Let them drive! Learner-centered training gives learners the keys to drive

Personalization is the modern standard. Previous experiences and preferences shape our world, embedding personalization everywhere, including online shopping, smart phone apps, social media sites, and more. Improved technology has provided the means for us to receive what we want, when we want it, avoiding what doesn’t interest us. With this level of personalization widely available, why do we still encounter employee training and development that seems to use a one-size-fits-all approach?

Read the rest of the post on the GP Strategies blog.

Asking Good Questions

A child questions everything, yet as adults, we often accept what is front of us, even if it doesn’t work so well, never asking for more information, clarification or simply, why? Our acceptance of what is rather than what could be can mean the loss of potential for an organization. By encouraging and asking questions,--good questions -- the kind of questions to challenge processes and simply ask why are we doing what we do in the workplace, organizations can move past the status quo and get more creative.

Why? So, why don’t we ask questions? Those of us who have been in the school system too long (high school, college, grad school) often regret asking too many questions; we get singled out, and not in a good way, for asking rather than accepting what we are told.

Maybe we have a question yet don’t ask when given the opportunity because we believe our question isn’t good enough to ask. In the workplace environment, we hesitate to question someone with authority or power over us, whether it’s our boss, a subject-matter expert, or even a colleague.

Many of us are intimidated by silence, the time when someone says “does anyone have any questions”; we may not want to reveal our ignorance. Instead of putting ourselves into a potentially embarrassing situation, we keep silent. Our question goes unasked and unanswered.

Good questioning skills are a talent we should help our employees to embrace.

Communicate and encourage. First and foremost, let employees know there are no stupid questions. Smart, successful people don’t accept what is front of them at face value and they certainly aren’t satisfied until they find an explanation they understand—to do this they ask questions.

Engage. Help people ask better questions. Give them effective examples such as:

·         "Can you explain the details of this situation?"

·         “Why did you choose this particular approach?”

·         “What are the possible consequences of going this route?"

·         “Why do you think this project turned out as it did?”

·         "Can this be accomplished in any other way?"

·         “Why did this work?”

·         "Why didn’t this work?"

·         "Based on your experience, what do you suggest we do here?"

Self-help guru Tony Robbins puts it like this, “Successful people ask better questions, and as a result, they get better answers. “ By encouraging and showing employees how to ask good questions, you can develop their abilities—abilities for solving problems, being resourceful, and becoming more creative in the workplace.

Karen Sieczka is an Instructional Designer with a performance consulting company, Creativity@Work expert, and founder of Growing Great Ideas.com, a training resources website. Karen has designed, facilitated, and managed a variety of training programs including technology, soft skills, customer service, leadership, and business communications. She also trains organizations of all sizes to be more creative and innovative in the workplace using micro-steps from her Kindle eBook Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work.

Low or No Cost Training Resources

The Competitive Edge of Continuing Ed...

If knowledge is power, then training and continuing education are the power source that keeps your business moving ahead. From industry changes to regulation to technology and more, additional training and education is available in virtually every aspect of business, from a wide variety of different sources, says workplace training consultant Karen S. Sieczka, founder of Growing Great Ideas in Douglasville, Georgia.

Read more on the INC. Small Business Solutions blog here.

Spring: A Time for Renewal

Spring is a time when nature refreshes and renews. It is also a great point in the calendar to look at your training resources to if there is an opportunity to refresh or renew your materials or methods.  Most trainers and training departments have a range of resources already created and in place but like the garden that needs some TLC after a long winter, these resources can be revitalized with a little bit of effort and enthusiasm.

Read the rest of this post on the Greenlight Communications blog.

Key Trends in Training for 2012

From HR Matters: Special Feature -As I see it

13 practitioners share what they believe to be key trends in training and development for 2012

Karen Sieczka shares, "Since most training departments will still be running “lean” in 2012, one of the trends I see is that training programs will need to be even more targeted and relevant to the job skills your organization’s workforce needs. "

Read more here.

