Are you going to that place-based class?
Heard around the water cooler: Place-based learning to identify learning that is classroom-based or face-to-face.
Quotable: Lora Reed
Online learning is "consistent with where we are going with employers and teams." Employers need people who are self-motivated and who can work independently and collaborate online with colleagues, including critiquing each other's work - exactly the skills that online learning builds.
Lora Reed, Assistant Professor, Ashford University Forbes School of Business as quoted in HR Magazine, May 2015
Collective Differences equal Better Learning Outcomes
Research now tells us that what makes a group truly intelligent and innovative is the combination of different ages, skills, disciplines, and working and thinking styles that members bring to the table.
Scott E Page, professor and director of the center of the Study of Complex Systems at the University of Michigan has demonstrated that groups displaying a range of perspectives and skill levels outperform like-minded experts. He concludes that "progress depends as much on our collective differences as it does on our individual IQ scores."
Source: Institute for the Future for the University of Phoenix Research Instituted and Scott E Page, "The Difference," published by Princeton Press
Training: Free? Money Maker? Or Gift of the organization?
In an article in SHRM's HR Magazine in May 2015, an interview with the VP of Organizational Development and Chief Talent Officer at Hospira, Inc., Pamela Puryear, revealed an interesting approach to learning and development: employee-teams can apply for a grant from the Training Department to meet a learning and development need in their business unit.
Quotable: Suzanne Martin
Everyone who comes to Google comes with a learning hat and a teaching hat - they have to teach as much as they learn, says Suzanne Martin, head of global people development, brand and marketing at Google, referring to the company's g2g (Googler to Googler) program that puts employees in teaching roles.
Source: HR Magazine, May 2015
Guest Blog: 3 Ideas for Leadership Development Outside the Classroom
By Halelly Azulay, TalentGrow LLC
Your current leader population wants to grow and needs to continue to improve their leadership competencies. You have Baby Boomer leaders set to retire, but many of those 'on the bench' to succeed them are not quite promotion-ready. Millennials are chomping at the bit for ongoing leadership development opportunities.
You need to create 'bench strength' in the form of a pool of ready-to-lead talent .Does this sound familiar? Don't despair. Hope awaits...When we deploy a wide variety of development methods to get our leaders to the next level, everyone benefits. It is not merely a training issue, either. It's bigger than that. Here are three ideas to help you approach leadership development in a broad, and inclusive way that doesn't require developing coursework or having people attend classes!
Rotation/stretch assignments
A job rotation means that the leader is temporarily assigned to a different job, usually laterally, in another role in the same organization, for an agreed-upon period of time. A stretch assignment is a task or project that these leaders perform usually within their current role but beyond their job description that challenges and broadens (stretches) their current skills and capabilities.
In leadership workshops or seminars, leaders are usually isolated and focused on learning outside the context of their workday. But when they are strategically working in a job rotation or stretch assignment with a developmental lens, leaders learn new skills in the context of their daily work experience and apply their lessons immediately, continually.
These kinds of assignments, when coupled with specific development goals, are a rich growth opportunity that yields many benefits to the leader as learner. They are a wonderful platform for leadership development that is readily available and completely scalable to the specifics of the leader, team, and organization.
Volunteering in a leadership role
How can your future and current leaders practice new leadership skills on-the-job without any downside for your organization whatsoever? By practicing on someone else's turf as a volunteer.
Volunteer jobs in leadership positions provide a great opportunity for leaders to 'get their feet wet', try new approaches, and practice skills they haven't yet mastered. And they do this all away from work where their mistakes don't affect your organization directly or cause any hardship.
There are endless leadership positions in non-profit and community-based organizations that need volunteers to serve their constituents. Leaders can craft a development strategy for leveraging a volunteer job for their own learning and growth, then deploy the plan and bring back the newly developed skills back to your organization. It's a win-win-win.
Mentor/protégé
Do your current or high potential future leaders have a mentor? And, are they mentoring someone themselves?
Lots of employers already have, or are considering adding, a mentoring program. Often, we view these opportunities as intended to benefit the newest members of the workforce. Yet, the potential developmental benefits of mentoring and being mentored can be equally valuable to those in leadership positions.
When in the role of protégé (aka mentee), leaders can gain insights from those who are a few steps ahead of them on a similar leadership journey. Even the most experienced and successful executive coaches have an executive coach of their own.
