Press Release from…

THE COMMONWEALTH CLUB OF CALIFORNIA

595 Market Street San Francisco, CA 94105

 

Contacts: Riki Rafner, 415.597.6712/rrafner@commonwealthclub.org

Charlotte Greenwood, cgreenwood@commonwealthclub.org

June 25, 2012 – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

                                                                

The Commonwealth Club of California

Presents the “The Future of Work: How to Identify and Prepare for the Jobs of Tomorrow” series

Career Coach Marty Nemko Headlines Series Workshops

 

Hosted By Member Led Forums

On-site Programs FREE FOR MEMBERS

SAN FRANCISCO –  (June 25, 2012) With the presidential election looming, the health of the economy has remained a critical campaign issue as both candidates propose very different ways of revitalizing America’s job market.  A new jobs report released this May showed the worst single month for job growth in a year, pushing the U.S. unemployment rate up to 8.2 percent, creating only half the number of jobs projected.  According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, California’s unemployment rate as of May, 2012 was even higher, at 10.8%.  A new report showed the rate of unemployment in the 17-member Eurozone had risen to 11% in April as manufacturing slowed in Britain, Germany and France.  All this has driven the unemployment rate up for the first time in 11 months as more people are looking for jobs but failing to find them.

To what degree is the slowing growth in China and Europe really dragging down America’s job market?  Why aren’t American companies hiring more employees at a faster pace? Are they worried about rising taxes, regulation, a new Presidency, automatic spending cuts?   To what degree are companies afraid to hire new employees?  What’s hurting us most—lack of business confidence? Lack of consumer confidence? What about the more than 5 million people who have become the long term unemployed, whose extended unemployment benefits are quickly running out?   Experts say that although the number has decreased from this time last year, these rates do not even reflect those who have given up looking for work altogether.  

 

Considering the gravity of this issue, The Commonwealth Club has elected to explore how the situation has risen to crisis proportions, examine the future of work, and investigate how to identify and prepare for the jobs of tomorrow for this year’s timely August series.  This year’s programs will address the gamut of issues facing those looking for jobs as well as provide tips on how to keep them.

 

Chair of the “Future of Work Program” Dr. Carol Fleming, who spearheads the series, commented, “It has always been the case that there have been too many people for very few jobs here in the San Francisco Bay Area.  But since the economic downturn late 2007, and subsequent downsizing and consolidating of positions, we have seen even more individuals lose their jobs.  It is tragic that so many qualified individuals have lost their livelihoods in fields that seem to be disappearing.  It is even more devastating that there seem to be very few industries creating opportunities.  It is not only demoralizing for those who have been skilled and educated, many even with Ph.Ds. but for those who are just out of college, struggling to pay off student loans and put their new degrees to good use.  This is why we are focusing on jobs of the future in fields like technology and health care.  We will also look at how the older, more seasoned employee can retool his or her skills to remain competitive in our more technological world.”

 

Nationally renowned Career Counselor and Host of "Work with Marty Nemko," on KALW radio, Marty Nemko will headline a series of discussions on work, starting with “What Every Career Minded Person Should Know for 2013 and Beyond.” The Former Columnist for the SF Chronicle's Career Column, named "The Bay Area's Best Career Coach" by the San Francisco Bay Guardian and "Job Coach Extraordinaire" by U.S. News will reveal some rewarding but little-known gems about the art of job hunting.   He'll share what is working best for his clients in their endeavors and talk about a new strategy called “onramping.”  Finally, he'll present his favorite low-risk/high-payoff/high-ethics small businesses one can start on one’s own.  The first of Nemko’s sessions will take place Wednesday, August 1, at 5:15 p.m. at the Club Office at 595 Market St., 2nd Floor.   

 

The series will be launched by speaker Meg Jordan Ph.D., RN, CWP, Professor and Chair of Integrative Health Studies at the California Institute of Integral Studies and CEO of Global Medicine Enterprise who will discuss the new roles for growing demands in the medical profession. She will explain the up-and-coming vocation health coaching, and how it differs from traditional health education.   She also will tell us how many traditional health care workers have begun to see an overwhelming need for supportive and supplementary allies to facilitate today’s medical experience. She will examine how health coaches can offer the latest motivational science and share the art of adopting healthy behaviors, as chronic disease burgeons and patient-physician face-time shrinks. Her session will provide four big ideas from research in neuroscience, addiction, social ranking and creativity that are moving the new field of health coaching from the margins of the medical landscape to a central role. Dr. Jordan educates masters-level integrative wellness coaches at CIIS and serves as a board member, establishing educational benchmarks for their training and eventual national certification.

