3 ways to fix those meetings

Tseen Khoo's avatarThe Research Whisperer

[Image origin unknown] [Image origin unknown] Every academic I know loathes meetings. Loathes them.

They view meetings as obstacles to (rather than elements of) work, wasted time, forced upon them, and – even worse – as forums for awful colleagues to showcase their awfulness.

Having attended many meetings in my academic and other professional lives, I can’t rally much of a defence for meetings. They are the bane of many working lives, academic or not.

Now, I’m not talking in this post about getting together with collaborators, new colleagues, or catching up with buddies under the guise of ‘meetings’. These could turn out badly, but they’re more likely to be energising and fun events. And they’re often by choice.

However, no-one’s ever said that of the majority of work meetings, particularly those regular committee and staff ones.

Some of the meetings I’ve enjoyed the most are the ones I don’t attend. They’re the ones being livetweeted (or…

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The Download for June 7

Fall 2015 Internship Opportunity: Advertising/Marketing Communication Intern, Morrison Senior Living, Atlanta

Morrison Senior Living, a member of Compass Group, currently has an exciting opportunity for an Advertising/MarComm Intern to work out of our Atlanta Support Center. The Communications Intern would report to our Communications Manager.

This is a paid position and would require 15-20 hours/week. 

Candidates should meet the following criteria:

• Familiarity with SharePoint 2013
• Vast knowledge of social media
• Vast knowledge of PowerPoint
• Knowledge of Adobe, Photoshop and other design programs
• Knowledge of Constant Contact and MailChimp
• Familiarity with marketing and communication collateral, such as
press releases and product cut sheets

Qualifications:

  • • Student can be an undergraduate junior and senior or a graduate student.
  • Enrolled in Bachelors in PR/Communications, advertising or marketing

Interested candidates may submit resumes to dorimendel@iammorrison.com. Learn about Morrison Senior Living by visiting:www.morrisonseniorliving.com.

Labor/Community Strategy Center, Media Director, Los Angeles

Job Opening: LCSC Media Director

Position: Media Director

Supervisor: Eric Mann, Executive Director

Location: Los Angeles

The Labor/Community Strategy Center is hiring its first director of media relations. While it has had a strong in-house media tactical plan and substantial media victories, the organizing work has far outstripped the organization’s capacity to “get the word out” consistently and most effectively to the largest and most influential audiences-especially the national Black and Latino communities and international social movements.

The Strategy Center is a multiracial “think tank/act tank” for regional, national and international movement building, founded in 1989 and based in the 10 million-person world city of Los Angeles.

Our campaigns, projects, and publications are rooted in Black and Latino working class communities and address ‘the totality of urban life” with a view of the whole human being and community in a revolutionary relationship to society. Our primary focus is civil rights, environmental justice, public health, global warming, and the criminal legal system. We build consciousness, leadership, and organization among those who face discrimination and societal attack-Black and Latino high school students, bus riders, security guards, college students, women, immigrants, workers, LGBT people, youth, all of whom comprise our membership.

  • The Center is known for building “big picture campaigns” that make the link between the wars abroad and the war at home. We are also known as an organization that “fights to win” – we come out of the traditions of those who passed the 1964 Civil Rights Bill, organized in Mississippi, worked to end the war in Vietnam, fought for OSHA, the EPA, the Equal Rights Amendment, and nuclear arms treaties. In the past 25 years, some of the Center’s highest-profile victories include:The Campaign to Keep GM Van Nuys Open that forced General Motors to keep its Van Nuys assembly plant open for a full decade after it planned to close it, saving the jobs of 5,000 auto workers.
  • The Billions for Buses Campaign in which the Bus Riders Union, and Labor/Community Strategy Center, fought a landmark civil rights case in a powerful collaboration with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, grassroots organizing, a “no seat no fare” campaign, and federal court orders that won 2,500 new compressed natural gas buses, dramatic reductions in fares, 1 million hours of new service and yes, $2.7 billion for 500,0000 LA County Black, Latino, elderly, disabled bus riders.
  • The Community Rights Campaign, fighting the School to Prison Pipeline and the Mass Incarceration of Black and Latino communities has reversed L.A.’s “daytime curfew law” and stopped the Los Angeles School Police Department and LAPD from issuing 40,000 “truancy tickets” for low-income students and is challenging the entire “stop and frisk” policy in the schools, on the streets, and on the buses and trains of L.A.
    The Position

The Director will head up a comprehensive and multi-faceted media strategy and press campaigns to help secure victories, highlight accomplishments, build the organization, it’s political ideas, greater public recognition of its unique contributions, and strengthen the movement. Media work will include: social media strategy, placement and campaigns, media relations, publications promotions and increasing visibility of the organization’s director, and his books, publications, videos and weekly radio show “Voices from the Front Lines” as well as the visibility of other key Strategy Center leaders.

