FPSA Members benefit from exclusive webinars from thought leaders in the industry.

These webinars focus on industry issues such as staffing and retention, industry trends, and upcoming events to prepare you and your company for maximum success in the fast-changing food industry. These educational sessions are provided free to members. You can view past webinars in the members-only section of the website.

Summer Series of Career Roundtables

The FPSA Young Professional Group (YPG) is hosting a Summer Series of Career Roundtables. Career Roundtables are a “Speed” networking opportunity for students to discuss with YPG members various topics/concerns regarding entering the food and beverage sector.

Register TODAY – Summer Series of Career Roundtables:

• • August 16^th at 2 PM ET (food science/chemistry/biology/science degrees)

Marketing & Sales Uniting to Attain Peak Results

Are your sales and marketing teams working in concert and at peak efficiency? Would you like increased sales and more robust marketing? Do you feel like your sales team is going in one direction while your marketing team is heading in another? FPSA is hosting this webinar on August 10th at 2 PM ET with a marketing and sales professionals panel addressing many teams' pain points.

Howard Deskin, WebStrategies (Moderator)

Panelists:
– Jennifer Fenimore, Rubber Fab (Marketing & Management)
– Jessica Gray, Grote Company (Marketing)
– Matt Hartman, Blentech (Sales)
– Kristin Harrison, WebStrategies (Smarketing)

Past Webinars

FPSA Financial Wellness Program

In this insightful webinar, staff from FPSA and Truist Momentum will present the latest benefit available to members, the FPSA Financial Wellness Program. During this important presentation, participants will learn how their company can access this exclusive program of tools and education to provide financial confidence to their employees. When you consider that employees spend an average of 28 hours per month worrying about their finances at a cost of over $5,000 per employee per year in lost productivity, this program meets an employee need you may not have been aware of.

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The Use of Restrictive Covenants in 2022 to Protect Your Trade Secrets, Customer Relationships, and Workforce

Benesch Law provides a high-level overview of the types of restrictive covenants typically found in company agreements (employment agreements, stock option agreements, severance agreements, etc..), review the key restrictive covenant cases and legislation from 2021, and examine restrictive covenant legislation at the state and Federal level that could be enacted in 2022. Benesch Law will also provide practical guidance and “best steps” that companies can take to protect their trade secrets, business relationships, and workforce through enforceable and reasonable restrictive covenants.

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P3 Cost Analysts

P3 helps companies across the nation determine if their spending on utility, telecom, waste and recycling, merchant processing, uniform/linen, managed print, shipping, and property tax expenses are correct and cost-effective. P3’s services aim to uncover your vendors’ hidden errors and overcharges while determining if there is a more cost-effective way for you to be billed.

When P3 saves clients money, they simply split the savings each month. If there are no savings identified, there is no fee. To date, P3 has saved hundreds of millions, for tens of thousands of client locations around the country, from small businesses to Fortune 500 companies.

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FPSA Sales Management Series – by Kelly Riggs

Discovery: The Person with the Best Information Wins

The majority of salespeople are what are referred to as “product pushers.” They call on prospects with a singular objective – to “sell” products. However, prospects don’t buy products – they buy what those products do for them. This single point dramatically changes the way great salespeople approach prospects and leads them to discover the two primary agendas a prospect has in the buying process. In this webinar, participants learn the single most important skill in selling and find out how effective salespeople discover what prospects are really looking for.

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“The Secret to Outselling the Competition: Follow the Science”

So, why are 3-out-of-4 salespeople average…or worse? More importantly, why is it that the vast majority of people despise salespeople? Turns out, these two questions have the same answer! For decades, the average salesperson has been taught how to sell in such a way that almost guarantees mediocre performance and simultaneously irritates the customer. In this webinar, participants will discover why salespeople approach selling completely wrong and what they need to change in order to succeed.

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Quit Whiting & Start SELLING!

Victims make terrible salespeople. In fact, the primary difference between exceptional salespeople and everyone else is that great salespeople are always troubleshooting, assessing their work, and finding ways to improve. They create different habits. They make different choices. Unfortunately, most everyone has an excuse. In this webinar, Kelly Riggs, author of “Quit Whining and Start SELLING! A Step-by-Step Guide to a Hall of Fame Career in Sales,” reviews the critical non-negotiable components necessary to succeed in sales, and reveals the habits and choices that make the difference between average and extraordinary.

