This is an
online
"re-print" of the article posted to the USATODAY site
(on 08-30-05) ... we didn't want to lose it should that
page be renamed or archived in the future. |
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Company 'alumni' groups take shape
By Stephanie Armour, USA TODAY
Many employees are finding that
leaving their employer doesn't always mean saying goodbye:
Membership in organized corporate "alumni" groups is
increasingly in vogue.
There are now
alumni groups for hundreds of companies, including
Hewlett-Packard, Ernst & Young and Texas Instruments. Yahoo
alone lists more than 500 such ex-employee groups.
Some groups
are started by former employees, while others are formally
sanctioned by employers as a way to stay in touch, creating a
potential pool of boomerang workers that employers can draw from
when hiring picks up. For example:
• The
Microsoft Alumni Network (MSA) has grown from 2,000 members in
2003 to more than 6,000 today, with a goal of 10,000 in the next
two to three years (www.msanet.org). The network provides
services such as a membership business directory, where alumni
offer their services — from house-cleaning to an acrobatic
flight school.
"MSA was
formed to keep people connected, to each other and to
Microsoft," says Kathi Jones, executive director of the group.
She has worked in recruiting and human resources at Microsoft.
Membership dues in the USA are $130 a year.
• About 125 former
employees of Nabisco have formed an alumni group (www.nabiscoalumni.net)
which members use to arrange happy hours and get-togethers at
hotels. The group is mostly a way for former employees to
celebrate personal milestones and stay in touch; some post news
about job changes, new babies or home purchases.
"We've heard from people
who left years ago," says Sandee Weiner, of Wayne, N.J., a
former Nabisco project manager who runs the Web site. The group
was launched in February 2004.
• An alumni
group of Arthur Andersen employees (www.andersenalumni.net) was
founded in May 2002 after layoffs amid the accounting scandals
that brought down the company. It now has about 10,000 members
and has organized alumni reunions in Los Angeles, Houston and
Chicago. The group created a Web site, which has about 300 job
postings, as well as a résumé database.
"We still get
people joining every day. Andersen was sort of like a family;
they want to stay in touch," says Jonathan Goldsmith, the
Chicago-based group president and a former mergers consultant.
The groups
can be especially cathartic for employees who have been let go
in layoffs, Goldsmith says.
Alumni groups
are growing because there is more job turnover and because the
Internet makes it easier for former employees to stay in touch
across long distances.
When two
alums of Boston-based Bain & Co. established a relief fund for
refugees after witnessing the tsunami in Sri Lanka, support came
from former employees informed through an alumni network.
Employers
often support and even spearhead the groups. That's the case at
the Bain alumni group, which is now nearly 6,000 members strong.
The network has advice for entrepreneurs, news from Bain, career
resources and more.
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