Networking specialist & A-Wakened Events founder Flory Hiatrides gave a seminar to Iona fraternity students on Nov. 12 at the Hynes Institute.  

The discussion highlighted the multi-disciplinary approach to maximize success and happiness while navigating the natural obstacles of life.  

  Flory Hiatrides’ story begins as a Bronx native being born and raised to later on graduate from Iona. Soon after she became a professional facilitator, mentor, entrepreneur and mother. Her experiences have led her to find purpose in giving back all she has learned. The purpose of Hiatrides’ practices are for those to find fulfillment in career navigating as well as self-discovery. Her teachings had been adopted by the Delta Upsilon fraternity member John Stivala who invited Hiatrides to have an open group discussion with fellow members.  

   When having arrived Hiatrides had surprised students by bringing alongside various CEOs from all categories of professions from mass media advertising to data analytical pharmaceutical company chiefs of staff, all for the sake of sharing their own insights of how to navigate a career. 

   Hiatrides embraced the group to vocalize their thoughts and perspectives on depth defining questions such as “What they would like to gain more from their fraternity?’’ “What could be better about their fraternity?’’ and “What are they not doing to gain these idealistic things from their fraternity?” All things were specific to a fraternity, however, she openly planted the seed for the basis of how to analyze and assess any situation to actually gain a tangible and ethical resolution.  

That solution and or resolve is what she describes as the concept of “the vortex,” the biggest emphasis of point to the fraternity. She describes the vortex as “all things and actions that give the sense of euphoric relief of comfort and ease.” Simply enough, she emphasizes to feel no remorse or stagnancy in eliminating all aspects of people, places or things that take said individual out of the vortex, all for the betterment of individual growth which then delves into other aspects a person is engaging in. “Be aware of how centered you are to know when you are out of your vortex,” Hiatrides reiterated.  

     The fraternity was later encouraged to participate in connectivity activities to acknowledge and understand the severity of perspectives. This was done with the use of a Myers Briggs Type Indicator (mbti), a tool used to help individuals understand their own communication preferences and how they interact with others. Her teachings gave greater understanding of self to the young men so they can much more accurately cultivate solutions for any scenario they are in, whether fraternity sense of communion issues or finding a major that much more suits your interest. Her teachings can be utilized for any category.