Upcoming Events Archived Events Before and After: Jan 28 - Jan 17 - Dec 13

SME Morning Workshop & Luncheon

Location: Metropolitan Ballroom, Hwy 394 & 100 - 5418 Wayzata Blvd. Minneapolis  Directions

Morning Workshop
Becoming Great: Enabling Employee Communication that Optimizes Company Performance
John Evavold, President & Lead Coach, CommFormance^SM
Mike Ellsworth, Managing Principal, Stratvantage Consulting, LLC

What do great companies do that good ones don't? Among other things, great companies:

• Create a performance communication program that brings the "Mission & Strategic Plan" into employees' working environment.
• Hire excellent employees and create a worker "Job Fit Program."
• Develop appropriate feedback and feed-forward communication to assist in keeping all stakeholders on the same page and stimulate excellent performance.
• Institute a performance enhancing compensation system incorporated with performance appraisals that link employee value to company performance.
• Ensure that company information systems can support efficient flow of performance information required for proper coaching and employee involvement.

Great companies, as defined in the book GOOD TO GREAT: Why Some Companies Make the Leap . . . and Others Don't by Jim Collins, have made the transition to sustainable high performance not by acquiring a high profile CEO, the latest technology, innovative change management, or even a fine-tuned business strategy. Rather, truly great companies develop a corporate culture that finds and promotes disciplined people who think and act in a disciplined manner. Employees throughout great companies share a common picture of success and an understanding of how to work as a team to achieve success.

These days, many companies place a strong emphasis on teams and collaboration. Thus the transformation process can start at the team level, eliminating contention (Does sales hate marketing? Does marketing hate sales?), developing a common understanding of goals and objectives, and improving teamwork. This presentation describes how sales and marketing teams can put into place communications, compensation, and technology systems that provide a structure to support your company's desire to become great. From this presentation you will learn:

• how to develop, encourage and reward high performance teams
• how to cultivate a positive sales culture and supporting environment
• how to get the right people in their right spots headed in the same direction with the right information and rewards
• how to develop sources of innovation within your company
• how to better understand your clients and their needs
• how to develop appropriate service levels for your best - and your less than best clients

If your company aspires to greatness, or even if your company could stand some improvement, this session will give you valuable techniques to put into practice. Come to evaluate a process for turning your company's mission, strategy, and values into living, breathing components of the supporting structures of a high performance organization.

John Evavold is founder of COMMFORMANCE^SM Inc. and the i-TEAMS (internet delivered, Team - Engaging - Assessing - Mentoring - System) system for company performance enhancement. The i-TEAMS system allows clients to continually make desired changes and edits at will to keep the communication style and content current to their company's needs. The company offers a seminar series that expands upon the messages from this presentation to help human resource personnel develop their company's employee performance communication system for the 21st century. Prior to founding COMMFORMANCE^SM, Mr. Evavold has worked as a high school teacher, sales and marketing representative, general manager and in business planning and consulting, primarily in companies involved in the sales of products and related services.

Mike Ellsworth is Managing Principal of Stratvantage Consulting, LLC, where he helps companies make better technology decisions about emerging technologies like wireless, mobile computing, eBusiness and security. He has helped senior company leaders from the Fortune 5 on down to startups create an effective information technology strategy and connect it with their business. Ellsworth also offers digital marketing assistance: running email campaigns and writing email newsletters and technology white papers.

Anne Warfield

Luncheon Presentation
Outcome Thinking: Getting Results without the Boxing Gloves
Anne Warfield, Impression Management Professionals

Would you like to learn how to say the right thing at the right time? Would you like to gain back 1-2 hours of time for YOU each day? Would you like to have people understand exactly what you are saying so you do not have to repeat yourself? Then this session is for you. Anne will show you how to shatter barriers and how to communicate so you avoid assumptions and misunderstandings. This skill will benefit sales, negotiations, presentations, management and customer service.

When people want know how to say the right thing at the right time, they call Anne Warfield. As the leading Outcome Strategist, Anne helps people negotiate, present, sell and lead by speaking from the other person's perspective.

As a prominent author, speaker and coach Anne's expertise is utilized to gain insight and to create change in leadership and communication within Fortune 500 companies around the world. From selling firewood at age 9 to negotiating multimillion-dollar deals around the world, Anne quickly learned to read what is being thought but not being said.

Because of her expertise, Anne has been featured in Business Week, Forbes Publication, Mademoiselle, Investors Business Daily, has appeared on ABC, NBC CBS, and the Discovery Channel as well as Radio Stations around the world. As a Certified Speaking Professional, Anne is one of the top 2% of female speakers nationwide!

Anne shows you how to build strength in your communication without the boxing gloves. Top Fortune 500 companies utilize Anne's strategies to clear their communication path, build leaders and strengthen teams. You will see why Anne's audiences and clients nationwide rank her a 9.04 on a scale of 1-10