Hello everyone. We’re back. Did you miss us?

Yes indeed, the CMEpalooza caravan is in operation once again after a much-needed rest following our Spring and Fall successes in 2019. Our staff returned recently from a week-long retreat in luxurious and balmy Pekin, IL, where we broke down the data on CMEpaloozas past and made plans for CMEpaloozas future. We’ve got some fun things in store for 2020, which we’ll get to, er, eventually.

We are here today, though, with some exciting news – we’re hiring! Well, sort of. OK, we’re not really hiring someone who will actually be paid, but we are looking to bring another energetic and entertaining voice into the CMEpalooza family in 2020. After six years of putting up with us making fun of each other in less and less creative ways, you deserve a new perspective, which is why we are officially opening up the process to select a CMEpalooza Spring 2020 Intern.

We thought of opening up the CMEpalooza coffers to put a flashy ad up on Indeed.com to attract applicants from around the world, but then we realized we didn’t have any coffers to open and so we had to settle for the corporate blog. Good news for you though – you now likely won’t be competing with anyone from the Seychelles for this gig.

So what exactly are the expected duties of the CMEpalooza Spring 2020 Intern?

1. You’ll have the opportunity to contribute to the CMEpalooza blog at your leisure. Maybe once a month or so. You can write about just about anything that won’t offend people. Scott is in charge of the offensive material.
2. We’ll have you shadow one of us virtually as we plan a CMEpalooza session. You’ll learn how the proverbial sausage is made. Maybe you’ll even pick up a thing or two that you can incorporate into your real job. You’ll likely even have the chance to show up on camera during a Spring session so you can show your doubting friends and family that, yes, you are officially part of the CMEpalooza team.
3. You will spend every other Saturday with a bullhorn outside of your state capitol building singing the CMEpalooza fight song for 2 hours (optional duty)

What qualifications are we looking for?

1. You should be working in CME in some capacity
2. You should have a thick skin – it’s pretty certain that we will make fun of you at some point
3. You should not be a Dallas Cowboys or Boston Celtics fan (sorry, we have to draw the line somewhere)

Beyond that, we’re open to anyone. Maybe you have only worked in CME for 1 year and want to learn more about our industry? Great. Maybe you’ve worked in CME for 25 years and want to do something fun in 2020? Also great. Maybe it’s been your lifelong dream to meet Derek and you think that this is your chance? You need professional help.

While this is an unpaid position, Derek has promised to send our CMEpalooza Spring 2020 Intern a half-eaten box of Thin Mints as a personal thank you (note from Derek: Very clever idea, Scott. Everyone knows there is no such thing as a half eaten box of Thin Mints.)

The application process for the CMEpalooza Spring 2020 Intern is simple and short. Fill out a brief questionnaire by clicking on this link to apply. Every answer is vitally important so please think before you respond. The application process will close on Friday, January 3, at which time a special task force will cull through the applications to select our winner. You can email us if you have any questions (our email address is on this site somewhere – you just need to find it).

Another CMEpalooza has come and gone and Scott and I are so thankful and appreciative for everyone who participated, whether as a faculty member or as a participant. We could not — would not — do it without all of your support and it is a thrill for us to see the positive response CMEpalooza continues to get. Now, we need a few days/weeks/months to recover, recharge, and do it all over again!

I also want to take a moment to address a comment that was made on the CMEpalooza survey that we ask participants to complete. The comment stated that the “distracted boyfriend” meme I posted yesterday morning to promote CMEpalooza Day was “inappropriate and objectified women” and that we should apologize.

They are correct. I am the one who posted it and it was a bad judgement call by me. I have removed it and offer my sincere apologies to all. If anyone cares to discuss it or anything else related to CMEpalooza, you are welcome to send me a direct email at thecmeguy@gmail.com. Thank you.

Thank you to everyone who participated in our wrapup session to CMEpalooza, The Great, Big, Play at Home in Your Jammies CME Quiz. We know covered a lot of information in a very short amount of time. Consequently, our faculty was kind enough to put together this document explaining all of the answers and providing detailed rationale. If you want to argue or disagree with any of these explanations, that’s why we provide links to all of our faculty LinkedIn pages on the agenda tab 🙂