Harvesting Creativity through Social Media

Social media can be a creative and collaborative portal for organizations that makes it easier to gather ideas and generate innovations. Proper implementation is necessary to fully develop these tools so the business can reap the rewards. This article illustrates how to successfully integrate social media into the workforce for a creative idea harvest.

Read the rest of the article in Training Industry Quarterly...

Want to get more creative and innovative in the workplace? Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work, THE creativity training book, is now available for Kindle. 

Creativity@Work Exercise Soup Bowl

Soup Bowl

Making out-of-the-box associations and connections gives staff practice that can be applied to internal projects, products, or services.The exercise encourages thinking outside the box when facing problems needing solutions that are out of the ordinary.

Objective: To come up with creative ways to use common, everyday items.

Instructions: As a team, spend five minutes finding an interesting use for five items randomly pulled from a large soup bowl such as small toys, sticky notes, paper clips, etc. Anything that fits in the bowl is fair game. Teams will then be invited to share and illustrate alternate uses for the item with the group. The group can then vote for the funniest or most interesting uses by a team and a prize could be given.

It’s almost here! The complete, expanded second edition e-book comes out on March 1st! Download a free, 25 page preview of THE training guide to Creativity@Work, Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work, at the E-book website.

Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter or become a fan of my Facebook Creativity@Work page. I can also train you and your organization to be more creative and innovative at work. Email me for more information.

Creativity@Work Exercise: Three Wishes

When we face a difficult project or situation, we often wonder what would happen if we could just make a wish? Wouldn't everything work out just fine? Try this exercise under the assumption we could make a wish (or three) to make this project work or to go with a totally different possibility. To work within shorter time frame, you may want to limit the exercise to one wish.

Objective: To find a unique perspective to problem solving given unlimited possibilities and no restrictions.

Instructions: Each team has discovered a magic genie lamp. When you rub it , the genie pops out and grants your team three wishes on things you would like to see happen or change at work. The team must decide what the three things are. It can be to a person, the boss, the job, the people you work with or project specific. Remember each wish can have consequences if not thought out.

Spend 15-30 discussing the possibilities and the ramifications of each and choose the three best alternatives. Each team will then explain to the group why they chose their particular wishes and why some were not chosen.

Need more ideas to unleash Creativity@Work? Download a free, 25 page preview of THE training guide to Creativity@Work, Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work, at the E-book website.

Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter or become a fan of my Facebook Creativity@Work page. I can also train you and your organization to be more creative and innovative at work. Email me for more information.

Creativity@Work Exercise: Conversations with Fame

Many of us are fascinated with famous people. Sometimes we wonder what it would be like to live their lives and interact the way they do (or did). Why not use this interest to spark some new lines of thinking when facing a work challenge or anticipating a new opportunity?

Objective: To find a new perspective to view issues, opportunities, and challenges at work.

Instructions: in teams of 4-5, have each group pick a famous person, living, dead or well-known fictitious character. A person can also be supplied to each team. You can even bring in a magazine like People or US to randomly choose a person. For example, you can start out asking how would Tiger Woods, Abe Lincoln, Paris Hilton, Hugh Jackman, Joe Jonas, etc….handle this challenge (insert your opportunity or challenge here)?

Discuss within the teams how this person would:
 Solve a work-related problem?
 Market a new product or service?
 Discipline an employee?
 Make new contacts or network?
 Make a presentation or run a meeting?
 Handle a crisis?
 What would make this person handle the situation in this way? Explain?

Each team should spend 10-15 minutes discussing this and then prepare to share a short summary to share with the group.

Coming Wednesday: Creative Tool Bubbl.us mind mapping tool

Want more ideas to unleash Creativity@Work? For more information on how to get your copy of THE training guide to Creativity@Work, Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work, visit the E-book website. Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter or become a fan of my Facebook Creativity@Work page. I can also train you and your organization to be more creative and innovative at work. Email me for more information.

