2020 Spring UNO Coffee & Careers

In early May of 2020 I was contacted by Joe Hayes to be a guest on Coffee & Careers.

The focus would be careers in technology. A day in the life of developer, What are the different types of roles in the field? What is the needed or desired skill sets in technology. How a student can stand out and shine?

Here is a link to the YouTube video. If you use a podcast platform like Spotify. The video will show up on the Coffee & Career too.

On a final note. We did the video using Zoom technology. The one story not on video was our discussion on life. We talked because we are self quarantine working from home. How we are allowing others to see our personal life more. That we are seeing each families and of course why I am in a Sauna.

2020 Spring UNO Professional Sales Resume Reviews

This afternoon I attended the University of Nebraska-Omaha Professional Sales Resume Reviews. The College of Business Career Center was partnering with the Marketing level 3100 Professional Sale course taught by Ann Herman . The goal of the day was to provide students with resume critiques from employers.

I was part of multiple sessions were I was able to connect in the students in the classroom. I was placed at a table with a group. I went one by one through each person resume. I provided feedback about my professional career. I firmly believe the students appreciated the feedback.

2019 FALL UNO Advanced Systems Analysis and Design

In Early Fall of 2019 I reached out to Dr. George Royce wondering if there is a slot in September for a class room visit if possible.

The class Agile project management was canceled due to low number of students. I was offered to be a guest lecture on Agile Systems Analysis and Design.

After going back in forth via email and video conference calls. I agreed to speak about my approach to agile systems analysis and design works is done on my particular team at Farm Credit.

The official name of the class was Advanced Systems Analysis and Design. On October 8th starting at 10:30 AM in PKI room 260 I gave a presentation. I used the white board to discuss topics and concerns of systems being used on a daily basis.

The following day I received this email from Dr. Royce.

2019 Fall UNO ENTR 3710 ENTREPRENEURIAL FOUNDATIONS

On September 18th, 2019 I was able to two have two teammates talk to the 3710 Entrepreneurial class. This was a chance to highlight the internal Intrapreneurial program, but also give an overview of some of the other innovation activities that we do in the organization.

2019 Fall UNO SCMT 3500 OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT

Before the 2019 CBA Career Fair we made a class room visit.

2019 FALL UNO MISSO Meeting

The Management Information Systems Student Organization (MISSO) is a student group at University of Nebraska-Omaha. MISSO has a general meeting once a month, usually featuring a guest speaker. This past Friday September 13th. Myself and Joni Stewart were the guest speakers at the September meeting. I also wanted this spot because of talking about Internships and Technology Works here event.

I had set up this visit in early August by emailing the Professor Dr. Paul Van Vliet.

Before

The MISSO group does a good job of advertising the meeting. About a month before the meeting I was asked for a topic. The topic I wanted to talk about was UX in my development process. Here is the abstract:

This month our guest speaker will be Anthony Carlson, a UNO graduate and lead application developer with Farm Credit Services of America. His software journey has been through various forms of service-oriented architecture for client and web applications. As a member of the first team at Farm Credit Services to use an agile methodology for software development, Anthony helped champion practices such as test-driven development and service-level testing. Currently, he is part of the Customer Solutions team where his focus is on iOS, Android, and responsive platforms.

Anthony’s talk is entitled

“How do I include UX in my development process?” How do we know if our software efforts are on the right track? Finding the answers to these questions doesn’t need to be scary, your users want to tell you everything you need to know to be successful. Anthony Carlson Lead Application Developer will explain how to build simple UX practices into any software development processes. Learn real world examples on how to effectively engage your customers and development team with UX basics, when to apply them and how to plan for them.

They take my topic and make a nice graphic to be shared on social media.

Day of Event

At the UNO IT Career Fair on Wednesday I took a selfie in front of the MISSO flier inside PKI. This was going to be

my social Media post.

I arrived right around 4:30 p.m. to set up.

I also want to make sure my presentation Would work. I also brought the following

Dartboards
Internship Fliers
Works Her Event card.
Business Cards
Presentation Pointer

I sponsor Pizza for the group which comes in under $100.00 The group doesn’t charge fees and helping out leaves a good impression of our company. Always remember to get vegetarian pizza.

