Workshop Summary - Sharon Exharos Makes PICA Think Green

Good morning, PICA! In keeping with our promise to recap our annual workshop, here is a post from Vice Chairperson, Becky Marshall. She's summarizing our session with Sharon Exahros of Realty Executives of Nevada.

Communicating Green in the Workplace

During this session of the PICA workshop, Sharon Exarhos of Realty Executives of Nevada shared numerous ideas of communicating green to Company employees, agents, policyholders and community residents. During her presentation, Sharon provided the group with a “green” checklist to take back to the office to conduct our own green audit within our companies. PICA members also discussed green initiatives already taking place within their own companies.

At the conclusion of Sharon’s presentation, workshop attendees were excited about taking new “green” ideas back to their home offices to incorporate in their internal and external communications.

Thanks, Becky! Of course, there are lots of ways your company can adopt green practices to improve its carbon footprint. But for attendees looking for ways to get their companies more involved in their communities, Sharon's presentation and our conversations after definitely inspired. Consider increasing your company's green awareness and helping your neighbors practice conservation:
Host a shredding day at your company's headquarters. Allow a mobile shredding service to set up a station in your parking lot on a weekend or after work hours. Advertise locally that you'll shred a certain amount of paper per person for free. Not only does this help encourage recycling, but also helps reduce identity theft.
Work with a local school and invite students to give your business a green evaluation. It's a great way to uncover simple practices your business can adopt and it encourages a good relationship between your business and local schools.
At a scheduled time, allow your neighbors to drop off hard to dispose of items such as paint cans and chemicals or light bulbs containing mercury. Work with a local hardware store or contractor for haul away services, then plan a time to allow neighbors to drop off these substances that are harmful to the environment.

Think about developing a committee within your company to brainstorm green ideas and use Sharon's guide as a starting point. Go green!

Workshop Summary - Marko Sakren Opens the Box

Hello, PICA People! We recap the presentations of our speakers to help refresh your memory about what you learned in the workshop. One user tip is to forward a link to this blog to any of your work colleagues who might benefit from the information...this is a great way to share the information you learned, making your workshop tuition dollars go even further!

Today's recap is from Vice Chairperson, Becky Marshall. She's recapping our session with Marko Sakren of Red Rock Media Group, Inc.

Thinking Outside the Box…Without Missing the Target

Each of us around the workshop table takes a turn reciting our name, company name and job duties. We tick off our laundry list of job duties: brochure design, newsletter writing, event planning, presentation development, advertising, community support…the list goes on-and-on for the group of us participating in the 2010 PICA Communications Workshop held in Las Vegas last month.

What the group discovered during this exercise was that in our positions, we are responsible for a slew of duties that can become quite challenging at times. Once it becomes overwhelming, we tend to spread ourselves thin…and, as a result, creativity goes right out the window.

Marko plays "Name That Product" with Carol, Carol and Rick to help them break out of their usual methods of thinking.

Workshop speaker Marko Sakren of Red Rock Productions shared with us some ideas on how to think outside the box…without missing the target. What exactly does this mean? To put it simply, as insurance communicators, we must learn to step outside of our comfort zone when it comes to communicating…in both the written and spoken word. At the same time, we must continue to meet our targets (i.e. deadlines, budgets and approvals from co-workers, supervisors, executive management).

During this session of the workshop, PICA workshop attendees explored ways of communicating to publics in a more creative and entertaining manner. We learned that once we step outside the comfort zone and begin thinking outside the box, it is necessary to identify some of the challenges we face that prevent us from fully fulfilling our responsibilities as communicators. During his presentation, Marko offered the group suggestions on how to overcome some of those challenges and ways to implement solutions back at the home office.

Marko’s presentation material sparked dynamic conversation between PICA attendees. In the conclusion, the group discovered that if small steps are taken to think outside the box, our communications will develop into more creative and effective pieces without missing the target.