move Your Career ‘One Step Beyond’ Career Transition Workshops are especially designed for this purpose
To start this process, please contact, Ashling Ward on info@cktraining.ie or 087 6140386 in the strictest confidence.

Yours Sincerely

Niall McDonnell                                               Ashling Ward
_________________                                             ___________________
Niall McDonnell                                                   Ashling Ward
CEO County Carlow Chamber                            Training Manager
12/03/2009

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