Don't forget to listen to the Transition Solutionz Series aired last week on BlogTalkRadio.com

On Thursday of last week, the third and final day of the Transition Solutionz series featured:

• Mark Wayman with the Godfather's Career Guide - what to do when you get whacked.
• Anne Fry - the author of Sixty, Sexy, Sassy and Free talking about reinventing yourself
• Lynne Waymon - the author of Make Your Contacts Count gave practical advice about all kinds of networking
• Lauren Milligan of ResuMAYDAY talked about the importance of the resume and how to get over any bumps in the road in preparing that all important document for your career search

ALL SHOWS FROM THE SERIES ARE AVAILABLE ON DEMAND. SIMPLY CLICK SELECT THE SHOW ON THE BLOGTALKRADIO WIDGET ON THE SIDE BAR

Great lineup for Wednesday's Transition Solutionz series

Thank you to Wednesday's sponsor of the Transition Solutionz series:









We have a great lineup on Wednesday morning. Join us live if you can, either online at www.blogtalkradio.com/cfitzgerald
or by phone 1-646-727-3553



10am Tierza Davis - owner Pura Vida Adventures in Costa Rica - from a dot com bomb in the late 90s to surfing coach for executive women, Tierza has a story you won't want to miss.

1030am Michelle Bersell - psychotherapist and life coach talks about "Weathering the Financial Storm". Whether you are unemployed, self-employed or afraid that you may not be employed for long, you need to hear what Michelle has to say.

11am Eli Davidson - author of Funky to Fabulous - If you are tired of all of the discouraging news in the marketplace, you should put aside whatever you are doing from 11am to noon tomorrow and tune in to Eli. She will make you laugh, make you think and will inspire you to reinvent yourself.

For more information, see www.solutionzlive.blogspot.com

Transition Series begins Tuesday at 10am ET with Libby Gill

Everywhere you look there are companies laying off people. The numbers are staggering.

The Solutionz Group wants to be proactive and help those in our industry struggling with this issue.

The Transition Solutions series will be broadcast on BlogTalkRadio.com/cfitzgerald on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday from 10am ET to Noon ET.

This inaugural show is sponsored by Travelport.

Tuesday's lineup begins from 10am to 11am with Libby Gill, former senior broadcasting and entertainment executive and the branding brains behind the launch of the Dr. Phil Show. For the first 30 minutes of the show, she will talk about creating your own personal brand, and then shift in the second half of her hour to what happens when traditional roles have to shift during troubled times. She has written several books, Traveling Hopefully and Stay at Home Dads. Libby will also be the featured speaker at TravelCom's Executive Women's Forum on March 31st in Atlanta.

From 11am - 1130am ET we will have co-authors, Andrea Waltz and Richard Fenton who wrote "Go for No". From 1130am - noon ET we will have the author of "Give your elevator speech a lift", Lorraine Howell.


The series will include interviews with top authors on various practical topics such as creating your own personal brand, honing your elevator speech, creating a winning resume and more. The series is suitable if you are a job seeker, if you are in a company or an industry where employment is tenuous at best or if you are an HR director or manager that is having to deal with laying off employees.




Join us live on Tuesday for the show (or have the system send you a reminder) or call in to the number provided on the show site. CLICK HERE

We will be posting the speaker schedule on Monday for the Wednesday and Thursday shows.

Please pass the word.

Chicke Fitzgerald

Join us this Friday for Holly Green, author of "More than a Minute"

Holly is currently the CEO and Managing Director of THE HUMAN FACTOR, Inc. Ms. Green has more than 20 years of executive level and operations experience in FORTUNE 100, entrepreneurial, and management consulting organizations.

She was previously President of The Ken Blanchard Companies, a global consulting and training organization as well as LumMed, Inc. a biotech start up. She has a broad background in strategic planning, organization design and development, process improvement, leadership assessment and development, and the integration and alignment of business strategies.

Her current book, More Than a Minute: How to Be an Effective Leader & Manager in Today’s Changing World can be ordered by clicking on this link or on the book cover above.

If you are not a member of EGG, please come back next week to download the audio of the Vignette speaker portion of the call.

Need a helping hand or know a friend who does?

Flo Lugli received this resource from a colleague who used it when a close family friend’s husband died (with 2 small children and one on the way she was overwhelmed dealing with things).

