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I'm ready! Let's plan it! Quentin-? You did such a good job organizing the first, got any ideas for the next?

Or I could plan it, if you guys want to drive out to Rockford... :wink:

learningmgr's picture

Des Plaines again? Its quite Central for everyone. I live in Elgin

stewartlogan's picture

[quote="learningmgr"]Des Plaines again? Its quite Central for everyone. I live in Elgin[/quote]

I'm in. Just tell me where and when to be there ...

garnett21's picture

I'm in too depending on the date - I'm going to be traveling quite a bit for work in September, but if the meeting is on a day when I'm not out of town, count me in!

Des Plaines works fine for me too.

Looking forward to it!
Karen

terrih's picture

I'm good with Des Plaines.

The last one was on a Thursday, and ISTR that was problematic for a few. I'd prefer it not be a Tuesday, but the rest of the week is fine for me. Anyone else have preferences on the day of the week?

quentindaniels's picture
Training Badge

whoa, no rest for the weary!

I love everyone's enthusiasm to get back together. Sometimes my High I gets the best of me, and I put stuff off. Terri, great job starting a thread 

Here's my two cents:

Day of the week: Mark said Monday's and Tuesday's work best on the whole. I agree with this. I would love a Monday and believe this would leave things fresh in our minds to practice and reflect upon during the week. Cons: Monday night football  but I can live with this.

Day of the month: Assuming a monthly meet-up is something we want to keep doing, I vote we establish “when” we want to do it every month e.g. the "n"th Monday of the month. The sooner we get a routine the better.

*Seeing how we are coming up upon months with busy seasons towards the end (Oct. Halloween, Nov. Thanksgiving, Dec. Christmas) I propose we have it on either the 2nd or 3rd Monday of the month to make it easier to get this up and running. The 17th I think is a good date for this month, but I would like feedback

Length of meeting: I am firmly in favor of setting time limits to the meeting, and also making sure we achieve our group goals in this time period. If people want to hang around afterwards that’s great, but I think it is important that we set goals to achieve during the time period, and then achieve them. 1.5 hours sounds good to me, but would love to hear thoughts.

Agenda/Format: I truly liked Mark’s idea about us all bring our management problems and discussing them as a group. I think this can be a core part of every week’s agenda. Also, I would love to spend time each meeting practicing a specific manager tool e.g. the feedback model. My thoughts are that we all listen to that specific cast, and/or practice that tool prior, and then share insights. If we did both of these every month, I would learn a lot.

*Also, Flipchart is definitely on the first agenda. I can’t wait

Location: I don’t care where we go as I am close to everything. That being said, the feedback I received at the end of the last meeting was that something closer to the city was better. On the other hand, that’s rough for people from Milwaukee and Rockford.

Personally, rather than deciding where the most ideal part of town is, lets hear offers as to what space is available to us. We need a more effective environment than Leona’s, and I would like to hear someone suggest an area they have access to that we can use. Then go from there (My apt. is a little small )

Lastly, I am sending these thoughts and a link to this discussion board to all the emails I received at dinner. Hopefully then we can then get everyone’s inputs. And again, these are only my thoughts and want to hear everyone’s’.

Sorry so much writing,

Quentin Daniels

quentindaniels's picture
Training Badge

It looked less long in Microsoft Word I promise :lol:

amitkhosla's picture
Training Badge

Any day suits me fine. How about the schaumburg area , something near the metra line. That way people coming from town can ride a train .

terrih's picture

The 17th is fine for me.

ISTR someone offered a conference room at their office. Is that still a possibility? I'll bring brownies. :D

TimCarlson's picture

I composed a long(er) winded, high C, reply that got wiped out when I tried the "preview reply". Here it is in the condensed version...

I vote for:
Farther northwest, but I'll understand if most of the group resides in the city. Schaumburg seems to be a reasonable spot for many reasons.

Not Monday although I understand the logic for having it at the beginning of the week

Early to mid month versus later (too many deadlines at the "end of the month")

I'll be looking for potential meetup sites. Hope to see you all at the next one.

terrih's picture

I'm all for farther northwest. Somebody propose something already! :)

We could meet in the conference room in my office building, and I'm dead serious but I still rather doubt everyone wants to drive as far northwest as Rockford. :twisted:

quentindaniels's picture
Training Badge

agreed, or I'm going to start calling people and offering feedback :x

mharhhar's picture

I am downtown but I am willing to meet within an hours drive. Its worth it.
I was at the last one but I will be out of town this month from the 12 to the 25

jwyckoff's picture

I'll offer one of two office buildings my company is in. Either

a) I-94 & Rockland (Rout 176) or
b) I-94 & Half Day Road

If you want a place, I'll figure out what days of the week are good for me, and we can make this a recurring meeting.

Thoughts?

TimCarlson's picture

Jason,

Sounds great to me, either location. Every restaurant I found with meeting space (near the highways) also charge for that space. For a group our size, we're looking at ~$500.

I do know of a few restaurants up in Fox Lake and Wauconda that have private meeting areas (as long as you're buying dinner), but they're a bit of a haul for anyone coming from downtown.

My two cents.

Tim

quentindaniels's picture
Training Badge

Connick,

Thank you for making your work space available to us. I agree that this is far for the downtown people, but I think it will work for now. My vote is to do it.

All my other thoughts surrounding the dates/times/recurrences are listed in my thesis-like post from a week ago.

What are everyones' thoughts?

terrih's picture

Either one is OK for me, not much difference in travel time.

stewartlogan's picture

Less than a week to go. Any decisions yet?

terrih's picture

Connick, how about the south location. Name a date that works for you there for this month, we can worry about future meetings later.

Thanks so much for offering to host! And I really will bring brownies. :D

jwyckoff's picture

I can't do Mondays -- so the date this month will be

[color=red]Thursday, September 20th[/color]

I'll post more details later today.

jwyckoff's picture

[b]Date:[/b]
Thursday, September 20th

[b]Time:[/b]
6:30pm. [color=red]We will start on time. [/color]

[b]Location:[/b]
2333 Waukegan Rd
Bannockburn, IL 60015
Suite 300
[url=http://maps.google.com/maps?q=2333+Waukegan+Rd,+Deerfield,+IL+60015,+USA...

[b]Directions:[/b]
1 light south of Half Day Road (Route 22) and Waukegan (Route 43).
Turn East into complex. First building on right.

From Interstate: Get off of I-94, and go East on Half Day Road. 1/2 mile to Waukegan Rd. Turn right. Follow directions above.

[b]Agenda:[/b]
To come later this week.

terrih's picture

Hurray! Thanks! :D

quentindaniels's picture
Training Badge
mahomer's picture

While I live in Cincinnati, I visit our HQ in Chicago every couple weeks. I am in town next week. If I am still there on the 20th I will try to make it out to the 'burbs' for this meet-up.

Beware, I am still full of that contagious MT energy from the San Antonio conference!

Thanks for planning.

- mark

jwyckoff's picture

I'm going to start a new thread so folks don't have to dig through this one to see the date/time.

jwyckoff's picture

Hey folks --

I had to change to Wednesday -- I just found out I couldn't get the room for Thursday.

Again, the date is [color=green]Wednesday, September 19th[/color].[size=18][/size]