Forward Thinking: 2020 into 2021…

After a year of earnest effort learning new skills to perform old jobs in new ways (whether virtually or still onsite), staff are weary. Heart and soul weary. And, despite whatever fun one might try to have with this day/Groundhog Day this year—for the sake of celebrating something—these times, and looming February blahs, can be tough to take. Staff are desperate for uplifting premium fuel (beyond that of chocolate, wine and butter-laden popcorn!) to confidently and hopefully continue meeting the challenges of this second year of Covid-19 isolation—including the challenges of continuing to sustain high standards in service excellence, and common-courtesy graciousness to colleagues, external clients, and even themselves.

Through my virtual motivational keynote, Forward Thinking: Strategies for Protecting Your Professional Passion By Building Resilience, Embracing Renewal and Recovering Everyday Joy, I offer attendees Covid-times-sensitive motivational messages, tips, tricks and techniques for soldiering on through this continued tough stretch. I deliver content that is simultaneously inspiring, encouraging, and yet still educational—carrying messages that fortify staff spirit and boost team morale, because at our core all of us, regardless of position or industry, need an intermittent dose of motivating fuel to keep moving forward. Especially right now.

We are all potentially negatively fuelled and susceptible (even if we don’t succumb) to worries, frets and concerns that may undermine personal and organizational morale when facing prolonged periods of crisis, whether in 2020, 2021, or beyond. That’s why periodic morale-boosting fortification is essential. As renowned and sage keynote speaker Zig Ziglar once said, “People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing—that’s why we recommend it daily!”

Year One of this pandemic, for most businesses, was one of scrambling and “survival mode.” For many, 2020 presented little time for such staff “extras” as motivational keynote messages and optional professional development workshops, because treading water to keep businesses afloat filled every workday hour. But now, with the close of January 2021, we have travelled around the calendar one full turn with how this Covid-19-times reality impacts workplaces and the fine people that make them tick.

Now we know that people must carry on as diligently as possible. We all must, as that classic old Timex watch commercial reminds, “take a licking and keep on ticking.” My timely (no pun intended—well, maybe slightly) ;) virtual keynote presentation, Forward Thinking: Strategies for Protecting Your Professional Passion By Building Resilience, Embracing Renewal and Recovering Everyday Joy is a perfect staff appreciation gift for you to offer your folks, to do just that—to bolster their spirit and morale so that everyone can “take a licking and keep on ticking,” with clarity, confidence and professional purpose through 2021, until better days arrive.

Forward Thinking… energizes and educates virtual participants with inspirational, doable-today tips, tricks and techniques to:

• Uplift Spirit;
• Protect Positive Attitude, For the Sake of Self as Well as Colleagues and Clients;
• Fortify Professional Passion and Morale;
• Remember, Identify and Declare Professional Self-Worth/Professional Purpose;
• Employ Stress-Resistant Strategies/Stress & Conflict Management Techniques;
• Apply the Anger Cycle With Colleagues and Clients, to Minimize Resentments;
• Access Humor, to Lighten Sprit and Protect Mental Health;
• Exercise the Shifting Perspective Muscle—to Always See the “Good” in the “Bad”;
• Embrace Easy-to-Learn-and-Apply Daily Mindfulness and Resilience Enhancing Techniques to Protect a Mentally Health Mindset, to Maximize Successful Navigation Through These Tough Times.
• Identify Ways to Network and Stay in Touch—To Stay Virtually Connected and Together While Literally Apart.
• List, Explain, and Apply Five Best Practices to Embrace Every Day, Before Even Getting Out of Bed!

Here is a Sample of Client Feedback From My Most Recent Virtual Keynotes:

“A heartfelt thank you for your [virtual] contributions to our [annual conference] yesterday, Nina! Your keynote messaging, your engaging spirit, and your delivery were exactly what our sector needed. Not to mention the books… can’t wait to crack mine open! I’ve connected with you so many times and I always leave with new insights, ideas, and more energy to push forward and continue on! Staff left feeling acknowledged, energized and inspired to take on their roles, and the challenges and victories that await them in the year ahead. Mission accomplished! It has been an absolute pleasure working alongside you this year. We look forward to working with you again!”

— Tenneil Dhaliwal, Manager, Quality Initiatives, Child Development Resource Connection Peel (CDRCP)

“You were amazing! On point; a truly wonderful keynote!! We were delighted to have you be part of our very first virtual staff event.”

— Denise Plinton, Specialist, Region of Peel (Ontario)

Clients repeatedly share that my virtual and in-person keynotes are highly engaging, interactive, and congenial in presentation style—blending a fast-paced, tasteful combination of humor and inspiration, with a fold-in of respect for the gravity of our times. With my proven keynote track record of forging immediate and natural connections with audiences, you can trust that I will be quick out of the gate with an interest-piquing, provocative opening that grabs your staff’s attention, and then sustains that level of virtual participant engagement and intrigue until the final, throw-down-the-gauntlet inspirational challenge of my closing words.

Motivating with in-person and virtual keynotes for 24 years (and presenting repeatedly to a significant percentage of my diverse list of clients), I will get your staff bobbing their heads with enthusiasm, smiling and laughing in agreement (even on their own, while sitting at their home-based computers!). Attendees will be stimulated and challenged to “do things differently moving forward”—and moving forward, literally and figuratively, is what it’s all about right now!

Participants will move forward from my virtual session with plenty of spirit-and-morale-boosting practical points to ponder that make them go, “Hmmm, I like that! I can do that! I can use that! I can be that!”

AND THE BONUS: My one-to-two hour inspirational professional development keynotes do double-duty as fortifying fuel for participants’ private lives, too, because wherever you go, there you are! (Even if “there,” these days, isn’t much further than the front door!)

To book my keynote services, feel free to call me at 416-588-3334.

I’d love to have a real-time chat with you! No email required to arrange an appointment to call. Feel free to be spontaneous and forward thinking! ☺

If email is your preferred way to connect:

nina@ninaspencer.com

To learn more about my keynote services, and to view a wider sampling of my clients’ accolades about my contributions to their corporate, public sector, not-for-profit, and association events, visit:

https://ninaspencer.com

While there, also feel free to click the links to a wide sample of my TV and radio interviews with on-air media such as:

• TVO’s The Agenda,
• CBC Radio,
• Zoomer Radio,
• CTV News,
• Global TV and
• And Newstalk 1010

And also while visiting, feel free to review my featured articles and profiles in print publications such as:

• The Globe and Mail,
• The National Post,
• Chatelaine Magazine,
• And Canadian Manager Magazine (alongside two decades of my Working Wisdom periodic articles)

So, once again, Happy Groundhog Day! And my sincere best wishes to you, your staff and loved ones, for solid good health and happiness throughout 2021.

Nina