As we continue to focus in 2012 on serving the HR professional and engaging the member, this year’s conference planning committee has an incredible line-up of top-notch speakers and timely topics that you won’t want to miss.
PHRMA and our partner sponsor Davis Wright Tremaine are pleased to present the 7th annual Strategic Management Conference, The HR Factor. Register now for May 16, 2012 at the Oregon Convention Center as this event has sold out in past years. The full-day conference features national and local speakers providing 7.0 hours of strategic credit towards HRCI recertification. The focus of the conference will be creative strategic solutions for HR in the new economy.
A big thank you to our sponsors listed below. Please be sure to visit their booths at the conference and thank them for their continued support of PHRMA.
Conference Sponsors
| Davis Wright Tremaine – Partner Sponsor | Occuscreen |
| Boly Welch | Providence |
| Chubb | PSU Professional Development Center |
| Davidson Benefits Planning | Regence |
| Human Resource Specialties | The Partners Group |
| HR Answers, Inc. | The Standard |
| Kaiser Permanente | Transamerica Financial Advisors |
| Lee Hecht Harrison | USI |
| Mercer | Willamette Univ. Atkinson Grad School |
| Morgan Stanley | Xenium |
I also want to take this opportunity to thank the conference planning committee Tina Weber & Pam Mack (co-chairs), Chrys Martin, Lisa Welch, Jana Earnshaw and Shannon Bougher. This team has been working diligently since last summer to pull this conference together for all of us to benefit from the educational and networking opportunities. If you are interested in volunteering for next year’s planning committee please let me know.
See you at the conference!
Warm Regards
Christina York
April PHRMA Luncheon
By · CommentsPHRMA April Luncheon:
Why Listen? Building Effective Team Relationships Through Skillful Listening
April 18, 2012
11:30am – 1:00pm
Portland Doubletree Hotel – Lloyd Center
PHRMA Member – $25; Guest – $40
HRCI Credit Approved
We learn to read, write and speak in school, yet we spend 45% of our workday listening, a skill we are not formally trained in. Listening skills or the lack thereof, affect team relationships and an organization’s bottom line.Berry Kruijning, founder and principal of Crowning Communications LLC, will facilitate an engaging session where participants will gain an understanding of the power of listening in a team, explore and experience different levels of listening, identify barriers between listener and talker and learn how “OK” attitudes affect the team relationships.
Afternoon Workshop
PHRMA Member – $50; Guest – $65
Following the Luncheon – 1:15pm – 4:00pm
HRCI Credit Approved
In this afternoon workshop, participants will gain awareness of their listening skills through self-evaluation, practice the three levels of listening, learn how to break down barriers to develop good team relationships and learn ways to get others to listen. Participants will feel empowered to build constructive team relationships through listening and leave the workshop with a 3- step action plan for applying the Listening System.
HR Leadership Awards Debrief
By · CommentsThe pictures are rolling in, and there are some great moments captured from this year’s HR Leadership Awards. If you haven’t had a chance, go out to the PHRMA Facebook Page and take a look. You will see a lot of smiling faces. And who doesn’t like having fun while they network and learn about hot topics in their industry?
By the numbers, this was quite an event (some numbers are based on estimates and interpolation, but they should be pretty close). There were 4 judges who chose 9 finalists and 4 winners out of a pool of over 50 nominees. There were 5 sponsors providing more than 1,500 free gifts to around 350 guests, over 50 of whom were already PHRMA members (not a bad showing). And the Portland Business Journal distributed roughly 10,000 event inserts to their 90,000 readers. Wow! What an impact this event has on our beloved bridge city!
Thank you to everyone who attended! I hope that you feel as good as I do about the event. And if you’re wondering about how to get involved in more fun, informative events where you can meet thought leaders in your industry, go to www.portlandhrma.org and sign up for a luncheon. Or contact me directly – Andrew Cecka, at marketing@portlandhrma.org – to find out how to get involved.
PHRMA March Luncheon 3/21/2012
By · CommentsHot Topics This Year in Employment law
March 21, 2012
11:30am – 1:00pm
Portland Doubletree Hotel – Lloyd Center
PHRMA Member – $25; Guest – $40
Friday is the last day to register here!
