2014 ILSHRM Conference – All The Juicy Details

With many of us still thawing out from the Polar Vortex, I thought a little something to make us think about warmth, happiness and growth would be a nice change of pace.

It will be warm in August.

Being around smart people who get where we are coming from makes us happy.

Attending three jam packed days of awesome content to challenge our minds and help us improve both ourselves and our workplaces helps us grow.

Of course I'm talking about ILSHRM14!

We are still hammering out some minor details, but the important stuff is figured out.

The pre-conference workshop has been designed.

The keynotes are settled and so excited to grace our stage.

The concurrent sessions are decided and scheduled.

We even know what time everything is happening.

You can get all of the preliminary details here. All of this information will be up on our website shortly.

To register for the conference or pre-conference workshop click here.

-Sabrina Baker - Conference Chair

If you are a vendor who is looking for information on sponsoring or exhibiting with us, please email ilshrmexpo14@gmail.com

HR Helping HR

The theme of this year's ILSHRM conference is HR Helping HR and we have plans to do just that. In this post I highlighted the keynote speakers who will be taking the stage to impart their wisdom with us. If you haven't read it yet, go check it out. Go ahead, I will wait.

Now that you are pumped about that I wanted to share another exciting event happening just before the actual conference begins. On Sunday, August 18, 2013 from 2-6pm at the Hilton Suites (located right next door to the Drury Lane), we will be hosting an event targeted at both social recruiters and social job seekers. Before I explain the event, let me give you a little background.

Over the past few years, ILSHRM has been a leader in highlighting emerging trends in HR. One of those emerging trends has and continues to be, social media. We have offered workshops, concurrent sessions and a cool Social Media Lab (which will make its appearance again this year) all focused on helping attendees gain a better understanding of social media usage in the workplace. Over and over we hear how attendees want more information targeted towards social recruiting.

At the same time we realize that as a profession, HR has been hit hard by the economy. Many human resource professionals have found themselves on the other side of the unemployment line for the first time in many years. Going from hiring manager to job seeker is no easy task, especially when the rules have completely changed. At last year's conference I was approached specifically by several individuals who asked if there was anything ILSHRM could do to help them in their job search.

In thinking about those two requests, this Sunday event is what I have come up with. We want to take social recruiting and pick it apart. We will talk about where, how and why. We will give you tools and resources to use and actionable items you can implement immediately. THEN we are going to reverse engineer that for the job search process.  We will highlight how job seekers can use a similar social media strategy on their side of the employment line. Oh and sometimes when recruiters and job seekers get into a room together, jobs happen. I'm just saying.

This event is for any HR pro currently looking for work and any HR pro looking to learn how to incorporate social recruiting into your current or future candidate strategy. The event will be led by both HR practitioners and social media aficionados so attendees get the best balance of information.

The cost of the event is $50 and is considered separate from the actual conference.  To register for the event or overall conference, click here.

We are very excited to be able to offer this special event and hope you will join us for this and the rest of the conference in August.

Sabrina Baker, PHR  - ILSHRM Conference Chair

#ILSHRM13 - You, Your Team and Your Culture, We've Got You Covered!

We have a guest post today from ...

Sabrina Baker

Sabrina Baker (@sabrinalbaker) is a certified human resource professional who spent eleven years in the corporate trenches before experiencing a layoff in 2010.  That experience drove her to start her own human resource consulting and recruiting business focused on not only helping employers, but employees too.  She is passionate about helping job seekers and in 2012 co-founded Discovering Social in an effort to help job seekers navigate this very different job market.  Sabrina serves in several volunteer roles including the current conference chair for the Illinois State Council of Human Resources

The annual ILSHRM conference is committed to providing HR practitioners, vendors and consultants across the state a chance to learn, grow and network.  Every year we spend a great deal of time focusing on how we can make the annual event something that allows attendees the opportunity to walk away with ideas to improve themselves and their work environment.

This year will be no different.

Even though ILSHRM is sharing its city with the National SHRM Conference in June, we are still planning on a full ILSHRM event in August.  On August 18-20, ILSHRM will be hosting its 13th annual state conference.  The event will be held at Drury Lane in Oakbrook, IL.

