BANKING
Federal bank directors named
Akron area business leaders have been named to the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland board of directors and the Federal Advisory Council. Richard K. Smucker, chief executive officer of Orrville-based J.M. Smucker Co., was reappointed chairman of the board of directors. Smucker served as deputy chairman from 2010 to 2012 and as chairman for 2013.
Also re-appointed is Christopher M. Connor, chairman and CEO of Sherwin-Williams Co. of Cleveland. He was reappointed as deputy chairman and has served as a director since 2011.
Kevin T. Kabat, vice chairman and CEO of Fifth Third Bancorp in Cincinnati, was elected a director and Hal Keller, president of Ohio Capital Corp. for Housing in Columbus, was re-elected to a second term as a director.
Paul G. Greig, chairman, president and CEO of Akron-based FirstMerit Corp., was appointed to a one-year term as the Fourth Federal Reserve District’s representative on the Federal Advisory Council. Greig served as director of the Cleveland Fed from 2011 to 2013. The advisory council is composed of representatives of the banking industry from each of the 12 Federal Reserve Districts.
Job interview talk in Hudson
Preparing for job interviews will be the focus of a talk at 2 p.m. Wednesday at the Hudson Library & Historical Society.
Bonnie Dick, co-founder of the Career Transition Center, will present Improving Interviewing Skills for Job Seekers, and discuss researching companies, preparing for difficult questions and providing answers so a candidate may separate himself from other candidates.
The Career Transition Center was founded in 2011 in Shaker Heights.
To register, go online to www.hudsonlibrary.org and click on “Programs & Events/Registration” under the “Adult” tab, or call the library at 330-653-6658.
The library is at 96 Library St. in the First & Main shopping complex.
SCORE schedules workshops
Akron SCORE, the nonprofit business counseling service, will this month offer three workshops aimed at small and start-up businesses. All workshops will be at the Taylor Institute in the University of Akron’s Polsky Building at 225 S. Main St. downtown Akron.
On Wednesday , the “Results Selling” workshop will run from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. and cover sales types, prospecting, preparing for sales appointments and overcoming objections.
On Thursday, the “Business Start-Up” workshop will run from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. It is billed as a primer on how to start and market a business. Subjects will include developing a business plan and lender requirements for financing.
On Jan. 29, the “Business Plan” workshop will run from 8:30 to 11:30 a.m. Topics will include setting business goals, creating a business plan, understanding financial needs and analyzing markets. To register, go online to www.akron.score.org and click on “Local Workshops” or call 330-379-3163.
UTILITIES
Ohio Edison has fewer outages
Outages for Ohio Edison customers improved in 2013, in part because of improvements to the utility’s system, officials said. Ohio Edison, a subsidiary of Akron-based FirstEnergy Corp., said it spent $246 million in scheduled reliability enhancement projects in 2013, including constructing three new substations, rebuilding and upgrading circuits, inspecting and replacing utility poles and continuing vegetation management programs.
The utility’s number of outages and duration have been getting lower for several years, said spokesman Mark Durbin. In 2011 the figure was 0.86 outages per customer and 0.85 in 2012. For 2013, the number dropped to about 0.67. The average restoration time for customers in 2011 was 113 minutes, 106 minutes in 2012 and about 100 minutes in 2013, Durbin said.
LABOR
Union nears deal with YRC
The Teamsters Union announced a tentative agreement with trucking company YRC Worldwide Inc. aimed at allowing the company to move forward on debt reduction and refinancing measures. A previous agreement was defeated in a membership vote.
The union said details of the revised proposal will be reviewed at a meeting of local union officials to be held on Tuesday. A committee must approve sending the revised proposal to the membership for a ratification vote. Information is to be posted online at www.teamster.org/yrcw.
YRC was formed by the combination of Yellow Freight and the former Akron-based Roadway.
Compiled from staff and wire reports