Staff Advisory Team Meeting Notes September 2, 2009

Staff Advisory Team Meeting
Wednesday, September 2, 2009

In attendance: Gail, Edy, Trinidad, Rachel, Rafael, Devin, Amy McGill

Rachel Christopherson opened the meeting by recapping our initiatives:

Three Main Themes:
Professional Development • Outlook Training • Excel Training
Communication • Pre-Orientation Orientation (org chart for the new structure, what is new on campus); Email blast with org chart attachment, where to send students for what and one page department phone list; student “Things To Do Early”; banner updates; • Monthly Department Open House (50 dollar budget and take suggested months); leave timing up to them, get top 3 preferred months; each SAT member contacts their former department • First Friday Lunch beginning in October (Outside Holland Center or Samson Ctr) • Rotate responsibility for advertising etc.

Resources • Local Discounts (wellness discount) Blog • New Staff Orientation • Benefits

AMY RESPONSE/QA (Q&A paraphrased):

Amy McGill: Hold off on anything that is benefit related, because that will be changing shortly with the Middlebury merger. There is a group at Midd that looks at benefits, hopefully their will be some representation from MIIS with this group.
The SAT could be very helpful in communicating what these benefits are so that we can inform the MIIS community.
We will likely have an open enrollment in late September/October, and then another one in January for the Midd benefits.

SAT Question: How should we deliver the executive summary?

AM: We should share with presidents staff and presidents council.

SAT: What is the deal with our Budget?

AM: It is likely that there is an ongoing budget number, it is just a question of how much.

SAT: What would be the most effective way to summarize this information?

AM: Keep it to a page, and if you have any graphics that would be ideal. Focus on the initiatives, not necessarily the problems.

SAT: Could we post interviews of staff members on the blog?

AM: Absolutely.

COMMENTS/DISCUSSION:
AM: A bit on the new staff orientation piece. There just aren’t resources to do a comprehensive orientation. Lets try to own this process a community, to supplement what HR is doing. By pooling our resources we can come up with something really great.

AM: Invite Jason Warburg to a meeting about communications in general.

AM: We got an increase in HR for Staff Development Projects. This budget is more for group stuff, as opposed to sending individuals for specific trainings.

RACHEL: There has been much of discussion has surrounded customer service. Is this a good area to pursuse?
AM: Yes, absolutely.

TRINIDAD: Should we only focus on staff? Or can we expand to faculty too?
AM: If there is no particular constraint, than why not be open to the greater community?
TRINIDAD: That isn’t exactly my point. Let me try again: from the staff perspective, would opening everything up, make our group appear like we aren’t really addressing the staff, but the whole community.
AM: If your focus is on what the staff has brought to you, and you’re addressing it, than you really are representing the staff.

AM: Just to go back to Outlook and Excel training, is there anyway that anyone could help with that? Could we create the type of culture where the trainees become the trainers.
RAFAEL: The SAT should go first. We should be the trainers
TRINIDAD: The real issue is room.
AM: Well, we could do it in offices, with 2-3 people in the room.
TRINIDAD: Elluminate will also be a good medium for these trainings.
AM: we are going to have another training issue with the website update strategy.

GAIL: A proposal from another staff member was about an information session regarding staff tuition benefits. How should we go forward with something about that?
AM: What about having an HR coffee break. Where every month there would be a 15-20 minute discussion about a particular benefit or issue.
RACHEL: Perhaps we could pay for the coffee.

ACTION ITEMS:
Invite Jason Warburg for a meeting on communication. Eventually he will be managing the website and MIIS@WORK. Jason is currently working on a channel guide to clarify where someone goes for what.

Schedule of next Meeting: September 16th at 330pm in the IT training room. Will discuss Brown Bag Lunch Schedule (Kenley for October, Rachel for November), Train the trainers Excel sessions for the SAT and other initiatives, as well as the Warburg meeting.

Approach your departments with $50 Open House. Go in person, explain it and get dates from that person. The list of departments is on the shared document