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FPSA Valor/180 Skills

FPSA and 180 Skills/Valor as they roll out the latest track of the 180 Skills/Valor online learning platform – Food Safety. These 20 new courses will help your personnel master critical topics in the plant, ahead of any audits coming this fall.  Whether you are a food manufacturer or a supplier, these courses help your company secure the highest levels of food safety.
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Membership

FPSA Members are Conquering Today's Volatile Energy Markets with Transparent Energy: Smart energy procurement for food processors is more important now than ever. Join us to gain actionable insights into the current energy market, how we got here and more importantly how to navigate it moving forward.   You’ll also learn procurement strategies that you can use to optimize your energy spend.

Speaker:  David Blair, Transparent Energy
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What FPSA Members Need to Know About the Employee Retention Credit: As the U.S. economy begins to reopen, business owners are looking for ways to accelerate recovery. There are government incentives available to you because of the services you provide here in the U.S. Join alliantgroup for an informative session on the latest updates to powerful tax credits and incentives for FPSA members. Hear from alliantgroup’s technical directors, Jennifer Groff and Johnathon Johnson, as they walk you through the Employee Retention Credit, why it applies to you, the latest changes to the tax code from the IRS, and how you can qualify for these critical credits and incentives. To date, alliantgroup has helped FPSA members uncover over $20 million in credits and cash refunds.

Speakers:  Jennifer Groff, alliant group, Johnathon Johnson, allaint group
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Packaging

Traceability:  Where We Are & What's Next – Listen to this panel discuss Traceability from the customer's perspective – a food manufacturer, a policy expert, and an OEM packaging manufacture. The panel will discuss Traceability's impact on customers, companies' sustainability initiatives, its legal requirements now and into the future, the role of technology, roadblocks to implementation, and trends in the marketplace.

Speakers:  Darryl Riley, Senior VP of Quality; Rasma Zvaners, VP of Regulatory & Technical Services at American Bakers Association; John Dwyer, VP of Business Development at WestRock Company

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Food Safety

Rising to the Sesame Challenge – The FPSA Food Safety Network,  Bakery, and Prepared Foods Councils are proud to present the “Rising to the Sesame Challenge” Webinar. This webinar features a panel of experts – Nathan Mirdamadi (Commercial Food Sanitation), Kara Scherer (Dennis Group), and Adam Guichard (Neogen). Moderated by FPSA Prepared Foods Council Vice Chairman Darin Zehr (Commercial Food Sanitation), this panel of experts will dive into the operational allergen challenges to food production that sesame seeds pose and solution considerations from sanitation, design-build, and lab testing perspectives.

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Bakery Food Safety Innovations: Where We've Been & Where We Need to Go – Get your year started right by thinking about how to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of your food safety programs. In this webinar, General Mills Karl Thorson will discuss food safety bakery innovations in recent times and where the industry needs to go next. Join us, and you'll learn about:

•    Machine – sanitary design simplification and automation
•    Method – cleaning/changeover optimization
•    Personnel – training, and education of those performing critical tasks and those leading those tasks

Speakers: Karl Thorson, Global Food Safety and Sanitation Manager at General Mills

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OEMs and Hygienic Design – Teaming Up for Success– Sanitation demands on food processors continue to evolve. With labor constraints and increased production quotas, OEMs are supporting processors like never before. This means strategic partnerships and teams-based approaches to the hygienic design of equipment are critical to end-users. Food processing solutions engineered with experts from sanitation, equipment manufacturing, and customer processes best position consumers for safe and efficiently produced food.

Speakers: Anthony Saitta, Food Safety Specialist, Commercial Food Sanitation; Tricia Clark, VP of Operations, Ensight Solutions; Heath Clifton, Director of Automation and Controls, Ensight Solutions

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Food Safety Execution and Your Bottom Line – Food Safety is everyone’s concern from facility associates up to the CEO.

Often the concept of Food Safety gets convoluted with the idea of “cleaning”. While cleaning is a part of Food Safety and Sanitation execution it does not by itself, get to the bottom line which is mitigating risk to your operations, profits, and customers.

It is paramount that an effective food safety program address food safety planning, execution, and tracking because without one of these pieces an operation is not completely risk-averse. Especially as COVID-19 subsides and companies reflect on their effectiveness at keeping employees safe during challenging times, what are some of the key takeaways in terms of food safety? We will explore the ways in which food safety can be optimized and discuss some of the common shortcomings operations face.