The community kicked in and everyone went to this site to find out what the woman needed (childcare, meals, car pooling, etc.). thought you should all know in case you know of a situation where someone could use this.

Click on the web image to go to the Lotsa Helping Hands site.

Also, for those of you in transition, remember that focusing some of your energy on helping others is a great way to make your transition a really rewarding time. Check out their volunteer opportunities.

Chicke Fitzgerald

Lynne Sarikas vignette recording now available - Advancing your career in funky times

Mark your calendar for Friday's call with Lynn Sarikas, director of the MBA career center at Northeastern University’s College of Business Administration. She will be addressing the issue of advancing your career during these "funky" economic times.

With the nation’s unemployment rate at its highest point in five years, you might be surprised to hear Lynne’s thoughts:

• Many think that a funky economy means it is not a good time to advance your career. While the answer may vary by industry, it can actually be the best time to make a change. More than ever, companies need skilled leaders to help their business address critical issues and challenges.

• Obviously industries that are in the midst of major layoffs are not doing any significant hiring, only pursue opportunities in that industry if you have a very unique, marketable skill set that can add value in turbulent times. Investment industry is hard hit right now with many firms laying off staff. Do you have unique marketing, HR or finance/controller experience in the investment industry that could help them during these troubled times?

• Other industries are actively seeking experienced talent. While most have no problem sourcing entry level positions, it can be more challenging to fill management level positions. Turnover including retirements can create key, strategic openings that must be filled with the right people.

• Especially in this economy, not all positions are posted. It is not likely that senior level job seekers will find their position by searching job posting sites on the web. Use your job search time more strategically.

Audio recordings are free for Charter members and $10 for all others. Please pay online by selecting the Vignette Recording item under Executive Girlfriends' Group section.

Chicke Fitzgerald
Founder - Executive Girlfriend's Group

Monday am 730 ET "Money for Breakfast" on Fox Business - check it out

Chris Dane and I are the experts on Fox's Money for Breakfast tomorrow. The subject is the rivalry between Carnival and RCL and how it has benefited the industry as a whole and consumers in particular.

If you miss it live, they have their shows online as well.

CLICK HERE TO GO TO FOX BUSINESS ARCHIVE

Chicke

Great call with Captain Karen Kahn yesterday - largest participation ever!

Thanks to all who participated in the call yesterday with Continental Captain Karen Kahn. It was great. We had 31 people on the call! Whoo hoo!

Karen's book is available on the EGG Book Club carousel to the right. Just click on it and you can order from Amazon.

Watch for the EGG survey this week. Exciting things coming down the pike and we need your input.

EGG featured on BlogTalk Radio Yesterday

I was interviewed yesterday on BlogTalk Radio. I talked about the Executive Girlfriend's Group, Solutionz Group and some of the companies that we are incubating (LeisureLogix RoadEscapes.com, HotelsbyHospitals, etc.).

I am the second interview on this one hour show hosted by Jason Crouch and Ken Cook.

VIEW THE SEGMENT

Click on the segment on the right that begins with TS Elliott (no, not the dead poet). I got tired of hearing the music from the show each time I opened this blog!

Thanks to all who participated in the Transition Call yesterday

We had 21 on the call yesterday! It was interesting to hear the various perspectives. We had some that have been job hunting for as much as 6 months, to those that just learned before the holidays that their job had been "made redundant", to those that are still employed, but have had to lay off team members and wanted to know how they could be of help.

I will be updating the site today to organize some of the resources that were recommended by various participants on the call.

If you would like to take the transition survey and were not on the call yesterday, please email me.

Chicke Fitzgerald
chicke@solutionz.com

Welcome to 2009! Don't forget the Transition Group call today!

As you get yourself organized on what I suspect is your first full day at work this year, please remember that we have the Transition Group call at 4pm today.

This call is for those that are in transition and those that want to ensure that they are ready with "Plan B". We have had a tremendous response for this call. If you haven't sent your RSVP, please do so now, as there are some preparation materials that I need to send to you.

January Speaker Roster - Executive Girlfriend's Group Calls

Today's call features Jaynie Smith - author of Creating Competitive Advantage.

January 9th - Captain Karen Kahn - author of Flight Guide for Success. Karen is one of the first female pilots.

