Tips for #URMIA2022 in Indy

Join guest-host URMIA’s Senior Director of Events, Michelle Smith, along with guests, Todd Adkins, Kathy Hargis, Marje Lemmon, Courtney Davis Curtis, Chauncey Fagler, Joseph Storch, & Julie Groves, as they share their sage advice and insider tips about the URMIA Annual Conference 2022 in Indy. URMIA’s Annual Conference will be at the JW Marriott in Indianapolis from September 10-14. Hear about great ways to get involved at the conference, to explore special interests in risk management through educational breakouts & roundtables, and to network with colleagues from all over the country! Learn about more about how to get the most out of your annual conference experience from current and previous conference co-chairs. 

Show Notes:
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 URMIA Annual Conference in Indy Sept 10-14
AC2022 Registration for Volunteers

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Transcript

Guests

 Todd Adkins - Director of Risk Management, University of Kentucky

 Kathy E. Hargis, MBA, DRM- Associate Vice President of Risk Management & Compliance, Lipscomb University

 Marjorie F.B. Lemmon, ARM, CPCU, DRM- Risk Manager, Yale University

 Courtney Davis Curtis, CPCU, ARM, ARM-E- Assistant Vice President for Risk Management and Resilience Planning, University of Chicago

 Chauncey Fagler, ARM-P- Executive Director & CRO, FCSRMC (Florida College System Risk Management Consortium)

 Joseph Storch- Senior Director of Compliance and Innovation Solutions, Grand River Solutions

 Julie L. Groves, ARM- Director, Risk Services, Wake Forest University

Guest Host

 Michelle J. Smith, CAE, Senior Director of Events, URMIA

Transcript

[00:00:00] Michelle: Welcome to another episode of URMIA matters. My name's Michelle Smith. I'm coming to you from the URMIA national office, and we are doing all things annual conference coming up in Indianapolis in September. We're excited to gather at the JW Marriott and to do so, to get ready for that, to get geared up, we've had some guests on our recent podcasts who have shared with us advice for getting the most out of the annual conference experience. So here we go.

So, starting with our conference co-chairs, Todd, Kathy, and Marje.

I think each of them have some great advice for us. We'll start with Kathy. She co-chaired Indianapolis from the start. When we were supposed to be in Indy 2020 through the virtual conference. And now finally we made it to Indianapolis. She is the associate vice president of risk management and compliance at Lipscomb University.

[00:00:56] Kathy H: Oh, wow. Say, well, I don't want you to miss anything, but, if I have to narrow it down, I would just say there's, there's a couple of things, for sure. If you can, be a part of the pre or post con, if you, that works into your schedule, you know, I would really encourage you to do that.

I think those are some of great values. These are great sessions delivered at, by, exceptionally, talented people for a very reasonable price. So that's one thing. Secondly, on the round tables, I would encourage, everyone to try to make sure that you plug into one of those. We've got it broken down this year, I think this is great, by institution size and kind of what fits that along within some special interest round tables, which I think, you know, if you have an interest in athletics or compliance or some of those, it's a great opportunity to just jump in and kind of meet, some specific people that may have an interest in that, and to make some contacts along those ways. So that's a couple of just tips that I can give to people, uh, that might be helpful of things not to miss. 

[00:02:02] Michelle: Hey, Todd, Todd Adkins is director of risk management at the University of Kentucky. Todd, what do you have to share with us?

[00:02:09] Todd Adkins: You know, my advice is just meet as many people as you can introduce yourself. especially try to find anyone, that you've not met that, you know, from a, a local, regionally, peer institutions, at least get, some business cards, an introduction.

Are you gonna remember everybody? And all the details no, but if you at least put a, a face to the name, I know that. that was one of the great things that, I feel like with the networking that our institution will maybe engage with another institution in something, and there, we're needing to review it from a risk and I'm like, oh, hey, I know the risk manager from that school and, you know, can reach out to them and we can have a conversation.

