ATD-LA News

Is your ATD-LA membership coming up for renewal?

Take advantage of this special offer!

If your renewal date falls between the months of August and December, your next year’s membership will include three free bonus months – 15 months for the price of 12!

To redeem this offer, please contact the office.

Renew now! This offer ends October 31.

Per the terms of the chapter bylaws, we call for your self-nomination to join the Board of Directors.

Positions with terms beginning in 2021

• President Elect
• Treasurer
• Director of Workshops & Webinars
• Member-at-Large
• Secretary
• Director of Marketing & Communications
• Director of Membership

Visit www.atdla.org/page-1819156 for position descriptions.

All Nomination Forms must be submitted by or before the deadline: August 21, 2020, 5 p.m.

Click Here for the form.

1995 seems like a long time ago. Yes, it was in 1995 that a memorial fund was established by Ken Nowack, now Chief Research Officer of Envisia Learning, Inc. and members of the ATD-LA chapter in honor of a very special person, Mira Gold, former late wife of Ken and ATD-LA member. I am honored to share that after 25 years, new ATD-LA board members will receive a generous grant that will allow them to undertake a professional development program thanks to the Mira Gold Memorial Fund established by Ken Nowack and members of the chapter back in 1995. Here is what Ken wanted to share.

Mira began her long volunteer involvement with ATD-LA as co-chair of the Career Development Special Division with Amy (Clement) Lichty in the late 1970s. She was a seasoned learning and development consultant and specialist in the career management field, working as a career consultant for Northrop before starting a career skills center and program at the Los Angeles Times. Her career as a consultant with Lee Hecht Harrison was cut short with a brief battle with cancer at the age of 40.

Mira met her husband Ken Nowack while they were both working at the University of California, Davis, before moving to Los Angeles to work as an HR consultant for Flying Tigers Airline that was acquired by FedEx.  She was born in Harrisburg, PA and Mira did her undergraduate work at the University of Pittsburgh, followed by graduate studies at Indiana University where she obtained her master’s degree in College Student Personnel. Mira and Ken were married for 14 years and lived in the San Fernando Valley.  She was a talented trainer, consultant, and career development professional that modeled empathy, compassion, and support to those she touched in her delivery of career services. 

We are truly grateful to Ken Nowack and his family for their generous gift to ATD-LA in support of Mira’s devotion to professional and career development. Special thanks also go to our CFO Anna Halbur, OD Chapter Leader Scott Wimer, and 2012 Past President Sean Bloch for their help and input in facilitating the release of the Mira Gold Memorial Fund for the benefit of chapter board members. If you or your organization would like to make a gift to ATD-LA, please contact Anna Halbur at cfo@atdla.org.

Every five to ten years, it is common practice for our chapter to make updates to the ATD-LA bylaws in order to better reflect the practices and procedures necessary to keep the chapter running smoothly and serve our membership. The bylaws were last updated in April 2015 and are once again undergoing review. 

At the July ATD-LA Board of Directors meeting, the board voted to approve updates to the bylaws. These proposed changes will be presented at the August 13 chapter meeting and all current ATD-LA members in attendance will be invited to vote on their approval. 

Proposed changes to the bylaws include:

- Updating board member positions and titles, including the addition of Director of Workshops, Director of Webinars, and Director of Special Interest Groups positions. 

- Modifying the timing of key annual meetings to better accommodate the chapter calendar. 

- Adopting processes and procedures to better allow us to function in a more virtual world, necessitated in many ways by the Covid-19 crisis. 

- Aligning the bylaws with the current official name of the ATD-Global organization (changing from ATD National to ATD Global). 

All proposed changes will be made available at the August 13 chapter meeting. In the meantime, if members have questions or comments on anything related to the bylaws updates, they are welcome to contact ATD-LA secretary, Annie Liao at secretary@atdla.org.

Diversity training, cultural awareness programs, and learning and development forums that are focused on inclusion may be new to some of us. But as talent development professionals and members of the global ATD community, it is our job to offer programs that cover ATD’s Talent Development Capability Model, which lists Cultural Awareness and Inclusion as one of the 7 capabilities that help individuals Build Personal Capability in the workplace.

