Gregory Lay is a speaker and trainer with a core message of strengthening employee involvement and building job satisfaction. His strategic targets are:
1. Employees with a burning desire to create a more successful career; and
2. Employers who recognize that organizational success depends on employee success.
A key discriminator in Gregory’s message is that “quitting your job to chase your dream” isn’t smart – or even brave. The most effective way to achieve a dream career is to have the courage to focus on making the most of the job you have right now and becoming so good that your dream will come find you!
Gregory created Accidental Career to meet a critical need for employee development in the rapidly-evolving 21st Century workplace. Driven by immediate needs, many employees begin their careers before have time to make a heart-felt choice and prepare to enter their chosen field.
Many of your co-workers also got started without a clear goal in mind – and to this day, the workplace is filled with employees working at jobs they didn’t plan, many in positions they hadn’t even dreamed about.
Even so, you and your colleagues are entitled to rewarding careers. Gregory cares about workers and wants to help you build practical career plans, stronger career skills, and recognition for opportunities to increase career satisfaction – and to do it without necessarily feeling the need to change to a different career.
Three careers
Gregory’s first career was in journalism, writing for and editing newspapers in Louisiana, Oregon, Texas, and New Mexico. He learned the many sides of a single story, and the many distractions people go through to grasp a message.
He calls his second career phase the middle management career. He managed in a public ride-sharing program, a health gym and attached restaurant, a research department, and a bookstore. He learned that people superimpose their own ideas over the instructions they hear, with results that would be funny if they weren’t so frustrating. It was during this time that Gregory began to notice the high percentage of employees who, to make a living, have accepted employment that falls outside their dreams and intentions.
Discovering that the aspect of management he enjoyed most was supporting and motivating employees, he moved on to speaking and training for his third career. He has served as a corporate trainer for an optical company, a manufacturer, and since 2004, as a contract trainer, presenting practical training and problem-solving skills to employees from more than 1,000 public and private organizations.
Speaking and Training
Gregory’s signature keynotes are ideal for organizational conferences. When there are front line workers, you’ll benefit from:
- Don’t Dream It – Do It! – Excellence is the Answer
When there are more managers in the audience:
- Kiss My Authority – Why ‘Boss’ is a Four-Letter Word
He is the designer and principal presenter of a series of full-day training programs to develop organizational skills, including:
- Personal Performance: Five Ways to Excel
- Supervision: Six Responsibilities of a Boss
- Leadership: The Legend of The Leader
- Teamwork: Pulling Together… Not Pulling Apart
- Communication: Building Better Relationships
- Project Management: Excellence in Execution
Writing
In addition to the Accidental Career blogs, you’ll find Gregory’s writing in his book, Every Job Has Its Jerks! (2012) and as a featured writer in the collaborative book Life Choices: Putting the Pieces Together (2010).
Organizations
Gregory is or has been an active member of, and he recommends participation in:
ASTD – American Society for Training and Development (2000 Chapter President)
ISPI – International Society for Performance Improvement
NSA – National Speakers Association (2012 Chapter President)
SWW – Southwest Writers (2011 & 2012 SWW Service Award)
TI – Toastmasters International (2003 District Member of the Year)
Contact Gregory
For information on keynotes or training sessions with Gregory, contact:
Gregory@AccidentalCareer.com
505 242-4946