NSA Virginia

NSA Communicator

A Newsletter for NSA Virginia

December 2012

In This Issue
Presidents Remarks
Watch Out for the Vernacular
NSA VA Notables
Tools of the Trade
Be a NSA VA Sponsor
Save the Date: Upcoming Events
2013 NSA Virginia Board
Quick Links
 

 

Newsletter Coordinator:

We appreciate any comments, article submissions and other ideas.

This Month in NSA Virginia: 

Be our GUEST at the 2012 Holiday Party

Don't miss this much anticipated event!

 

This FREE event will be held at the home of NSA Virginia Chapter President, Pam Rambo in beautiful Governor's Land:

Friday December 14, 2012

4pm-9pm

3101 Parkside Lane
Williamsburg, VA 23185

 

Chapter Members and Guests will enjoy tastes of the holiday while visiting with friends and associates.  There will be a great opportunity for photos with a professional photographer on site for anyone wanting to update their marketing package. This is a special price of $40 extended only to NSA members! And whether you are naughty or nice, there will be a special appeareance from Santa Applause!

 

So drop in and enjoy bidding on silent auction items which will raise money for the NSA VA Chapter. If you have an item You would like to donate, please contact:  Barb Upchurch @ [email protected] 

Here is a SNEEK PEEK at what has been donated so far:

 

Barb's Marketing Boot Camp

Weekend Getaway to the Blue Ridge Mountains at Jim Gordon's

Lori Hobson's Book- Momma Sayings

Nancy Giere's hand made Jewelry

Mary Foley's Book, Polish and More

Shirley T Burke is offering two hours of consulting and one FREE NSA meeting

Tom Davidson donated some Bubbly

Joan Bowling is offering Silpada Jewelry

An hour long make-up session and autographed book by Susie Galvez

Do It Well, Make It Fun - written by Ron Culberson

David Newman's Speaker Marketing Tool Kit (a $1500 value!)

Julie Morrison Write Your Book NOW! One hour session - Become a Published & Profitable Author in 90 Days or Less!

Pam Rambo is donating a Williamsburg Sampler holiday basket filled with holiday goodies and wine.

Dorothy Erlanger has some super chic scarfs on offer, one Ferragamo!

 

 Many thanks to the chapter members and supporters who have donated these awesome items for auction!

 

There is no cost to attend this event, however please take a moment to RSVP CLICK HERE!

 

There is a special rate at the Crowne Plaza of $72 for people attending the Dec 14 Holiday Party.Call 757-220-2250 to make reservations and ask for the NSA Virginia Rate!

Presidents Remarks:

Pam Rambo, Ed.D

NSA VA President 2012-13

 

November was a busy month at NSA Virginia. Executive Board members including Shirley T. Burke and Jim Gordon completed our annual IRS 990 and State Corporation Commission reporting while others prepared for our November workshop with Ed Tate and Barb Upchurch rounded up silent auction items for the big holiday party December 14 in Williamsburg.

 

Our November meeting in Norfolk had excellent attendance including people from as far away as Northern Virginia and visitors from other organizations including Pete Moyer, District 66 Governor of Toastmasters International. Ed Tate, CSP conducted an outstanding workshop that that taught us story telling formulas and provided the opportunity to practice story telling.

 

Our NSA Va Academy Mentor class attended a seminar at ODU taught by former NSA Va President, Cathy Lewis, where they learned about all things media including how to book media appearances and get invited for return interviews.

 

Halfway across the country, Jim Gordon was making his mark on NSA at the NSA Chapter Leadership Institute at NSA Headquarter in Tempe, Arizona. Jim met with other NSA chapter presidents for 2013-14, current and past national officers and chapter liaison representatives to prepare for his year as NSA President which begins in June, 2013. We are looking forward to a great year under his leadership.

I am thankful for the work of our 2012-13 Board Team. Their professional skills, creativity, spirit and love of our organization is evident in their hard work.

