Chapter Leadership Forum
Date: Thursday, Oct. 20 | Time: 9:00-12:00pm | Speakers: Frank Lippert FSMPS, CPSM, Holly Bolton, CPSM, Tina Myers, CAE, Mary Cruz
The Chapter Leadership Forum is a meeting designed to engage SMPS chapter volunteers at all levels. Attendees will learn what resources are available, get ideas from other chapters, and develop relationships with both National Board/Staff and fellow Chapter Leaders that will benefit you as a future leader of both your chapter and your firm. Questions? Mary Cruz at 800.292.7677, x225 or mary@smps.org.
Welcome: Clues for a Great Leader
Date: Thursday, Oct. 20 | Time: 12:00-1:30pm | Speaker: Frank Lippert
As marketers and business developers, we are leaders in our firms regardless of whether you’re Miss Scarlet, Professor Plum, or Mrs. Peacock. Pulling from lead pipes, wrenches, ropes, and candlesticks found in the classic game of Clue, you’ll learn how these clues can help you solve your leadership challenges. Rope can tie you down, trip you up, or hoist you up to higher ground; a candlestick can bonk you on the head or shed some light on the best way forward. SMPS National President, Frank Lippert, FSMPS, CPSM, will help you put the clues together, so that you can solve the mystery of your own path to leadership greatness.
Uncloaking the Hidden Internet: The Invisible Web Revealed
Date: Thursday, Oct. 20 | Time: 1:45-3:15pm
This session is for individuals that utilize the internet to gather information for research and intelligence about client, projects, and competitors. In this dynamic presentation, you’ll discover how to leverage Google and many other websites to access the “invisible web” and find the information you didn’t even know existed. Build deeper relationships with any client, find hidden information about your competition, and even discover what is out there about you and your firm. All attendees will receive Sarah’s “Search Engine Bible” and a Google “Cheat Sheet”.
Secrets to Success from 3 High Powered Women
Date: Thursday, Oct. 20 | Time: 1:45-3:15pm | Susan Murphy Marion Thatch, FSMPS, CPSM, Anne Crowe Kroger, MBA, FSMPS, CPSM
Susan Murphy Marion Thatch, FSMPS, CPSM and Anne Crowe Kroger, MBA, FSMPS, CPSM are legends in the AEC Industry, and not because they have been around a long time. Networking, Business Development, Marketing, Training,Coaching – these three women are the experts others turn to when they need counsel, motivation and, most importantly, RESULTS. This session gives attendees the opportunity to get answers to specific challenges, as well as hear the philosophies and Best Practices that led to success for Anne, Marion and Susan. They will share their secrets, their successes, their near successes, their “learning” moments and their ideas about the future of the industry. Attendees will hear – and experience – the superb networking, communication, presentation, and management skills of successful marketers, coaches, and business development experts.The attendees are encouraged to ask questions throughout the session.
CPSM-Only Special Session: Building a Better Life – Concrete Steps to Success
Date: Thursday, Oct. 20 | Time: 3:30-5:00pm | Speaker: Joel Oppenheimer
To have a great day and a great life begins with attitude. We explore being proactive, positive and in control of your thoughts and your life. We address the importance of goal setting and how to write meaningful goals. We discuss the value of time and how to manage one’s time most effectively. We also address “sharpening the saw” by seeking continuous improvement. We conclude by putting it all together into how a great day may look!
Communicate to Win! Understanding Why your
Technical Staff hates Interviews
Date: Thursday, Oct. 20 | Time: 3:30-5:00pm | Speaker: Mike Tosch, CPSM
Marketers are keenly aware that clients are no longer interested in seeing the marketing/BD staff at interviews; frankly, they often don’t even want to see the Principals there either. Today’s clients are looking to meet and get to know the project managers with whom they will be interacting on a daily basis – the folks many of us don’t want attending interviews because of their less‐than‐stellar communication skills! What is today’s marketer to do? This session will explore some basic tenants of communication theory that will help you understand some of the difficulties associated with preparing your technical staff for an interview. It will explain both the similarities and differences between conversation and public speaking and provide some common‐sense tips to help your staff overcome obstacles to effective communication, like nervousness and stage fright. Intended to provide you with the tools you need to affect change in your office, this presentation will reinforce and validate your marketer’s mentality and will show you how to get your technical staff to COMMUNICATE TO WIN!
Karma Marketing ‐ How Giving Back Comes Back
Date: Friday, Oct. 21 | Time: 8:00-9:30am | Panel
As the business value of social purpose continues to gain momentum, more and more AEC firms look to integrate corporate responsibility programs into their business practices and company culture. Cause marketing contributes to a long-term competitive advantage by strengthening a firm’s brand, attracting and retaining the most qualified talent, and forming enduring relationships with clients and partners who share your core values. Hear from a panel of AEC firms with some of the strongest corporate social responsibility programs in the region. Learn how doing good has become an integral part of their business strategy and firm culture and how it has positively impacted their employee recruitment and retention, overall brand and bottom line.
