There are more than 1,000 HR conferences each year in North America. I know because HRmarketer monitors all of them. Why are there so many? Despite the rising costs and hassles of traveling and the growth in “virtual” events, people still value the face-to-face interactions that only a physical presence at a conference can deliver.
“48.5% of HR professionals consider attending conferences highly valuable with respect to staying knowledgeable about Human Resource management – more than webinars, print publications and white papers.” – 2015 fisher VISTA HR Buyers Survey
Nevertheless, there is a lot of competition amongst event organizers for the limited budgets that HR practitioners have available to attend events.
“More than 80% of HR buyers attend at least one conference per year, but almost none (1.5%) go to more than five.” – 2015 fisher VISTA HR Buyers Survey
Even for us at HRmarketer. We get invited to a lot of events, so we too have to make hard decisions about which to attend. But when we were invited to attend the annual IBM HR Summit at the Hyatt Regency Boston Sept. 6-8, it took us all of two minutes to say “YES!” (and not just because Boston is spectacular in the fall).
There are four things that make a great event, and the Boston HR Summit has them all:
- HR people. Nobody likes to be at an event that has more exhibitors/vendor/consultants than practitioners.
- Interesting stories about real business issues told by HR leaders (not consultants).
- Networking and relationship building. Yes, I love an event that offers ample time to talk with other attendees.
- Important people. Let’s face it, it’s fun to meet the industry’s most recognizable influencers/analysts/talking heads. Like Kevin Kruse and Seth Mattison.
Kevin Kruse (left ) is a NY Times bestselling author, Forbes contributor, entrepreneur and keynote speaker. Seth Mattison (right) is a writer and global trend spotter of the shifts happening in the new world of work. Both are two of the many influencers and really interesting speakers at the IBM HR Summit in September.
Below are just a sample of some of the great stories that you can hear at the Boston HR Summit: (Full disclosure: HRmarketer is a media partner for this event. But if the event was not worth attending we wouldn’t have agreed to be a partner.)
- H&R Block knows something about recruiting, hiring and on-boarding — they hire over 80,000 employees each fall! Katie Waldo and Carolyn Walters from H&R Block will discuss how H&R Block works to streamline, reinvent and evolve their hiring process.
- 69% of job seekers say they are less likely to buy from a company based on a bad application experience. In this new reality, companies must infuse their recruitment operations with insights and best practices from marketing in order to attract top talent. Tricia C. Sapp (Lowe’s Companies), Jennifer Schnack (AMC Theatres) and Helen Lynch (NBCUniversal) will discuss how their companies are collaborating with their marketing colleagues to “out-recruit” the competition.
- ATB is Alberta, Canada’s largest financial institution. Terry Lashyn from ATB will discuss Talent Analytics and how ATB leverages employee and customer data housed in many different systems to draw insights about their people and customers.
- In March of 2014, Loblaw Companies acquired Shoppers Drug Mart bringing together Canada’s number-one grocery retailer and number-one pharmacy and beauty retailer. Fran Hansen from Loblaw Companies will discuss the integration and share the company’s culture journey and the lessons learned along the way.
- Grant Thornton is doing something right — they’ve been around for about 100 years. Julian Malnak from Grant Thornton will discuss how they build a coaching culture to develop future leaders.
- David Littlechild from Lloyds Banking Group will discuss the company’s innovative approach to measuring employee engagement and how the program has enabled Lloyds to monitor employee attitude and assess progress towards fulfilling group goals, as well as providing the organization with detailed insights and comparisons of engagement levels across the group and industry as a whole.
- Steve West (Citibank), Angie Grilliot (UnitedHealth Group), Mary Amundsen (Land O Lakes) and Shelly Bergh Gardner (The Mosaic Company) share their stores on how workforce science and analytics are driving value in their organizations. Applications such as individual assessment, employee engagement, leadership development, and multi-rater feedback will be addressed.
- Kathleen Bauguess (Intel Corporation) and Mike Cook (Horses for Sources) discuss how robotics/automation, consumerization of HR and the candidate experience, and the rise of the flex worker are impacting talent acquisition.
- Patrick Selby from LexisNexis will discuss how LexisNexis is using a Learning Content Management System to “skate to where the puck is going to be.”
- Cornelia Kunert from Zurich Insurance will discuss how Zurich created an integrated and continuous listening approach to provide better insights on their strategy execution and their employee satisfaction.
And there are a whole bunch more stories. See the full agenda. Kudos to IBM for putting together an excellent event. We’re looking forward to it (and Boston in the fall)! Join us! Register today.
IBM HR Summit is at the Hyatt Hyatt Regency in the heart of beautiful downtown Boston on September 6-8 (close to many historic attractions).