Moderator:  Chuck Sena, AXIS Automation
Speakers: Randy Kohal,  Nexcor Technologies; Taryn Hickey, Nexcor Technologies
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Sales & Marketing

After the Sale – How do Vendors and Customers Partner for a Better Handoff – In this presentation, we will discuss ways that vendors can leverage better tools and communication to help reduce the headaches associated with the transition of ownership after the implementation of a new project. Chad will share his insight into a few ways the teams can collaborate to reduce the cost of transition often realized as technical support is required beyond the standard expected handoff.

Speakers: Chad Larson, Vice President of Manufacturing, Mel-O-Cream Donuts International
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Manufacturing Content to Generate New Leads & Sales – Content Marketing for Manufacturers – how content drives lead generation, lead nurturing and builds trust with your prospects and customers. This webinar is for both marketing and sales teams to partner on the content journey and benefit from the content that attracts and educates prospects and customers.

Speakers: Howard Deskin, Webstrategies, Inc.; Jennifer Fenimore, Rubber Fab; and Preston Kendig, Webstrategies, Inc.
Moderator: Chris Leone, Webstrategies, Inc.
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Leadership

3×3: Critical Questions for Your Business in 2021: Change or transition in the business world can be a difficult proposition. The tendency is to do things a certain way for so long that the ingrained habits are hard to break. However, savvy business leaders recognize that adapting to change is a non-negotiable aspect of business success, so they consistently ask and answer critical questions about three aspects of their businesses – sales, leadership, and strategy. These questions force owners and managers to think about important areas of their businesses that often get overlooked in the daily grind of running a company. In this webinar, taken directly from the training and coaching practice of award-winning author and business coach, Kelly Riggs, you will discover nine important questions (three questions each in the areas of sales, leadership, and strategy) you should be asking yourself and your team as you roll into 2021.

Speakers: Kelly Riggs, Business Lockerroom
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Young Professionals Network

Public Speaking & Lessons Learned – Panel Discussion: a panel discussion on public speaking and lessons learned.

Speakers: Maria Nardone, Ph.D., Psychologist & Organizational Consultant, Michael A. Alagna, Retired COO from Nation Pizza and Foods, Matthew Hartman, PE, Senior Account Manager from Blentech Corporation, Andrew Merkins, Business Development Manager from Kiewit Industrial Group
Moderators: Nehemiah White, Market Manager from Deville Technologies
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Women's Alliance Network

Re-Energizing Your Strategic Planning Process

If your first thought is, “what strategic plan?” or you have one…that you built in 2006…. or you have a big fat binder from 2020 that’s been sitting on a shelf in the closet, maybe it’s time to pull it out, shake off the cobwebs and do a refresh! In this engaging webinar: • You’ll learn the difference between a strategic plan and a work plan — and the benefits of each. • We’ll discuss leveraging the strategic planning process for much more than simply delivering a plan. • We’ll cover who to include in your planning process and how to build a plan that works for your business and circumstances. • And we’ll share ways to keep your plan alive and adapt it to the changes in your business.

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Be the Inspired You: Identifying & Owning Personal Skills for Professional Success – When thriving in the workplace, most opportunities for professional success lie in exercising professional power. Professional power is the identification and ownership of your skills, goals, strengths, preferred work styles, and operating with emotional intelligence, mental toughness, and as “the inspired version of you.” Using your professional power reduces relational and workplace stress, disconnectedness amongst teammates, and productivity loss. In this workshop, participants will explore how mindset, mindfulness, and personal behaviors are catalytic for better approaches and successful outcomes.

Speakers:  Rahkel C. D. Shelton, is an author,  workplace peace advocate, speaker, and inspiration enthusiast.  With over 12 years of corporate experience, including roles with CNN, Warner Media (formerly Turner Broadcasting System, Inc), WGN, iHeartMedia, and Fox Chicago News
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Technology Advancements

Creating Traceable Maintenance Logs with Blockchain Technology – Learn how Festo Corporation has leveraged the use of blockchain and peer-to-peer networks to create maintenance records that are tamper-proof and redundant. Also, learn how these leveraged technologies can help in compliance with the recently proposed future FDA traceability rules.

Speaker: Eduard Grün, FESTO
Moderator: Nehemiah White, Deville Technologies
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