MNBLN News

 

Career and Mentoring Day for Students and Professionals with Disabilities
By Divya Ghia

Career and mentoring opportunities for the minority job-seeking market are generally harder to come by, but on Wednesday October 26, 2005 the situation proved to be quite optimistic for those individuals. This day served as a symbol of great potential for the job seekers who struggle with a disability, because that day, they had the chance to connect and network with a host of different employers and business leaders from all over Minnesota. The Minnesota Business Leadership Network presented the 2nd annual Minnesota Career Development Day which was hosted by Medtronic Corporation at their World Headquarters building in Fridley.

The event was a wonderful marketplace for college students and graduates to put their best foot forward and focus on their abilities and strengths to gain a job or internship opportunities with major Corporations such as Medtronic, 3M, Microsoft, and Deloitte.

The morning session kicked off with representatives from the participating companies addressing their corporate values to the attendees. Fairview Health Services, Federal Agencies, and Ameriprise Financial, were among the presenters. The keynote speaker, Jennifer Sheehy Keller, the President’s appointed Special Assistant for Employment to the Assistant Secretary of the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation and the Acting Deputy Commissioner of the Rehabilitation Services Administration in the US Department of Education, gave an inspiring discourse about her personal struggles a disability and how she was able to overcome the obstacles in her life to achieve her success. Sheehy Keller encouraged the audience to shoot for the stars and go for their dreams. Next, a panel of speakers who have disabilities addressed various topics through a great selection of questions from audience participants. The panel’s speakers gave invaluable information to the audience because of their experience in having gained success in school and in their jobs, regardless of their disabilities. The wise-ranging panelists consisted of a Medtronic employee, college students, disability activists, and many others. The last event of the day was a career fair which offered students and job-seekers a chance to market their skills and talents to the employers at their given booths and also to participate in a resume review session.

The key message conveyed by the presenters throughout the day was, that no matter what your disability, focus on your abilities. Dismiss the “dis” in disability, and just see how success will follow you everywhere you go. Presenter and State Representative, Torrey Westrom reminds us, “If you don’t control your attitude, it will control you.”

Next year the Minnesota Business Leadership Network will host the US Business Leadership Network Annual meeting in Minnesota. And, Minnesota will also be the National kick-off site for the National Disability Mentoring Day in 2006. If you are interested in being involved in the planning of either of these events, please contact Karen Quammen at 763-505-2663.

Pictures from the 2005 MNBLN Career Day

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Article courtesy of: GoodwillTODAY, a member publication of Goodwill Industries International
(July 2005)

Goodwill Industries/Easter Seals Minnesota (Minneapolis):

When Goodwill Industries/Easter Seals Minnesota joined forces with a business consortium interested in hiring people with disabilities for jobs in the customer service/call center field, they had the luxury of knowing they shared an end goal.

That partnership between the Minneapolis Goodwill and the Minnesota Business Leadership Network (BLN) resulted in the development of a 10-week course that helps prepare people with disabilities for customer service-related jobs – positions that can garner salaries of $25,000 a year. With two courses behind them, the Goodwill has so far trained 15 of its clients in customer service and is planning to boost its recruiting for the next class beginning September 5.

“What I like best is (BLN) is not doing it for philanthropic reasons,” said Kelly Matter, the Goodwill’s Vice President of Program Services. “They’re doing it because they need to meet their business needs…..”

The partnership began last year after BLN Board Member Joan Camerer asked Matter to help determine the need for call center training among companies where the Goodwill placed clients. Once a need was determined, BLN partners American Express, Wells Fargo, Northwest Airlines, BlueCrossBlueShield and Medtronic Inc. began donating resources to train Goodwill’s trainers in customer service instruction.

Clients receive training in the basics of customer service, computer skills and how to interview for a job. In its second year, the course has placed three-fifths of program graduates in jobs related to the call center/customer service field, Matter said.

Camerer, the Manager of Recruitment and Selection for American Express, said, although the partnership required a lot of time on all the partners’ parts, everyone believed it was for a good cause. She nominated the Goodwill for a U.S. Business Leadership Network award in 2004 and Goodwill officials took home the Partner of the Year Award.

“It was a great collaboration that truly required teamwork,” Camerer said.

Read more about the U.S. Business Leadership Network, which has chapters in 43 states.

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Minnesota Business Leadership Network & Access Press Makes Russian Connection

Courtesy of: Access Press (Minneapolis, MN)
July 10, 2005

By Terri Ricci

CONNECT/US-RUSSIA(CONNECT) is a Minneapolis-based organization with a mission to promote a more humane and peaceful world by embracing critical issues facing the United States and the former Soviet Union through the creation of collaborative relationships. CONNECT recently received a grant from the Open World Leadership Center to bring a delegation of professionals from Russia to Minnesota. The Open World Program, based in Washington, DC, brings emerging Russian leaders to the U.S. on 10-day programs to experience U.S. democracy and free enterprise in action in communities across the United States.

