The Greater IBM Connection - on the blog side

August Highlights

As I again couldn’t reduce the number of pictures that I would like to share with you, I will try to at least concentrate on the most important things while writing my third blog entry. I am still enjoying my time on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean a lot - working, taking Spanish lessons, swimming, meeting many, many lovely people, doing a lot of sightseeing, traveling and discovering different parts of New York City.

 
The Tornado:

Surprisingly, I have survived the tornado which caused extensive damage in parts of Brooklyn two weeks ago - without even noticing that there had been one. So either the definitions of the words “thunderstorm” and “tornado” are slightly different here in the US or I myself have just had an extremely deep sleep that night, so that I was kind of shocked the next morning when no subway was running and I got to know from the newspapers that there had been a tornado the night before…

Washington D.C.:

As if 3.5 months in New York City weren´t enough, Karina (my German co-op colleague who is interning at IBM Poughkeepsie at the moment) and I decided to visit the national capitol. So we went to Washington, D.C. by bus for two days – taking the famous Chinatown Express from Chinatown NYC to Chinatown Washington, D.C. in order to have a weekend full of sightseeing, extremely good summer weather and a lot of national culture and, of course, a lot of fun combined with walking another 200 miles (at least it felt like that). The city itself is really fascinating, especially because it is extremely quiet, green and relaxing compared to NYC.  Since I would like to share as much as possible with you, here are some great impressions from DC: The Chinatown Express, the Washington Monument, The White House, The Supreme Court, and The Capitol.

Community Building Workshop in Somers:

Last Tuesday I was finally able to meet the rest of our team in person for the first time, because the so-called Community Building Workshop of the communications team was taking place in Somers,NY, which is located about 1.5 hours north of NYC. So after getting up in the middle of the night, I was picked up near Grand Central Station at 6 a.m. together with Kevin Clark and Larry Phipps by an SUV limo service. Well, I could have also taken the train instead, but I have to admit, that I have enjoyed my first limo ride ;-) After a warm welcome including coffee and breakfast and getting to know the other participants – about 15 IBMers from different sites in the US, Austria and Germany - the workshop itself started. And it seemed like none of us would be allowed to leave the room again before the Greater IBM Connection’s goals were refined down to the very last detail and Holt, our workshop facilitator, had achieved his “at least five motivators” per topic.

 

Lots of greetings!

As usual, I´m looking forward to your feedback.

Mona Lisa

Eggcorns and other slips of the tongue

Ever start to say one thing and then hear something totally different come out of your mouth? Sadly, I have. Happily, I have lots of company. In a new book described by its author as "a work of applied blunderology", writer Michael Erard argues that verbal blundering is natural, meaningful, and "integral to language."

You can see Erard's book, "Um...slips, stumbles and verbal blunders, and what they mean",  through the eyes of another book author, Charles Harrington Elster, in a Wall Street Journal book review (Section W4, August 24, 2007 at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118792053559707527.html?mod=at_leisure_main_reviews_days_only). Elster's books include "The Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations," "What in the Word?", and other books on language, so he knows whereof he speaks.

"Um..." (published by Pantheon, in case the WSJ article is no longer available when you read this) tells us that as many as 8% of the words you and I utter today will likely be misused. Since I do a lot of talking in the course of most days, that could add up to be a pretty scary number.

I immediately placed my order for the book. I mean how could I resist reading about the differences between malapropisms (e.g. Curly of 3 Stooges fame: "I resemble that remark") and a spoonerism (e.g. Rev. Archibald Spooner supposedly toasted Queen Victoria as "our queer old dean").

And did you know that tying down a person's dominant arm increases verbal blunders while gesturing while speaking decreases them?

There's much more covered in the review, which is only a foretaste of the book.

It may not reduce the number of times I misspeak, but I expect it to increase my appreciation for the complexity of language and expression. And that's not all bad.

By the way, an Eggcorn refers to a word someone uses incorrectly but believes to be correct - including eggcorn for acorn.

Do you have a favorite example of verbal blunders you've heard (or, spoken)? If so, post them so the rest of us won't feel alone.

-posted by Larry Phipps, a greater IBMer

Burlington draws a crowd for its 50th birthday celebration

IBM Burlington threw a 50th birthday party, and drew an estimated 6,500 to help mark the event - including Vermont Gov. Jim Douglas and US Sen. Patrick Leahy. In addition to the midway, a free barbeque lunch, and a stage show organized by the Site Diversity Council and featuring performances from IBMers, an exhibit representing more than a half century of technology drew a steady crowd.