- Josh Carney, President, Carney Engineering Group
- Haley Russell, Co-Chair, DC Social Responsibility Initiative, Perkins+Will
- Craig Williams, Principal, David M. Schwarz Architects (DMSAS)
- Moderator: Ida Cheinman, Principal/Creative Director, Substance151 Benefit LLC.
Success Begins with Engagement ‐ How to Get Everyone On‐Board & Thinking Strategically
Date: Friday, Oct. 21 | Time: 9:45-11:15am
Whether you are pulling together a team for a SWOT analysis at strategic planning or a major pursuit, your success depends on the degree of engagement. Great teams work when everyone is equally invested and equally accountable for the end result. So, how do you get there? The project manager is swamped with billable work, the firm principal is dealing with HR issues, the technical team is in the field, and you’ve got 3 proposal deadlines…this session will not make that go-away (sorry), but it will give you some interactive exercises to better understand what messages get attention, how to approach prioritization and scheduling, and how to effectively communicate marketing messages internally.
Presentation Skills 201: Taking it to the next Level
Date: Friday, Oct. 21 | Time: 9:45-11:15am | Bill Steele
After 16 years of continuous presenting as a marketing executive, Bill decided to take his love of presenting and dedicate himself to helping others succeed in front of audiences. Today, 19 years later, he specializes in taking experienced presenters to new, higher levels of speaking effectiveness. Attendees will develop an understanding of the skills and practices that most often distinguish the best presenters, discover how to immediately take your own speaking “up a notch”, and unlearn some common practices that inhibit better performance.
The Art of Understanding Clients ‐ Using Feedback to Enhance Loyalty
Date: Friday, Oct. 21 | Time: 11:30-1:00pm
This presentation illustrates exactly how to collect and incorporate client feedback to minimize problems that undermine your firm’s marketing efforts. Systematically collecting client feedback reveals when a client problem has developed. Responding quickly creates lasting value and mutual success. Attend this session to see a simple and powerful process that identifies loyal clients for referrals and creates stronger client relationships.
Getting Past the Information Overload and Developing a USABLE Strategic Plan
Date: Friday, Oct. 21 | Time: 11:30-1:00pm | Bill Long
You have gathered your research and looked at trends in the marketplace. You have interviewed clients and surveyed employees. You have even done sophisticated SWOT analyses. Now what? How do you decipher this information and structure a strategic plan that makes sense, will be implemented, and moves your company forward? This session will look at goal setting and responsibility assignments as part of the process and will also discuss pushing the envelope of your firm’s services, developing contingency plans, and – believe or not – the possible need for more precise information! In the end, a strategic plan must not only be comprehensive and thought-provoking, but it must be organized for implementation, easy to monitor, and successful!
Lunch Keynote: Find Clues To Success
by Shaking Things Up
Date: Friday, Oct. 21 | Time: 1:00-2:30pm | Speaker: Mark Zweig
As the design and environmental industry’s landscape is changing around you, do you know how your firm is going to fare? Are you, like so many in this industry, afraid to break with tradition? Whether your firm has been on an elevator ride straight up or you have had some tough times lately, sometimes you have to shake things up. Mark Zweig has worked with A/E firms of all sizes and types to help them solve just about every business problem there is. In this presentation, Mark will lay out a list of specific actions you can take to stir the pot and keep your firm on a growth path.
Unlock Your Brand Using Social Media
Date: Friday, Oct. 21 | Time: 2:45-4:15pm | Dana Galvin, Holly Bolton
As user-generated content, the communication method of social media provides a virtual megaphone to share our voice with the world through our mobile devices and keyboards. How do we use this voice through channels like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and blogging platforms – to brand ourselves while connecting, communicating and collaborating in line with our personal, professional and organizational goals?
Presented by a team of marketing professionals with experience in the architecture, engineering and construction community, this session will include learning through lecture format, interaction and case study examples taken from research and interviews conducted through the Society for Marketing Professional Services Foundation white paper, “The Client’s Use of Social Media and Social Networking.”
Highly engaged in social media, this team will share research findings and examples of the connections, communications, and collaboration that is possible within the online landscape. Through survey results, interviews and the presenters’ personal experiences, the audience will learn and understand the power of social media as an effective branding and marketing tool in the current business environment.
Decoding the MCA Awards
Date: Friday, Oct. 21 | Time: 2:45-4:15pm | Molly Dall’Erta
Award-winning marketing communications are byproducts of targeted marketing objectives, good design, compelling copy, and measurable results. For you, entering competitions and winning awards for your work can elevate your credibility within your firm, establish your personal brand as a marketing professional, and advance your career. For your firm, award-winning marketing communications demonstrate a return on the investment in marketing—and demonstrate to clients and the industry that your employees are creative, business savvy, and results oriented.
This session will arm you with tools and strategies to create award-winning marketing communications pieces. You will learn the importance of planning your marketing communications to track a measurable return on investment (important to jurors and firm management!), gain valuable insight into the dos and don’ts of entering awards competitions, and examine winning entries in the 2011 SMPS National Marketing Communications Awards in person.
ADDED BONUS: Get answers to your questions about the 2012 MCA program during the Q&A at the end of the session!
Closing & Door Prizes
Date: Friday, Oct. 21 | Time: 4:15-5:00pm
