The information below is from the completed 2024 event. Check back in the winter for 2025 updates.

Maine HR Convention: May 6-9, 2024

Finance Authority of Maine (EXHIBITOR)

FAME works at the nexus of economic and educational development and provides financial solutions that help Maine people achieve their higher education and business goals. We know that financial issues can be a primary stressor for employees. We can work with you as an employer to provide valuable resources to support the financial wellness of your workforce.

FAME helps Maine families achieve their goals by helping them afford higher education. We provide free publications and information sessions on planning and paying for higher education, including responsible borrowing. Employers can download or request free FAME publications and/or info sessions on a variety of affording higher education programs, including:

NextGen 529™ – Maine’s Education Savings Plan
Financial Aid and FAFSA (Free Application for Financial Student Aid)
Private education loan financing through Maine Loan
Refinancing Student Loans
Financial Education

FAME also provides access to capital for Maine financial institutions and businesses. We support Maine businesses as they start up, operate and expand to compete more effectively and grow Maine jobs. When traditional loans through traditional lenders do not solve a business’s financing needs, FAME’s business loan programs may be the answer.

Let us help you, help your employees. Learn more at Investinme2030.com and/or request free education publications or an information session by contacting us at education@famemaine.com, 800-228-3734.

Maine HR Convention

Katie’s Corner: Reflections
This morning, I was browsing through some memories of the #MaineHRConvention in years past, and was overcome with feelings of nostalgia, energy, and PRIDE for the human resources community our event serves. Our return to the Samoset in May is a long-overdue homecoming for the HR professionals of Maine. This crowd has been through the wringer in navigating the health & safety, emotional wellbeing, and workload of their fluctuating workforce. It’s about time that we all get in a room and take one big (masked!) EXHALE together. I can’t wait to reunite with friends new and old, and produce an event worthy of this group’s time and energy. As you ramp up your plans for May – join the hold a seat list, book dinner reservations in Rockport, and wait patiently to book that coveted Samoset room – please consider the 2022 Maine HR Convention my team’s bottom-of-our-hearts THANK YOU to the people who take care of their people. We are truly in a debt of gratitude. Katie Jones Creative Director, COO The Maine HR Convention Katie@StrategicHRus.com
A Note from the Curator: 500,000. HR, Gratitude, and Hope
For our friends in the HR orbit who deal in numbers and people. (That’s all of you!) On Monday evening, the President said, “We often hear people described as ordinary Americans. There’s no such thing. There’s nothing ordinary about them. The people we lost were extraordinary.” The HR community also has been extraordinary this past year, balancing numbers so organizations survive and recognizing that analytics matter little without seeing the people behind the numbers. There are countless stories of HR leaders rising to the occasion, tending to their employees, and reaching beyond their immediate circles. So, how do you grasp 500,000? Some draw the connection to lives lost in the wars of the last century. I imagine the combined populations of Bangor (my hometown) and Portland (which I now call home). Times FIVE. That thought nudged me from a self-defensive numbness to a gentle ache – and an elixir with two-part chemistry. The first part involves gratitude for frontline employees. Nurses jabbing arms. Clerks bagging groceries. The second part of the formula is hope – that uniquely human gift. Teachers planting seeds that will blossom into ideas. Ideas that might cool the planet, cool our heated political rhetoric, and warm the way we think about work, life, and the people we love. If you haven’t seen the Mars landing – watch this 3-minute NASA clip, which is awesome and sweetly geeky at the same time. If you want a little music to inspire – watch and listen to this clip created by “From the Top”. Here’s hoping that you are in good spirits, and that if you have lost a friend or family member, that this person resides in your heart as extraordinary. Bud Bernstein Curator for Strategic HR U.S.
A Note from the Curator: HR Superpower Alert
We’ve witnessed the Maine HR community in action these past few months, and you’ve done extraordinary things, calling on your superpowers to make a difference in the lives of your employees and the continuity of your organizations. We intend to reward those efforts with an extraordinary Maine HR Convention in May; so please watch for the opening of registration next week. I’ve called on the superpowers of my Strategic HR team, a faculty scattered around the U.S., and a virtual platform in London, England called HopIn to provide you with something unique. An online experience that leaves you informed and inspired across three learning tracks, a Maine Great Leader series, six keynotes, and a journey around America to meet HR miracle workers in action. In just a few days, you’ll see what we’ve been cooking up behind the scenes. For now, here’s the start to an Emily Dickinson poem: “Hope” is the thing with feathers – That perches in the soul – And sings the tune without the words – And never stops – at all Bud Bernstein Curator for Strategic HR U.S.