  • The membership work of Joan Bowling and the outreach efforts of our regional teams including Cathy Lewis, Barb Upchurch and Lori Hobson have increased the number of people who are benefitting from our monthly workshops.
  •  Liz Garrett's work on sponsorship of our meetings is helping us keep member costs low and providing an opportunity for our members and outside businesses to promote products and services to our members.
  • Shirley T. Burke keeps our bills paid and manages our finances so that we can continue to serve our members and move our organization forward.
  • John Lewis has been hard at work on our vision and strategic plan to help us accomplish our Goals for 2012-13 and develop a plan for the future of our organization.
  • Nancy Giere is helping us keep good records of our meetings and has helped guide our new after meeting PEG meetings and will be helping us with some of our Toastmaster liaison work.
  • Dave Miles is finding new ways each month to promote our organization and our members while Jayme Miles gives critical support to our newsletter effort. If you have not already told Dave and Jayme about news from your business, please do so. We want to brag about you.
  • Kittygayle McMoon has re-organized our NSA Va CD library and is diligently getting CD's back that we have borrowed to keep them in circulation so that our members can continue to learn and grow.
  • Other members of the board are helping in many ways. Gloria Thomas is giving support to the Academy Mentor Program and providing much needed historical perspective to the board. Ron Chapman and Winston Bersch have worked behind the scenes to help the Academy Mentor program become a reality. Jim Gordon, Hope Mihalap, Jerry Teplitz and Cathy Lewis are official mentors this year for the NSA Va Academy Mentor class.

In addition to the work of board members, there are past presidents like Tom Davidson , Dorothy Erlanger, Harold Wood, Sandy Dumont, Jerry Teplitz, Hope Mihalap and others who regularly support the current board and organization in critical ways to insure our success.

 

The best thing about our members and leaders present and past is that they are enormously enjoyable people and great fun to be around. Make time in your busy holiday schedule to join us at the holiday party on December 14 at 3101 Parkside Lane in Williamsburg from 5 pm to 9 pm. The registration form for this free event includes a place for you to register yourself and your guest and sign up for a time to have your photo made. Barb Upchurch and Jim Gordon will be working with Jennifer Morrone to circulate the silent auction items that will be up for grabs at the party and which wer donated by NSA members from our chapter as well as those from NSA members all over the country. Our Chapter Liaison, Greg Williams, secured amazing not to miss items for the silent auction at our holiday party.

 

Mark your calendar to join your NSA Va friends at the holiday celebration. We look forward to seeing you and your guest!

 

 Watch Out for the Vernacular 

By Dick Olenych, NSA VA Guest Columnist

 

 

Sometimes I like using words that garnish a bit of attention. But I've got to be careful because I can trip over my own vernaculars. Doesn't everyone?

 

By the way, what is vernacular?

 

A nurse recently told me about an argot that almost got her in trouble. I guess a patient was reading his hospital file. Patients really aren't supposed to be reading those reports. They are just for the professional staff. But he did read it. And he did become quite indignant.

 

He thought the staff was unprofessional and demanded to be moved to another hospital immediately. The staff didn't know that he had read it, so they couldn't understand what was going on.

 

The patient's file read something like this: "Mr. Smith - 9:42 pm - complained - SOB"

 

Mr. Smith just could not tolerate this insult. How could an organization that was

supposed to be so dedicated to the welfare of others write such things?

After the incident, the hospital changed its colloquial speech.

 

In another example, my bride is a teacher and her school will soon be preparing for the SOL testing. Personally, in this economy, I don't need any tests that teach me how to be SOL.

 

I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed, so maybe I'm missing something - but being SOL is plenty clear to me.

 

I know it's an old argument, but why? Why would our state name a learning program SOL?

 

It's kind of funny though, until I have to explain it to my out-of-state friends. They don't get it.

 

Years ago I was a Hobart technician - I washed dishes in a restaurant. Now there's an industry with a ton of idioms. Why would anyone "86" anything. What is 86?

 

How about, "...sling that hash, hold the road kill." Who makes up this stuff?

"Yeah, give me a little varmint with those taters, will ya?"

 

We should all look at what we say and how we say it.

 

Recently, a customer came back to me and said, "Dick, Katy and I walked out of your print shop and we really didn't have any idea what you and Pete were talking about."

 

My heart sank. You see, a week earlier Pete and I had spent an hour with Madonna and Katy. We were brainstorming on design ideas. I thought it had gone pretty well. Everything seemed positive.