This program, “Serving Russians with Disabilities,” provided an opportunity for seven delegates to visit the Twin Cities and obtain information to enhance the work of their organizations back in Russia. CONNECT designed a professional agenda to familiarize delegates with:
• educational programs for children with limited mental and physical abilities;
• social adaptation and integration programs;
• general care programs;
• integrated measures of social assistance;
• employment issues and programs;
• funding issues and sources;
• technology utilization.

On June 24, 2005, the Russian delegates visited with the Minnesota Business Leadership Network at Medtronic to learn about each other’s programs for the disabled. In their discussions, the delegates and the Business Leadership Network member companies noted the many similarities between the US and Russian services or lack of services for people with disabilities.
Russian parents have a more passive role in caring for their child. The reasons for this are:

1. The distance between the cities’ programs and the people needing those services.

Because of their country’s massive size, the Russian delegates pointed out that servicing people with disabilities is difficult. Many children with disabilities have to live at the school during the week and are only able to go home on the weekends. This ongoing disconnection between the parents and children plays a factor in the parents’ lack of involvement to advocate for their children’s needs.

2. The idea that the Russian state should provide for the services and programs for a person with a disability.

It is the state’s role, not the parents’ or family’s role, to give the children the education and training they need to become self-sufficient. This is the biggest difference between the two countries’ means of servicing people with disabilities. In Minnesota, especially, our non-profit advocate organizations work through government and other funding sources to provide better treatment, education, job training, and employment for the disabled.

The seven delegates represented a variety of Non-government Organizations (NGOs) and rehabilitation centers from cities across Russia. In Novosibirsk, Tamara Antolyevna Polenova is the Director of Social Work for the transition services for children. Her organization’s services are more advanced than the transition services in Minnesota. Local employers and agencies learned how the Russian transition service provides training and other emotional and psychological care for the disabled as they shift into the workforce. One institution has a training/mentoring program that pairs people with disabilities together to help each other adjust and adapt to living with a disability and to work with other people with disabilities in the orphanages and the veterans’ hospitals.
Other areas of Russia are not as advanced as Novosibirsk.

Although Polenova does not see many people with disabilities committing crimes in her region, the area where Valeriy Vladimirovich Chereshnev works with disabled youth is struggling to transition children with disabilities as well as trying to keep them out of the correctional system. His organization is in the process of creating an educational and correctional program to help adolescents shift more easily into society by having better educational and employment opportunities.

Similar to the situation in the U.S., funding is a critical issue in Russia. In Chereshnev’s city, there are 12,000 children with disabilities and only enough funding each year to serve 1,000 children. The rest of the children are expected to get services from other areas of the state, which often provide services that are not as effective.

Chereshnev stated, “Businesses and people with disabilities live in different realms. Even though we have laws that state that businesses have to have a 3% quota for employees with disabilities, no businesses are fined if they refuse to hire a person with a disability.” In contrast, the United States has Affirmative Action business guidelines in place for people of minority status, but the government does not regulate these guidelines for people with disabilities. Chereshnev also added that people with disabilities, who are entrepreneurs, have no insurance even though the government run businesses do. This sure sounds familiar to the healthcare crisis in Minnesota.

The organization that Polenova runs has business leaders on their board of trustees, however, most of the financial support the organization receives comes from the government rather than from these businesses. They do, however, have strong community leaders who help create jobs for disabled people and they provide the transition services for free for people with disabilities.

By the end of the day, the Minnesota Business Leadership Network (BLN) and Access Press agreed that there is a need to travel to Russia to learn from the Russian organizations. All of the delegates were very excited that Minnesota had a disability newspaper and they all took copies to share within their regions.

Access Press plans to incorporate a Russia/Minnesota section in the upcoming issues of the newspaper to cover highlights of the great work happening over there. The goal of this new section will be to stay connected and informed about the Russian programs and to learn how we might be able to incorporate some of their experience into our Minnesota programs.

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Minnesota company honored for its commitment to hiring and supporting people with disabilities.

Minneapolis, Oct. 27, 2004 - Citing its commitment to the comprehensive and long-term employment of persons with disabilities, the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services today gave Medtronic, Inc. its highest award, the Secretary Recognition Award.