Creativity@Work Exercise- Map Making

We are all familiar with maps. They serve as guides, help us navigate unfamiliar surroundings, and even lead us to find alternate routes. As a creative tool, mapmaking is often used as a way to find, chart, and tell both fictional stories and true life experiences. It can encourage exploratory thinking. So why not apply a simplified version of mapmaking when approaching unfamiliar topics and problems at work? Why not use it to chart the story of the organization or of a product or service? Map making can also help plan milestones, anticipate problems, and identify opportunities for an upcoming or in-process project.

Gather:
Color markers
Post-it flags
Large pieces of blank paper

Put participants in teams of 4-5, giving 1-2 hours to complete the exercise. Each team will create a map to represent a project or goal at work. Draw a small icon to represent the beginning or current point and an icon for the end point. Then start the “trip” and add lines as your team works toward the destination goal. Don’t forget to include detours, hazards, possible short cuts, alternate routes, rest stops/refueling, points of interest, and other stops along the way to the final destination. Teams will then explain how to get there from here, showing the map to illustrate.

Coming Wednesday: Creative links

Want more ideas to unleash Creativity@Work? For more information on how to get your copy of THE training guide to Creativity@Work, Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work, visit the E-book website. Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter or become a fan of my Facebook Creativity@Work page. I can also train you and your organization to be more creative and innovative at work. Email me for more information.

Creativity@Work: Identifying Creative Barriers

I recently wrote an article about organizational culture vs. creativity and innovation. One of the key points is many organizations and their members have barriers to ideas. Some of them are obvious and some, not so much—they remain unspoken, hidden within organizational culture. One source of these barriers comes from the attitude of leadership of the organization. Do they support creativity and ideas or shun anything that shakes up the status quo? Are creative efforts communicated? Are idea mavericks ostracized or celebrated? Are failures and mistakes viewed as learning experiences or horror stories?

Some of these organizational roadblocks include:
• Management “non” acceptance of ideas
• Maintenance of status quo
• One focus-long term v. short term or vice versa
• Limited view of value of creativity and innovation
• Preconceived notions about creativity and innovation
• Distrust of the new or unfamiliar
• Lack of experience in innovation
• Inflexible/rigid organization
• Traditions
• Lack of channels or processes for input

Other creative barriers come in the form of personal issues and aversions to anything new or different.

Some of these individual barriers include:
• Close mindedness
• Fear of ridicule or criticism
• Fear of failure
• Past experiences coloring current situations
• View self as a non-creative person
• No experience with creativity

Take some time to consider these barriers. Are there any you could add to this list that are affecting your organization? What are your own attitudes toward innovation and creativity?

Now consider, what can you do to help remove some of these roadblocks?

Want more ideas to unleash Creativity@Work? For more information on how to get your copy of THE training guide to Creativity@Work, Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work, visit the E-book website. Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter or become a fan of my Facebook Creativity@Work page.

I can also train you and your organization to be more creative and innovative at work. Email me for more information.

Creativity@Work: Exercise Unleashing Creativity with a brick

How do you unleash Creativity@Work with a brick? The next time you have a planning session or a meeting and want to mix things up and get the ideas flowing, try something simple to get started. Pose this question: How many unusual uses can you come up with for a brick? We all know you can build things with bricks but what else can you do with a brick? You would be surprised at the ways this common item can be used!

Give everyone two minutes to think of as many uses as they can. You can have them shout out the answers and write them on a whiteboard or you can let them write them down and then share when time is up. The whole point is to move thinking from the ordinary to extraordinary. There are no wrong answers!

Any time you get stuck for ideas on how to improve or change a product or service? Contemplate new uses for existing products and services using the same line of thinking! ASK: What are other unusual ways can we use (insert your product or service name here)?

Coming Wednesday, Creativity@ Work: Idea Barriers

Want more ideas to unleash Creativity@ Work? For more information on how to get your copy of THE training guide to Creativity@ Work, Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work, visit the E-book website. Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter or become a fan of my Creativity@ Work Facebook page.

