National Association of Professional Organizers
Washington, DC

NAPO-WDC’S Community Partner for 2011-2012 is A Wider Circle. As part of promoting community awareness of this organization and its mission, and as our main GO Month event, volunteers from our chapter will be participating in AWC’s Neighbor-to-Neighbor Program on Saturday, January 28th from 10 am to 3 pm. On January 18th, our Corporate Partners Junk in the Trunk and 123 Junk will tear down the mountain and haul away the unwanted and damaged items that accumulate at AWC. For more information or to volunteer for these events, contact Leslie Nathan.

In addition, we are very pleased to announce that Mark Bergel, Ph.D., Founder and Executive Director of A Wider Circle, will be speaking at our January 9th chapter meeting in Bethesda, MD.  Dr. Bergel has emerged as a leader in the movement to end poverty. He is a nationally acclaimed speaker in the fields of poverty, health and social connection, and has been featured on national television and radio programs.  We hope you will all come out in force to the January meeting to welcome Dr. Bergel and find out more about this incredible organization and their inspiring mission.

POSH, PERKY, PRACTICAL OR JUST PLAIN PRETTY, THERE’S LOTS TO CHOOSE FROM OUT THERE!

For those of us non-digital types who haven’t picked out this year’s planner yet, what a big choice we have! We need to think really hard about our design tastes, our image, and our pocketbook/wallet before we make our final purchase. While the great standbys are all still around (Day Runner, Franklin Covey, Filofax, Levenger, etc.), some of the upstarts out there are really getting interesting!

To top it off, many of these new calendars are tailored to highly specific audiences, whose every taste and need is being catered to in terms of formats and features. Here are some examples to give you a head start, so you can either choose one for yourself or recommend the most appropriate one to your clients:

• The Left-Hander’s 2012 Calendar: Left Handed Legends, Lore & More by Cary Koegle
• Moleskine 2012 12 Month Daily Planner Hard Cover X-Small (Moleskine Legendary Notebooks)
• 2012 Polestar Family Calendar: A Family Time Planner & Home-Management Guide
• The Sacred Journey: Daily Journal for Your Soul 2012 Planner by Cheryl Thiele
• 2012 Genuine Goatskin Leather Daily Journal, 8″
• Sticky-Note 12-Month Objectives Planner, 24 in x 38 in
• Do It Later! A 2012 Planner (or Non-Planner) for the Creative Procrastinator by Mark Asher

As you can see, there’s plenty of opportunity to think outside the box (or in this case, planner book)! Check out all of these and many more on Amazon.com.

Ronni Perry is focused on helping home-based business owners succeed through decluttering, paper/electronic management, and time management, as well as effective workflow processes. Her Virginia business, Yellowbird Productivity Consulting, was born out of 19 years of experience as a home-based business owner.

The December NAPO-WDC chapter meeting was held on Monday, December 5, 2011 at Kena Shriners in Fairfax.  There were 26 members in attendance and 2 guests.

Alisa Levy welcomed everyone.  Maria White introduced a new member and our guests.  Our ice breaker tonight was something a little different.  Alisa asked for chapter members to talk a little bit about any personal experience they’ve had with one of our Corporate Partners.

C. Lee Cawley talked about her experience with Noel of Eco-nize Closets.  He helped her with a client with a physical disability by installing a valet rod for her quickly and at no charge, really going the extra mile. Pierette Ashcroft highlighted an experience with Shred Ace.  They shredded 85 boxes of paper in 45 minutes, sent the invoice to the client and couldn’t have been easier.  Victoria Robinson talked about Shelf Genie and Joe Johnson.  He did a wonderful job for a client of hers who moved into a condo with a very small kitchen.   Maria White raved about 123Junk who helped with several clients.  Their friendly follow up is fantastic, and she liked their philosophy of donate/recycle/trash.  Nealey Stapleton endorsed Ron Goodes of ReSale Solutions.  He has come many times to a client’s home to pick up books, DVDs and CDs.  She’s happy, Nealey’s happy.

Victoria Robinson hosted the “Ask the Expert” table tonight and had 2 visitors.

Terry Fischer introduced our Corporate Partners in attendance:

Ron Goodes and Joan Clark:  ReSale Solutions
Zach Johnson:  123 Junk
Helen Long:  Partners Estate Sales
Joe Johnson:  Shelf Genie
Noel Sweeney:  Eco-nize Closets
IKEA:  Wendy Rogers
Alonzo Zamora:  B. Thrifty
Andy Ryman:  Modern Image

Noel Sweeney gave a five minute presentation about his services.  Eco-nize provides a 3D design rendering along with their estimate and proposal.  Eco-nize Closets was recently named Contractor of the Year on the DC area Angie’s List.

Zack Johnson of 123Junk spoke about his company’s services.  Recently re-branded the company with new logo, 20% larger trucks and a new emphasis on their process of disposal via charity, recycle or trash (in that order).