If you want to look for familiar faces, Henry Raymond (one of the original 400 hires at the Burlington site) took pictures that he posted at:

http://www.vtgrandpa.com/photos/slideshow.php?set_albumName=ibm50_070818

IBMers in Peru safe

Rafael Sanchez Loza, IBM country general manager for Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador, was able to report that all IBMers are accounted for and safe in the earthquake-damaged areas of Lima and three smaller cities in the south affected by the quake.

The magnitude 8 quake that struck the area on Wednesday, August 15, was estimated to have taken 500 lives and forced another 100,000 people from their homes. A 200-mile stretch along the coast and into the Andean foothills received most of the damage.

"Our deepest concern and sympathy goes out to those affected by this natural disaster," Loza said in a statement. "Our employees in Lima are safe and accounted for at this time and there has been no direct impact on IBM's Lima operations. Our service center is operating normally and our sales support has been contacting clients to offer our help as some have reported damage to their infrastructure."

While the safety and welfare of IBM employees and customers were a primary concern, Loza emphasized that the company is working closely to coordinate response services with local government and monitoring developments for areas where the company can contriute to the relief effort.   

-report filed by Larry Phipps

Greater IBMers – You have an opportunity

By Flor Estevez, operations manager, The Greater IBM Connection

When I joined IBM in 1999, I came from the furthest point away from a corporate environment like IBM you could be. I had my own business, residential real estate in the Caribbean, staff that included a driver, cook, secretary, assistant and salesperson. I made very decent money working 8 -9 hours a day, five days a week and some weekends.  Palm trees waved in a constant breeze, sun shined perfectly, the grass was always green and I had 63 orchid plants hanging by the side of my "villa" overlooking one of the world's top golf courses. I rode horses when I wanted to, went to the beach midday, had no Sametime, or email following me everywhere, could take long lunches and dinner meetings.

Don’t misunderstand. I ADORE what I do now, but I miss the strong sense of teaming and commitment my staff and I shared with our clients.   

We have a wonderful community of 7,500, sharing a common bond of the IBM experience. And we can grow this community together. I want to see in this community that same sense of teaming and commitment that I knew before.

What I have loved about IBM is pretty much what I think most of you have loved; working with very smart people, who care about the quality of their work, care that things get done well – and want to make a difference.

That’s who you were and it’s who you still are.

Over the past couple of weeks, I've spoken to many of you who are the most active in the forums and some who email me regarding events and other happenings in the Greater IBM community. I love it when we correspond and talk; it makes everything feel more human.   

This community didn’t “just happen” you know. Before we launched The Greater IBM Connection, we hired a research firm and traveled to five areas of the world, asking former IBMers like many of you whether you would find value in a social and business network based on your IBM affiliation.

One of the first things we learned: you don’t want to be considered alumni. You said you still felt an important emotional tie to the company and its people, your old colleagues, and maybe some still working here.

So, we aren’t an “alumni” group; we’re Greater IBMers.

You also said there were some things you would value. Contact with former colleagues, and
The ability to network, for friendships, for business opportunities, for extending your experience – many reasons and, since you joined, I’m sure you have your own.

We chose a company named XING to host the Web portal, because it's the most comprehensive, open standard, social networking, global platform network host we could find, and it had the strictest privacy laws to abide by.  Then we began to populate this site with the sort of content you told us you wanted: the kind of thought leadership and business insight from IBM and IBMers past and present, you used to have access to when you got a paycheck from the company.

You also asked to have events where you could trade smiles and shake hands: business events, social events, Webinar, coffees. We've been creating those.

So that’s what we’ve done, so far, and we have a lot more planned in the future. That’s what those of us who are in the inside working for you, the Greater IBMers who make up this growing community.

And that’s where I need your help. We can provide the opportunity, but it’s up to you to make it your own so that this network truly is driven by the interests and needs of the Greater IBMers “out there”.

I want to see more people involved the way our most active members are involved, sharing ideas, raising issues, adding your own insights to the content you find in The Greater IBM Connection, whether it’s in our articles or in a Blog or a Forum – or an event that you join. Or, even better, an event you organize.

We’ll help you. There are tools to help you plan and execute a local event. Write me and ask how.

Just as important, I need you to invite your friends who work at IBM or who used to work at IBM. They can gain value from being a part of The Greater IBM Connection – and that just makes it more valuable for all of us.

