Who’s your hype woman?
Sam and our WAVE ERG break down this year’s theme & a couple helpful resources you’ll want to take advantage of.
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On today’s episode of Up To Speed Live:
- Recapping Black History Month
- Supporting the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association Tournament in Baltimore, Maryland
- Extreme training for disaster response with the U.S. Military in Hattiesburg, Mississippi
- Kicking off Women’s History Month with head of HR, Sam Hammock, and WAVE ERG global lead, Kia Wilson
📆 Recapping Black History Month
Special thanks to the BOLD (Black, Originators, Leaders and Doers) ERG (Employee Resource Group) for leading the charge on an exciting, educational and engaging Black History Month, with the theme, “BOLDer Steps Together: Tomorrow is Built Today.”
Featured BHM Events:
- 1️⃣Black History Month Kickoff on Up To Speed Live, with Executive Advisory Board Member David Hubbard and BOLD Finance Lead Sopi Mitil
- 🎂 BOLD 40th Anniversary Celebration webcast and premier BHM event
- 🎬Sponsoring the James Brown: Say it Loud docuseries on A&E - Stream the series ▶️
2024 Black History Month Recap: Get a full listing of all of this year’s BHM events.
🏀⚙️🎒🏫 CIAA Tournament: supporting athletics, tech and the community in Baltimore [01:40]
In time for the last week of Black History Month, we were the title sponsor of the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association (CIAA) Tournament, featuring teams from Historically Black Colleges and Universities. The tournament features events throughout the Baltimore area from kids’ athletic clinics to the annual Tech Summit House, which attracts some of tech’s brightest minds supporting the Black community to discuss enhancing ecosystems, networking and career opportunities.
Watch the video: Be sure to watch the playback to hear from Chris Flood, President of Verizon’s Atlantic North Retail Market, and Paul Plymouth, a Verizon Director of State Government & Local Engagement, who kicked off this year’s summit.
Video extra: See Chris Flood on Fox Baltimore chatting with host Marc Clarke about Verizon’s role in the community and contribution to economic growth in the region.
🌀 Extreme disaster response training at Camp Shelby in Hattiesburg, Mississippi [03:17]
At Verizon, we run to a crisis, which is why we prepare, prepare, prepare. With hurricane season just a few months away, the time was right for a disaster response drill at Camp Shelby in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, taking advantage of the opportunity to do some high-intensity training alongside the U.S. military.
About the exercise: The training consisted of multiple realistic, high-intensity simulated crisis scenarios. It included a simulated Category Four hurricane that damaged critical communications at a hospital and a tornado causing a nuclear radiation release with network restoration needed in a hot zone.
Groups involved included:
- Verizon’s Major Emergency Response Incident Team (MERIT), a specialized team of hazardous material-certified Verizon technicians and engineers.
- Verizon’s Dedicated Impact Response Team (DIRT), technicians and engineers with specialty training in mobile satellite asset deployment, basic generator repair and cable/connector making.
- Verizon’s Emergency Response Team (ERT), technicians and engineers supporting wireline operations specialized in restoring fiber connections.
- Verizon Frontline Crisis Response Team dedicated to providing on-demand, emergency communication assistance during crisis situations to government agencies and emergency responders, on a 24/7 basis. This team set up portable cell sites, WiFi hotspots and other Verizon Frontline solutions, including the Verizon Rapid Response Connectivity Unit, to help enable communications and/or boost network performance.
Watch the video: Check out our press release for additional details and to see and share the video.
🚺 March is Women’s History Month [06:32]
We’re excited that Women’s History Month is here, as is our top HR leader, Sam Hammock, and WAVE ERG Global Lead, Kia Wilson, who joined us on Up to Speed.
Why we celebrate🎈: As Sam said, “Women’s History Month is a celebration of us – and not just women. It’s a celebration of our history, the ceilings shattered, the hills climbed, the discoveries made and the world we built. It’s about acknowledging where we’ve been, how far we’ve come and the work left to do and honoring the women who helped us make that happen.”
Why press play▶️? Come to see Sam and Kia discuss their journeys, as well as what the holiday means to them personally. Stay to see the audience members talk about the women who influence them.
What’s in store for WHM? Our theme is: Be inspired. Be ignited. Be included. Get a full list of events and more information on our WHM page.
Bonus - Sam’s advice for growing your network and career:
- Access a community of supporters at WAVE or any of our ERGs.
- Check out WOW Connect – enrollment opened today and there are resources, workshops, conversations and peer-to-peer support to take advantage of.
- Don’t forget about all our awesome benefits, like our backup care available to U.S. employees. We are one of the few employers who do not stipulate how our backup care through Bright Horizons is used and V Teamers used nearly 27,000 hours of backup care just last year.
- Plus, you can take advantage of all the features offered through Spring Health, like the six free counseling sessions and six free coaching sessions. As you grow your career, make sure you have the wellbeing support you need to thrive at work and in life.