Ideal candidates must be passionate for racial and social justice, proactive and organized creative thinkers and skilled multitaskers who know how to utilize a range of communications tools to advance campaigns and build a movement.

Primary Responsibilities

  • Work with executive director and leadership team to execute communications plans, including a breakout and coordinated social media campaign, media relations, new media and membership communications.
  • Work to make the Strategy Center a major force in social media with great name and message recognition-on the ever expanding platforms-Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, and many others with a great emphasis on a Black and Latino youth and multi-generational audience-and key opinion makers who increasingly quote the Strategy Center as a source of frontlines theory and practice. Build an even stronger and more responsive email list with breakthroughs in measurable outcomes in terms of written responses, calls, attendance at rallies, letters to elected officials, visits to the office-ability to use email as a mobilizing tactic. Coordinate content for Strategy Center website.
  • Build on the director’s national media connections to further position him as a spokesperson for social justice issues on a wide variety of platforms. Build the profiles of 3 other key Strategy Center spokespeople.
  • Work with the director to syndicate Voices from the Frontlines-Your National Movement Building Show now broadcasting on Pacifica KPFK Los Angeles  www.voicesfromthefrontlines.com
  • Build the Center’s Frontline Press-an independent publishing house. Frontlines Press has published Eric Mann’s L.A.’s Lethal Air, Dispatches from Durban, Katrina’s Legacy, and Camino Para Progresistas (the Spanish Language edition of Playbook for Progressives: the 16 Qualities of the Successful Organizer published by Beacon Press). It will be doing a major new edition of Katrina’s Legacy on the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, exploring joint publishing ventures with commercial and online publishers, and publishing new authors such as the poems of recently deceased revolutionary Salvadorean Maria Guardado.
  • Expand upon and strengthen the organization’s relationships with key national publications including Counterpunch, Colorlines, Black Commentator, and the Nation.
  • Identify “newsworthy” components of organization’s work and develop media materials and messages. Initiate contact with and respond to inquiries from print, radio, and television journalists; pitch story ideas and provide information to generate positive media coverage; look for opportunities to insert the director and other key spokespeople into breaking news stories.
  • Expand upon the Center’s relationships with labor, political, immigration reporters and other key media, including African American and Latino press outlets. Review and place op-eds and written materials in newspapers and blogs.
  • Write news advisories, news releases, background pieces, fact sheets and other press materials for campaigns and initiatives; write, edit and produce clear, engaging, compelling publications.
  • Coordinate closely with the executive director to enhance Strategy Center fundraising efforts.

 Qualifications

The ideal candidate will have:

  • Three to five years of experience in media relations in labor, politics or advocacy organizations with strong social media skills
  • Experience in strategic media planning in a multi-faceted organization.
  • Experience in the creation of successful social media strategies and campaigns.
  • Demonstrated fluency in communicating in all formats and mediums; able to create strong press releases, message documents and communication materials.
  • Experience generating media coverage for policy issues and a track record of packaging ideas and pitching and placing stories in local and national media outlets, including online venues.
  • Excellent writing, speaking and analytic skills.
  • Enthusiastic support for the Strategy Center agenda and a strong commitment to our mission and vision; demonstrated commitment to racial, social and economic justice, and if possible, work with labor, low-wage and Black and Latino communities.
  • Strong work ethic and interpersonal skills, flexibility, creativity, curiosity, and a good team player.
  • Able to work with a strong director and take great initiative within clear political guidelines.

Strong salary and benefits package and the chance to grow with the organization.

Application Instructions:

Please email resume and cover letter to: Crystal@thestrategycenter.org

Job Opportunity: Press Secretary, 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, New York City

1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East is the largest, fastest-growing, most progressive healthcare union in the country, and we are looking for a Press Secretary to work out of our New York City office.

The members of 1199SEIU are driven by a mission to achieve quality healthcare and good jobs for all. If you want to work in a fast-paced, action-oriented environment, using the latest communications strategies to win social justice for working families, this job is for you.