I need you to send me questions or write the editor. Share you opinions on the community, its intent, the direction you perceive it’s going. Take pictures of your Greater IBM get-togethers and write up what you are doing in those pictures. You can even share your humor (yeah, we still laugh occasionally in the Blue World! )

I need partners and colleagues in growth. I want to find  folks to raise their hands a and say "yes I will come and show up" - to the event, to the tabs to see new content, to promote ideas, to benefit discussions, to provoke opinions, even to take and take, but eventually to give also.

Send me your thoughts.

I’m waiting.

New York, New York - Sightseeing, the first THINK Forum and American peculiarities

As I promised, here is my second blog entry from NYC. A lot has happened since my arrival, even though that was not even 3 weeks ago! So here are my personal highlights of the first few weeks:

First of all – I have already found myself a nice new place to live in. As the first apartment I lived in was very remote and the neighbourhood not too appealing, I managed to visit several places all over New York City (some different ones in Brooklyn and also one in Union City, New Jersey, from where you’ve got an amazing view onto the Manhattan skyline) and decided to move into a lovely place in downtown Brooklyn which I share with two incredibly nice American roommates.

Secondly, I didn’t have to wait very long for my first real highlight inside IBM. Last Friday, the Greater IBM Connection organized its very first so called THINKForum – which itself already was a very interesting event, because Ted Childs (www.tedchilds.com), a greater IBMer who is renown as the top diversity expert on planet and his successor at IBM, Ron Glover, Vice President Global Workforce Diversity – HR,  discussed the impact of diversity on business success. One exciting thing about the event was the fact, that groups of Greater IBMers in Bangalore and Vienna were connected to the discussion via web and phone conferences, while they sat together in IBM locations and could ask questions to the guest speakers and participate.

 

 

Ted Childs (left) and Ron Glover

Moreover, the event took place in Armonk, where the Corporate Headquarters of IBM are located. Therefore, Flor and I went to Armonk and I was allowed to visit the headquarters for the first time in my life – which was really impressive! Especially because I expected them to be extremely different: just seconds before we arrived there, I was afraid that the taxi driver got lost (again ;-)) because we suddenly found ourselves in the middle of many, many trees, forests, lakes and nature reservations – AND three different buildings labelled with the three letters I, B and M J By the way, a funny coincident was, that one of my German coop colleagues, Maik Kelpin, works as an intern in Armonk right now and we met there. Well, sometimes the world seems to be just like a village!

After having enjoyed the first weekend mostly in the beautiful parks of the city, Karina Jankowski, who is a German coop student as well and interns at IBM Poughkeepsie at the moment, visited me last weekend and we finally discovered the city as tourists and tried to do as much sightseeing as possible within two days. We walked a lot(!) and visited many of the famous attractions, as you can see from the impressions I’m sharing with you in the pictures below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On Sunday afternoon we were even able to see the Broadway play “A chorus line” – can you believe that you can get Broadway tickets for $25, if you know WHERE and WHEN to buy them?! ;-)

        By the way, another exciting coincidence is that both of us are going to deal with projects within Second Life during our internships at IBM here in the US, so that we will be able to support each other in the next few months. Talking about work – I don’t think I’ll get bored until November, seems like my list of tasks is growing and growing. So I’m allowed to help organize events for the Greater IBM Connection, design a career centre in Second Life and support the team with their daily business. By the way, I’m thinking about organizing a nice get-together myself with all current or former IBM interns in the New York City area before autumn… any ideas or suggestions?! Let me know!

Alright, as a little conclusion after the first three weeks, I’d like to share some of my most “interesting” observations here in NYC with the non-New Yorkers amongst you:

• a cheese cake in the USA can exist of up to 90% chocolate or even more

• New York is a crazy city to live in, there are so many free concerts and theatres in all the different parks all around the week

• never try to meet a particular person at Times Square at 11pm on a Saturday evening

• it’s definitely true: this city never sleeps

• if you walk around and don’t see more than 3 Starbucks cafés within 10 minutes, you must be outside New York already

• never ask in a supermarket, if they offer a certain product in SMALLER packages than those huge family sizes you usually get, unless you want the staff to know that it is your first week over here
  

Best regards,
Mona Lisa

Internship at the Greater IBM Connection in NYC

Hello everyone!
My name is Mona Lisa Merkert, I come from Germany and have studied within IBM Germany’s co-op program in Stuttgart since 2005. I´m in International Business Administration, especially because the opportunity of working in an international environment and getting to know new cultures and languages really fascinates me. 
I´ve been registered at Xing for about one year and became a member of the Greater IBM Connection a couple of months ago. As I got really interested in what the premium group was doing, I finally contacted Flor Estevez, the program manager, in April, told her about my studies and the required internship abroad, my interest in communications and project management etc – and guess what, some weeks later, I had the approval to come to New York and work for the Greater IBM Connection until November! Exciting, isn´t it?!

