Tridel’s Gino Maulucci, Senior Manager of e-Marketing will be the featured speaker on Thursday January 31st, 2008

Gino Maulucci is the Senior Manager of e-Marketing for the Tridel Group of Companies. These companies include construction, legal, energy management, property management, rental, furnished suite, and home automation. Mr. Maulucci has been with the Tridel Group for over seven years as a full time employee and three years providing freelance services.

Mr. Maulucci has an undergraduate degree from the University of Toronto in science and a science degree in biomedical communications from the University of Toronto.

Upon graduation, he was signed under contract to produce high end airbrush illustrations in the communication and publications department for Sandoz Pharma AG in Basel Switzerland. Within a year he was working with the business unit to assess strategies in implementing computer based training. He then went on to work with Sandoz and other pharmaceutical companies on CD-ROM training materials on a freelance basis, producing, writing, coding and designing interactive media, print media and medical literature. He has won awards for his art direction and graphic design for CD-ROMs and video. He has also illustrated two well-received medical books on spinal surgery.

In 1997, with the emergence of the internet, we went on to design and maintain the Tridel Website. In November, 2000, he was hired full time to work on more web-based projects for Tridel and the Tridel Group of Companies. Besides the Tridel website, he maintains and contributes to the Tridel Group of Companies websites, the Tridel purchaser website, MyTridelHome, the corporate wikipedia, and customer and prospect communications via the internet and email.

Speaker Notes

Here are some of the notes that I will be covering in the speaker series with my thoughts and experience on careers.

With the incredible rates of change we are seeing in the world it still surprising to see people look for a job, career or occupation to fit in; or choosing a career path based on salary expectations. Your career should fit you and not the other way around.

My career path couldn't be anticipated because the internet or email didn't exist when I was in High School. Google, Facebook and YouTube are such a large part of our lives that we can't imagine living without them, yet none of these is even 10 years old. If someone asks what I'll be doing in 5 years, all I know is that it will be different than what I'm doing now.

Your success is going to be determined by acheiving personal happiness and having fun at what you're doing. You know you're in the wrong job when getting out of bed to go to work is the very last thing you want to do.

There has never been a better time in human history to take your strengths and talents and turn them into a career. There has never been a time in human history where the individual has been so empowered.

Unit 1 - Seeking personal knowledge

Know yourself and know what you like. This sounds so obvious but so many take decades to find out who they are and what really drives them. A large number never find out.

• Get opinions from people you know and respect. Your teachers can often see your likes, dislikes and inclinations remarkably well.
• Identify the things you really like to do, especially those activities that you can't wait to get out of bed for.
• Get yourself a mentor. Get yourself a coach or coaches.
• I'm a strong believer in psychometric assessment for identifying strong traits and comparing yourself to the general population. DISC assessment and Gallup's Strenghs Finders I have found to be helpful in getting to know myself better and my colleagues.

Unit 2 - Exploring opportunities

With the huge growth of the internet, you can actually try out a large number of careers now! These are some of the careers you can do now just by starting a website or blog:

• Photographer
• Journalist
• Musician
• Writer, poet, illustrator, 3D illustrator, graphic artist
• Web designer
• Ecommerce
• Consultant, tutor, critic
• Programmer
• Tech support

You never know, you could actually start generating an income, a career or an entire industry - Michael Dell, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs did.

Preparing for changing world

There's no running away from change now - change is exponential. Most people tend to fear and resist change. But change also means tremendous opportunity, and today's youth stand to gain the most. All it takes is to position yourself to take full advantage. There are going to be many careers that don't even exist or can be imagined now that you'll be stepping into.

• Keep learning
• Gather experiences
• Broaden your network
• Don't overspecialize
• Connect the dots - bridge disparate ideas and experiences
• Be passionate about who you are and what you do
• Challenge yourself
• Be infinitely creative
• Go global
• Approach everything with a positive attitude because pessimism never created or solved a single thing
• Get serious at having fun

The definition of an entrepeneur is someone who sees opportunity where everyone else sees a problem.