“Wi-Fi signal will be stronger downtown - Daily Tribune” plus 2 more |
- Wi-Fi signal will be stronger downtown - Daily Tribune
- Customer Training Improves Procurement - GCN.com
- Kelly shaking up Notre Dame football program - Detroit News
| Wi-Fi signal will be stronger downtown - Daily Tribune Posted: 16 Apr 2010 04:00 AM PDT Verizon sets up mobile cell site for two-day FutureMidwest conference. Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. |
| Customer Training Improves Procurement - GCN.com Posted: 16 Apr 2010 11:02 AM PDT By Jeff Erlichman SEWP outreach is based on the strongly held belief that onsite training and one-on-one meetings with customers build relationships. Key enhancements to the contract are the results of give-and-take training session discussions. Keep them calling. That's a big part of the SEWP training goal. "Part of the goal is not that they will call us less, but they will call us more," Joanne Woytek, SEWP PM explained. "That way they feel like they really know us. They feel comfortable calling us. It really builds that relationship and we get really good interaction through that process." The SEWP outreach model is different from everybody else's. The model is based on the strongly held belief that going out and meeting one-on-one with customers and training them on site is beneficial to them. It helps build relationships with the SEWP program people. As a result, they gain a good understanding of how to use the contracts correctly which is beneficial from a compliance point of view. "We are in front of them talking with them, interacting with them. This way they are going to get a lot more out of it and we are less likely to have any issues down the road. It's well worth it from that regard," said Woytek. "We really have concentrated in the past few years on outreach and training on site as being our main way of getting to people." Catalyst for Change At the same time this interaction benefits the program because many of the changes in how the contract is administered happen as a result of these discussions. Woytek explained that "in fact the key enhancements came about from those training sessions when somebody said, 'why don't you have this feature?' Nobody's ever asked for it. 'Do you want it? OK, that sounds good, let's go ahead and do that'." SEWP outreach is aimed at both the procurement and technical communities. "We usually train COs and more often the procurement resource people who support the COs," said Woytek. "If there is a good relationship between the procurement and the technical folks, we will get some technical folks in there. So I'm always happy when I see the technical folks in there because the process becomes a whole lot easier if you know up front what your options are." Practical SEWP SEWP serves customers in the North America, Europe and Asia. Products bought using SEWP find their way to Iraq and Afghanistan. Logistics and cost-consciousness make it hard for the SEWP team to go everywhere to do training. That is where the SEWP training video plays a big role. It makes it possible for people at DOD to use SEWP, because DOD requires that everybody be trained to use this. In the 15 minute training video, customers get a basic understanding of the contracts. "Then we have their name and then when we are in the area we can call and say we are coming to your area," said Woytek. "We don't just do these trainings on sites. There's Germany or Fort Bragg or upstate New York, we don't just say let's go fly off there. It's a process of deciding who else is around there; who else needs to get trained, so it's cost effective to do." The training video has brought a lot of value. It's instructed more than 3,600 so far. It's also available on DVD. To get yours, contact SEWP.
Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. |
| Kelly shaking up Notre Dame football program - Detroit News Posted: 16 Apr 2010 12:21 PM PDT Tom Coyne / Associated PressSouth Bend, Ind. --The morning before spring break at Notre Dame, the football team got a 5 a.m. wake-up call from coach Brian Kelly. It was time to start. The Fighting Irish players gathered at a practice field surrounded by snow and began what the new coach affectionately calls Camp Kelly. Players won't say exactly what went on during the 90-minute workout, except that there were no footballs or football drills involved. Mostly it was intense, team-building exercises and an eye-opening signal to players that Kelly wants to change the atmosphere at Notre Dame -- breathing new life into a once-elite program that's struggled through a series of mediocre coaching tenures. Kelly is aiming to put Notre Dame first, in the minds of its players and in the polls. He wants to persuade the Irish to start worrying more about their teammates than where they'll be drafted. Gone are the days of Charlie Weis, with his ostentatious Super Bowl rings and talk of how Bill Parcells, Bill Belichick and Tom Brady did things. Gone are the two-hour daily meetings and the walkthroughs at practices. Gone is the NFL approach. Advertisement Kelly, who spent 13 years coaching Division II Grand Valley State in western Michigan, wants the Irish giving it the old college try. That means a team first attitude. That means uptempo practices and a focus on ending a national championship drought that stretches back to 1988. "I want to hear about Notre Dame. I want to hear about restoring the glory to a university that has a great tradition," Kelly said. "What I want them talking about is, 'It's me that gets that first national championship,' not 'I want to be the No. 1 draft pick.' That's what we're reshaping." Kelly is not only transforming Notre Dame's offensive and defensive schemes, but everything from how the Irish practice, to how they eat, to how they spend their free time. The goal, as Kelly describes it, is to "get the fight back in the Fighting Irish." The most obvious difference under Kelly is the practices. Everything is done at a frenetic pace. Even stretching is done uptempo, with players leaping while running back and forth. Scrimmages are chaotic, often with several coaches yelling out at the same time in the same area. "We're trying to create an atmosphere that is difficult for them in the practice. I believe if you can get through practice, you're going to be prepared for Saturday," Kelly said. One way the coaches measure how players are doing is to grade each play to see if any players are loafing. One of the team's top players already has 20 loafs, Kelly said. "Now that's not because he wants to loaf. It's just the expectation of what we want him to do for that entire play is so different from what he was allowed to do in the past," Kelly said. "We're trying to set a new standard and demanding something different." Kelly believes he is responsible for developing players in five areas: skill on the field, physically, intellectually, socially and spiritually. Irish coaches teach football skills at practice. The physical improvements come through things like Camp Kelly, offseason workouts and the first training table at Notre Dame since Lou Holtz was there. Players eat dinner together Monday through Friday, a practice Weis tried to reinstate when he was coach. Athletic director Jack Swarbrick said the need to make sure players were eating right, instead of letting them eat at dining halls, became apparent when players, especially linemen, had trouble keeping weight on. The Irish were just 3-10 in November the past three seasons. "It's tough for you to be in great form in the last third of the season if you haven't maintained weight," Swarbrick said. Kelly's also given the players what he calls the Irish creed, covenant and commandments, which basically outlines how he expects them to act on and off the field. When Kelly arrived on campus he was appalled to see how disheveled the locker room was, how players were sleeping in the players' lounge, which had pillows and sleeping bags strewn about, and how players were parking illegally next to the football offices. One of the first things Kelly did was put a sign in the locker room diagramming how he wanted players to store their equipment in lockers. He then posted a sign warning that illegally parked cars would be towed. He then changed the players lounge into a game room, complete with pool table, ping pong table, air hockey table and other games. The idea, Kelly said, was to build camaraderie. "It's just like at the student union. You have a break in your classes it's a chance to blow off some steam, relax a little bit and get a chance to build relationships with coaches and players," Kelly said. He also doesn't allow players to wear hats or earrings in any team meetings, practices or football-related buildings. They also aren't allowed to take their helmets off at practice. "When you're here, you're here to play football and you do it with a helmet," he said. He also wants to build the team spiritually, an area where he said the team was lacking. Players have begun having Bible readings on Thursday night. He also is encouraging players to perform community service. "We need to be thinking about others," he said. Kelly has made other changes. He has been making the rounds on campus, including at various sporting events. While Weis would attend basketball games, he would generally sit in his seat and leave quickly afterward. Kelly walks around at halftime shaking hands and talking to people. He even did an Irish jig at halftime of a women's game. The mood at the football offices are different, also. Visitors used to have to get through two locked doors to get to the coaches offices. During a recent spring day the doors were not only unlocked but wide open. Kelly said he wants others on campus to feel welcome. He also has shortened the amount of time players spend on football by 75 minutes. Because players eat and study in the building housing the football offices, players' essentially spend two hours less a day on football. "I thought their day was too long for a college football player. It got close to being a job, and I don't want it being a job," Kelly said. The goal of it all is to get the Irish back to focusing on winning that next national championship. "I would hope that every player we recruit to the University of Notre Dame has the dream still in heart that he's going to play in the NFL," Kelly said. "Having said that, I hope he chooses Notre Dame because he wants to be at Notre Dame. Not because it's a launching point for his NFL career." Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. |
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