Congratulations to these new members for joining our section. The Winnebago ASQ Section welcomes you to YOUR professional society!
Thank you and welcome aboard.

For the past 57 years Minnesota ASQ has been privileged to host an annual quality conference providing training and education.  This year, in recognition of the forces of change, the voice of our customers, and our new vision and mission, we are transforming our annual quality conference to provide more value, better skills, and enhanced experiences. 

The theme of this year’s Professional Development Summit is “Creating Advantage in Today’s Challenging World.” 

We are expecting more than 250 attendees from Minnesota, Wisconsin, North Dakota, South Dakota and Iowa with backgrounds ranging from engineering to customer service to management working in industries as diverse manufacturing, biomedical, defense, retail, technology, banking, and healthcare. 

When:  Monday, April 2nd and Tuesday April 3rd
Where: Earle Brown Heritage Center, Brooklyn Park, MN

Tracks:

Leadership Track:  Including, but not limited to: organizational culture, influence management, resistance to change, managerial skills, communication skills, building trust, building a quality culture.
Technical Track:  Quality tools, techniques and skills - focused on those new to quality or established professionals - or somewhere in between.
Case Study Track:  Case studies to showcase successful application of skills. 
Future of Quality Track:  Showcase for new developments, trends or responding to the forces of change shaping quality including globalization, innovation, global responsibility, technology, the rate of change, consumer awareness, or aging population.
Job Survival Track:  Networking, certification, guerilla job search, resume development, interviewing, marketing, positioning and the like.

Sessions may be one hour, half day (3 hours) or full day (6.5 hours)

For general questions about this year’s event, please email summit@mnasq.org.

By Jaime Leick

The Great Recession took a lot out of us.  The good news: recovery is on its way.  The bad news: your employees are gonna jump ship when it gets here.  In August 2009, financial advisory firm Deloitte dubbed the situation a looming “resume tsunami” and warned that employers should act now to retain top talent.

It happens after every recession.  After months (or years) of belt-tightening and anxiety, employees look elsewhere for job satisfaction.  They’re often frustrated by pay cuts or seeking greater job security.  Resentment runs particularly high in workplaces where employees were asked to put in extra hours to make up for staffing shortages. 

“There’s a general understanding in the industry that as things loosen up, the employee that may have been put in a difficult situation in terms of having lost resources or lost opportunities will be more open to new [positions],” said Cliff Bowers, vice president and co-owner of Management Recruiters of Green Bay.

For employers who have already whittled their staff down to a core team of top performers, the reality could be especially harsh.  The best employees are also the most mobile.  As one Deloitte report put it, “Instead of celebrating the upturn, many corporate leaders may well face a new problem: replacing lost employees as the economy kicks into gear and talent is once again a scarce commodity.”

According to a December 2010 Right Management survey, 84% of employees plan to search for a new job in 2011.  And according to CNNMoney, economists are forecasting 2.5 million jobs will be added to the U.S. economy this year.  That would be the best one-year hiring gain since 1999.

Scared yet?  Looks like the resume tsunami Deloitte predicted is just about upon us.  Kramer Rock, owner of Temployment in Green Bay, has worked in the staffing industry for 30 years and is hesitant to believe we’ll see massive waves of turnover locally.  He suggests workers in the Midwest will be more understanding and more loyal.  However, he said, “Any employing entities that don’t try to share the wealth when things turn around will be quickly slapped in the face.”

As for Bowers, he says organizations were already hiring—sort of.  Companies were “top grading.”   “That means employers are bringing in higher quality employees to replace lower performing employees in their organization,” Bowers said.  All the more reason employers should be concerned about retaining their best and brightest.

"There is no denying this environment has been tough for both employers and workers,” said Jesse Harriott, Monster senior vice president in a press release,  “but the resentment workers have built should be cause for concern for employers, particularly if they have had to impose longer hours, lower pay, decreased benefits or have become a less flexible workplace."  

Bowers said it’s never too early for employers to start thinking about retention:  “They have to ask themselves, ‘Have I created an environment in which our best people are going to want to stay? And if not, can I fix it?’”

Deloitte identified workplace flexibility as one of the top three retention strategies (along with compensation and benefits).  Given that salary increases are at their lowest level in 33 years and few employers will be in a position to turn that around just yet, offering greater scheduling flexibility may be the retention tool of choice.

“Most employers know it’s not always about money,” Bowers said.  “The quality of the culture, the communication that’s taking place—it’s all those elements that make good employers stand out.”

Portions of this article originally printed in The Business News and Life Meets Work. Used with permission.

There is help from ASQ for payment of your membership dues if you are unemployed or retired.

If you are unemployed, you can receive a discount on your membership dues.  You may submit the application form only after 90 days of unemployment if certain criteria are met.  You must be a Full, Senior or Fellow member and actively seeking employment. 

If you have been an ASQ member for over 10 consecutive years, you are also eligible for a discount on your dues when you fully retire.  The application can be submitted if you are completely retired and meet all other criteria.  This help does not apply if you are working part-time or consulting. 

For more information:
·   Log in to My ASQ
·   Go to "Manage My Account"
·   Click on "Dues Programs" at the bottom of the page

Download the Unemployement Program Application (PDF format, 58 KB)

Visit the ASQ Learning Institute™ and set up your profile now!

The ASQ Learning Institute™ Is Now Live - Learn Skills That Will Help Make Your World Better

Quality: The Cause of Good Things in the World
Quality techniques from ASQ enable doctors like Dr. Manu Vora, an ASQ Fellow - and the Blind Foundation for India, which he co-founded-to help cure and prevent blindness for approximately 90,000 people in India.   "The quality discipline has helped us manage the foundation from the beginning," said Vora. "By implementing the PDSA model at BFI, we were able to hit the ground running."   Using the plan, do, study, act cycle, a basic quality tool, Vora also played a major part in providing vaccinations and vitamin A to tens of thousands of children in India. 

With your ASQ membership, you belong to an organization of continuous learning and improvement, making quality the cause of good things in our world. 

Primary Benefits of the ASQ Learning Institute™:
The ASQ Learning Institute™ will help you to plan, manage, schedule, and track ALL of your professional development needs anywhere in the world while guaranteeing the same high-quality training and instructors you expect from ASQ.

The ASQ Learning Institute™ allows you to create a user profile so you can build your learning plan, track your success, and boost your career-all starting today.

Tools of the ASQ Learning Institute™
These tools are available to Full, Senior, Honorary, and Fellow members now:

• ASQ Course (Learning) Catalog - Compiles a list of available training, including instructor-led, online, and document-based training. Allows users to browse and locate catalogs very quickly by subject areas or calendar date.
• ASQ Learning Institute™ Calendar - Provides a clear view of all the professional development opportunities over an 18-month period. The calendar allows users to view upcoming learning offerings that include all courses, seminars, and conferences in multiple modalities.
• Learning History - Displays the entire history of learning events for a learner-including components assigned and completed. The learning history can be thought of as the learner's "transcript."
• Competency Assessment - Provides a structured list of knowledge, skills, and abilities that serves as a foundation for users to map the level of competencies needed for various job functions.
• Career Planner - The Career Planner helps you manage your career by mapping your future career path and assessing the difference between your current abilities and the abilities (called competencies) required for the job to which you ultimately aspire to.
• Learning Plans - This personalized plan provides a detailed description of user activities to help learners achieve their education goals. The learning plan can be thought of as the "to do" list.

Visit the ASQ Learning Institute™ and set up your profile now!   
ASQ Learning Institute™ - Anywhere, Everywhere. It's All About You.