Why employee development matters

Here's a link to an interesting report on the subject of employee development from Mind Leaders.

Why Employee Development Matters

There are some worthwhile conclusions drawn from the document, which come out broadly in favour of adopting a blended learning approach. There's also a useful list of elements to look for in your company which will help if you are looking to set up an employee devlelopment programme.
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Language, culture and how we think

There's a fascinating article from Lira Boraditsky titled "How does our language shape the way we think?" which looks at the ways in which the structure of different languages influences the speakers understanding of the world. Her description of how grammatical gender in language can effect our thinking is truly eye opening.

Whilst the articles main conclusions are around the way in which language effects how we think, I can't help reflecting that it also reinforces the importance of being clear in how we communicate with others, particularly if we are interacting with people from different cultures. As a trainer, how I communicate is core to everything I do, so how does the knowledge that a phrase as simple as "building bridges" potentially has a different positional context for a German speaker and a Spanish speaker. And does it have a same or similar impact on a second or third generation participant who may use both languages regularly?

To a German the word "bridge" is feminine and can be ascribed feminine terms to describe it (slender, elegant, pretty), whereas to a Spaniard it is masculine and can be ascribed masculine terms (hard, sturdy, strong). Is there a possible implication that gender bias means that they ascribe the activity ("building bridges") with a masculine (power, conflict) or feminine (consultative, caring) action bias? My instinct, if I am developing the wider implications of the article correctly, is to presume that it can.

In which case, WOW! I'm both excited and intimidated by this knowledge. Excited by the possibilities for developing ways to approach subjects using language that is more appropriate and helpful for those I'm seeing to engage, and intimidated by the implications that even a casual, unintended misuse of a word or phrase could bring to the way in which a topic is interpreted.

Also, does it have implications if you examine the cultural language of your organisation?

I've recently had experience of delivering training in my own organisation where some of the ideas I was seeking to explore with a training group were received with some hostility, now these ideas weren't controversial... in fact they were pretty mainstream from a training perspective, but the group were certainly uncomfortable with them and (my interpretation) felt that they threatened their map of the world. I'm hoping to revisit the ideas in future sessions and think this information about language will help me reflect on how I presented them and if there is a conflict between the ideas, my presentation of them and the cultural language of the organisation.
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When Brainstorming Goes Wrong

As a trainer I must have run thousands of brain storming session over the years, some of them more successful than others. In my early days I struggled to understand why some of them worked out well and some of them crashed and burned.

This was pre-web, but it would have been handy if I could have had something to refer to, to help me go through that process of elimination at the very least.

This is a thoughtful post that might help if you're in a similar position

26 Reasons Why Most Brainstorming Sessions Fail (And What To Do About It)
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Penguin Business Thought Leaders

To promote their authors Penguin regularly produce interviews/ podcasts covering a wide variety of subjects. At the moment they have a series of interviews posted on their website under the heading of "Business Thought Leaders", in which writers they describe as having "contrarian views" talk about how we should manage our careers.

The authors are:

Pamela Slim ("Escape from Cubicle Nation")
Seth Godin ("The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit and When to Stick")
Hugh McLeod ("Ignore Everybody")

Penguin Business Thought Leaders
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The Ten Commandments of e-learning

A good blog post from Cath Ellis outlining the ten commandments of e-learning.

The first one sums up a lot of my thoughts in the debate about e-learning; it's not the solution to all our problems, it's not a flash-in-the-pan, it's not going to revolutionise training and development in the short to medium term. It is however an incredibly useful option to have available to you.

1 Put the pedagogy (not the technology) first
Think about what students need to learn then think about how it is best for them to learn it. Only then think about which technology is best used to accomplish this.
Don’t be too ambitious. Start out small (eg. just a discussion board or a group blog) and build on this in subsequent years.

cathellis13: Ten Commandments of e-learning
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Mind Mapping

I'm a big fan of mind mapping, especially when it comes to the initial stages of course design. I find being able to put everything down in a pictorial form and then make links and create a flow really helps me to get a sense of how a training day or programme might fit together.


Kudos then to the folks at IQ Matrix who have spent some time putting together a series of mind maps on a number of subjects, including a very handy "How to Mind Map: A Beginners Guide".

I particularly like the one I've used to illustrate this post: Stress Management: 39 Essential Tips.
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Persuasion

This is very good.

Taken from the new book "Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to be Persuasive" by Noah Goldstein, Steve Martin & Robert Cialdini, it's an overview of all of the techniques they describe.

