Open Forum Discussion

Hello Everyone,
The agenda for this Friday's Hopkinton Networkers Group (HNG) meeting will be an Open Forum Discussion. The facilitator for this week will be William Lam. We will devote the first hour, from 10 to 11 AM to the following agenda: Welcome, Landings, Announcements, New Member Intros, and Needs & Leads. Important Note: We are going to start the meeting on time at 10:00 AM. In the second hour, an "Open Forum Discussion on Various Topics" will occur.

If anyone wants to bring in any "goodies" to share, since being close to Christmas, then please do so.

Open Forum Discussion

For those attending, the following topics will be prioritized to see which gets discussed first:
- Network:
On telephone
Face-to-face: buddy groups
Social media: Facebook, LinkedIn, Tweeter, etc.
- Resume and Cover letters
- Interview questions
- Cold calling
- Positive attitude:
Emotion and mindset
Getting started in the morning
- Dealing / handling rejections
- Communicating effectively:
Toastmasters
Value statement as presented by Stuart Papp
Elevator speech: 15, 30, and 60 second speech
- Money management
Health insurance cost
Unemployment checks running out
- Other income
eBay
Survival jobs: part / full time
- Recruiters: one-night-stand types versus long-term relationship ones
- Hiring managers: What do they want?

Two landings:
George Kocyan Started December 9th at SanDisk; 50 minute commute
Jeff Beauchaine Starting in January at Comnet

We had a speaker Kevin Kopec who talked about "Understanding You Training Options." Here is what he covered:
- Why is the Training so important?
- Choose Your Method of Training
- What to look for when choosing a Training Provider
- Ways to Fund Training
- New England - State Career Centers
- Self Fund
- Vendor Payment Plans
- Training Proposal – Get Started
- The Jargon working with Career Centers
- How Long Does it Take to get approved?

Schedule for HNG Meetings:

January 3, 2014 Ed Yee + Panel Tax Details

General Information

The networking group meets in Hopkinton, at St. John the Evangelist Church parish hall. The meeting occurs, from 10 to 12 noon, and will meet the first and third Friday of the month. The parish hall has a capacity for 250 people and there is plenty of parking spaces in the parking lot and on the street. Around the perimeter of the parish hall are rooms to allow us to have focused network groups or for any other purpose we need. We chose the first and third Friday to allow everyone to attend the Acton Networking Group or any other networking group, if they wanted, on the Friday we do not meet.

We will maintain our close affiliation with Acton Networkers by using the same list-server to share information between the groups. Any e-mails specific to the Hopkinton Networking Group (HNG) will be indicated in the subject line either by "Hopkinton Networking Group" or "HNG"; this way anyone attending these meetings will know the e-mail is intended for them.

We will follow the following agenda items:
* Welcome
* Landings (with doughnuts)
* Announcements
* New member introductions
* Needs and Leads
* Speaker(s), Workshop, or Focus Group
* Cleanup

For those new members who give their introductions, this is what we would like to know:
* Name
* Skills and Value Statement
* Where have you been?
* Where are you going?
* Your title
* Your target companies
* Geography of search
* Name and e-mail address

If anyone wants to join our team, please let one of us know; we could always use the extra help and input for ideas.

Directions:
Take Rt. 495 North/South and get off Exit 21A. Go through three traffic lights. Colella's Supermarket is on the right at the third traffic light. The first street after the third traffic light is Church Street, take a right turn. The church is on the right. Go around to the left of the parking lot and go into the side entrance of the parish hall.

Depending upon where you live, perhaps you may want to use Mapquest for a more direct route. The address of the church is:
St. John the Evangelist
20 Church Street
Hopkinton, MA 01748

Regards,
Hopkinton Networkers Group (HNG) Coordinators:
MaryLou Fish marylouisefish@gmail.com
Ed Haddad ehaddadjr@verizon.net
Gil Krispien g.krispien@verizon.net
William Lam wmlam508@yahoo.com
Salpi Sarafian ssarafian@rcn.com
Laura Startzenbach laura.startzenbach@gmail.com