January 16th - Lyn Sarikas - Advancing your Career during troubled times. Lynn is the
director of the MBA career center at Northeastern University’s College of Business Administration.

January 23rd - Holly Green - author of More than a Minute and former President of the Ken Blanchard Companies (author of One Minute Manager).

January 30th - Mary LoVerde - When you can't keep up - Connect! Mary is the author of three best selling books: "Stop Screaming at the Microwave", "Touching Tomorrow", and "I Used to Have a Handle on Life but It Broke".

As always, you can order their books by clicking on the links above.

Calls are by invitation only and are held at 4pm ET.

Chicke Fitzgerald
chicke@solutionz.com

Job Opening - VP of Hotels, Cars and Cross Selling

Rapidly Expanding Top 3 Travel Company on the East Coast and Top 20 Agency in the US, both on-line and traditional with offices in US and Asia, is seeking to fill the position for VP of Hotels, Cars/Cross Selling Products and Services.

Contact Chicke for the complete description at chicke@solutionz.com.

Don't miss Jaynie Smith on Competitive Advantage on Friday, January 2nd

Jaynie Smith is the author of Creating Competitive Advantage.

She will be our Vignette Speaker on Friday, January 2nd at 4pm.

Take a look at this video interview on ABC of Jaynie where she talked about recession proofing your business.

Recession proofing interview on ABC



Jaynie's credentials include:

• 30,000 plus hours experience consulting CEO’s
• 15 Top Performer Awards for CEO coaching
• Featured in Entrepreneur, Industry Week, Investors Business Daily & Business Strategies Magazine among many other magazines and newspapers
• 20 years experience working with Fortune 500 companies
• Appeared on several TV business shows including ABC World News This Morning & MSNBC
• Selected by TEC/Vistage, an organization of 14,000 CEOs worldwide, as one of the 50 most influential people of their first 50 years
• Her Competitive Advantage proprietary workshop was selected as one of the leading new courses for the 2007 curriculum for the American Management Association
• Selected to deliver Microsoft Office Live Seminars 2007 with speakers such as Michael Gerber, Stephen Covey, Marshall Goldsmith, Jack Canfield & Jim Kouzes
• Guest on Bloomberg Radio, WABC Radio “Brinker Show,” & NPR affiliate WLRN among scores of other radio shows
• Featured in telecast with Jay Conrad Levinson of Guerrilla Marketing Association
• Contributing Business Expert Columnist to Affluent Magazine

Transition Group call on Monday at 4pm ET

For those of you that are in transition, I am holding a special call on Monday, January 5th at 4pm ET.

We will review the model that I talked about last week on the call and will share some survival tips and a new job posting service offered by EGG. As any of you hear of jobs, please send me the information and if it comes through a recruiter, I'll get permission to post the jobs on our site.

Hospitality Jobs - Washington DC area

Spa Director
A luxury boutique hotel southern Maryland just outside Washington DC is hiring a Spa Director. The property has all suites less than 100 rooms. Full service spa. Located on water, so lots of aquatic sports. Part of a worldwide luxury hotel group.

For more information, send your resume to the recruiter, Ron Cribbet:

roncribbet@Aston-Remick.com

If the client is interested, he will share more information directly with you.

Hospitality Jobs - Memphis TN

Sales Manager & Director of Sales (reports to Dir Marketing)
A luxury boutique hotel near Memphis Tennessee. Just finished a $24M renovation of property. Hope to gain Mobil 5 Star status. Less than 100 luxury rooms. Several thousand sq/ft of meeting space.

Reservations Manager
The same hotel as above is hiring a reservations manager.

For more information, send your resume to the recruiter, Ron Cribbet:

roncribbet@Aston-Remick.com

If the client is interested, he will share more information directly with you.

Happy Holidays

2008 The Fitzgerald Year in Pictures

Happy Holidays. Here is the Fitzgerald year in pictures in lieu of our normal holiday letter.




See you next year!

Chicke Fitzgerald

Happy Holidays - NO CALL THIS WEEK

Nancy Widmann was wonderful on Friday. Thanks for those of you who participated. It was our largest call yet! A very nice way to end the year.

You are all very special to me, my gift for 2008.

I hope this finds you winding down for the holidays. My "present" to you is to lift each of you up this holiday season and pray for peace in your hearts and your families and for clarity of vision for those of you who are in transition or unsure about your future or your finances.

