What is Professional Development? I began this article by looking again at the differences between professional development vs training, or trainers and teachers. In A Look at the Education vs Experience Debate and in an earlier post, What’s the Difference Between Training and Teaching, I made a few comparisons. This time, I thought it might …
Human Resources/
Training & Development
We know training is important to both organizations and employees, yet it is often seen by workers and supervisors as extra work of no real value. It interrupts the workflow. It is the immediately tangible evaluations that become most important. The effectiveness of training should matter. That’s what we tell ourselves and, yet, we hand …
It seems the Transportation Security Administration or TSA does not train its agents in any of the soft training skills. Is “nice” a dirty word? It is a four letter word, but come on! I’m not being insensitive. I know the TSA has had a rough time of it, especially recently when they lost one …
Do we treat shy or introverted people any different from other trainees? We should. This relates back to my differentiated learning post. This will be a short blog–especially short for me. Everyone has encountered that person at work who doesn’t look at you, stays buried in paperwork or the computer, sneaks off to lunch and …
Montessori and other private schools have used these learning techniques for years, but it is beginning to sound like public schools may be getting the same treatment if higher education has its way. However, it is a big change for the public schools. Probably even bigger than the change to using technology, i.e., where all …
The current government shut-down is affecting everyone, especially trainers who depend on government contracts to stay alive. As a Federal worker, I went through several government shut-downs, and when it got down to dangerous territory one side caved–a compromise. Here, though President Obama has said, he will not compromise or even negotiate with the Republicans …
(By the way, I know some trainers use toys in icebreakers and throughout their training, but I’m not going to address that here. Maybe later.) Some trainers and some employers expect these toys: stacks of pre-packaged company-tested programs. Other trainers and employers expect a personalized, yet professional assessment and work experience, which may or may …