Media Event: Attending the Midwest Lotus User Group MWLUG Conference in Cleveland, Ohio!

I am currently in lovely Cleveland, Ohio just soaking in all the knowledge from the experts that are presenting great topics & hands on workshops here at the MWLUG Conference! We got here early this morning at 2:30AM, Cleveland time, driving almost 7.5 hours from Milwaukee, Wisconsin! It was a smooth drive on Interstate 80/90 East. As I mentioned in my earlier posts, I am staying at the Hilton Garden Inn in Downtown. We were first given a room on the seventh floor and when we were walking down the hallway, I smelled cigarette smoke. When I walked into my room, I was surprised to find an ashtray and room reeked of more smoke. So, I called the front desk and they told me I was on the smoking floor!! I just assumed that they would have all my preferences noted (made reservations online), but apparently not. The front desk receptionist was kind enough to move us to the 11th floor promptly and get us new key cards and boy was I glad to get another room!! What a difference!!! The room is quite comfortable and I have a view of the freeway.
After barely about 4 hours of sleep after 7 some hours of driving, I feel a bit tired now. I woke up at 7:30AM EST and got ready to attend the 8AM breakfast & registration at the conference. They had a nice spread of fresh fruit, pastries, bagels with cream cheese, fresh fruit juices, coffee and tea! The opening general sessions were presented by Richard Moi, President of GRANITE Lotus User Group, Scot Rourke, oneCommunity, David Via, IBM and Kris Snyder, Vox Mobile.
I attended the Web Technologies Every Domino Developer Must Know session presented by Brandt Fundak, Olympic Steel and Introduction to XPages session presented by David Leedy, Notes in 9. After lunch & some much needed rest, I attended a 2 hour workshop on Building your first XPages application with Roy Rumaner & Michael MacGarel! Hence, today was totally packed with lots of exciting new material for me and I am looking forward to tomorrow's sessions!

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Media Event: The Presidential fundraiser event was WONDERFUL!!!

Today, I had an interesting opportunity to attend a Democratic fundraiser event for Mayor Tom Barrett at which President Barack Obama was speaking. This was a private event not open to the public. We were seated at table #2, very up close and personal to the podium. The lunch was delicious and included a pasta salad, grilled chicken, and a yummy caramel apple pie! Mayor Tom Barrett took to the podium first, welcomed everyone and spoke briefly. He then introduced the next speaker, President Barack Obama! I have not had the opportunity to see and hear the President in person, and it was amazing! The highlight for me was to be able to shake his hand at the end of his speech and for him to ask me "so how are you?". That sums up this post for today! To hear his speech and schedule at Milwaukee, visit these links:
Presidential visit in Milwaukee, WI
For others that are reading my blog that have also attended this event today, feel free to share your thoughts below.

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Media Event: Attending a fundraiser event for Mayor Tom Barrett

The President of the United States of America is in Milwaukee, Wisconsin today and I will be attending an event in which he will be speaking! It is such a privelege to have such an opportunity. I will be representing my company at the event.

Thank You iCare! To learn more about the President's schedule in Milwaukee today, check this schedule.  I hope to have photos later in the day.

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Media Event: MWLUG Conference Attendees get 50% off on IBM Certification Exams!!

This is latest from the MWLUG 2010 Conference that is coming up later this week. All attendees will receive a voucher for 50% off their certification exams from IBM!! Just in time for me to take advantage of this offer to take my recertification for 8.x!!
You can check out the details here: IBM Exam Certification Discount Vouchers

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Video: American Teens & Social Media

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Blog Updates: New feature- A Job Board!

I am pleased to announce my newest service to all my blog readers-- a job board feature powered by Job*a*matic, a Simply Hired career management service!  The job board is called "Get me hired now!".  Job seekers are able to browse through all available jobs in Wisconsin, search for a specific job by keywords, and also see the most recently posted jobs on the site.  Employers and recruiters can post jobs on this site for a small monthly subscription fee.  I would love to hear your feedback on this new career management feature! Please post your comments below.

Also, if you would like to get help in setting up a job board service for your blog, drop me a line below.  Hope everyone is enjoying their weekend so far!

Get me hired NOW!

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Media Event: Department of Workforce Development DWD - Reemployment Services Session

Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development Website

Today, I was invited to attend and participate in a 2 hour session from the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development's Reemployment Services.  RES is an important program that has proven effective in helping job seekers.  This program was made possible through a DOL grant.  For those of you interested in learning about this program, view this PowerPoint presentation.  The letter I received mandated me to attend it and that I was randomly chosen due to my layoff in 2009.  I also had to take a survey and create a candiate profile on the Job Center of Wisconsin before the session.  I found out that it did not matter that I am currently employed.  They are offering this as a useful resource to everyone that has been, is, or will become unemployed. I am glad I attended, as I found a lot of great information at the event!  The session was held in the MATC, Mequon location at 5555 W. Highland Ave. on the West Campus. I had to sign in and then received a bright pink parking permit to put inside the dash of my car. The receptionist informed me I can use the same permit for future events I attend at that DWD Center.  There were atleast 10-15 other attendees today.  We were escorted by Mr. Ken Moravec, our RES coach to a classroom down the hallway.  We received helpful handouts on resources that are available through DWD, local networking groups, calendar of events for training, career workshops etc. It was all very useful information.  Ken presented our orientation session offering various helpful resources that are available, interviewing tips, networking events, career workshops, and the National Career Readiness Certificate Program (NCRC Certification Program). I will be doing more research on this in the upcoming weeks to see if that is something I might be interested in acheiving for my jobskills portfolio. Overall, it was a very helpful session.  I picked up a lot of good resources from the center.  If my blog readers are interested, I can blog about topics of interest such as: networking for job seekers, dress for success, job resources for persons with disabilities, How to get started on LinkedIn, how to setup a blog and use it as a tool for your job search etc.
If you are interested, leave a comment below with your topic of interest and I will queue up my posts per your requests.

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