Wednesday, December 15 is the second early-bird entry deadline for The 9th annual American Business Awards, the premier business awards competition in the U.S.A.  This is your final chance to save money on entry fees for all categories - for marketing awards, PR awards, HR awards, web awards, management awards, IT awards, new product awards, and more.

If you miss the December 15 early-bird, don't fret.  The final deadline is March 31, and even then we'll accept late entries, with payment of a $35 per entry late fee, through April 27.

The ABAs are open to all organizations operating in the U.S.A. - large and small, for-profit and non-profit, public and private.

First step to submitting entries is to get the entry kit.  Get your entry kit for the 2011 ABAs here.

Ready to enter?  Begin here.

The full-text of the most of the Stevie Award-winning entries in The 2010 International Business Awards have now been published at www.stevieawards.com/iba, and there are three reasons why you should read them.  If you're not familiar with the IBAs, it is the all-inclusive Stevie Awards competition that's open to all organizations worldwide.  The "international Stevies" typically receive nominations from organizations in more than 40 nations, in categories ranging from Executive of the Year and Most Innovative Company of the Year to web awards, marketing awards, public relations awards, and more.

The awards were presented at a ceremony in Istanbul, Turkey back on September 27 that was attended by close to 300 executives from more than 20 nations.

You'll find the complete lists of honorees, with links to the full text of Stevie-winning nominations, through the following links.

Here are three great reasons why you should explore and read these winning nominations:

1. Every organization should be adept at summarizing and publicly expressing their achievements, and these are great examples of organizations that have done this well
2. There are household names galore among this year's Stevie Winners, including Acer, BASF, ING, and Procter & Gamble, among others, but there are many more companies, executives, products, and initiatives that you've probably never heard of, whose stories will surprise, inform and enlighten you
3. If you're planning to enter the IBAs in 2011, the winning entries from 2010 are great models on which to base the structure and tone of your own entries.

Creative, Advertising, Web Sites & Blogs, Literature, Interactive Multimedia, Video, & Live Event Awards Categories
Categories that recognize excellence in all forms of advertising, web sites and blogs, interactive multimedia, annual reports and other literature, interactive multimedia, video, and live events.

Management Awards Categories
Categories for executive management including Management Team of the Year, Executive of the Year, and Chairman of the Year, among others.

Company/Organization Awards Categories
Categories that recognize the achievements of entire organizations.   Includes Multinational Company of the Year, Corporate Environmental Responsibility Program of the Year, and Most Innovative Company of the Year, among others.

PR Awards Categories
Includes Communications or PR Campaign of the Year categories, among others.

Customer Service Awards Categories

Human Resources Awards Categories

Information Technology Awards Categories

Marketing Awards Categories
Includes Marketing Campaign of the Year, among others.

New Product Awards & Product Management Categories
Includes the categories for Best New Product or Service of the Year, among others.

Support Awards Categories

Congratulations to Jeff Shuman, senior vice president of Human Resources and Corporate Relations for Harris Corporation, for being named to the Board of Directors of the National Association of Manufacturers. Read the press release here...

Jeff won the Stevie Award for Human Resources Executive of the  Year in The 2007 American Business Awards, has since then been a judge of the human resources awards categories in the ABAs, and is an all-around good guy. 

You can read Jeff's Stevie Award-winning nomination from 2007 on The American Business Awards web site.

There are a good many HR awards categories to choose from in The American Business Awards, although there are only three that are specifically labelled as HR:

Human Resources Department of the Year
Human Resources Team of the Year
Human Resources Executive of the Year

Here are some others that human resources professionals should consider submitting nominations to:

Read the rest of this article here...