NetworkWomen.org
PO Box 1640
Bend, OR 97709
(541) 388-9787 |
Enewsletter Volume 3, Issue 7- July 3, 2009
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| Our Upcoming Meeting |
Program:
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Speed Networking and State of the Network
We'll spend half our time working those elevator speaches. Then our outgoing president, Anesa Moyer will give us a State of the Network address as we roll over the board to start a fresh
year in September
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| Date: |
Wednesday, July 15th, 5pm
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| Location: |
St. Charles Medical Center - Bend
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| Agenda: |
Networking: 5pm - 6pm
Dinner & Program: 6pm - 8pm
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| Menu: |
Chili rubbed lamb chops, chipotle re-fried black beans, grilled chayote squash and salsa verde ~ Vegetarians may add to their plate from the buffet, in addition to their vegetarian order.
~ Vegetarian Meals Are Available ONLY If Ordered In Advance
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| Register: |
Please make your dinner reservation no later than Thursday, July 9th, online at www.networkwomen.org.
Member price is $22 and non-members price is $27. A an additional $5 charge is automatically added to late registrations. Indicate regular or vegetarian meal.
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| The Value of Your Contribution |
by Kristie Lemon, High Desert Oasis
Sometimes we don’t have any concept of the depth to which we touch people.
As a NEW board member I thought I was just doing my job. I cast off the compliments I was receiving, as simply “people making nice,” as if the kind words they were saying to me were not somehow real. Maybe I am afraid it is too heavy a responsibility to bear.
On my last night as a board chairwoman I got so many positive comments I couldn’t overlook the importance. One lady told me how much energy she felt just from being around me, and thanked me for the last two years, I had no idea she felt that way. Another woman told me she was so motivated by my humor she was going to take a laughing workshop. Finally the one that closed the deal was, “ I show-up because I can count on you to make it fun.”
As I reflect on my service to NEW and other organizations I realize I regularly minimize the impact I have. In fact I minimize the impact I have on humanity.
Starting today I am going to make a concerted effort to internalize the gift of praise, I am going to acknowledge it and be grateful for the openhearted gift people are offering me. I am going to accept the kindness, because it will close the circuit of energy thereby keep it running. I am going to say “thank you” in an entirely new way.
My dilemma is not an inability to accept a compliment, because I have learned the genuine thank you response. It is a matter of deeper listening, and owning the impact I am making. I know my smile matters, I know my laugh can be contagious, and I know how to make eye contact. What I don’t know in my heart is how to feel the weight of goodness I bring into every interaction, just by listening and being interested in what someone has to say, by lighting up and smiling, by exchanging hugs, and connecting in a meaningful way. I make the community a better place to live, and that is heavy.
My contribution matters in more ways than I comprehend. I am grateful that I can give, that I want to give, and how much I value giving. I am grateful that somewhere along the way I learned to give so freely of myself, because today it has given me a gift of insight. I see how much I have grown as a result, how much larger of a person I am, how my capacity to give has grown, and the vital impact I have had on my small universe.
When you are brave enough to extend a compliment, remember to be brave enough to accept one as well. A list of short reminder to keep us on track:
You can never know the full impact your smile makes.
People need you. Sometimes they don’t have the words to tell you.
Try the power of “yes.” It is okay to get involved, even when it isn’t your business.
Make eye contact with everyone.
Do your best, always. Expect the best from others.
Ask for help. Look for opportunities to assist in ways that meet your needs too.
Listen with more than your ears.
You can always find the time. Review priorities often.
Love what you do or stop doing it.
It is what you do, about what you say, that goes on mattering long after you have forgotten.
And for goodness sake take compliments to heart! |
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| Robin Kendall |
 Please note this is a re-run of a previous spotlight on Robin. As you know, Robin is recovering from an automobile accident in Honduras. We will update the spotlight when Robin is available for an interview. If you would like to know how Robin is recovering, please check out Robin’s CaringBridge website. The name is robinkendall and the web address is: http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/robinkendall
Meet Your NEW Board: Robin Kendall, President
by Linden Gross, Incubation Press: Empowering – and Publishing – the Writer in All of Us
“I love what I do!” exclaims Robin Kendall, a senior loan officer and certified mortgage planner with Columbia River Bank who’s known as the M&M Lender around town because of her trademark M&Ms and associated slogan Money for Mortgages. “It’s a perfect fit for me because it’s a perfect blending of my background.”
Robin’s route to mortgage planning proved to be as circuitous as it has been sweeping. After just two years in college at the University of Oregon, Robin left school to take a job with a manufacturing and direct sales company in Houston. The owner couldn’t afford to pay her, but she offered to put Robin up in her home and give her stock options. The company, which sold home accent products using a Mary Kay Cosmetics approach, took off and at the age of 19, Robin became its president. She ran it for four years, opting to move on only when the owner decided to try and take the company to the next level.
Next, Robin got involved in the financial services industry, working for The Equitable as a registered representative selling everything from stocks to insurance and handling estate planning. “That all plays into what I do now,” she says. “When you talk to me about mortgages, you also get a financial planner even though I don’t have the certification.”
She burned out after about five years. “That’s when I got a wild hair and bought a restaurant in Central Oregon,” she recalls. That’s also when Robin discovered her passion for cooking, which an intensive month at a culinary school in San Jose took to a new level. For the next four years, she worked as head chef and owner of the Alpine Restaurant and Country Store at Suttle Lake during the eight months a year it was open. Winters were spent in Portland. When she and her partner couldn’t find a dog-friendly rental, Robin decided to buy a place instead, thereby launching herself into real estate investing.