Leaders of all levels should also keep their skills sharp by getting a mentor. These leader mentors create value for their protégés, but don't they also grow their own skills as a result of mentoring others? Yes! For example, they may develop patience or empathy, or gain a new perspective on organizational challenges and trends, or enhance their coaching skills while playing the role of a mentor. These new skills can then be leveraged back on the job. This is leadership development at its best. There is dual-value delivered to the organization as a result of both parties developing.
Developing leaders is an ongoing challenge many organizations face, and by expanding the idea of "development" to include non-training-related methods, we can all benefit richly. Whether by completing a stretch or rotational assignment, volunteering in a leadership capacity, mentoring or being mentored, current and future leaders can grow their skills, stretch outside their comfort zone, and bring the benefits of their expanded skillsets to their organization without ever stepping foot in a leadership development workshop.
Look for these and many more non-training employee development ideas in Halelly's book, Employee Development on a Shoestring published by ATD Press.
About Halelly Azulay, TalentGrow LLC
Halelly Azulay is an author, speaker, facilitator, and leadership development strategist, as well as an expert in communication skills and emotional intelligence. She is the founder of TalentGrow LLC.a consulting company that develops leaders and teams experiencing explosive growth. TalentGrow specializes in people leadership skills, which include communication skills, teambuilding, coaching and emotional intelligence. TalentGrow works with all organizational levels, including C-level leaders, frontline managers and individuals.
Halelly is the author of two books, Employee Development on a Shoestring and Strengths Can Help You Lead a MoreFulfilling Life .She also hosts The TalentGrow Show, a leadership development podcast. She brings 20 years of professional experience in workplace learning and leadership development to her work with corporate, government, nonprofit, and academic organizations.
FREE Video Editor
Last month we told you about a free video recording software that will allow you to quickly and painlessly record training videos using your webcam or by application sharing to something you need to demonstrate.
This month we suggest you checkout www.123apps.com for free video and audio editors. You can also use this website to record a video from your webcam.
The Traditional "Education" Model is Waning
Interest in online learning is growing rapidly, while interest in traditional education is waning. From 2012 to 2013, distance education enrollment rose 1.8 percent, compared with a drop of 4% in overall higher education enrollment, according to the US Department of Education.
About one-eighth of students take all their higher education courses at a distance (online or through video, satellite or correspondence work), while another eighth take at least some classes at a distance, according to Russell Poulin, director, policy and analysis for the Eastern Interstate Comission for Higher Education Cooperative for Educational Technologies, a Boulder, CO, based organizations that focuses on best practices and technology for distance learning.
Source: HR Magazine, May 2015
Quotable: Thomas Handcock
Worldwide, organizations spend at least 11% more on training per person than is cost-effective, according to Thomas Handcock, senior director at Corporate Executive Board Co. (CEB) in London. That's time employees spend away from their core jobs engaged in learning that is not germane to the business.
You May Go Out of Business in the Next Five Years....
There is no lack of chatter in business and human resource journal's these days regarding the imminent brain drain as the Baby Boomers retire at a rate of 6,000 to 10,000 per day, depending on the source of your information. By 2030 all of the Baby Boomers will be over age 65. This means that the next generation(s) need to be ready willing and able and to fill critical roles. The problem is-they are not ready.
Your lack of a skilled workforce may cause you to go out of business in the next 5 to 10 years. What are your options?
Plan A - Hire skilled workers
While the younger generation cohort (those born in the 1980s and 1990s) is actually the largest cohort in history, they've had a tough time securing employment while the Baby Boomers have been in place. Therefore, while there are a lot of them, they often lack skills.
Plan B - Promote from within
Many employee satisfaction surveys over the years have revealed that the most frequent cause of an employee leaving his current employer is because they see a lack of career advancement. This is often coupled with a lack of training which would enable that career advancement. Therefore, without a concerted plan to develop incumbent workers (see plan D), this is not a realistic option for most organizations.
Plan C - Hire from the competition
While this a somewhat logical short-term solution, the reality is you're simply exchanging the current talent pool. At some point in their tenure with you, an employee will leave for your competition because they don't see career advancement with you.
