I believe, because I haven't checked, that my last post was in February. I don't really know what took place between February and June, but in June my professional life kind of got catapulted out of control. I was asked to work on a proposal for a non-credit course for a Certified Financial Planner and I joined the board of the ASTD Smoky Mountain Chapter. I also joined the walk committee for the Knoxville Walk to Defeat ALS. Somehow everything hit at one time.
My proposal was due in September, the walk was in September, the board takes much more of a time commitment than I realized it would, and on top of all of that, I was preparing for a presentation that was last week (the week after ASTD ALC). So - I've been busy. I haven't been motivated to blog on anything, either. I wanted to incorporate something learning related in this post and not just talk about how busy I have been, so below is a little bit on my presentation.
At my presentation last week I discussed eLearning. My partner for the presentation did a great job with the PowerPoint and I got to stand up in front of a group of my peers to talk to them about eLearning development tools and social media. We showed them how they can create a Facebook page and upload a YouTube video on two different development tools: Camtasia and Captivate. I was quite pleased with the response that I received from the audience. There wasn't as much interactivity as I wanted, but that's okay. I'll try to get more interactivity when I do the presentation again in two weeks to a group of credit union trainers in Atlanta.
I'm looking forward to doing more presenting. It was something that I was extremely frightened of. After about 10 minutes I realized that I was calming down and starting to enjoy myself. I like talking to people. I like helping them. And most of all, I like doing something that it turns out I'm decently good at!
Below is a link to the presentation:
eLearning: From Preparation to Delivery to Evaluation
Oct 24, 2011
Jan 23, 2011
Collaboration - How a TED Talk Inspired Me
I have been thinking about collaboration a lot lately. It probably stems from the work that I've been doing at my job as a trainer for a small credit union. I'm the only "trainer" employed by the institution and relatively new to the industry so quite a bit of the work that I do requires collaboration with my peers. As the person responsible for the encouragement of learning for roughly 70 people, working collaboratively is a job requirement that I can't look beyond - and don't necessarily want to.
I downloaded the TED app to my iPad and decided to do a quick search on collaboration. I planned on spending several hours watching these TED videos. I didn't anticipate that the first video I saw would prove to be so inspiring. It doesn't deal with corporate training, and it doesn't mention collaboration. There were several reasons it was inspiring. The speaker's passion for the subject matter was what first made me think that there was something special going on. It wasn't just his passion, though. It was the whole story: how they went from being a publishing company to a retail store to a community-wide tutoring group. The way they used what they had and made it work for everyone by being creative really struck a chord with me.
I know that your time is valuable, but I feel that if you take 25 minutes to watch this video you will understand why this has impacted me.
Pirates, Superheros, Time Travel, Fighting Words and happy kids. People working together to achieve something for people they don't know. Just because they have something to offer. Because they want to help. There is this need, this void that needs to be filled in these kids lives, and these people are helping them, selflessly. I don't think that this should have surprised or impacted me as much as it did, but it did.
Since watching Dave Eggers' video, I've been trying to think about how I can do something like this. How can I achieve this in my environment? How can I pull this inspiration into my training? I should focus on the constraints that I'm facing within my organization. I should use the same kind of creativity that his group used to solve their dilemma. Focus on the end result. Make adjustments to the program as I go along.
They collaborated together and developed this amazing thing that has impacted untold number of people. How many kids that are nine have been published five, yes five, times? To be able to impact people and create successful members of society is amazing. How can this be done with adults? Collaborating with my peers and coming up with creative and innovative ways to involve the people who are going to be impacted most with the training should be the focus. If I'm told "this is what you've got" then I need to work with people to make 'this' go above and beyond. I know it can be done. If I create a culture of fun, creative, and innovative learning at my place of employment while collaborating with my peers, I will view myself as a success.
The most important thing out of this whole 'insight' for me is to realize that while the focus of the collaboration is different for Dave Eggers' and myself, the method for achieving the results is oddly similar. We'll use our individual talents to create an environment that is irresistible to those partaking in what it provides.
I downloaded the TED app to my iPad and decided to do a quick search on collaboration. I planned on spending several hours watching these TED videos. I didn't anticipate that the first video I saw would prove to be so inspiring. It doesn't deal with corporate training, and it doesn't mention collaboration. There were several reasons it was inspiring. The speaker's passion for the subject matter was what first made me think that there was something special going on. It wasn't just his passion, though. It was the whole story: how they went from being a publishing company to a retail store to a community-wide tutoring group. The way they used what they had and made it work for everyone by being creative really struck a chord with me.
I know that your time is valuable, but I feel that if you take 25 minutes to watch this video you will understand why this has impacted me.