By the time she sold the restaurant and moved to Portland in the mid 1990s, she had purchased two dozen turn-of-the-century units. “So there was always something to do,” she says. Though her work as a property manager ranged from repairs to full rehabs and more, she realized while trekking across the Andes in Patagonia with her mom that she wanted to go back to school. She enrolled at Portland State University, and by her mid-30s had earned a B.S. in biology. Her vision of attending vet school, however, crumbled when she was wait-listed. “I didn’t want to wait at that age,” she says. So she charged back into the financial arena as a private portfolio manager until 2001, when she added a real estate license to her list of credentials, moved to Bend and decided to become a mortgage planner.
“I’ve bought and/or sold 25 properties, but in 1992 I couldn’t get a loan even though I had 20 percent to put down because I was self-employed,” says Robin, who with her partner Leah are parents to 15-year-old son Talon (a skier and cellist), two dogs (Tug, a lab, and Bode, a border collie) and two cats (Juliette, a Linx-point Siamese, and Puffalumpagus or Puffy for short, a “mutt with an eating disorder”). “It’s really gratifying to be able to help people buy their first home or their vacation home, or restructure their mortgage to finance their kids’ education. People hate the notion of a mortgage, but it’s an incredibly powerful financial tool.”
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| Leadership in Action Award Winner |
 Leadership in Action Award Winner: Dina Barker
by Linden Gross, Incubation Press: Empowering – and Publishing – the Writer in All of Us
Dina Barker has always raised her hand to say yes whenever it came to community volunteering. That practice has yielded a lifetime of service and earned her this year’s Leadership in Action Award from the Network of Entrepreneurial Women (NEW).
Dina, a marketing specialist (working along with her new husband Duane) for Southwick Specialty Advertising Inc., which specializes in marketing consultation and promotional products, has been deeply involved with over ten local nonprofit organizations—many concurrently—since she moved to Bend in 1994. She has volunteered for everything from Bend 2030: Vision to promoting the annual Christmas Parade, for which she also does commentating.
Her community volunteering started when she was living in Redding, California and became president of the Newcomer’s Club at just 23-years-old. She hasn’t stopped since. After her arrival here fifteen years ago, Dina became involved with Bend’s Chamber of Commerce. A short stint as a Chamber ambassador led to her involvement with the St. Charles Foundation’s Saints Gala. For seven years, she contributed to its success with community outreach, procurement and fundraising.
Personal experience with domestic violence during her second marriage—and her subsequent firsthand knowledge about how that kind of abuse affects women and children—prompted her to reach out to Saving Grace, which provides support and services to survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, date rape and stalking. In addition to serving on the non-profit’s fundraising committee for several years and volunteering to help with its public events (including sponsoring the art contest for this year’s Saving Grace Children’s Festival), she and husband Duane contributed booth space to Saving Grace during this year’s Winter Fest, where they both spent time helping to raise funds and awareness. “Saving Grace is a very special place to me,” Dina says. “They helped me move on from a particularly dark chapter of my life.” And move on she did.
In 2007, while participating in the Bend Leadership class put on by the Chamber of Commerce, she learned about Cindy Pasko’s dream of bringing Project Homeless Connect (now called Project Connect) to Central Oregon. The program provides low income and homeless people with direct access to basic services, including medical care, dental care, clothing, employment, haircuts, children’s services, assistance in applying for benefits, financial counseling, obtaining identification, vision, pet care, and much more.
“If you wind up moving this forward, I want to be involved,” Dina told Pasko. “There’s really a need for this.” Dina, who continues to contribute marketing and fundraising assistance to the program, was excited that each September up to 700 individuals and 150 organizations volunteer time and donate services to help guests find the resources they need to get back on their feet. The fact that Project Connect also links together non-profits that can work together was equally appealing.
Though she is modest about her contributions to such charitable institutions and events, others are not. “Dina Barker is a community treasure as a person, a woman and a leader,” writes Pasko, last year’s Leadership in Action award recipient. “For two years, she has not only raised large sums of money for Project Connect, she has volunteered tirelessly for countless hours on a host of other project details, whether that be folding clothes or publically introducing elected officials in front of hundreds of people. Her advocacy for those who are vulnerable and her ability to bring people together for a common goal is a mark of true leadership.”
This year, Dina has added the title of vice-president of Healing Reins Therapeutic Riding Center to her list of credentials. She started volunteering time with Healing Reins, which helps children and adults with special needs discover a sense of power and independence through riding, as a way to be around horses. “I grew up with horses, I love horses, and I don’t have horses now,” she says. “It was a way to satisfy a part of me.” But when the organization needed her fundraising and marketing skills, she traded hands-on time with the horses to help out in a more substantial way.
Dina realizes that her involvement with non-profits isn’t the norm. “So I guess the question is: Are you crazy?” she said with a smile when accepting NEW’s Leadership in Action award at the June meeting. The fact that her sons, 26-year-old Zach Koelzer and 23-year-old Taylor Koelzer, are both out of the house and serving in the U.S. Army allows Dina to follow her passion for community involvement. So does an understanding husband, who willingly allows Dina to “volunteer” him during events throughout the year. And while she knows that most people will never jump into volunteering the way she has, she also believes that we all have a role to play. “Each of us has our own power to give back to the community in a very small way,” she says. “If we all just donated one hour a month—or skipped one latte a week and donated that money to a local non-profit—think of the difference that would make in the lives of the people served by those organizations. Those things add up. Together we do have the ability to change the world.”
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