September 2, 2008: Passion, Motivation and Goal Setting
The kickoff of the 2008 EIR session explores the foundation of successful innovators, leaders and entrepreneurs. In this session, you will learn how to create, measure and achieve S.M.A.R.T. goals, powered by passion and directed by motivation.

September 16, 2008: Leadership as a Discipline
The term “Leadership” is overused to be sure, but if we break it down and explore what research of thousands of “leaders” has found, we can create a framework in which to describe, evaluate and apply leadership.

September 30, 2008: Competing through Innovation - Karen Padgett (guest speaker)
Innovation today comes in all shapes and sizes, and often when you least expect it. In this session, we’ll hear an innovation success story and use examples to identify milestones of the innovation life-cycle.

October 21, 2008: Harnessing the Power of Communication for Innovation and Leadership
Alyssa O’Brien (guest speaker)
Effective communication helps in all aspects of business, but it is critical for situations involving innovation and leadership. In this workshop, we’ll examine models of persuasive communication that use words and images to make a lasting impact. We’ll look at recent political cartoons, advertisements, and videos as models. Participants will learn concrete strategies for approaching communication with both creativity and resources for success.

November 4, 2008: Spirit of Entrepreneurship
In this session, we explore the essence of entrepreneurship, what it takes to be an entrepreneur and what inspires people to pursue their vision even in a world of uncertainty. We’ll look at what entrepreneurship means within a startup versus a large company.

November 18, 2008: Leading and Influencing Independent Business Partners - Liam Crowe (guest speaker)
Managing and negotiating with independent business partners is essential in running and growing any business. You will learn about a company that has built their entire business model on the success of their independent business partners. We’ll examine the risks, benefits and strategies of building a strong business partner network.

December 2, 2008: Debrief and Summary Discussions
To wrap up the 2008 EIR session, we open the floor for discussion of key learning points, takeaways and an overall review of our time together.

All seminars are held on Tuesdays from 4:00 - 5:30 p.m. in Hill Hall, Room 202

This seminar is free and open to the public.
Questions? contact: Kathleen Martin, Phone 303-273-3482, kmartin@mines.edu