For the last year most of us at HR.com have devoted a great deal of time and effort to bring to you, our members, the best possible conference we could. We have been fortunate to work with great partners like PWC Saratoga to leverage their expertise and offer what we think is the best content possible. The list of well regarded keynote speakers (Jim Collins, Coleman Peterson, Daniel Pink) from the business world to the less conventional speakers like Mary McGinnis (CBS) to DeWitt Jones (National Geographic photographer and orator extraordinaire) to David Whyte (Poet and business consultant) the vast majority of delegates felt that their contributions were worth the price of admission in and of itself.
When you add to that some of the most innovative and well spoken HR practitioners presenting their own version of how successful HR practices are developed in workshops and roundtables the consensus was our latest conference was the most successful we´ve offered to date. This year we also introduced our Employers of Excellence awards and with just under one year of development many think we have the most comprehensive approach to the benchmark assessment of HR practices available.
Highlights for me were three of the guest speakers: Jim Collins, DeWitt Jones and David Whyte. Though Coleman Peterson also left an indelible impression on me the other three really caught my imagination with their words.
Even though I´ve been a fan of hers (she´s my favorite colleague and I proudly call her a friend) for some time our very own Karen Elmhirst surprised even those of us who know her well. Karen is our Thought Leaders host and Leadership Analyst. She has long been a fan of the coaching world and has had a tremendous amount of experience facilitating meetings (she used to be a trainer in a former life). Even though she has never played the MC role in the past she stepped up to the challenge and with little time to prepare practically stole the show from the heavyweights mentioned above. Her natural ease, glow of enthusiasm and her ability to effortlessly weave a storyline from speaker to speaker caught the attention of the close to 500 attendees who enjoyed her commentary and self described ´shtick´ in between speakers. Given that she had interviewed practically every keynote speaker this year for her Thought Leader series afforded her a personal connection with each of them that made her introductions and commentary appear effortless. However we all know better. Karen worked tirelessly to make sure she gave each speaker an appropriate introduction to the attendees. As I´ve predicted in the past and will go on record here and now will state...Karen is someone who has yet fully stretched out her wings and will undoubtedly soar higher than even she ever thought possible once she decides that public speaking is something she can conquer. Karen will no doubt read this and respond with that ´gosh, shucks´ response in her attempt at well veiled though genuine modesty. Deep down she knows that she´s much more capable then even she believes she is. Only time will tell if she makes the leap most of know she is more than capable of.
Of course everyone made exemplary efforts to make this happen and it showed. HR.com staff have committed to making next year's show an even better one. Feedback tells us we´re going in the right direction and we´ll use all the helpful comments we´ve collected to make sure we continue to provide decision makers in HR with the best possible content. After five days in Phoenix with 100 degree plus temperatures those of us from the North East were looking forward to getting back to more seasonal temperatures. What a shock to the system to come back to temperatures far below normal last night. We left Phoenix and the morning sun at about 90 degrees and landed in 65 degrees and overcast skies in the afternoon that drifted to well below 60 last night. BBBRRRRRR...it´s good to be home...I think.