Art Collins, Medtronic chairman and chief executive officer, accepted the award on behalf of the company and noted, " People with disabilities represent a significant, untapped talent pool for technology and 'knowledge'  industries.  We recognize that everyone benefits when we support an increasingly diverse workforce, and the contributions of people with disabilities have helped Medtronic develop leading medical technologies for patients worldwide. We accept this honor with pride, but also with reinvigorated commitment to reaching out to people with disabilities."

The award was presented by Secretary Tommy Thompson in the building named for another prominent Minnesotan and advocate for people with disabilities, the Hubert H. Humphrey Building in Washington, D.C. Additional honorees included news anchor Larry King, who was honored for funding life-saving treatments through the Larry King Cardiac Foundation; Rachel Simon, whose memoir of her developmentally disabled sister will be broadcast on television later this season; and the Art and Drama Therapy Institute, the American Network for Community Options and Resources and activist Mr. Don Dreyer of New York state.

Medtronic, which sponsored "Minnesota Career Development for the 21st Century Day"  for people with disabilities at its headquarters last week, also has received the Distinguished Community Service Award from ARC Minnesota (Oct. 9, 2004) and the "Employer of the Year"  award from the Minnesota State Council on Disability (Sept. 30, 2004).

Joan Willshire, executive director of the State Council on Disability, cited the involvement of Medtronic executives as most influential in making the workplace supportive of people with disabilities. " Executives at Medtronic make an active effort to improve employment circumstances for people with disabilities. Their leadership makes change occur, and makes change occur more quickly, so that hiring people with disabilities becomes a priority and barriers to employment are dismantled,"  said Willshire.

In January, Medtronic hosted a "Career Exploration Day"  for Minnesota students with disabilities attending colleges and transitional education programs.  The nearly 170 attendees heard Roy Grizzard Jr., Ed.D., assistant U.S. secretary of labor for disability employment policy, discuss his office ' s focus on the goal of increasing employment of persons with disabilities. The day included presentations on the medical device industry, opportunities for students to explore related interests, discover potential mentors and focus on abilities they offer.
Medtronic employees also led the establishment of two employee resource groups, ABLED (Awareness Benefiting Leadership and Employees with Disabilities) and Parents of Children With Special Needs, which support employees, raise awareness about experiences of people with disabilities, and consult with Medtronic executives in implementing wellness programs and jobsite accommodations.

Medtronic, Inc., headquartered in Minneapolis, is the world's leading medical technology company, providing lifelong solutions for people with chronic disease.  Its website is www.medtronic.com. 

Northwest Airlines Sponsors Student Career Event

Northwest Airlines and the Learning Disability Association worked in partnership to sponsor a Career Event for students with learning disabilities on April 14. Northwest showcased talented employee speakers from equipment service (John "Q-tip" Bergman), customer service (Flo Hall), aircraft cleaning (Ann Rustad), clerical (Mary Scholl), in-flight (Kevin Kuretzky), technical operations (Jim Baumiller) and meteorology (Tom Fahey). This exciting event was held at the Flight Training Facility in Minneapolis/St. Paul and was topped off by a tour of the flight and training simulators.

This career event afforded an opportunity for 21 Twin Cities youth with learning disabilities to do hands on career exploration in the aviation industry. The frank discussions and videos about "the day in the life of an Northwest employee" provided the students with a real sense of the skills, education and tenacity needed to work in aviation. Tom Fahey, manager-meteorology, remarked that "the students displayed a real willingness to participate and contribute." Many of the students commented, "the speakers were great" and asked for an opportunity to return to Northwest in the very near future. A follow-up event will be held Oct. 16 as a part of the National Disability Mentoring Day and will offer students an opportunity to do one on one job shadowing.

Northwest Airlines participated in National Disability Mentoring Day (NDMD), which generally takes place in the month of October, however NWA decided to postpone participation until April 14, 2003.

Speakers were represented from 7 different career areas within the aviation industry, specifically selected by the 21students that attended. After the career discussion, students were provided a tour of the Company’s flight training facility.

Following the career event, 9 students completed an evaluation form offering feedback regarding their experience. All students agreed unanimously that they enjoyed the event, would be willing to participate in the career event again and would recommend it to a friend. Comments such as “the flight attendant position and other jobs are not so easy as they may seem” and “we talked about how to fly a plane and the safety training the pilots must go through” helped to reinforce that the students were able to gain valuable information from the event to use in furthering their career goals.

Northwest plans to participate in NDMD in October of 2003 by offering students an opportunity to shadow aviation professionals for a day. This event will enable students to meet with aviation employees one-on-one and to discuss specific details about career areas that they may be inclined to pursue in the future.
Northwest welcomes questions or comments from other organizations regarding the NDMD event.