50 Scientifically Proven Ways to be Persuasive
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Team Building Exercises Wiki

If you're looking for team building exercises, ice breakers or energizers you could do worse that take a dip in to Teampedia.

Teampedia is a Wikipedia- style collection of exercises submitted by trainers and educators that are free for anyone to use.

Teampedia
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Blog: e-Learning help

E-learning is one of the bigger topics in Training and Development circles at the moment. Some are claiming it is sounding the death knell for traditional classroom training, others are of the opinion that it's a flash in the pan that wont last the course. It can get a bit heated as this TrainingZone article demonstrates.

I"m of the opinion that e-learning is a an exciting new frontier for trainers and instructional designers. I'm only playing on the fringes at the moment (my budget wont stretch to a proper implementation) and I'm about to start some limited application with a Senior Management Development Programme that I'll be rolling out in my organisation shortly. It will increasingly play a more and more important part in blended learning programmes.

I've found the WWW incredibly useful as a starting point for researching and trialling some of the applications that are out there, and two blogs in particular are worth recommending for anyone who is dipping their toes in the e-learning river.

e4innovation is by Grainne Cronel who is Professor of e-learning at the Open University.

Jane's e-learning Tip of the Day comes from Jane Hart, a social media and learning consultant.

Both have been incredibly useful to me as I've tried to get my head around the thousands of e-learning possibilities.

100 Inspiring Videos for Leaders

Thomas Edison once said, "Genius is one-percent inspiration, ninety-nince percent perspiration", so what do you do when you're putting all the hard work in but that final 1% is eluding you? The Online College have put links to 100 inspiring videos for you to turn to when you need that final spark to bring something to fruition.

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The videos are divided in to ten categories covering areas such as, "Changing the World", "Inspirational People" and "Staying Strong". The videos include talks, movies clips, short films, performance pieces, conversation and interviews.

Althogh nominally put together for leaders, there's enough here to inspire anyone.

100 Inspiring Videos for Leaders

Disclaimer: May not result in actual genius.
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Podcast: Coaching

Interested in coaching or engaged as a coach in your organisation? Do you want to keep your skills and knowledge refreshed?

Here is a useful series of Podcasts from Results Coaching Systems that could come in handy. Some of the Podcasts are a bit on the long side so make sure you set some time aside to listen.

Results Coaching Podcasts
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View from the Middle

Articles on leadership are ten a penny on the internet, so it's refreshing to find a regular columnist that looks at management from the perspective of middle managers, and Wayne Turmel's articles come with a healthy does of irreverant humour to boot.

Wayne Turmel's View from the Middle

Wayne also produces a regular podcast that takes a similar perspective which is available via iTunes or The Podcast Network.

The Cranky Middle Manager
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Leadership: Models, Frameworks & Theories

There are a lot of leadership models out there; Situational Leadership, Action Centred Leadership, Path-Goal Theory, Servant Leadership, etc. The following sites provide overviews of some of the common models you’re likely to come across.

Leadership Models (1)

Leadership Models (2)

To add some additional context (and building on Don Clark's work in the second link), here is a helpful article which takes and historical look at the development of the different types of theories of leadership; trait theories, behavioral theories, cognitive theories and transformational theories.

Historical context of Leadership theories

If tou're the type who likes to be able to refer to models and frameworks you may find this site useful. It's a huge list of the different types of frameworks that currently exist broken down in to fice categories; strategy models, change models, leadership models, decision-making models and communication models. A handy starting point if you come across a framework or theory that's unfamiliar to you.

List of models, theories and frameworks

Finally the generous people over at RapidBI have produced a series of free, unbranded PowerPoint slides which demonstrate a wide range of management models and theories.

RapidBI PowerPoint slides

More on informal learning

Here’s a couple of articles from ASTD (American Society for Training & Development) on informal learning

Informal learning in the workplace

Informal mentoring
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Creative CV's

OK, so in my normal HR world I'm used to seeing plenty of CV's. Most of them tend to be of the straight-as-a-die variety; 2 or 3 pages of closely typed Ariel/ Times New Roman, achievement or objectives focused and with a degree of creativity applied to the facts (if the statistics are to be believed, the average CV comes with a 50/50 chance of being fabricated.) Traditional, safe and a little bit dull

But there is a different type of "creative" CV, the type that some graphic designers or artists might produce. Take a look at these.

Creative CV's

Talk about standing out from the crowd. I LOVE these! If one of them landed on my desk I would be blown away. I would want to find a reason to give you an interview. I know its not the proper business focused, objective way, but how many CV's have ever triggered an emotional reaction in you?

And on a similar topic: 100 really creative business cards
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