 

For crying out loud, I'm a professional speaker! I'm supposed to be a good orator. I am supposed to say words that others understand. It's called communication.

 

I just couldn't believe my ears when she said that. She must have seen my skin go white or my eyes pop because she quickly added, "It's OK, we knew that you knew what we wanted."

 

Is it OK to use jargon that doesn't make sense to our customers? I don't think so.

I'm going to make a stand of sorts, until my wife tells me to give it up. I will stand by the notion that less is more. That simple is best.

 

No more dialectal words or urbane phrases.

 

By the way, the patient, Mr. Smith, was complaining of Shortness Of Breath.

 

Dick Olenych owns Spectrum Printing in Virginia Beach, Va., and is the author of the business novels, Joe Sails and the ladder part of our lives. He's a member of the Virginia Chapter of the National Speakers Association. He can be reached at [email protected] .

NSA Virginia Notables

HIGHLIGHTING OUR MEMBERS

By Dave Miles, NSA VA Publicity Chair

  

 This month, I would like to highlight one of our members and ProTrack alumni, Dr. John Lewis, who recently added an important addition to his resume along with emphasizing the importance of networking with your fellow NSA members and knowing what their specialties are.

 

John Lewis, Ed.D. recently spoke at the Canadian Society for Training and Development (CSTD) annual conference in Toronto. His 90-minute "Thought Leader" presentation was on the topic called "The Explanation Age," which was followed by a book-signing event where John signed and discussed his book, also titled "The Explanation Age." This is a topic for those in the Knowledge Management and Organizational Learning fields who are interested in new business methods for innovation and productivity that move us beyond the Information Age. As John says, "We have enough information, thank-you."

 

In addition to business consulting, and teaching a master's course in organizational learning, John is serving on the NSA Virginia board this year to head-up the strategic planning effort. From the recent survey he sent out to our members, he noticed that one of the things we really like about NSA Virginia is the ability to network with other speakers. And this is for a good reason - networking is how John landed the speaking engagement in Toronto. He met someone in an academic setting in D.C. over a year ago, who was asked to help find a speaker for this conference.

 

So let's continue to network with our fellow NSA Virginia members, so that we will know who to call when the right opportunity arrives. It may just be the opportunity you have been looking for. In John's case, he has completed another goal he humorously adds to his title: International Speaker.

Tools of the Trade

By Dave Miles, NSA VA Publicity Chair

  

This month with the holidays upon us, I wanted to take a bit of different approach to the 'Tools of the Trade' segment this month and search online for some interesting things that you can use online to help enhance your presentations. There were three things that piqued my interest that I wanted to share:

 

First, there is the 'Speakers Tool Kit' from Kathy Reiffenstein at www.andnowpresenting.us/speakers-tool-kit.html (just a little technical note - it took me quite a few clicks on this site to discover what "Kathy's" last name was). The tool kit is a list of links to helpful sites for speakers, here are a few:

Speaker Net News (www.SpeakerNetNews.com) - weekly newsletter for speakers.

American Rhetoric (www.AmericanRhetoric.com) - text/audio for over 5,000 speeches plus more.

Brainy Quote (www.BrainyQuote.com) - good reference source for quotes, search by author or topic.

Bartleby (www.Bartleby.com) - a searchable database for classical literature & contemporary titles.

Rhyme Zone (www.RhymeZone.com) - nice website to find out what rhymes with a word you may have in mind, or find synonyms, anonyms, and other rhetorical items of use.   Quite a selection.

History Channel's Famous Speeches in History (www.History.com/speeches) - another repository of famous speeches for your review.

World Wide Words (www.WorldWideWords.com) - an interesting site about the English language where you can find things like the origin of quite a few words, particularly interesting and unusual words. Might be one of the 'interesting facts' that you can add to your speech.

 

There are also things like the free dictionary, Thesaurus.com, and others but the site is worth bookmarking for a reference to these other sites which can help when you're composing your next keynote address or training workshop.

 

Next, was a white paper by Kathi Edwards entitled "Get Interactive! Ensure your Webinar Speakers Engage Their Learners". You can find it (without having to cough up your email address!) at http://bit.ly/webinarwhitepaper. The white paper is sponsored by KRM Information Services, which has a WebEx, GoToMeeting, BigMarker, etc. type of service but the information is applicable across all platforms. For speakers looking to do more and more online venues to increase revenue streams and decrease the potential for TSA pat-downs, the more you can learn about webinars the better.