 

The series, comprised of speakers programs, panel discussions and workshops, will be open to the public.  Most programs will be held at The Club offices located at 595 Market Street, 2nd Floor in San Francisco, unless otherwise noted.  Please find a detailed list of scheduled events below.

 

Generous grants from our SILVER sponsors Wells Fargo Bank and Ernst & Young have made it possible for the Commonwealth Club to offer many on-site talks and panels FREE FOR MEMBERS and at a reduced cost for non-members. 

 

Founded in 1903, The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation’s premier non-profit public affairs forum, with more than 18,000 members.  Based in San Francisco, The Club hosts speeches, debates and discussions on issues of regional, national and international significance.  At least half a million people hear The Commonwealth Club’s weekly radio broadcasts on more than 150 public and commercial radio stations across the country.  The Club also broadcasts on XM Satellite Radio, and recently began pod casting its programs.  A selection of The Club’s programs is now also televised on Comcast Premium Digital Cable.  For the past century, The Club has fostered free speech and civic dialogue on wide-ranging topics, addressing key issues in society, culture, politics, the economy and more.  For more information, visit www.commonwealthclub.org.

 

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PROGRAMS WILL INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING:

 

July 31, Tues., 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m. program

Speaker: Meg Jordan, Ph.D., RN, CWP, Professor and Chair of Integrative Health Studies, California Institute of Integral Studies; CEO, Global Medicine Enterprise

Title: Medical Careers: New Roles for Growing Demands

MLF: Health and Medicine

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, $7 students (with valid ID)

Dr. Jordan will explain the new career of being a health coach and how it is vastly different from traditional health education. This session will provide four big ideas from research in neuroscience, addiction, social ranking and creativity that are moving the new field of health coaching from the margins of the medical landscape to a central role. Dr. Jordan educates masters-level integrative wellness coaches at CIIS and serves as a board member, establishing educational benchmarks for their training and eventual national certification.

 

Aug 1, Wed., 4:45 networking reception, 5:15 p.m. program

Speaker: Marty Nemko, Career Coach; Former Columnist, SF Chronicle’s Career Column; Host, “Work with Marty Nemko,” KALW

Title: What Every Career-minded Person Should Know for 2013 and Beyond

MLF: Psychology

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, $7 students (with valid ID)

In today's tough job market, career and job seekers are wise to consider under-the-radar careers. Dr. Nemko will reveal some rewarding but little-known gems. He'll also share what is working best for his clients in landing a job. (Hint: networking and a good resume are far from enough.) He'll talk about the art of onramping: how to get off to a great start in your new job, so you succeed rather than finding yourself soon needing to look for a job. Finally, he'll present his favorite low-risk/high-payoff/high-ethics small businesses you can start. Nemko was named "The Bay Area's Best Career Coach" by the San Francisco Bay Guardian and "Job Coach Extraordinaire" by U.S. News. In his private practice, he has had more than 4,000 clients and enjoys a 96 percent client-satisfaction rate. He is the author of seven books, including Cool Careers for Dummies, which reached #2 on the Wall Street Journal Business Bestseller List and was ranked the #1 most useful career guide in a Reader's Choice Poll.

 

August 2, Thurs., 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m. program, 7 p.m. book signing

Speaker: Olivia Fox Cabane, Chief Charisma Coach, Spitfire; Author, The Charisma Myth

Title: Charisma and Leadership – What If Charisma Could Be Taught?

MLF: Business and Leadership/Science and Technology

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, $7 for students (with valid ID)

Most of us assume that charisma is something you're either born with, or not. But science is proving otherwise. What makes people charismatic, and which aspects of charisma can indeed be learned? This talk will present the highlights of a few compelling studies, as well as practical tools for everyday application. For the first time, science and technology have taken charisma apart, figured it out and turned it into an applied science.  In controlled laboratory experiments, researchers claim they could raise or lower people's level of charisma as if they were turning a dial. In The Charisma Myth, Cabane takes a hard scientific approach to a heretofore mystical topic, covering what charisma actually is, how it is learned, what its side effects are, and how to handle them. She breaks charisma down into its fundamental components.