Wendy Rogers from IKEA spoke about the products that IKEA provides to help organizers bring out the best in their clients.  Home furnishing consultants are available at each store to help clients.  Pick and Deliver service will start in January.  For $99 they will take your shopping list, do the shopping and have it delivered.

Pierrette Ashcroft then introduced the evening’s speaker:  Terri Holley, CEO of Holley Creative.  Terri spoke on “Social Media Marketing:  Driving Business Value.”  Her presentation goal was to help answer questions like:

How do you translate using social media tools into more clients?
How do you leverage the tools?
How does a small business owner take their social media to the next level?
How do you connect with prospective customers using social media? (versus B-to-B interactions)?
How do you create more content?
How do you sync social media with your CRM?

Terri reviewed 3 “must haves” before you jump in to using social media:  setting goals around your use of social media, thinking long term about your use of social media (i.e. blogging, tweeting, etc.), and tying everything together (how to funnel leads back to your website, nurture them so you can get a new customer, etc).

Terri’s presentation was full of great information whether you are a social media wannabe, newbie or early adopter.  You can find more info on her website www.creativeblogsolutions.com/presentations.

Alisa Levy reviewed the calendar for the upcoming month.

Scott Roewer announced that if you reserve your NAPO conference hotel room by December 31st, you will receive free Internet access in your room and 20% off at Hilton’s two bars. Also, for each night you stay at the hotel you receive 25 “NAPO Bucks” to spend on future NAPO courses.

Door prize winners included Andrea Hancock and Nealey Stapleton.

The meeting closed after a lively networking session.

The next meeting will be held at Rock Creek Mansion in Bethesda on Monday, January 9.

It is the most wonderful time of the year!  Well, in addition to the holidays, we are starting to plan our 2012-2013 NAPO-WDC Board of Directors!  It’s time to make your nominations of some of our awesome members to serve on the NAPO-WDC Board of Directors.

Here is the schedule for the nomination process:

• December 14 – The nomination application is already posted in the Members Only section of our website
• January 1 – All members will receive an email requesting nominations
• January 9 – January blog is posted with information about the board positions and duties
• February 1 – February blog is posted with second announcement for nominations
• February 6 – Leadership Forum will be held at the chapter meeting
• Feb 20 – Nomination deadline (11:59pm)
• Feb 21 – Candidates will be announced by email
• March 5 – You will have an opportunity to meet all the candidates at the chapter meeting
• March 6 – Ballots will be emailed to members
• March 12 – Last day to vote (11:59pm)
• March 14 – New Board of Directors will be announced by email
• May 16 – New Board of Directors take office

We have an extensive description of the duties for each of the board positions in the Chapter Operations Manual which can be found in the Members Only section of our website.  I thought it might be more entertaining to have a thumbnail about each of the positions to help you get your thought process going on whom to nominate.

Don’t forget, we LOVE volunteers, so if you want to run for a position, nominate yourself!

Step right up and show your leadership skills. You will gain personally, professionally, and you’ll have fun doing it.

• President: The president leads the board, runs the chapter meetings and takes care of problems (and we have very few thank goodness!)
• Vice President: The vice-president assists the president with any special projects.  The VP opens each meeting with an ice-breaker and has a prize at the end of the meeting.
• Secretary: The secretary writes everything down so we know what we’re doing.
• Treasurer: The treasurer makes sure we don’t spend more than we have!
• Program Director: The program director finds all the great speakers for our meetings and plans all the programs.
• Marketing Director: The marketing director tells the press and public about what we are doing through conventional and social media venues.
• Corporate Partner Director: The corporate partner director recruits new corporate partners and is the liaison to our corporate partner members.
• Membership Director: The membership director signs up new members, provides orientation, and is usually the first person they see at every meeting.
• Technology Director: The technology director is awesome, maintains our website, and helps all the other board members figure things out they don’t know.
• Immediate Past President: The immediate past president handles the nominations process. This is the easiest position on the board and it’s a reward for serving as president.

We have so much talent in this chapter; I can’t wait to see who will fill the 2012-2013 Board of Director seats.

For more information, contact Cris at pastpresident@dcorganizers.org.

Each year, NAPO-WDC selects a Community Partner with whom we can give back to our community. This year, we have chosen A Wider Circle located in Silver Spring, MD. They are dedicated to helping children and adults lift themselves out of poverty through the use of resources that exist in our own community.

As Professional Organizers, we have the unique opportunity of being able to help in redistributing these resources. We help our clients to give their unwanted, unneeded property to those who can really use it. It is clearly a win-win situation.

So far this year, we have collected mountains of excess cleaning products and given them to the families of A Wider Circle. Soon, we will be spending a day working at their facility as volunteers. We’ll do many things including sorting incoming donations and assisting families with their “shopping” there.

Please join NAPO-WDC in providing support to A Wider Circle through donations of your unwanted furniture, toys and many other things. For more information, visit the NAPO-WDC website and/or download this flyer.

Thank you for helping those in need!