Pirates, Superheros, Time Travel, Fighting Words and happy kids. People working together to achieve something for people they don't know. Just because they have something to offer. Because they want to help. There is this need, this void that needs to be filled in these kids lives, and these people are helping them, selflessly. I don't think that this should have surprised or impacted me as much as it did, but it did.
Since watching Dave Eggers' video, I've been trying to think about how I can do something like this. How can I achieve this in my environment? How can I pull this inspiration into my training? I should focus on the constraints that I'm facing within my organization. I should use the same kind of creativity that his group used to solve their dilemma. Focus on the end result. Make adjustments to the program as I go along.
They collaborated together and developed this amazing thing that has impacted untold number of people. How many kids that are nine have been published five, yes five, times? To be able to impact people and create successful members of society is amazing. How can this be done with adults? Collaborating with my peers and coming up with creative and innovative ways to involve the people who are going to be impacted most with the training should be the focus. If I'm told "this is what you've got" then I need to work with people to make 'this' go above and beyond. I know it can be done. If I create a culture of fun, creative, and innovative learning at my place of employment while collaborating with my peers, I will view myself as a success.
The most important thing out of this whole 'insight' for me is to realize that while the focus of the collaboration is different for Dave Eggers' and myself, the method for achieving the results is oddly similar. We'll use our individual talents to create an environment that is irresistible to those partaking in what it provides.
Dec 10, 2010
A Confident Trainer?
#lrnchat is a weekly conversation among L&D folks in the Twitterverse that happens twice every Thursday at 11:30 EDT and 8:30 EDT. Yesterday's topic was working in a one-person training department. I was excited to see the kind of response these questions got because I wrote the first four questions. I mention that I wrote these questions not to garner recognition, but because I did not think that they would generate the level of conversation that we had yesterday. You can see the transcript here: http://lrnchat.com/
I know I'm intelligent but when comparing myself to my Twitter peers, I just feel like I can't compete on any level. I think that part of it is because I've only been doing this (educating/training) for 4 years. I think that another reason is my lack of confidence in myself. That's where I see the problem because I'm good at my job.
Maybe the solution is to stop comparing myself to my peers in the great land of Twitter - but it's hard to stop making those comparisons because they are doing things that I aspire to do and they have knowledge that I wish I had. The decision to stop comparing myself to my peers is a difficult one to make because I push myself to be better when I think about the things they do that I want to do and achieve in my life. And then I think about this: I've only been on Twitter since March 17 this year. I can't imagine all the things that I wouldn't know if I wasn't on Twitter so if I stop making the comparison then I don't grow as much. That doesn't seem like a good solution.
I can say without a doubt that my knowledge has increased since March 17 this year. I don't remember how I stumbled upon #lrnchat or came to follow people like @c4lpt, @janebozarth, or @hjarche and others, but I do know that I find their thoughts, books, and blog posts to be some of the most influential additions to my personal learning. I don't even know if I would be attempting a blog if it weren't for the influence of my PLN on Twitter.
Maybe I shouldn't be saying "Am I Capable" but "I Am Capable". Maybe I can compare with the 'big dogs' of the L&D world. I've got a lot of room for improvement, but changing the attitude from 'am I' to 'I am' seems like a better solution than not striving to achieve new and great things. I guess that's all it is - an attitude adjustment. The title of this post shouldn't be A Confident Trainer? it should be A Confident Trainer. Expanding my PLN has benefited and challenged me more than I realized. Those feelings of inadequacy must just be there to push me further so that I no longer feel inadequate. It's good to never be too sure of one's self anyway, right?
I know I'm intelligent but when comparing myself to my Twitter peers, I just feel like I can't compete on any level. I think that part of it is because I've only been doing this (educating/training) for 4 years. I think that another reason is my lack of confidence in myself. That's where I see the problem because I'm good at my job.
Maybe the solution is to stop comparing myself to my peers in the great land of Twitter - but it's hard to stop making those comparisons because they are doing things that I aspire to do and they have knowledge that I wish I had. The decision to stop comparing myself to my peers is a difficult one to make because I push myself to be better when I think about the things they do that I want to do and achieve in my life. And then I think about this: I've only been on Twitter since March 17 this year. I can't imagine all the things that I wouldn't know if I wasn't on Twitter so if I stop making the comparison then I don't grow as much. That doesn't seem like a good solution.
I can say without a doubt that my knowledge has increased since March 17 this year. I don't remember how I stumbled upon #lrnchat or came to follow people like @c4lpt, @janebozarth, or @hjarche and others, but I do know that I find their thoughts, books, and blog posts to be some of the most influential additions to my personal learning. I don't even know if I would be attempting a blog if it weren't for the influence of my PLN on Twitter.