Responsibilities

• Developing and executing both the New York region and national press strategies for the organization.
• Asserting the union’s role as a leading national voice for quality healthcare and good jobs.
• Developing short and long term press outreach plans.
• Working with communications staff in our other regions to optimize and coordinate our press strategies.
• Working with leaders and organizers to fulfill their press outreach needs around campaigns and union-wide mobilizations.
• Developing messaging and talking points on specific issues and for the organization as a whole.
• Training leaders, members and staff to be effective media spokespeople.
• Developing, maintaining and expanding the union’s media database.
• Writing and distributing press releases, op-eds and letters to the editor and making pitch calls.
• Forming strong working relationships with key reporters and editors.
• Ensuring the union and our issues have a strategic, consistent and powerful presence in the media.
• Beyond press relations, taking responsibility for coordinating whole communications campaigns, including planning and budgeting, writing literature and ads, etc.

Requirements

• Excellent ability to work closely with a team, accommodate requests from team members, and assimilate input from multiple sources.
• Excellent inter-personal skills, a positive, enthusiastic attitude and a commitment to contribute to a positive work environment.
• An ability and commitment to modeling pro-active leadership behavior and skills.
• The ability, experience, energy and enthusiasm to take responsibility for whole communications campaigns and pro-actively see each component through to a successful conclusion.
• Deep commitment to the labor movement and progressive causes.
• Excellent visual, written and verbal communications skills.
• BA or higher.
• At least 5 years experience working in communications and press relations for progressive political campaigns, non-profit organizations or unions.
• Proficiency in Word and Excel and ability to learn media database technology required.
• Experience with social media tools and campaigns.
• Must thrive in an environment with tight deadlines, changing priorities, high-pressure and irregular hours.

1199SEIU is an affirmative action employer- women, people of color and LGBT candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.

Compensation: 1199 offers competitive salaries as well as excellent benefits.
Send cover letter, work samples and resume to: jobs@1199seiu.org

Conquer the blank page – and a way to beat writer’s block

A good read and reminder for anyone who writes (not just novelists) that the blank page can be a welcoming invitation (rather than a scary, deviant monster). Read the tips at the bottom (if you’re in a hurry).

Roz Morris @Roz_Morris's avatarNail Your Novel

When you sit at the keyboard (or seize your writing irons), how certain are you about what you’re going to write?
I’m a big fan of plans, but sometimes they’re frustrating. We know the next point in the story but can’t get the characters there. We need to set up a development and it won’t work. Or we need something, anything to darn well happen.

This week I heard the broadcast journalist Libby Purves (@Lib_Thinks) ask two creatives about their processes, and the results were rather interesting (listen to it here) . They weren’t writers, but what they described was exceedingly familiar.

Katherine Hooker Nail Your Novel

The moment when you get the pencil out

Fashion designer Katherine Hooker (left) @KatherineHooker and furniture maker Peter Korn (below) (who has written this book about creativity) were asked about the moment ‘when you first get the pencil out and think now I’m going…

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Director of Communications, Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, New York City

The Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs (MOIA) promotes the well-being of immigrant communities by

recommending policies and programs that facilitate successful integration of immigrant New Yorkers into the civic,

economic, and cultural life of the City. MOIA is one of the lead agencies for IDNYC, New York City’s successful

municipal ID program, and is spearheading a number of initiatives to expand access to justice for immigrant

communities, including efforts on citizenship and executive action. The work of the Office cuts across a broad range

of issues citywide—for example, workers’ rights, health equity, and language access—and MOIA works closely

with sister cities around the country to promote immigrant integration. The Director of Communications will join a

robust team of outreach and policy staff in a fast-paced work environment with significant opportunity for initiative

and innovation.

