Changes over the years
In the winter of 1998, most of the world was buzzing about the ongoing Winter Olympic Games being held in Nagano, Japan. But the Vandiver Group was buzzing with a different sort of news—the first community newsletter, Updates, had been written and printed for distribution. At the Olympics, the U.S. took home six gold medals. TVG did a bit better, with the front page of Updates listing the 11 awards the group had won since January.
1998 was the year that the Vandiver Group turned five years old, and like any five-year-old, it had transformed since its inception. It had moved offices and expanded its ranks, changed telephone numbers and, most excitingly, had set up a website and an AOL email address.
TVG’s Updates newsletter is still being released, with a digital copy of every issue from 1998 on file. In recognition of the 25th anniversary of the Vandiver Group’s continued success, I took a deep dive into the archives to find out how we spent those twenty-five years, what changed, and what didn’t.
TVG’s Training evolution
The winter 2003 newsletter opens with a report on a presentation TVG gave on current consumer trends. The theme of the presentation was that consumers were “Anxious about [their] uncertain future, but ready to move ahead focusing on what really matters in our lives like friends, family and things we can control.” While 2003 was a year marked by uncertainty, TVG did its best to make things clearer, presenting seminars on everything from bioterrorism to brand training. We also forged ahead with technological advances, putting out DVDs, testing out online client portals and using data in new different ways.
The winter 2004 Updates addressed this shifting, adaptive nature by describing TVG as an “amoeba”, changing to suit the environments that we find ourselves in. This amoeba-like nature is what led to the summer 2009 Updates excitedly announcing the creation of the TVG Facebook page, the official TVG Twitter, and the TVG Blog—what you’re reading right now.
In 2009, TVG even presented a seminar on social media at Webster University two months after Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter, also presented at Webster. And in 2013, TVG offered a new training class on integrating millennials into the workplace, focusing on the barriers of technology and how the various generations communicate and prefer to be communicated with.
In just a few years, we started thinking about Generation X and millennials, and now Generation Z will be entering the workforce. We are looking at what challenges and benefits they might have for employers. Nobody can predict the future, or what innovations may come, or how the atmosphere of the industry may change, but the best anyone can do is exactly what TVG has done—adapt, overcome, shift and improvise all in order to move forward with confidence.
Although the details might change, the Vandiver Group’s goals and passion for our work never have, and never will. It’s this sentiment that the first issue of Updates closes with– “We’re with you every step of the way.”