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November 2022

Volunteer Spirit Award: Call for Nominations

The annual Chancellor’s Honors Banquet celebrates excellence at UT Knoxville. Nominations are now open for the spring 2023 event.

The Volunteer Spirit Award is the highest staff honor, and recognizes a staff member who has gone above and beyond their professional role. Please nominate colleagues you feel exemplify the Volunteer spirit by having the courage to act and give of themselves in extraordinary ways.

Ashley Blamey, Title IX Coordinator, was awarded the 2022 Volunteer Spirit Award recognizing her for her work in developing the Title IX Office.

Nominate a Colleague for the Volunteer Spirit Award

Explore All Chancellor’s Honor Awards

Veterans Toys for Tots Drive

UT Knoxville HR is partnering with the Knoxville Toys for Tots Foundation to provide toys to children in our local area. This year’s toy drive will focus on 9-to-14 year olds as this age group receives the least donations each year.

Please bring new or like new unwrapped toys to 105 Student Services no later than December 15.

Staff Performance Reviews: Early Learning Opportunities

It is never too early to prepare for performance reviews. As a reminder, staff performance reviews become available each January and are due on March 31. Reviews are completed in the online performance review system (OPR).

To register for upcoming staff review learning opportunities, visit K@TE and select UT Faculty and Staff. Select My UTK@TE Learning from the home screen and type the session title or “staff reviews” into the search bar.

Learn More About Staff Performance Reviews

LOD News

Welcome Brian Watkins, Leadership Development Consultant

Brian Watkins joined LOD in October as our Leadership Development Consultant. His focus will be development of specific learning and growth opportunities for leaders across campus in various stages of experience.

Brian served as the Human Capital Director at Tennessee Schools for the Deaf. He earned his Professional Training Facilitator for Advance Management Practices from the Tennessee Department of Human Resources in 2015. He holds a Bachelor’s in Business Administration (BBA) and Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Tusculum University.

We are rolling out the first Leadership Development workshop as part of our new leader development initiative. The opportunities below are a great opportunity for new or existing leaders to grow and strengthen their leadership competencies.

Leadership Development Opportunities

“Leadership Cores Workshop: Foundational and essential leadership concepts for Managers and Supervisors”
- November 30, 2022 from 1-2:30p
- Learn and strengthen your leadership concepts and competencies
- For new, current, and aspiring leaders

“Delegation: A Little Room for Happy Accidents”
- December 7, 2022 from 9-10:30a
- Content includes painting a clear picture of effective delegation and contributions to your masterpiece

LOD Anytime Podcasts

“CliftonStrengths and You - Part One” is now available. This is a four-part campus leader interview series diving into the four domains of the CliftonStrengths assessment.

Listen to LOD Anytime Podcasts

Reminder: Be an End of Year Volunteer

The end of the year means enjoying a well-earned winter break, spending time with family and friends, and giving back.

UT Knoxville employees may use up to eight paid work hours each year to engage in volunteer service through the Volunteer Activity Policy.

Celebrate your volunteer efforts impact by logging your service in ServeUTK.

Searching for a cause that ignites your Volunteer Spirit? Explore Volunteer Opportunies and ServeUTK.

Explore Volunteer Activities

DASH November Update

DASH (Dynamic Administrative Systems for Higher Ed) stakeholders have been hard at work as progress continues across many fronts. The financial workstream is progressing as participants have concluded the introductory round of workshops and are now focusing on future process flows and key decisions to finalize the initial design. The human capital management workstream has officially launched with its introductory design sessions well under way.

IRIS HR E-Forms Series: Available on Demand

If you missed this year’s IRIS Office Hours HR E-Forms series, you’re in luck: recordings of each session are now available on demand.

Visit K@TE and search “IRIS Helpdesk Office Hours” to view the series.

Log Into K@TE to View the HR E-Forms Series

Annual Compliance Training Reminder

Annual compliance training is available in K@TE.

The training should take less than two hours. The completion deadline is December 31, 2022.

Log Into K@TE for Compliance Training

Art in Our Backyard: Christmas Carol at CBT

A campus favorite holiday tradition!

Celebrate the season with the Clarence Brown Theatre’s annual production of “A Christmas Carol.”

Tickets are now on sale, and your faculty and staff discount is 15%.

Purchase Tickets Today

Staff Spotlight: Sam Smith

Sam Smith joined Human Resources in August 2022 as an Employee Relations Specialist. Sam graduated from UTC in May 2022 with an MBA and this is her first career position.

She loves to help people and is excited to be in a role that she can help UT employees. Sam is a Knoxville native and grew up attending UT football and basketball games every year since she was born. She was thrilled to join UT and work at the place that holds a lot of exciting memories.

Outside of work, Sam loves to watch Formula 1 races and being surrounded by nature. She also loves to collect houseplants and garden. You can also oftentimes find her painting or doing some other type of art project.

Hobbies: Formula 1, Plants, Reading, Painting, Paddle Boarding

Family: Parents Nina and Steve

View Upcoming HR Events

Our campus partners include:

The Veterans Success Center

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