Presentation

I got us rolling right at 5:00 p.m.

Joni started the talk with Internships and “Works Here” Video

I did a presentation on UX in the development process. The group asked good questions about the process.

Next Day

The next day we got a thank you email.

Another great event to build relationships with UNO.

2019 Summer Interns from University of Nebraska-Omaha

Proud to introduce the 2019 summer interns from the University of Nebraska-Omaha who are building a future in Information Technology at Farm Credit Services of America.

2019 Spring UNO MIS Capstone Dinner

On Monday, April 29th, I attend final presentation dinner for the University of Nebraska-Omaha Management of Information Systems Capstone Team EmpowerU students.

I was first contacted by a UNO Student who saw a class room presentation and attended Technology Works Here 2018 about fundraising.

After back and forth emails. I donated $100.00 to the presentation dinner.

I then meet at the 2019 Spring Career Fair who had the empoweru project on their resume. This was a good conversation piece for the students.

Event

The event began at 5:30pm in PKI room 158. There was a buffet style dinner.

The table I sat with was for professors who sponsored the project. Dr. Royce who I have built a good relationship was one of those professors. The tables had a program on it which contained the FCSAmerica logo along with other sponsors.

Presentation

The presentation kicked off about 6:00 p.m. with a presentation of the Team and project.

As individuals and a group they told their story of working on their capstone project. Their deliverable was great, but how they got there was even better. The students showed how as a team transparency, accountability, and teamwork makes great software. I know, I walked away knowing this was money well spent and a stronger relationship with the university.

A few days later I got a thank you card in the mail.

2019 Spring UNO ACM-W End of Year Celebration

In mid April I received a email from the University of Nebraska-Omaha Association for Computing Machinery-Women (ACM-W)

I was not able to attend the event, but I asked around to my teammates. who helped with my very first meeting with the ACM-W volunteered to go.

2019 Spring UNO Capstone Cup Finals

On Friday, April 12th from 12 PM – 3:30 PM was the University of Nebraska-Omaha College of Business Administration Capstone Cup Spring 2019 finals.

This was my second time being a on the judges panel for the Finals. This is one of the perks of sponsoring the Capstone Cup is FCSAmerica has a judges seat reserved for each round of the competition. I arrived about 12:45 p.m. to do a debriefing with the other judges in a class room. We were told for the final round of competition, the final four teams will be developing recommendations for Roku Inc. Once again, each team’s job is to identify a strategic issue facing Roku, conduct strategic analyses and come up with a strategic solution/recommendation that is driven by their analysis. The judges would be the ones deciding the overall winner.

The day of the finals I posted on social media a video that was created to show FCSAmerica’s support for the competition.

Presentations

About 1:00 p.m. the judges were taken to the auditorium which is a two-story, 186-seat capacity which was standing room only. I found out that actually over 200 RSVPS were sent in for the event. The Judges are placed in the front row. A wide variety of Omaha Companies sponsor the event.

The Associate Dean Harlandof of the CBA says a few words while revolving display of Agenda, sponsors and thank you to judges appear.

Teams presented every twenty-five minutes. Each group has 12 minutes to present, with warning times given for 5 minutes, 2 minutes, and 1 minute. This is followed by 5-10 minutes of Q&A with the judges. The level of the presentations were good. Two of the teams presenting I heard in round 1 and round 2. At about 2:35 the Judges will leave and deliberate.

The format for the next hour was different then previous Capstone Cup finals. The students that have not made the final round have been asked to address the final case in a Poster Session Competition where guests can vote on their favorite case recommendations. I made sure to vote the students I met from Innovation Works Here.

During the deliberation. The organizing professors asked if a two judges would be willing to announce the winners. I raised my hand to volunteer. I was given runner up. I also had to determine what to say. I kept in simple.

Before the winning team was announced. The professors gave each judge a thank you plaque.

After the winning team was announced. I stayed and networked with the students and faculty.

A few days later I received a thank you note.

I believe having someone at FCSAmerica on the judges panel is a good thing. I enjoyed the overall experience as a judge. I am sold that supporting this event for the future is money well spent.