Recent events in our neighborhoods and around the world have heightened the need to bring more awareness to this capability. Be sure to check out the ATD Diversity and Inclusion Resources put together by ATD that includes blog posts, articles, and webcasts to help you create programs that celebrate differences between individuals irrespective of race, religion, or color. A New Look at D&I: Interview With Michelle P. King, daughter of Martin Luther King, by ATD staff member Lisa Spinelli addresses important questions such as “Why do diversity and inclusion programs fail? What are they missing?” and “What do talent development and HR professionals not understand about the difference between diversity and inclusion?”

In closing, as we embrace summer and start enjoying our quarantine freedom, let us not forget that we are still embroiled in a pandemic and must continue to follow CDC guidelines. Stay safe and healthy and a Happy July 4^th to you and your family!

Dear Members and Friends,

Thank you for being a valued member and friend of the Association for Talent Development Los Angeles chapter. I hope that you have enjoyed learning from the multitude of programs we offer and connected with fellow colleagues or made new friends through our virtual and in-person events.

I wanted to take this opportunity to update you on the status of our program offerings for 2020. As you know, the pandemic has caused a great deal of disruption. Many venues, including USC and Antioch University that are our host venues for in-person workshops and chapter meetings, have enforced strict requirements that have precluded us from hosting in-person events on their campuses. As a result, we have had to move all of our programs to a virtual platform. This will be effective throughout the rest of 2020.

We apologize for any inconvenience that this has caused, but I want to assure you that we have made a smooth transition from in-person to virtual programs, and the quality of our programs still remains of the highest standards. We are also offering pre- and post-chapter meeting virtual networking opportunities. So please be sure to check out the calendar and save the dates for upcoming chapter meetings, webinars, special interest group meetings and the August 5 Member Networking Mixer.

If you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact me at president@atdla.org. We look forward to your continued participation in ATD-LA. And if you are interested in volunteering or serving on a committee, please contact Valerie Quezada at volunteers@atdla.org.

Stay safe and healthy and best wishes to you and your family!

Sincerely,

Kavita Gupta

ATD-LA President 

It is hard to believe that we are almost half way into 2020 which will always be etched in our minds as the year of the pandemic. What is most heartening is that YOU, our valued members and friends of the chapter, still continue to invest in your professional development through lifelong learning.

Attendance at our chapter meetings and webinars has been steady averaging 25-50 participants at each event. While all of us miss the personal touch of meeting our colleagues, sharing stories, or exchanging laughs over drinks and dinner at chapter meetings, all is not lost! Virtual lunch and learns, mixers, and our evening chapter meetings still offer a great way to network, meet new people and make new connections for professional or job opportunities.

Please be sure to check out our calendar as we have a full schedule of events and programs lined up for you, and reach out to a fellow member through the membership directory or board member by dropping a line to say hello. Stay connected, and bring a friend to an event. As always, stay safe and healthy!

Save the Date! Next May 23-26, 2021, Los Angeles will be the proud host city for the ATD Global International Conference and Exposition. Did you know that the world needs more than 1 billion people reskilled by 2030? We are the masters of this challenge, so be sure to join over 10,000 professionals from around the globe that will visit our city to participate in over 300 sessions, at the world’s largest learning and development conference along with 400+ vendors!

Led by our Volunteer Coordinator, Valerie Quezada and in partnership with ATD Global headquartered in Virginia, Alexandria, Valerie will oversee 450+ volunteers from all over the world. All of us will have an opportunity to volunteer, and a website dedicated to the conference will open up in January 2021 for you to sign up and volunteer.

Sadly, the International Conference scheduled in Denver this year from May 17-21 was canceled because of the pandemic. Let us get through these challenging times and look forward to better times. As always, learning never ends so invest in your chapter, and ATD Global, and avail of all the online and in-person opportunities that can help you in your career at www.atdla.org or td.org. Stay safe and stay healthy!