As an HR professional, are you aware of the 10 areas of labor and employment law that apply to your organization? Come participate in an interactive “pop quiz,” presented by Emily Shults, an Associate with Bullard Law Firm. Emily will review the latest updates by the National Labor Relation Board regarding employer social media policies, the praticical lessons we can learn from the latest Supreme Court employment law cases, procedural wage and hour issues, and the often overlooked questions regarding personnel files and reference requests, just to name a few. Emily has substantial writing experience in a range of federal and state labor and employment issues, including benefit administration and compliance, class-action litigation, employment legislation, anti-discrimination and wage and hour compliance, and federal administrative agencies, on both the trial and appellate levels.
Time for something fun!
Playworks is giving away 3 of their corporate recess programs to Portland employers and you can enter your organization in this drawing! They are hoping to catch the interest of HR professionals to enter the drawing.
Check out their website to learn more: http://www.playworks.org/make-recess-count/play/portland/win-day-recess-your-office
Here are some additional details from their press release:
PLAYWORKS PORTLAND RECEIVES $150,000 GRANT TO EXTEND MOVEMENT FOR PLAYFebruary 27, 2012, Portland, OR – Playworks Portland, a nonprofit that brings play and physicalactivity to more than 5,800 students every day in 14 Portland Public Schools, has received a$150,000 grant from KEEN Hybrid.Care to further Playworks’ goal of building support for themovement around play. Playworks is a 15 year-old national nonprofit that provides a full-timecoordinator to work at recess and throughout the school day to engage students in low-incomeschools with safe, healthy play.As part of the two-year grant, Playworks will provide Corporate Recess to businesses across thecountry, including Portland, Denver, Milwaukee, Philadelphia and Durham (NC), engaging adults inactive play and providing opportunities for them to volunteer in Playworks schools.
Have fun!
For March I decided to devote my column to a personal change that many of our members can relate to and that is job change. After fourteen years I will be leaving my position at the end of this month. It is with mixed emotions, the fear of the unknown coupled with the excitement and anticipation of seeking a new opportunity. I turn to PHRMA for support and resources during a time of transition.
There are number of benefits of PHRMA membership and several different ways to get involved. Each month PHRMA offers a luncheon featuring a high quality speaker and hot topic and typically the program has been approved for HRCI credit. The luncheon is preceded by an opportunity to network and build connections with 200+ attendees. For those who prefer a more intimate gathering and specialized topic, the Special Interest Groups (or SIGs) serves this purpose. The SIGs include: Active Search, Compensation & Benefits, Diversity & Inclusion, Recruitment & Selection, Global, Training & Development and Employee Relations. All SIG events are free for members and held at various times, dates and locations. In addition, for those wanting to pursue a PHR/SPHR professional certification, PHRMA offers two study groups, one in the spring and one in the fall. Check out the calendar of events on the website for dates, times and more information on SIG events and the study groups.
If you are an HR professional in transition, or “thinking about” making a job change, or targeting HR as a new career field, the Active Search meeting is the place to be. The Active Search group provides colleague-to-colleague network support, job search tips and techniques, sharing of job leads, and a framework for a productive job search. The group meets monthly from 9:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m., at the Doubletree Hotel Lloyd Center just prior to the monthly lunch meeting and is free of charge.
Did you know that PHRMA hosts a job bank on the website? If your company is looking for qualified HR professionals or you are an HR professional looking for a new opportunity, check out the job bank. For job seekers, the “Career Center” provides a place to actively manage your job search.
In addition to professional development and job seeking services, volunteering is another way to get involved to maximize the value of your membership. Volunteer opportunities range from getting involved with the PSU HR student chapter, numerous workforce readiness events, joining the membership committee and much more. Be sure to check out the weekly e-news for volunteer announcements or contact the Volunteer Coordinator at volunteer@portlandhrma.org to explore options. Volunteering is a great way to get more involved with PHRMA and the local community.
When I reflect on the many valuable benefits of being a PHRMA member, I am encouraged the organization offers the tools and resources I need to be a successful HR practitioner. If you have questions on any of the PHRMA member benefits, please contact me or any Board member.
