The Smartest things I ever did…

• Posted by Steve Spencer

Article posted on Mar 22

Yesterday was a CEO Peer to Peer Session put on by the UTC. The Topic being “The smartest things I ever did.” One of the things that I really like about the sessions is that they allow executives to air their successes, failures, fears, and hopes, but what they say is held in strict confidence by the others (and if not… we’ll send Tonya Harding by for a visit ).

So on to my review (bearing in mind that I will not be sharing any specifics, due to the confidence factor of such a meeting): UTC always does a heck of a job at these meetings (and I’m not just saying that because they are a sponsor). Started timely, ended timely, professional location, good advanced notice of, and reminders for the event. Kudos to Mark, Judy, and whoever else over there is responsible for such nitty gritty details. The information was very valuable (I think I can list a few readin selections at the end here without violating any confidences).

I would guess that my only real complaints would be that these events have become popular enough that it’s tough to get that many people into a conference room comfortably… Someone is always stuck sitting away from the table, and I think feeling a bit excluded due to that (although they definitely did their best to remedy this). Not sure how to resolve this though, as the event would not be nearly as functional in a really big location. Maybe a bigger room next time? It would be a shame to have to split the group on some criteria.

Also, the magic, but also a possible point of frustration for a very open forum meeting like this can be the lack of structure. I think things flowed okay yesterday… I give it a 7 out of 10 (as opposed to the last train wrecks meeting, which I would give an 8 out of 10). But I think that Eric from Tomax does a really good job of keeping things on a productive path.

All in all, I’m really glad I went. I am always really impressed at how much can be learned at UTC or EO events. It’s funny but we all see so many resumes come across our desks with various educational experience… based on what I have found, I think I would take an applicant who had spent significant time in UTC P2P events, and EO forums over a degree any day of the week.

• Posted in Local Review