Creativity@Work tool: Screenr

There are an incredible number of free, web-based and downloadable tools to spark the Creativity@Work flow. As part of the Wednesday rotation, I will be sharing tools I have discovered in my work as a trainer and Creativity@Work expert. Feel free to post and share your own discoveries too. After all, the Internet is the ultimate sharing place, isn’t it? If you have used the tool for training or any other creative purposes, by all means, tell us about it. Your story could end up my next book!

Today’s tool is called Screenr. This creative tool is geared toward Twitter users since it takes a Twitter login to use it. However, it’s a free resource provided by Articulate. Articulate is elearning software that easily integrates PowerPoint into e-learning courses. No software download is required to use Screenr and start recording whatever you do on your computer screen and create a screencast with this web-based tool.

By clicking the record button, your screen activity is recorded along with the narrative recorded through your computer microphone. Screenr then publishes the screencast to a high-definition Flash format. Then you can share the screencast on Twitter, YouTube, or anywhere else on the web. IPhone users can view your screencasts too.

To use Screenr, system requirements are Mac--OSX 10.4 and up, or Windows-- XP, Vista or Windows 7. Most common web browsers are supported, including Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, and Google Chrome. Also required are Java 1.5 runtime or later for recording and Flash Player for playing screencasts.

What can you do with Screenr? Since I teach many Excel courses, I decided to try Screenr out to record a short session on how to link information from one worksheet to another.

How did it work? It was pretty easy. I allowed Screenr to access my Twitter account so I could log in. Then I clicked the record button. The recording doesn’t start right away but gives you a screen to adjust the area of your computer showing. Next to the record button is your sound button. Click on it to make sure your microphone is set up correctly. My first couple of recording tries didn’t have any sound. Screenr gives you up to five minutes of recording time so get to the point. View my screencast here.

This would be great for on the fly training sessions. Give it a try and let me know if you like it and what you use it for.

For more information on Screenr, visit the website. There is also a Screenr blog to share ideas and uses from other Screenr users. Follow Screenr on Twitter too.

Coming Friday, Idea Masters: thinkers and innovators from yesterday and today. Warning: their insights could set off a creative spark in you!

Future Creativity@Work Wednesday treats: News, quotes, tools, websites, discussion of creative barriers, creative authors, and learning from failures— a whole host of Creativity@Work resources!

Want more ideas to unleash Creativity@Work? For more information on how to get your copy of THE training guide to Creativity@Work, Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work, visit the E-book website. Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter or become a fan of my Facebook Creativity@Work page.

Creativity@Work Exercise: Write it down

We are surrounded with tools to assist us to be more creative: smart phones, IPads, netbooks, e-readers… yet the start of many an idea still comes from using low tech tools, a pen and paper. Something about the blank paper suggests an endless array of possibilities, compelling us to fill the page with something. Why not use this inclination? We’ve all experienced a time when we had a great idea, overheard something awesome or hilarious, or we came up with a great line. Maybe we had an epiphany of sorts. Then what happened? We swore we would remember but didn’t write down this fleeting bit of wisdom or humor. Later, only vague details remained or nothing at all.

Great ideas seem to come to us in the strangest and most unexpected places, don’t they?

Leonardo Da Vinci had hundreds of notebooks with his observations and sketches on everything from nature to science to jokes he had heard while socializing. Thomas Edison kept notebooks too. Why not carry an idea notebook to jot down something before it’s lost? Just a few keywords or a sketch can preserve the next great idea to revisit later. It is amazing how many details you will remember and incorporate into your thinking processes.

Use a notebook for work too. Have you been tasked with solving a problem? Are you managing a team? Hand out notebooks to everyone and ask them to do two things: first write down a phrase describing the project, challenge, or issue. For example, your department is attempting to come up with ideas to improve customer service. Title a page in the notebook “ideas to improve customer service”. This acts as a placeholder on the page and starts the subconscious mind noticing how things are related and can be applied across different situations. If it helps the process, pretend these observations are for reporting back to aliens with no understanding of this world.