Now that I´ve been here for nearly two weeks, I would like to share my first impressions with you; enjoy :-)

After I arrived at JFK International Airport Wednesday evening two weeks ago, I took the taxi to my place in Eastern Brooklyn – one of the famous yellow ones! As the cab driver got lost, it took us about 90 minutes to get there, instead of 30… and as he was so confused and angry about this when we finally got there, he only asked me, if I had a gun (“You will need it in this neighbourhood!”) instead of wishing me a nice stay. Well – welcome to New York City!

Since on Thursday there was my first meeting with Flor, I went to the IBM location at 590 Madison Avenue in Manhattan; THIS was my first impression of the IBM skyscraper:

Nevertheless, I became kind of suspicious, when the receptionist told me that Flor Estevez was not working in this office… and several minutes later I left the building with a big smile on my face - what I found out was that there are TWO IBM locations on Madison Avenue… one on 590 Madison Ave and another one on 11 Madison Ave – and, as you might have guessed by now, my office is on the 18th floor of 11 Madison Ave :-) So that was the start of my very first day of my internship here, couldn´t have been more entertaining!

The next picture proves that I actually found the right office (it´s the building on the left)!
My very first day at work was amazing: after a warm welcome, Flor introduced me to many, many new colleagues here at the office and afterwards seemed to inform half of the United States over the phone, that I finally arrived and I was welcomed by several members of my new team which is spread over four locations, which means that we are going to communicate a lot using the phone, webconferences etc. So far, everything seems to be so new and so different from the German IBM locations I have worked at. For example, the office does not have its own restaurant, but usually employees go and grab a salad or something else in one of the delis around and then – I couldn´t believe it – sit down in Madison Square Park in order to have lunch… we are located in the very center of Manhattan and have lunch in a park right in front of the office building; crazy, isn´t it?! The next unbelievable thing about this office here is the amazing view out of the window… to be honest, I enjoy having to get some print-outs every now and then, because the printer is right next to the window ;-)

So that was my first day in NYC – at least nearly… I could also mention that I got lost on my way back “home” because I realized too late that there are two subway stations with exactly the same name in Brooklyn so that I only arrived there at 9pm. But I guess I better don´t mention it, might be too embarrassing ;-) I could also tell you that after my arrival there I realized that my front door keys didn´t fit and I was just lucky that my roommates were at home… oh, and furthermore I could mention that my day ended with the light in my room not working any more… but that would make it sound like I had a horrible first day in this city – which definitely is NOT true! :-)

I will keep you posted on what I´m doing here in New York City and what my experience as a staff member of the Greater IBM Connection is like – I really hope you enjoy reading my blog entries and getting an insight into my life here, events we are going to organize, people involved, new ideas, my tasks, the team, my search for a new place and so on.

Warm regards from NYC,
Mona Lisa

New Chapter for The Greater IBM Connection

By Kevin A. Clark

Please meet Ethan McCarty, who starts today as the leader for The Greater IBM Connection.

Ethan McCarty

He's a truly talented fellow who I've come to admire over the past couple of weeks in background briefings about you, our members, and our goals. Ethan is the Editor-in-Chief of w3, IBM's employee intranet news and information service, and now adds The Greater IBM Connection and IBM Alumni Relations to his responsibilities. He is a member of the IBM Corporate Communications team. Please join me in welcoming Ethan to his expanded role.

Today marks a new chapter in the evolution of IBM Alumni Relations and The Greater IBM Connection with the strategic alignment of IBM's powerful internal web resources for the benefit of The Greater IBM Connection members worldwide. Look for great things in the future. Flor Estevez, our Operations Manager & Producer, and Larry Phipps, our Editor for The Greater IBM Connection, both move to Ethan's team.

Thanks to each of you for being with us on the first part of a long journey we're starting with IBM alums. I want to thank every member who's given of themselves to host a gathering, post a news item. or just visited The Greater IBM Connection regularly. A special thanks to the IBM Alumni Relations Core Team listed below for your unwavering support and fundamental contributions to The Greater IBM Connection: Bettina Kahlau, Deborah Kasden, Eve Iannuzzi, Flor Estevez, Jack Mason, Kevin Aires, Larry Phipps, Lois Dwyer, Pauline Ores, and Sandor Barany. Every one of these professionals, along with too many more to list here, have worked to reconnect Greater IBMers around the world for business development and professional benefit.

Greater wishes for success to you all.