 

August 6, Mon., 4:45 p.m. networking reception, 5:15 p.m. program

Speakers: Noreen McKeon, Program Manager, Coming of Age: Bay Area and Mark Guterman, Career Coach, JVS

Title: Rethinking the Job Search: Winning Strategies for People Over 50

MLF: Psychology

Cost: $20 standard, MEMBERS FREE, $7 students (with valid ID)

Whether you've been laid off or are simply seeking a job change, whether you're seeking extra income in retirement or a move into work in a new field, in the current economy there are clear challenges to job seekers over 50. This workshop will look at the changing face of employment and retirement, offer specific strategies for job hunters, and suggest new ways to sharpen skills, expand your network and position yourself to take advantage of opportunities. McKeon is a program manager at Coming of Age: Bay Area, a national initiative to capture the talents and expertise of people 50-plus as a force for public good. She has decades of management and volunteer development experience with nonprofit organizations, including Burt Children’s Center, West Marin Senior Services, Planned Parenthood and AIDS Project of the East Bay. Guterman is a long-time Bay Area career consultant who is principal of MeaningfulCareers.com and a coach and trainer for JVS. He was recently awarded a Purpose Prize Fellowship given by Civic Ventures to honor social innovators in their encore careers.

 

August 8, 6 p.m.

Speaker: Michael Rossi, Senior Advisor for Jobs and Business Development in the Office of Governor Jerry Brown 

Title:  The Future of Jobs in California

Cost:

This government official will offer his take on the future of employment opportunities in the state of California.

 

August 9, Thurs., 6:30 p.m. check-in, 7 p.m. panel discussion

Speakers: TBA

Title: The Green Economy: Where Are the Opportunities?

Cost: $15 standard, $10 members

According to the U.S. Labor Department, more than 3 million Americans have green jobs. The green economy is one of the fastest growing segments of the Bay Area economy, but where are the jobs and investment opportunities? And what’s the best way to find them? The panel comprised of green job experts from Google, SolarCity and other leaders in the green economy will describe new opportunities in the environmental arena.

 

Aug 9 or 16th at 7 p.m.

Speaker:

Title: The Shared Economy

INFORUM

Cost:

Panelists will discuss what’s been called the newest big business trend, “the sharing economy.” They will tell us how the sharing economy is getting the most use out of a product or asset, from renting out your apartment or couch in it, or leasing a bicycle or car you’re not using. With modern day technology, growing concerns over conservation of natural resources and consumption of material goods, and the popularity of social networking, the sharing economy is being called by many the next new “Industrial Revolution.”

 

August 13, Mon., 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m. program

Speaker: Matt Cantor, Columnist, Berkeley Daily Planet

Title: The New Slavery

MLF: Humanities

Cost: $20 standard, MEMBERS FREE, $7 students (with valid ID)

Monday Night Philosophy will investigate one aspect of the future of work and find a resurgence in a  different dress of the institution of human slavery. Cantor will look at the controversial topic of prison populations in the U.S., which are continuing to surge.  The labor of many of those forcibly idled inmates is being put to use. Are long prison terms for petty crimes a recruiting tool?  Cantor will share his arguments and concerns about the re-emergence and social acceptance of this ancient form of exploitation.

 

Aug 13 or 14

Speaker: Joel Garfinkle - Executive Coach

Title: "Getting Ahead - Taking Your Career to the Next Level" SV Bank

Cost:

Executive Coach Joel Garfinkle will offer suggestions and advice on how to take your career to the next level.

 

August 21, Tues., 4:45 p.m. networking reception, 5:15 p.m. program

Speaker: Marc Freedman, Author, The Big Shift; CEO, Civic Ventures

Title: Baby Boomers Defer Retirement for ‘Encore Careers’

MLF: Grownups

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, $7 students (with valid ID)

Remember “the golden years”? The time of life when you shed your job and the shackles of time schedules for the free-flying freedom of retirement? How quaint. These days, more and more Americans are nixing the notion of retirement in their 50s, 60s or even 70s. One of them is Freedman of Berkeley, whose latest book, The Big Shift, paints a bold picture of the new paradigm. Freedman will discuss how people are working well into their senior years because a) they need the money, b) they’re living longer, healthier lives and c) they like being productive and don’t want to be idle. Freedman, who at 53 is far from retiring, opens his book with his own quasi-midlife crisis, when he turned 50 “and decided to take a break.”