My goal as Conference Chair is to provide every attendee with a to-do list when they leave our conference.  It is my belief that after every conference one attends they walk away with one of three thoughts (or variations thereof):

"Wow that was nice, but not sure what to do with all of that info."

"Well that was a total waste of time.  Can't wait to see how many emails I have waiting."

"I learned some great things over the past couple of days and cannot wait to start implementing."

I want everyone walking away thinking that last one.  Yes our conference is nice and yes you will walk back into work with 337 emails to answer, but hopefully you will walk away with some key takeaways to help improve both you and your professional lives.

To that end, I am very pleased to announce the following keynote speakers.  We have a Doctor, a Chief Human Resource Officer, an operations-turned HR leader and a self-professed failed HR pro turned influential speaker, writer and social media pro.  Sounds like a pretty eclectic group right?

Dr. Daniel Crosby (@incblot) will be kicking us off with his motivational speech, "You're Not That Great!"  Dr. Crosby is a psychologist and behavioral finance expert who helps organizations understand the intersection of minds and markets.  He has been featured in the Huffington Post, Registered Rep and Risk Management Magazine.  He was recently named as one of the 12 thinkers to watch in the world of organizational psychology and has worked with clients such as Morgan Stanley, Grant Thornton and NASA (yes NASA).

The duo of Laurie Ruettimann (@lruettimann) and Kris Dunn (@kris_dunn) will be walking us through the "9 Faces of HR".  If you have pictures of a traditional nine box grid often used in succession planning, you are on the right track.  This nine box however will have the Laurie and Kris flare added to it.

Laurie has over a decade of Human Resources experience in Fortune 500 companies.  In addition to creating Punk Rock HR which was recognized by Forbes as one of the top 100 blogs for women, she was also the co-founder of several new media start-ups including HRM Today – the first social network for HR professionals.

Kris is a VP of HR type who has led HR practices in Fortune 500s and venture capital-held startups. He works for a living, and believes that the key to great business results is to get great people, then do cool stuff to maximize their motivation, performance and effectiveness once you have them in the door.   In his own words, here are his professional stats: 3 degrees. One marriage. An SPHR that's been recertified twice. 2,000+ hires. 1,000+ fires.  In addition to his own blog, Kris founded Fistful of Talent, a multi-contributor blog which provides daily HR insights.  Kris is one of the most transparent HR pro's you can find. 

As if those weren't enough, Dwane Lay (@dwanelay) will be wrapping up our conference with "Lean Culture: The Impossible, The Possible and Living on the Difference".  Dwane is the Head of HR Process Design for Dovetail Software a leading provider of HR case management and employee request management.   He is recognized as a leading authority on the application of Lean tools and techniques in Human Resources, as well as having a wealth of experience in applying business technology to improve HR processes.  Dwane holds an MBA from Lindenwood University, as well as having earned a Six Sigma Black Belt and is a certified Senior Professional of Human Resources.

I am thrilled about this lineup.  I believe each speaker is going to allow our attendees the ability to take a good look at themselves, their teams and the culture around them and figure out ways to improve all three.

Be on the lookout for other key announcements as we continue to prepare for the ILSHRM conference.  We anticipate attendee registration to open March 1, 2013.  We are also preparing an exciting Sunday event which should allow us to help HR professionals across the state with a very specific need (cryptic I know, but can't share anything more than that right now).

Hope to see you in August,

Sabrina Baker, PHR

ILSHRM Conference Chair

I Am Thankful For.....

Well, it’s come and gone. I hope that most all attendees at the 12th annual Illinois SHRM Conference (ILSHRM11) had the amazing time I had. We had a record crowd, cutting edge speakers and very intense but invaluable networking and I hope a little fun. I sit here trying to write a thank you post but have so many to thank I don’t know where to start and if I can keep it the length of a post and not a book, because it would not be hard to do.