Here is my favorite Christmas song. It presents an interesting perspective. Take a little time to ponder the man behind the day.

Blessings,

Chicke Fitzgerald

Don't miss Friday's Call

Nancy has a story to tell. Don't miss it.

Friday 4pm

Dial-in Number: (218) 844-8230 Participant Access Code: 874258#

Nancy is the former CEO of CBS Radio and the author of "I didn't see it coming".

From the calls and emails that I'm getting, I know you need to participate. Please don't be afraid to share your side of this story.

The final chapter of your story is one we can all write together.

It has success written all over it. Let's do something big together.

WOW - What a stat....

"It has been reported that over 70% of new U.S. business start ups
are owned by women. "

I now know how important "Go for No" is!

For those of you who missed yesterday's call with Andrea Waltz, we learned that going for "no" can be really empowering. She encouraged us to have "Go for No" goals - such as getting turned down for funding or trying to sell a given product 20 times. She said that if getting turned down is your goal, it depersonalizes it and actually can make it into a bit of a game that you don't take quite as seriously as if you are going for "yes". The odds are that if you increase the number of times that you are trying, you will get some yes answers along the way.

Another really interesting insight was that we often say no for our customers/prospects without giving them the chance to even react. We talk ourselves out of even trying. That is a NO-NO!!

Get Andrea's book and gain some new courage in your negotiations - both personally and professionally.

Chicke Fitzgerald

Today's Call with Eli Davidson was terrific!

Well ladies, those of you who did not make the call today really missed out. Eli Davidson was very informative and entertaining at the same time. She gave us some great tips on how to manage our relationships.

I won't do it justice by putting the highlights here, but I'll do it anyway:

1. Men and women communicate differently - women talk like we toss salad and men talk like they are laying bricks.
2. Train your man like you train your dog.... ok this one I can't summarize as easily but after Eli was off the call we got great pleasure in imagining training our bosses the same way....
3. Men use about 10k words per day, women 25k. If you have an excess of words and no one to deliver them to, call a girlfriend.......
4. Secret words to use in communication "Happy", "Hero" and "I need" versus "I want"
5. Vitamin "G" (girlfriends) are a very important part of our daily needs. Thankfully we all have EGG that helps us fulfill our weekly requirement.
   

I did tape the session (although I've never quite figured out how to get it from the teleconference company, but can if if someone wants it!). So let me know if you want it. I'll need a credit card to process the $10 fee.

Join us next week for the author of "Go for No". See you then. Have a super weekend.

Chicke Fitzgerald

Why men are never depressed

Jane forwarded this to me. I've tried to find proper attribution, but it seems to be going around as an anonymous post. Hopefully this will shed some light to us ladies out there on why men are never depressed, cause at the end of the day, men are just happier people, right?

• Your last name stays put.
• The garage is all yours.
• Wedding plans take care of themselves.
• Chocolate is just another snack.
• You can be President.
• You can never be pregnant.
• You can wear a white T-shirt to a water park.
• You can wear NO shirt to a water park.
• Car mechanics tell you the truth.
• The world is your urinal.
• You never have to drive to another gas station restroom because this one is just too icky.
• You don't have to stop and think of which way to turn a nut on a bolt.
• Same work, more pay.
• Wrinkles add character.
• People never stare at your chest when you're talking to them.
• New shoes don't cut, blister, or mangle your feet.
• One mood all the time.
• Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat.
• You know stuff about Tanks (Sherman? Tiger? T70?).
• A five-day vacation only requires one suitcase.
• You can open all your own jars.
• Three pairs of shoes are more than enough.
• Your underwear is $5.95 for a three-pack.
• You almost never have strap problems in public.
• You are unable to see wrinkles on your clothes.
• Everything on your face stays its original color.
• The same hairstyle lasts for years, maybe decades even.
• You only have to shave your face and neck (or head)
• You can play with toys all your life.
• Your belly usually hides your big hips.
• One wallet and one pair of shoes - one color for all seasons.
• You can wear shorts no matter how your leg looks.
• You can "do" your nails with a pocket knife.
• You have freedom of choice concerning growing a moustache.
• You can do Christmas shopping for 25 relatives on December 24 in just 25 minutes.

Now, no wonder men are more happier !!