Learning from the trainer, and the other students

It’s always refreshing to be in a room of entrepreneurs. That was the case Dec. 1 when I attended an executive retreat hosted by Change Create Transform.

The Feliciano Center is familiar with Change Create Transform because its foundation sponsors an annual $5,000 award to a Montclair State student. The award, called the Promise Prize, has been a wonderful honor for the three Montclair State students who have been selected since 2014. The Promise Prize program came to Montclair State in 2013 when Vikki Pryor, the managing principal and founder of Change Create Transform, was introduced to us. We were impressed with Vikki, and her desire to have a positive impact on young adults, and quickly expressed interest in being a Promise Prize site.

The executive retreat on Dec. 1 was the first training event I had been to with Change Create Transform. I was very impressed with the whole program. The presenter was Dr. Artika Tyner, a professor and associate VP at University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minn., who specializes in leadership development. Tyner had wonderful advice, and received stellar feedback from the attendees.

At any professional event, the formal program is obviously important and needs to be relevant, informative and inspiring. The Change Create Transform event met all of those markers with flying colors. But when you give up part or all of a work day for an event, it is equally important who else is in the room for networking purposes. Change Create Transform assembled a fantastic group of “students” in the room, many of whom were entrepreneurs. Learning from them was as valuable as learning from Tyner.

The event reinforced how much we value our affiliation with the Promise Prize program, which is identifying the future group of people who will be “in the room” at these types of events, either as the presenter or the fabulous people in the audience to network with.

This post was written by Sharon Waters, program manager for the Feliciano Center for Entrepreneurship.