Plan D - Grow your own
College graduates may demonstrate an ability to learn but have few-to-zero skills. While this might seem like a challenge, it is actually a wonderful opportunity for you to be the first employer to shape the way in which they work. Since they will not have preconceived notions about how work is done or their roles and responsibilities, you can " design" the ideal employee with the future in mind. If you have a well thought out career / curriculum path, you not only will "build" the perfect employee but they will stay with you for many years to come as well.
Employee's aren't so satisfied with their career advancement opportunities
This year marks the greatest increase in the number of employees satisfied with their current job since SHRM began administering the Employee Job Satisfaction Survey in 2002.
However, they appear to be least satisfied with their ability to advance in their careers. The satisfaction levels that relate to training and development include:
Organization's commitment to professional development - 23%
Job specific training - 22%
Career development opportunities - 21%
Company paid general training - 24%
Quotable: John Medina
Before the first quarter-hour is over in a typical presentation, people usually have checked out. If keeping someone’s interest in a lecture were a business, it would have an 80% failure rate.
John Medina, author, Brain Rules
Quotable: Heidi Grant Halvorson
Mastering new skills is not optional in today’s business environment.
“In a fast-moving, competitive world, being able to learn new skills is one of the keys to success. It’s not enough to be smart – you need to always be getting smarter.”
Heidi Grant Halvorson, author: Nine Things Successful People Do Differently
Training Doctor in the media this summer!
The Training Doctor was featured in the Staples Small Business Hubarticle, 4 Ways Apple Devices Can Help your Small Business
Also, the founder of The Training Doctor, Dr. Nanette Miner, was featured in an article from The American Express Open Forum, Successful Entrepreneurs' Secrets toMastering Work-Life Balance.
What's the Difference between Gaming and Gamification?
Game-based learning is the use of a game to teach. Gamification, on the other hand, only uses a few elements of games. A learning game is a self-contained unit. There is a definitive start, game play and ending to the game. In a learning game, the learners know they are engaged in a game activity and at the end there is a “win state.”
Source: www.trainingindustry.com/magazine Training Industry Magazine-Spring 2014
Here is a sample of a "game" we use to teach overcoming objections in a sales curriculum - feel free to copy!
Step 1 - Divide your group in to three: Team A, Team B, Team C
Step 2 - Each team is given 5 minutes to discuss among themselves and come up with the 5 "hardest" objections they have encountered when selling "x" (this assumes a group that is already selling a product or service and you are enhancing their abilities).
Step 3 - Conducted as a round robin. Team A "announces" one of their Top 5 Hardest objections. Team B has a few moments to discuss among themselves and come up with what they believe to be an appropriate response. Team C also discusses among themselves because they have the ability to "challenge" Team B's answer
Team B then provides their answer to Team A. If Team C thinks their answer is better, they can say "we would like to challenge that" and provide THEIR answer to Team A. Team A then decides "the winner" and a point is awarded.
The process then repeats with Team B providing one of their objections to Team C and Team A having the ability to challenge.
This should take about 45 minutes to conduct. The Team with the most points "wins" and everyone wins by having at least 2 great rebuttals to all the tough objections.
We're not name droppers... but....
TrainingIndustry.com just announced its Top 20 Training Content Developers and three of our clients are on the list! Congrats!
Training is essential for public safety!
WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has suspended the repair station certificate of Aviation Service, Inc. (ASI), a Lexington, Kentucky-based aircraft repair station.
The FAA alleges that ASI failed to establish an Employee Training Program (ETP) that met FAA regulations. The FAA notified ASI numerous times between July 7, 2011 and October 9, 2012 that its ETP did not meet FAA regulations.
After ASI failed to modify its ETP, the FAA issued an immediately effective action to suspend ASI’s certificate, determining that an emergency existed related to the safety of the traveling public.
An FAA-approved ETP is critical to ensure that employees performing maintenance for a repair station are capable of completing such work.
The suspension will continue until ASI develops an ETP that the FAA approves.
Source: AviationPros.com
Training in Decision Making Crucial to Business Success
According to a survey of 562 US based senior-level business, human resources, and management professionals, conducted by AMA Enterprise (a division of the American Management Association International) - a fear of failure or making a mistake often causes employees to avoid taking responsibility for their actions.
The solution? According to 46% of respondents: Training in decision-making and problem-solving which will, in turn, lead to more confidence in taking responsibility.