Midwest Society of Professional Consultants

This month's meeting will be held at the

Ramada Plaza Hotel
5616 N. Cumberland, Chicago
just south of Kennedy Expressway (I-90)

5:00 P.M. Registration

5:20 P.M. Pre-dinner Program

Blog Schmog Basics

This will be a smart and sassy overview about blogs – a credibility, conversation, and community building tool – for professional services companies and consultants. We’ll talk about how to use blogs successfully and how to avoid common pitfalls. You will leave with a toolkit of resources and information.

Key Takeaways:
   -   Blogging 101: the new media tool
   -   How to make your blog cooperative, not competitive
   -   Defining your own niche and declaring your own strategic
           advantage
   -   A-list bloggers, Top-N Lists, Link Love, and Long Tails
   -   A short lesson about "getting naked"
   -   Measuring ROI: why daily traffic, inbound links, and ad revenues
            should not be your only measurement of success
   -   Why buyers don't network - and often prefer to commune by blog
           (or: "I've met some damn fine people blogging - from Bob Lutz
           (GM) to Brad Feld (Mobius) - some dink heads too, but that's part
           of the drill.")

Presenters Kirsten Osolind and Todd Allen
re:invention Marketing

Kirsten Osolind is founding CEO of re:invention (www.reinventioninc. com), a full-service integrated marketing company for enterprising women and the corporations interested in doing business with them. Since 2002, re:invention has served 30 clients including Springboard Enterprises, Northwestern's Center for Women Entrepreneurs in Technology, IDC, Phatnoise, Type A, and Assimil. Kirsten's 15-year marketing career includes stints as Whole Foods Market's National Marketing Director, WebMD's Director of Advertising and Media, General Mills' ethnic marketing manager, and brand manager at Coke and P&G. She has launched a cookbook and a national gift card, shadow-boxed with Muhammad Ali, introduced yogurt in a tube for kids, and convinced Dilbert to Take the Nestea Plunge. A marketing columnist for Entrepreneur Magazine throughout 2005, Kirsten now edits the #1 women entrepreneur's blog. She chairs or serves on Executive Boards for the YWCA, NAWBO, Springboard Enterprises, and Illinois State of Women Politics and was recently elected to the Economic Club of Chicago. As "an agent for enterprising women", Kirsten has been copiously quoted in the media from Inc. to Redbook and has amused audiences at annual conferences held by WorldWIT, NYU, Duke, Ad:Tech, The forte Foundation and more. Honored as a 2004 Stevie Awards for Women Entrepreneurs finalist in the "women helping women" category, Kirsten received her M.B.A. from Duke's Fuqua School of Business.

Todd Allen, re:invention's Director of New Media, brings over 12 years experience in online marketing and media and is also currently an adjunct professor at Columbia College Chicago, teaching E-Business. He was the originating Producer for the online editions of the American Medical Association's suite of medical journals; has worked on Internet development, online marketing, e-commerce, search engine optimization and competitive intelligence projects for a diverse group of organizations including 3Com, Hewitt & Associates, The Professional Networker, and the National PTA; and has lectured to the Association of American Publishers on retaining brand between print and digital media. Also an author, Todd has written three books and formerly covered the "Technology & the Arts" beat for the Chicago Tribune's business section. He has an M.A. in Internet Business and Media Convergence from New York University and a B.S. in Communication Studies from Northwestern.

6:15 P.M. Announcements/Introductions

6:30 P.M. Networking

7:00 P.M. Dinner

8:00 P.M. After Dinner Program

So You Want To Be A Consultant - Key Issues For Prospective New Consultants

As people in the retiring baby-boomer generation leave the traditional workforce, they are seeking new careers in their own businesses. One of the more frequent choices is independent consulting. This presentation focuses on the key issues new consultants face and some approaches to resolve them. How you face and resolve these issues will determine your success or failure. The first and foremost issue to be faced is the fact that you are starting your own business. For someone who has been an employee, this is no small consideration. For some, the most disturbing part of having a business is the financial uncertainty. For others it is the loss of a social infrastructure. And for others, it is the realization that you are not as employable as you used to be. This session deals with the conscious and deliberate decision to start your own business and the things you have to do to make it successful.

Presenter Tom Long
Solid Oak Consulting

Tom Long is the President and Principal Consultant of Solid Oak Consulting, LLC and a member of MSPC. He is a seasoned executive with 30 years of experience in starting, managing and turning around business groups both domestically and internationally. He has started groups at Procter & Gamble, Nastec Corporation, Ernst & Young and R.R. Donnelley & Sons. And has worked to turnaround groups at Cincom Systems, Nastec Corporation, Oracle, KPMG, Andersen Consulting and Computer Associates. His involvement as an executive in a Venture Capital backed startup, Nastec Corporation, is where he first had the opportunity to work in a turnaround situation. But since then, he has consistently sought out opportunities to work in IT start-ups and turnarounds. Most recently, he led the AI Expert Systems practice at Computer Associates and took it from a starting position of breaking even, to a 24% net profit margin on a base of $5M in revenue. Tom's hands-on experience and leadership skills have helped him to be successful in dealing directly with senior management in client companies and acting as the communication facilitator between senior management and skilled technical people. Through mentoring and individual development to foster motivation, his teams have consistently been recognized as peak performers by his clients and management. Credentials Tom is a graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Rutgers University and The Stanford University School of Business. He is certified in the Capability Maturity Model by Carnegie Mellon University. He is certified in Business Dynamics and Dynamic Systems Modeling from the MIT Sloan School of Management. He holds certificates in Change Management from ODR and The Australian Graduate School of Management. He is trained as an Executive Coach and certified by Andersen Consulting.

Reservations

Registration fee includes dinner and programs.

Early registration must be made by NOON the Monday before the scheduled meeting:

Members/Spouse/Guests:	$40.00
Non-members:	$55.00

Late registration or at the door:

Member/Spouses/Guests:	$45.00
Non-members:	$60.00

To make a reservation via email, or call 312-201-0596.

Please specify:
Your name(s)
Choice of dinner entrée(s)
Payment information (check/visa/mastercard)
And a callback number

April 5th, 2006