The Director of Communications will have a broad scope of responsibilities including but not limited to:

 Developing and implementing MOIA’s communications strategy, in coordination with the Mayor’s Press

Office, including earned, social and community/ethnic media;

 Drafting MOIA press releases, statements, and other communications materials (e.g. brochures, talking

points, grant proposals) and managing stakeholder engagement and approvals for all external

communications;

 Staffing and supporting the MOIA Commissioner for media appearances and major public speaking

engagements;

 Overseeing MOIA’s website redevelopment, newsletter re-launch and other agency communications with

partners;

 Serving as a point of contact for community and ethnic media partners, and driving forward the Mayor’s

Office strategy for work with community and ethnic media in close collaboration with the Executive

Director for Language Access Initiatives, the Mayor’s Press Office and other key stakeholders;

 Building and maintaining MOIA’s press and communications infrastructure;

 Training and advising MOIA staff on interactions with the press and external communications, as well as

developing project-specific communications strategies as needed with staff;

 Recruiting and supervising communications-related interns or junior staff, as appropriate, as well as the

MOIA digital team;

 Coordinating creative process and vendor relationships for paid marketing campaigns lead by MOIA for key

initiatives; and

 Assisting with special projects, as needed.

Essential Skills / Qualifications:

The preferred candidate must have excellent analytical, writing and interpersonal skills, along with strong

communication and organizational skills, and a track record of effectively handling multiple priorities. The ability

to deal with a diverse constituency and work productively under pressure, both as an individual and part of a team.

Communications, legislative and/or advocacy experience, preferably in a not-for-profit and government context, is

important. Having general knowledge of City government is an asset.

The Director of Communications will report to the MOIA Chief of Staff. Skills required include:

 Master’s degree in related area – public administration or public affairs or Bachelor’s degree from a 4-year

college with equivalent job experience;

 Keen ability to prioritize and handle multiple assignments;

 Ability to work with all levels of staff, inside and outside the agency;

 Ability to work independently and exercise high degree of initiative to accomplish tasks and solve problems;

 Ability to prioritize and follow up while meeting deadlines; and

 Excellent writing, communication and interpersonal skills.

Salary commensurate with experience. The City of New York is an Equal Opportunity Employer. To apply, submit

cover letter, resume and three references to Marie-Fatima Hyacinthe (mfhyacinthe@cityhall.nyc.gov) with the

subject line: “Application for Director of Communications – MOIA.”

Digital Communications Specialist, General Board of Higher Education and Ministry of The United Methodist Church, Nashville, TN

POSITION OPENING

Job Title: DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS SPECIALIST

Reports to: Director of Communications

Department: Office of Communications

Schedule/Status: Full time; Monday-Friday; Exempt

Responsibilities: Proposes and executes digital plans and strategies; aligns web, social media, and video
platforms; applies digital media/online and content writing concepts and best practices to
agency platforms and initiatives; works collaboratively with the Communications team,
agency departments, and other stakeholders to develop, repurpose, inventory, and manage
content (text, video, links, graphics); assists with graphic design, production, and
photography as needed.

Minimum Bachelor’s degree or equivalent; 3+ years of professional experience in related field;
Qualifications: Apple Macintosh knowledge with proficiency using Quark Xpress and InDesign software,
Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator; experience and proficiency with digital design
including e-books and web (Drupal, Word Press, ExpressionEngine, etc); experience with
hand-held video camera and tripod, digital camera, and editing of short videos preferred;
experience with digital photography a plus; strong writing, editing, and proofreading skills
and thorough knowledge of English usage, grammar, and punctuation; excellent customer
service skills; strong attention to detail; ability to work well as part of a team; ability to
multi-task; ability to interact well with all levels of constituents and the general public;
ability to establish and set priorities; ability to work independently and take appropriate
initiative.

Apply To: Send a letter indicating how your experience, training, gifts and skills equip you for this
work. Include a resume and samples of your work.

GBHEM Human Resources
C/O Digital Communications Specialist
P.O. Box 340007
Nashville, TN 37203-0007
Phone: 615/340-7360 Fax: 615/340-7538 Email: hr@gbhem.org

Posting Date: May 19, 2015

Communications Manager, The Population Council, New York City

The Population Council has an opening for a communications manager with expertise in reproductive health and family planning. This position is responsible for developing and implementing a strategic communications plan to build the Council’s visibility and impact, with a focus on our RH-related contributions to the field.
We are looking for a communications strategist who has RH knowledge and relationships. In addition to strategic planning, other responsibilities include media outreach, conference and event strategies, science writing, and maintaining strong relationships with partners. This person can be based in Washington, DC or New York, and must be able to work in the U.S.
It’s a very exciting time at the Council – in March, we welcomed our new president, Julia Bunting, who is a champion for family planning and RH (among other things, she was a lead catalyst for the London Summit on Family Planning).  Julia is hugely supportive of communications – lots of opportunity here for the right person to join our team!
Interested parties can apply through the Population Council website.