 

Last for this month, I found out about an international speaker from Australia named Gihan Perera (www.GihanPerera.com) from watching a webinar hosted by Terry Brock. Terry, Gihan, and another speaker from Singapore (of which I cannot remember his name) were discussing global trends in the speaking business. I checked out Gihan's site afterwards and was quite impressed. His defining statement is "Leveraging Your Thought Leadership".  He specialized in two main things - helping you create content and marketing via the internet (blogs, website, social media, etc.). The content part is particularly interesting and what I wanted to highlight. Some of the items include: creating eBooks, print books, webinars, online courses, audio/video/slide presentations, as well as creating a paid membership site for your website. There are a lot of free podcasts, webinars, and resources there as well. Well worth checking out.

 

Hope you find a few of those items useful in your business and if you have any suggestions that you would like to recommend for a "Tools of the Trade" section, please forward them along to [email protected].

Thanks,
Dave
  

We Our NSA Workshop Sponsors!

By Liz Garrett, NSA VA Sponsor Chair

 
Workshop sponsors help keep our workshops affordable.  They increase the energy and involvment at the event.  They introduce us to new resources and opportunities.
 
Would you like to be a Workshop Sponsor to launch a new brand or service, or to let your colleagues know more about you?  Would you like to share this precious opportunity with one of your service providers, to give them a chance to impress our members?  Please do!  There are only a few sponsorshop opportunities remaining, so please email [email protected] immediately.

Workshop Sponsor benefits include:
*Two (noncompeting) per event
*exclusive right to put promotional materials and giveaways on guest tables in addition to speaker and NSA materials
*logo or company name projected on screen at meeting
*logo or company name published on email invitation and reminders, as well as event page of website
*sponsor receives 1 registration to workshop and display table at the event
*sponsor representative to be recognized at meeting (with introduction they provide)
*Can provide short article in newsletter (2 to 3 paragraphs)
Indicate your preference for Meeting Dates and Cities and we will try to accommodate (first come, first served).
14-Dec-12, Williamsburg, Holiday Party
18-Jan-13, Richmond, Speaking of Books, Blogs and Business, Monica Wofford, CSP One Spot Available 
15-Feb-13, Williamsburg, Putting Polish and Pizzazz in Your Next Presentation, Patrick Donadio, CSP
15-Mar-13, Norfolk, So You Think You Can Speak NSA VA Competition, (Members Only!)
19-Apr-13, Richmond, Speak Softly and Carry a Big Schitck, Mikki Williams, CSP 17-May-13, Williamsburg, Grow Your Business with the Growth Expert, Ed Robinson, CSP
21-Jun-13, Norfolk, Do it Well, Make it Fun and Laugh All the Way to the Bank, Ron Culberson, CSP and NSA President One Spot Available
SAVE THE DATE

       Please note: As we strive to have the highest caliber of speakers, with that comes last-minute changes at times. Therefore, speakers and topics are subject to change. Watch your email for details on these meetings. Registrations for these workshops will be open soon! 

 

View Photos From Past NSA Virginia Workshops 

2012 - 2013 Officers and Executive Board
 

LEADERSHIP TEAM

President- Pam Rambo
President-Elect- Jim Gordon
Immediate Past President- Coleen Kenny

Vice President- Ron Chapman
Secretary- Nancy Giere

Treasurer- Shirley T. Burke

Member at Large- Gloria Thomas

Member at Large for Planning- John Lewis

 

LOGISTICS TEAMS

 Chapter Growth:

Membership Chair- Joan Bowling
Hampton Roads Liaison- Cathy Lewis

Richmond Liaison- Barb Upchurch

Peninsula Liaison- Lori Hobson

Sponsorship- Liz Garrett
Publicity- Dave Miles

   Member Education:

ProTrack- Winston Bersch
Newsletter- Jayme Miles

Librarian- Kittygayle McMoon

 

CLICK HERE to VIEW their profiles and see contact information on the NSA Virginia Website.