RE: Seminar in Las Vegas
Pork
1,271 Posts
Hatchman, Thanks for the orginal posting, we were wondering where you were!So now we know! Those things are always great learning experiences; however, I have found over my 25 years HR experience that we never quite get everything we needed at these seminars.
Comments
So, I want to comment on it.
I found it interesting and educational -- the seminar, not Vegas.
The topics were for me for the most part related to the issues with which I deal. But I even found the topics in which I had no particular HR involvement, generally informative and interesting. I thought Mr. Beachboard was a fine moderator.
Margaret Morford was a great "keynote" speaker at the lunch on Wednesday. Her presentation on things HR people can do to be true strategic partners with managers was certainly accurate and remindful of many my own HR failings over the years in working with managers on HR issues: a tendency to say "no" rather than "here's a better way" when managers wanted to do something; atendency to put "HR demands" on line managers when working with them. Her suggestions on various steps to help avoid these things and others were great. xclap
The only significant negative about the seminar itself was the lack of time to ask follow-up questions on the various topics to the presenters. I realize with several hundred -- I think Mr. Beachboard said over 600 -- attendees, it would have been a logistics difficulty, but there were times when I just wanted to ask that "killing question" at the end of the presentation. Part of the frustration, however, was removed the next day when several of the speakers had lunch with the attendees at their tables (I was hoping for Jennifer Lopez or Britney Spears at my table, but wound up with a lawyer!). But I had a chance to put a couple of questions -- although, as it turned out, none of them were the "killers" my mind had told me they were. x:'(
Suggestion: Maybe written questions could be submitted and responded to at the end of the particular presentation or maybe after a short break before the next presentation.
And of course, the great personal triumph in Vegas is that I came home only a small loser -- monetarily that is, not professionally.
By the way, for all the years I've been posting on this Forum, I think this is the first or second time that I've actually posted an original message rather than just respond.
Well, I'll bug off now. I got a manager trying to hire an illegal alien. So, I'll show him how he can get around doing an I-9 and hire the person anyway since I'm a strategic partner -- 8-}