Today we have a guest blog post from an alumna, Judith W. Umlas (Heights '70), Author, Trainer, and Sr. Vice President of the International Institute for Learning, Inc. (IIL). Judy specializes in strategic and organizational communications, specifically involving leadership in organizations.
Judy will be hosting a free webinar next Thursday, March 28, and she is also offering all NYU alumni a free downloadable poster on the 5 C's of Grateful Leadership Acknowledgement. For the link, send an email to judy.umlas@iil.com.
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Judy Umlas:
Little did I imagine when I was an English major at New York
University that I would not only be an avid reader (had to be!), but that I would
become an avid writer – a published one at that! My first experience with being
published occurred when I was working at CBS Television, and was one of the few
women who worked until the end of their pregnancy. However, I paid a price – my
colleagues kept saying the strangest things to me, such as “Did you swallow a
basketball?” and worse.
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Working Women, 1986 |
Years later, I felt a similar dismay at the way people
responded when I acknowledged them. Usually I got comments like “Thank you for
thanking me. No one ever does that” or “I never hear compliments – I only hear
complaints.” My colleagues at work seemed equally shocked when I acknowledged
them. Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore and recommended to the CEO of the
company I had been working at for over a dozen years, International Institute
for Learning, that we publish a book called The Power of Acknowledgment.
She immediately told me to go for it, and once the book was published, I began
designing courses and webinars for project managers, engineers and executives.
I was shocked and delighted by the response I got – people seemed hungry for
the message. It was almost as if I were giving them permission to acknowledge
those important to them. People would even jump out of their seats in the
middle of a class and say, “I’ll be right back – I have to go acknowledge my
boss.” And they did return, beaming and thrilled with the response they had gotten.

My
travel schedule is now getting wildly out of control (what could be better?):
Among other engagements, next month I am doing a pilot project with a U.S. Army
base in Fort Drum, New York to use Grateful Leadership and The Power of
Acknowledgment to prevent military suicides; I am doing training for a huge
company, Wartsila, in Finland in April, and a presentation to a gathering of
140 association CEOs in Canada in June.
I will close this piece about how being
an English major at NYU can open the world, by citing the wonderful fortune I
received in a cookie recently:
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