Maybe I shouldn't be saying "Am I Capable" but "I Am Capable". Maybe I can compare with the 'big dogs' of the L&D world. I've got a lot of room for improvement, but changing the attitude from 'am I' to 'I am' seems like a better solution than not striving to achieve new and great things. I guess that's all it is - an attitude adjustment. The title of this post shouldn't be A Confident Trainer? it should be A Confident Trainer. Expanding my PLN has benefited and challenged me more than I realized. Those feelings of inadequacy must just be there to push me further so that I no longer feel inadequate. It's good to never be too sure of one's self anyway, right?
Sep 17, 2010
Writing to Get Published
I've changed my attitude about a lot of things lately. It's not if I lose weight, it's when. It's not if I get published, it's when. Noticing a trend? I don't know what happened or when it happened, but I now know that I am capable of doing whatever I put my mind to. How empowering is that knowledge? I mean, it's like a light bulb clicked on in my head.
I have this desire to be published one day. I don't know what kind of publication I want to be published in I just know that I want to see my name in black and white. This article, story, or whatever I write won't be a dissertation either. It needs to be in addition to my dissertation. I want to have fun writing the things that might get published.
I've got a book or article idea that I want to focus on. It's rough and definitely needs refining, but there is a seed of possibility that it could be great. I mean, even if no book publishers wanted to pick it up, I could always publish it myself. The internet is absolutely fabulous because what I write could be total crap but I could still put in book form! I really wouldn't do that because I would always know that I didn't achieve my ultimate goal.
More to come on goals later! Have a wonderful day readers who may or may not exist!
I have this desire to be published one day. I don't know what kind of publication I want to be published in I just know that I want to see my name in black and white. This article, story, or whatever I write won't be a dissertation either. It needs to be in addition to my dissertation. I want to have fun writing the things that might get published.
I've got a book or article idea that I want to focus on. It's rough and definitely needs refining, but there is a seed of possibility that it could be great. I mean, even if no book publishers wanted to pick it up, I could always publish it myself. The internet is absolutely fabulous because what I write could be total crap but I could still put in book form! I really wouldn't do that because I would always know that I didn't achieve my ultimate goal.
More to come on goals later! Have a wonderful day readers who may or may not exist!
Sep 14, 2010
The Beginning of Changing
I don't know exactly what the purpose of this blog is going to be. I think I need an outlet for venting frustrations but I also need a place for writing practice. You see, with all the great things about Facebook and Twitter, I just don't seem to have a space online where I can just write whatever. There are too many family members on Facebook for me to complain about a fight I might have had with my husband. Twitter isn't necessarily the most appropriate venue for complaining either. I mean, how effectively can a person complain in 140 characters anyway?
The nice thing about a blog is that the likelihood of someone actually coming across this blog and reading my thoughts are slim to none. I highly doubt that I am going to become the next The Girl Who or Mamapundit. I know that I definitely won't have any type of following that would get me a book deal like they featured in the movie Julie & Julia. Anyway, what I'm here for is to become better. A better trainer, a better woman, a better wife, better all around. Maybe the loneliness of the Internet is just what I need to express myself freely and openly. I just need to try and remember that it is still possible that someone might actually read this. And if someone does read this blog, please accept my apologies in advance. You might not get anything from it. You might get bored of reading about my trips to the gym, what I may or may not have cooked for dinner, whether I actually read that professional development book that I've been meaning to read for 3 months, and whether or not I'm succeeding at my job.
But maybe, just maybe I'll find out a thing or two about myself through this whole blog-o-sphere. I've learned a lot about myself from Twitter, so maybe I can learn about myself through my random postings. Either way - here I am world. Help me understand you so I might be able to better understand me.
The nice thing about a blog is that the likelihood of someone actually coming across this blog and reading my thoughts are slim to none. I highly doubt that I am going to become the next The Girl Who or Mamapundit. I know that I definitely won't have any type of following that would get me a book deal like they featured in the movie Julie & Julia. Anyway, what I'm here for is to become better. A better trainer, a better woman, a better wife, better all around. Maybe the loneliness of the Internet is just what I need to express myself freely and openly. I just need to try and remember that it is still possible that someone might actually read this. And if someone does read this blog, please accept my apologies in advance. You might not get anything from it. You might get bored of reading about my trips to the gym, what I may or may not have cooked for dinner, whether I actually read that professional development book that I've been meaning to read for 3 months, and whether or not I'm succeeding at my job.
But maybe, just maybe I'll find out a thing or two about myself through this whole blog-o-sphere. I've learned a lot about myself from Twitter, so maybe I can learn about myself through my random postings. Either way - here I am world. Help me understand you so I might be able to better understand me.
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