Ask the team to make notes, doodles, scribbles for the next week as they carry the notebook with them, including work and non work-related moments. Encourage them to observe without judging or being critical of the observations—just write freely. At the end of the week, come together and share notes!

Coming on Wednesday, January 5, Creativity@Work tools.

Want more ideas to unleash Creativity@Work? For more information on how to get your copy of THE training guide to Creativity@Work, Growing Great Ideas: Unleashing More Creativity@Work, visit the E-book website.

The E-Book begins

Starting Monday, January 3rd: and every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, I will be blogging and Tweeting about my new Creativity@Work E-book.

Follow along on my Twitter @growinggr8ideas to join in the conversation.

What's in it for you?

• Links to articles on creativity and innovation in the workplace
• Excerpts from the new E-book
• Creative authors to add to your reading list
• Creativity@Work exercises
• The Idea Masters series
• and...
• #creativitychat forum on Twitter

I look forward to sharing! Happy New Year!

Rapport is a many splendored thing

At a meeting yesterday, I was again struck by just how crucial it is to build a rapport with your training participants. Without that personal connection, a training session will often fall flat, no matter how high the level of expertise is on the part of the trainer, no matter how compelling the material.

Although most of my trainings are short, from a couple of hours to a day or two, one of my main objectives is to quickly build a personal connection with the people I train. How do I accomplish this so fast? One thing I do is to introduce myself on a first name basis as folks trickle in to the session. I also make myself a seating chart so I can connect a name and face easily (thank you, Dale Carnegie training). Third, I smile frequently and share some of my own foibles when working with the same subject matter we are currently learning.

I am asked at least once during a training how I am so good at remembering names and my answer is “its magic”. Then, since I am a trainer and teacher, I share my secrets.

Power from the People

As a trainer, I am often charged with taking a germ of an idea, nurturing it, and growing it into a full-fledged course. Most of the time, I work alone, at the keyboard of my computer, putting information together. Occasionally, I have the pleasure of working closely with those on the front-lines. One of my current projects, what my colleagues at the local community college and I call an “Ambassador” program, is heavily dependent on input from the outside. Geared toward those who work directly with tourists (we affectionately call them visitors), the program provides a background of the area, things to do, places to go, mixed with a heavy dose of customer service.

Yesterday was the second of two sessions meant as a sort of focus group to determine what, if anything is missing, inaccurate, or needs to be added? I had a small but powerful group of ladies who work at the official visitor center and are often visitors’ first point of contact when coming into the area. All generously offered their opinions and stories about encounters they have had. I want to use this post to thank them because their willingness to speak frankly is what will make this training the best it can be.

Why be creative at work?

Think creativity is only for artistic types? Think again; your livelihood and organization may depend on it.

Why bother with creativity at work? Why should you encourage it from your staff? For one thing, promoting creativity at work has many benefits and an organization’s continued survival may depend on it. Most importantly, ideas= $$$$$!

Read the rest of the article at Get Entrepreneurial.com

Where have all the leaders gone?

It's time to consider your organization's succession plan. Don't have one? You might want to rethink your position.

Your most knowledgeable employees may be retiring soon. How do you replace those years of know-how? By grooming and developing other employees…

Read the rest of my latest article on Get Entrpreneurial.com

Build an Idea Library

Want to encourage your staff to think outside the box? Provide the tools they need to get creative.

An Idea Library is a place where you and your staff can go to look for the seeds of a new idea. Much like a regular library, your idea library houses books, journals, and magazines, and offers comfy seating and a place for quiet reflection. What’s different ? It is on-site and available for use any time writer’s block strikes, a project gets stuck in development, or new concepts just don’t seem to be coming.

Sound interesting? Visit GetEntrepreneurial.com to read the full article.

For more information on creativity at work visit GrowingGreatIdeas.com