 

August 21, Tues., 6 p.m.

Title: I Must Resist: Updating Bayard Rustin's Dream of Work for All

MLF: LGBT

Cost:

This panel will focus on the life and accomplishments of openly gay African American advocate for human and civil rights Bayard Rustin.  He worked for more than 50 years, perhaps most famous for having advised Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Rustin was the chief organizer of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom where King made his infamous “I Have a Dream” speech.   He dealt with both racism and homophobia as he helped pave the way for others.

 

August 22, Wed., 6 p.m.

Inclusive Diversity and Talent Management

MLF: LGBT

Cost:

This panel will explore ways in which more and more companies and non-profit organizations are rounding out their workforce with people from diverse ethnic and religious backgrounds.

 

August 23, Thurs, 6 p.m.

Speaker: David Perry

Title: How Do You Do That? In conversation with David Perry

MLF: LGBT

 

 

August 24, 11:45 a.m. luncheon, 12:30 program 

Speaker: Steve Forbes, President and Chief Executive Officer, Forbes, Inc. ; Editor in Chief, Forbes Magazine

Cost:

The renowned business leader will discuss the outlook for employment in the U.S.

 

August 26, Sun., 1:30 p.m. check-in, 2 p.m. program

Speaker: William Clancey, Chief Scientist, Human-Centered Computing Intelligent Systems Division, NASA Ames Research Center and Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition; Author, Working on Mars: Voyages of Scientific Discovery with the Mars Exploration Rovers

Title: Working on Mars – Voyages of Scientific Discovery

MLF: Science and Technology

Cost: $10 standard, $5 members

A cognitive scientist with privileged access to mission operations, William Clancey will offer an inside look at the world of a scientist, explaining how the “robotic geologists” are not the rovers on Mars, but the scientists who have imaginatively projected themselves into the body of the machine.  For more than eight years, scientists have been doing fieldwork on Mars in the first overland investigation of another planet. Working through programmed robotic laboratories, called the Mars Exploration Rovers, they have a virtual experience of being on Mars. The Spirit and Opportunity teams have driven over 25 miles, taken thousands of photographs, analyzed the chemistry of the terrain, and inspected rocks by grinding them and taking microscopic images. How does working remotely through a robotic laboratory change the nature of field science? How does it change the scientists?

 

August 27, Mon., 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m. program, 7 p.m. book signing

Speakers: Rick Chitwood, BSME, HVAC: Insulation Contractor, Field Researcher; Code Writer; Author and Frank Bergamaschi, California Registered Architect, LEED Accredited Professional

Title: The Illusion of Building Green

MLF: Environment and Natural Resources

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, $7 students (with valid ID)

Two practitioners and on-the-job experts will demonstrate that we have the technology now to make tremendous reductions in energy and installation costs for businesses, buildings and homes.  They will discuss how changing the way we use technology will save our money and our environment.  The way we approach the marketing of environmental design and technology rarely includes practical, cost saving methods. Often the marketing message is: more money = best energy practices. Today, the way we construct and operate our buildings, including our homes, uses a tremendous amount of energy, contributing to environmental harm.

 

August 29, Wed., 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m. program, 7 p.m. book signing

Speaker: Maddalena Bearzi, Ph.D., President, Ocean Conservation Society

Title: Dolphin Confidential – Confessions of a Field Biologist

MLF: Science and Technology

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, $7 students (with valid ID)

Ever fantasized about the unique thrill of working among charismatic and clever dolphins in the wild? Renowned scientist Bearzi will talk about her experiences at sea.  She will trace her own journey as a woman and as a scientist from her earliest travails to her transformation into an advocate for conservation and dolphin protection. She will take us inside the world of a marine scientist and offer a firsthand understanding of marine mammal behavior, as well as the frustrations, delights and creativity that make up dolphin research. This compelling and in-depth account of Bearzi’s fieldwork will include a look into dolphin social behavior and intelligence, as well as the difficulties involved in collecting the data that transforms hunches into hypotheses and eventually scientific laws. Bearzi will share an honest, down-to-earth analysis of what it means to be a marine biologist in the field today and the life among the dolphins. She will also address the critical environmental and conservation problems facing these magnificent, socially complex, highly intelligent and emotional beings.

 

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