First let me start with our keynotes, pre-conference speaker and our emcee. Our opening keynote, Ryan Estes, kicked us off with a very motivating and moving presentation that set the tone for the entire conference. Talent Anarchy (Jason Lauritsen and Joe Gerstandt) did what many keynoters fail to do and that is took the tough after lunch spot and they OWNED it. Testify. China Gorman gave our final keynote as only China can, informative, entertaining and classy. As I said in introducing China, when I took on ILSHRM11, I had a short list of 3 keynoters I wanted and I was blessed enough to get all three, China being top of that list. Whew. Jessica Miller-Merrell came in and led our first ever pre-conference session and did everything I thought she would do and more. And what can I say about our first ever conference emcee, Charlie Judy, but WOW. (Already got him committed to ILSHRM12).

Next, I have to thank our concurrent presenters. I wish I could list all 30 of them but space does not allow it (we run into that book length problem). The only complaint I have heard so far is that we didn’t have bigger concurrent break out rooms (we are working on that). They engaged, entertained and educated all of you. If you attended one (or five) great session, I encourage you to reach out to the speaker and connect with them to thank them and network. They are easily findable on the internet and if not, let us know; we will try and hook you up.

Next, our Social Media folks who came in and shared the conference with the world in ways I never thought possible. The number of over 3.8 million internet impressions just staggers me. Thank you Robin, Geoff, Maren, Kristi, Bryan, William, Jennifer, Dwane, Mike, Jessica, Jason S, Jason L, Joe, China and Charlie.

Thank you to the staff at NIU, Drury Lane, MCS and Chris Martin Public Relations for support and your hard work.

Thank you to our exhibitors and sponsors. You help make this amazing event possible. Please check out the list on our web site. Special thanks to our conference sponsor, Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Illinois. They have been unbelievable in their support in the last few years.

Thanks to the SHRM staff at ILSHRM. Martha and Kristine, you support us all year long so thank you for sharing two days with us, I know how busy you are. Kattie from HRCI, it was so great to meet in person and thanks to your team for sponsoring our first tweet up and the ILSHRM All Acess video recaps. Curtis, thanks. Without your interest last year, our social media reach would not be anything compared to what it is.

Thank you to all of our Illinois SHRM Board and volunteers. You made this years’ event run as smooth as glass due to all your effort and work. Special thanks go to our officers (Donna, Amy and Marianne), our District Directors (Karen, Lenore, Janeane, Melissa, Connie and especially Pattie), our technology team of Rachel and Dave. Thanks to all the chapter members and SHRM members who pitched into help. Extra special thanks to Sabrina Baker, our exhibitor and sponsor chair and Cathy Plouzek, my Co-Director. You all are super heroes in my book.

Last but not least, thanks to each and every attendee who came and participated. Your energy, enthusiasm and excitement made ILSHRM11 a huge success.

See you at the Drury Lane on August 6-7, 2012.
-John Jorgensen Conference Director ISC SHRM

IL SHRM 2011 – Let the Excitement Build

Sabrina Baker

Today's guest post is from Sabrina Baker, PHR,  who is working with ILSHRM on the Conference, helping to fill the exhibitors/sponsor rolls.  She also writes a great blog as the HR Chatterbox. You can also find Sabrina on twitter as Sabrina_PHR

I know that everyone is gearing up for the National SHRM conference coming up in a few weeks, but truth be told, I’m more excited about our state conference happening in August.  The national conference is a great experience and offers lots of opportunity for personal growth, but there is something about bringing that down to a local level that really makes it impactful.

I was lucky enough to see the space where we will be hosting the 2011 conference and participate in discussions around setup.  This year’s event is sure to be bigger and better than ever before and I can not imagine anyone not walking away feeling energized and excited about the direction our profession is heading.

Working with the planning group has opened my eyes to how much conference organizers care about your experience.  This group is wholly dedicated to making sure this is a meaningful event for you, that conference tracks and speakers are relevant to the issues facing HR professionals today and that you have a sense of pride in not only yourself, but the professional organization that supports you.

If you have not made the decision to attend, I encourage you to do so today.  We are expecting over 600 attendees from all over the state and even if you get nothing out of the speakers (which I promise you will) you will have a great opportunity to network and learn from one another.  It doesn’t get much better than that.ns around setup.  This year’s event is sure to be bigger and better than ever before and I can not imagine anyone not walking away feeling energized and excited about the direction our profession is heading.