JULY
2013 |
Volume
12, Number 3 |
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CONTACT
HSA |
To contact us, click HERE.
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PUBLICATIONS |
For more information on our best-selling, award-winning books,
click HERE.
Need help with HPT terminology? Click HERE
for The HSA Lexicon.
Click HERE
to read our published articles.
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ASK
HAROLD |
Click HERE
to read the latest Ask Harold question and Harold's response
or ask a question of your own!
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UPCOMING
EVENTS |
September 16-17, 2013
ASTD Telling Ain't Training Event,Chicago, IL
October 8-10, 2013
ASTD Telling Ain't Training Event and Training Ain't Performance,
Arlington, VA
December 4-5, 2013
ASTD Telling Ain't Training Event, Atlanta, GA
For details about these events, click HERE
To learn more about engaging Harold Stolovitch to speak at
your organization, click HERE
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CPT
DESIGNATION |
Harold Stolovitch and Erica Keeps are Certified Performance
Technologists (CPT). The CPT designation is awarded by the
International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI) to
experienced practitioners in the field of organizational performance
improvement, whose work meets both the performance-based Standards
of Performance Technology and application requirements. For
more information, visit www.ispi.org.
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Have
You Noticed This, Too?
We
have been students, teachers and researchers of workplace learning
and performance for half a century. Still very much active, we find
ourselves in numerous work settings over the course of a year. What
strikes us all too dramatically is that while the physical features
of work environments change (manufacturing, mining, utilities, food
services, transportation, government, medical, to name only a few)
as do countries, cultures, technologies, and resources, not much
changes fundamentally in the way people are onboarded into their
jobs, trained, managed, supported to succeed and evaluated in how
they achieve desired results. Fads come and go. Enthusiasms about
performance results, quality of life, open communication, human
capital analytics and talent management wax and wane. Investments
in learning and performance enhancing technologies also increase
and decline in cycles. The outer appearances and terminologies become
more sophisticated. However, we still see organizations drawing
on subject-matter experts to train up the new or uninitiated folks,
using methods and content that leave the learners in semi-comatose
states. We encounter koosh balls flying through the air for no reason
other than to build apparent enjoyment, but not necessarily valued
performance capability. Beneath the veneer of modernity lie primitive
practices for building necessary learning and meaningful outcomes.
While this may sound negative, we ask ourselves, given all the
talk, technology hype/research and attempts at modernization, what
has fundamentally changed in how we draw out the best from all of
our workers? This includes everyone from new-hires to experienced,
high-level managers. Do we apply the basics of human learning and
performance that we have known for years? We have learned over time
what works:
- Clearly defining what performance (behaviors and achievements)
is expected in ways that are meaningful to each person at every
level.
- Communicating unambiguously what these expectations are and
expressing them in ways everyone values - job performers, supervisors,
managers, customers, co-workers, regulatory agencies, shareholders
and all direct and indirect stakeholders.
- Providing clear, timely, useful feedback on performance that
is concrete, helpful and motivating.
- Drawing out the valued talent that every employee possesses,
not just searching for stars.
- Being truthful with the workforce and operating ethically in
our human and business interactions.
- Analyzing what it takes to get from "here" (current
state) to "there" (desired state) based on data, not
ideologies and beautifully sounding beliefs.
- Applying sensible, systemic actions that reinforce one another,
not single-shot, "flavor of the month" enthusiasms.
We could go on, but there really is no need. We have a well-documented
repertoire of how to build effective learning and performance systems,
of getting the best from everyone by applying what research and
best practice has taught us over the years.
We have spent a half-century toiling in the workplace vineyards.
We happily encounter individual signs of promise. Yet there is so
much more that can be done by approaching senior leaders with sound
recommendations for improving workplace learning and performance.
It is up to us who call ourselves training professionals, learning
and development specialists or human performance improvement professionals.
May we always use sound judgment in providing counsel and solutions
that result in achievements everyone values.
All the best,
Erica and Harold
Tips,
Tools, Techniques and Other Tantalizing Tidbits
In the previous issue of HSA e-Xpress, we included
the first installment of a three-part series of brief articles
for instructional designers. It focused on separating myth
from research-based evidence on five commonly held beliefs
about learning and performance. If you haven't read it, click
HERE
and access it before continuing (although each part is a stand-alone).
The objective of this second article is for you to be able
to apply six tools we have found extremely useful in our professional
work that can enhance your ID practice and decision-making.
We begin with a useful project starter preparation checklist,
which we simply call Ready...Set...Go?
Click HERE
to continue reading this article.
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Brought
Back by Popular Demand!
Due to it's popularity, ASTD has added a one-day Training
Ain't Performance (TAP) event to it's October 2013
offerings in Arlington, VA. Based on the award-winning book
of the same name, this event takes its content and turns it
into a highly interactive learning experience that provides
the key concepts, principles and tools that can help transform
you into an effective Performance Consultant.
More and more 21st century organizations are transforming
their training/learning and development entities into workplace
learning and performance (WLP) support groups. This very involving
one-day event introduces you to the basic concepts of performance
consulting - a systematic process that allows training professionals,
OD or HRD specialists and even managers to analyze requests
for training or any other type of intervention and determine
whether or not it is necessary/sufficient. This even includes
materials and exercises that deal with human capital and performance
engineering. The full-day session guides you through a thinking
and decision-making process that sets the foundation for becoming
a true workplace learning and performance professional. You
leave with a set of skills and tools that are highly valued
in today's competitive environment.
If you have not yet participated in a Telling
Ain't Training (TAT) event, you can register for
TAT for October 8 & 9 just prior to the October 10 TAP.
While TAT is not a required pre-requisite to TAP, it
is highly recommended that you sign up for both.
Information on this
event is on ASTD's website (www.astd.org)
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