Hey, what do you know about this and, and we can work together. So just, making those connections. And then the other advice that I would give to the newcomers, even though, and say, go meet as many people as you can get, you know, go to as many events as you can. I also would say, take a little bit of time for yourself, maybe 15, 30 minutes each day, whether that's in your room, that's having a coffee somewhere and, just kind of self-reflect and just, you know, kind of think about what you're wanting to do that day and the next, because it can be, if you let it just go, go, go, and then, you're exhausted.

[00:03:17] Michelle: And finally, Marje Lemmon, our resident fast walker. She is the risk manager at Yale University. And you will find her at the 5K in Indianapolis for sure.

[00:03:28] Marje: this really goes to everybody, but especially to newcomers, is a little bit of advanced planning goes a long way. So, it's a very busy schedule. There are a lot of things going on. There are a lot of sessions going on at the same time. So, my advice is to look, really look at that conference schedule before you even get to Indianapolis and look through the sessions.

Pre-select your sessions. There's the beauty of it is that we, you, we've got the bios and stuff of the speakers on there, but we also will upload the presentations. So, you can take a look at the presentations, and really figure out which ones are the most suitable. Like which ones you really wanna go to and just plan, but be flexible because you know, I, I do my spreadsheet every time. I'm like, I'm going here, I'm going here. And then I get there and I'm like, no, let me read that description again. No, forget it. I think I'm gonna go to this one instead, but, but it really will help to just plan it out. Especially if you're a newcomer, that's going to the, you know, the first timers programming and, if you're invited to certain receptions or certain dinners, just plan everything out, have your schedule ready. And the Sched app will help with that, but also, be a little bit flexible once you get there. 

But I totally agree with what Todd said. You need to take a little bit of time to rest and rejuvenate. Otherwise, you you'll be completely exhausted, and your brain will be fried by the end of it. It's a lot of stimulation, intellectual stimulation, social stimulation. So definitely take a few minutes to step back and rejuvenate throughout the week. 

[00:04:50] Michelle: Next up, we have the fabulous Courtney Davis Curtis, URMIA’s president. She is the assistant vice president for risk management and resilience planning at the University of Chicago, Courtney.

[00:05:03] Courtney: We really do hope to see many of you in Indianapolis for our upcoming conference as well. We'll have a bunch of volunteer opportunities through there, networking chances, and an opportunity to meet your leadership.

[00:05:15] Michelle: Next up, we have immediate past president Chauncey Fagler. Chauncey is the executive director and chief risk officer for the Florida college system, risk management consortium, always a mouthful. Thanks, Chauncey, for sharing your information with our conference attendees. 

[00:05:30] Chauncey: I would just add that if you are interested, uh, especially for next year election, seek out one of the current board members or Courtney, myself, or Julie Gross, who is president elect for this term this year. And just ask us, um, you know, we've all been involved with this for a number of years and certainly happy to talk to you about it. So, search us out at Indy. 

[00:05:47] Michelle: And one of the biggest URMIA supporters, our friend, Joe Storch, is the senior director of compliance and innovation solutions at Grand River Solutions. Joe, what do you have to share?

[00:05:58] Joe: My advice for conference attendees would be every chance you get to sit down with someone who you don't recognize, take that opportunity to sit down. We tend to go to conferences and birds of a feather flock together and we sit with the folks we know from our institution that we've met before. But I have yet to have a bad conversation with someone at an earlier conference. So even though it's sometimes challenging right to go and sit down with folks you don't know, those are some of the best experiences that you can have at the URMIA conference 

[00:06:32] Michelle: And last but not least, we have some advice from our fellow URMIA matters, guest hosts and incoming president, Julie Groves. Julie is the director of risk services at Wake Forest University. And one of the funniest people you'll ever meet. 

[00:06:46] Julie: My advice for conference attendees would be to really take 

advantage of all the resources the conference has to offer. There are so many people there from different institutions from different affiliates and everybody wants to be a resource. You know I think the greatest thing about URMIA is it doesn't matter who your broker is, if you're with an institution, staff at other brokerages are happy to talk with you. I, mean I think it's just it's a very giving organization and people really want to help one another. So, I would say just take advantage of all the resources. Especially the people resources when you're at the conference.