Meet the Board – Marci Stafford
By · CommentsI remember attending my first PHRMA ‘luncheon’ four years ago (it was actually a breakfast that month). I had chosen a table near the front, and was seated with several board members, including the president elect and programs co-directors. I remember them all as very welcoming, down to earth, business-oriented professionals. The presentation had been interesting and informative, but what I remember more was coming home and telling my husband how comfortable I’d felt with the PHRMA folks I’d met. I joined PHRMA that month.
I joined PHRMA’s Board of Directors two years later by answering an ad in the weekly E-Newsletter that asked for help with the newsletter and website. In January 2011 I began my current position on the board as Secretary/ Communications Director.
In my day job, I work for the Employee Assistance Program at Optum as one of its management consultants. We offer guidance and support to employers when their employees’ behavioral health issues have impacted the workplace, assess and refer employees to appropriate care, monitor their progress and coordinate their return to work upon completion.
Outside work, I love spending time with my husband, Carter and almost teenage son, Nathan, and our 4 year old black Labrador, Finbar. I also love spending way too much time and money in bookstores. But enough about me.
The PHRMA Board Secretary is primarily responsible for providing information about what’s happening in the chapter, to the chapter membership and others. Currently, we have several communication channels to accomplish this:
Weekly E-News: Our free email newsletter is sent to subscribers every Wednesday at Noon. It highlights all upcoming PHRMA events including the monthly luncheon topic, special interest group (SIG) meetings, and PHRMA sponsored events like the HR Leadership Awards this month. The E-News also publishes events for our PHRMA partners, like Oregon ODN and ASTD, because PHRMA members can attend these events at the discounted rate for members. If you aren’t an E-News subscriber, you can sign up on our website.
Website: Our website provides comprehensive information about what PHRMA is and does, including our Calendar of Events to register for chapter meetings and SIGs, our current and previous monthly newsletters (News and Views) , how to advertise with PHRMA, information about our SPHR/PHR study groups, a job bank, our blog, resumes from our student chapter, and much, much more. This year we’ll be upgrading our website to add new features and improve access to information.
News & Views: This is our monthly newsletter which is posted on our website and also linked to the weekly E-News.
LinkedIn Group: PHRMA membership is not necessary to join our group on LinkedIn. We welcome discussions and events of interest to the local HR community, and encourage you to share yours by joining the group and posting.
Serving on the PHRMA Board has been a very rewarding and educational experience for me. I began last January not knowing a thing about HTML or maintaining a website and now…….this is what I do, and I am still learning.
I feel very fortunate to work with such a dedicated and hard-working team of professionals. The Secretary is a two-year, executive board position with a significant time investment initially. I am very grateful this year to have our new Commuications Chair, Glenna Davis, to assist me. If you’d like to learn more about PHRMA, about serving as a volunteer board member, or have an event to share, please feel free to contact me at secretary@portlandhrma.org
Marci Stafford
PSU Sponsors HR Internships, Spring 2012
By · CommentsPortland State will again be sponsoring Human Resources Management (HRM) internships in Spring 2012.
Dates: April 2nd – June 8th (ten weeks); 12 hrs/wk in 2-3 sessions (paid internships can be longer than 12 weeks)
Paid Internships are preferred: $12-$18/hr
Please consider working with a PSU graduating senior in HRM, who are also members of the PSU NHRMA/SHRM Student Chapter. They have learned all the HRM basics and will be able to perform significant tasks, not merely data entry or clerical.
Job descriptions from interested employers will be collected and distributed to the students. Concurrently, skills inventories will be collected from the students and provided to employers. Employers will interview and choose the student(s).
If interested, or if you would like more information, please contact Alan Cabelly no later than
March 5th: alanc@sba.pdx.edu; or call 503-250-3758.
Come celebrate the 2012 HR Leadership Awards!
By · CommentsPHRMA is proud to sponsor
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Hilton Hotel, Grand Ballroom
Portland, OR
11:30am – 1:00pm
Tickets are $60 or table of 8 for $550 – Register here.
Price increases and no refunds after February 29
Come celebrate excellence and innovation in Human Resources and find out who won in each of the company categories!
This award recognizes excellence and innovation in HR leadership in small to large businesses. Nominees will be measured by innovative approach, ethical practices, leadership track record, and impact on their organizations.
For more info contact Jan: jschierbaum@bizjournals.com;503.219.3423 or check out PHRMA’s calendar of events.
