The Rise of Emerging Leaders Groups
By Susan Schaul
Three employees at Philips Healthcare in Highland Heights — Erin Smith, senior project manager; Angela Willis, project manager; and Nilgoun Raihani, physics engineering — have banded together to coordinate a new group, Emerging Leaders. Via speaker events, they are encouraging fellow employees to meet each other, network, mentor and advance their careers. The goal is to cultivate and develop emerging leaders at their global company.
“Realizing there are close to 1500 people on-site here, I thought if we started by networking together, we could improve our career paths and grow the company,” said Erin Smith. The Emerging Leaders group launched over three months ago when Philips Healthcare executive Bill Bradley, director of Business Excellence, presented the importance of networking at your company to advance your career. Kerry Bubolz, president of Lake Erie Monsters and executive vice president and chief operating officer of the Cleveland Cavaliers, spoke at the second event encouraging people to stay in touch with their networks monthly. He described how Dan Gilbert and the Cavaliers organization are investing $4 billion in the NEO community to build the casino, bringing all kinds of related jobs to this region.
“So far attendance at our events has been surprisingly high,” Smith said. “We start with a mix and mingle where people have a chance to meet each other, the guest speaker presents, and then the participants gather around for round-table discussions moderated by a liaison facilitator.”
On Thu 6/7 at the Shoreby Club in Bratenahl, the Emerging Leaders have scheduled Chris Ronayne, president of University Circle Incorporated, to speak about recruiting and retaining talent in Northeast Ohio. This is the first time the Emerging Leaders have invited people outside of the Philips organization to partner with them, including the Next Generation Council at the Cuyahoga County Office of the Executive, American Greetings, US Endoscopy, Avery Dennison, Panzica Construction, Lincoln Electric, Home Savings and Loans, Doty and Miller Architects, Wire-Net, Case Western Reserve University, and the Cleveland Cavaliers organization.
Since building our region and making it more sustainable encompasses everyone, the Emerging Leaders group is starting to invite specific companies to get involved, see what is happening and implement ideas.
“Our concept is based on the appreciative inquiry model where everyone gets involved, from the bottom of the ladder on up to the top,” explained Smith. They are recruiting members of Philips management team to mentor and provide career guidance to employees. “We have had a positive response from Philips about this new group,” said Smith. Emerging Leaders has already had a positive impact: HR staff from their corporate headquarters has gathered information about this group for other Philips sites and the group has been published in the employee newsletter.
Many other organizations are considering how to recruit, encourage and network with the next generation of leaders. When Ed Fitzgerald campaigned for the Cuyahoga County Executive Office, one of his platform promises called for Destination Cuyahoga, a promise to develop a strategy to attract and retain young professionals to this region. From 145 applications, the County Executive’s Office interviewed viable candidates and selected 15 young professionals to fill a Next Generation advisory board. They have been given a broad mandate to develop a civic outreach plan and champion issues most important to this demographic group.
If you want to start this kind of group at your company, or if you want to attend the next event in July, please call Erin Smith at 216-659-3497.
From Cool Cleveland contributor Susan Schaul, who says the act of writing is like assembling a jigsaw puzzle. The challenge lies in getting the pieces to fit together and make sense.
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