Take Your Goals from SMART to SMART as Hell!

• Are you frustrated by misalignment during performance reviews or evaluations?
• Do you wast time and energy trying to understand what's expected of you?
• Do you struggle to create alignment between you and your employees, clients, managers, customers, vendors, teachers, or family?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, you need to attend our SMART as Hell: Goals session in Rochester, NY on August 2nd, 2012.

In this one-day training, conducted by Glenn Hughes, you'll learn the four types of evaluation, along with the advantages and disadvantages of each. You'll use the SMARTometer - the first tool that allows you to accurately measure the quality of your goals. You'll create a SMART as Hell goal for a task or 'soft skill' that's difficult to measure. Finally, you'll apply the SMART 6-step process to align evaluation expectations with those who measure you.

This program has been approved for 6.5 recertification credit hours through the HR Certification Institute. We guarantee that you will improve the score of your goal during this session, or you'll receive free coaching until your goal is improved.

Get control of your work, your life, or your team with goals that are SMART as Hell.

This event will be held at the beautiful Inn on Broadway in Rochester. 

Click here to enroll or obtain more information.

Four Lessons for Teachers from Bruce Lee

Last week, at one of my favorite used book stores, I picked up a book of quotes by Bruce Lee, called "Striking Thoughts".

I knew Bruce was a bit of a philosopher and definitely a sharp guy, otherwise I wouldn't have looked at the book. But, I didn't expect to find so many great thoughts about teaching and training:

• "Remember, I am no teacher; I can merely be a signpost for a traveler who is lost"
• "The ideal teacher - not 'what' to think, but 'how' to think"
• "Defeat simply tells me that something is wrong in my doing it is a path to success and truth"
• "Where method is, freedom is not"

I have often said that facilitation is more like zen than any other activity I can think of - Bruce's words confirmed that for me.

Can there be four better lessons for teachers and students than:

1. Take my words and do with them what you will. Your milage may vary...
2. Observe and explore my process, not my content.
3. Failure is not only to be expected, but welcomed and even celebrated.
4. If you didn't hear me the first time, reread 1, 2, & 3!!

Le Grand Tour D'Asia: Day 20 of 58

Geetha, Jaishree, and Uthra

January 27th, 2010

Learning Moment: Chennai, India

Today was a relatively quiet day.

It was cloudy during my commute into work; the first cloudy day we've seen. I continued reading "You Must Be Joking, Mr. Feynman" during the ride. Just as we reached the office, rain began to fall. Everyone seemed surprised, as the rainy season isn't due to start for another month. It was a short rainfall. The rest of the day was pleasant.

Our second day of the "Managing at KT" workshop was engaging. The group asks many interesting questions. We spent a fair amount of time on SMART goals. Most people don't realize the power of well-written goals, but these folks understood. It's rewarding to see them create strong goals.

Members of our stellar Human Resources team - Geetha, Jaishree, and Uthra - stopped in to make sure all was going well, so I took the opportunity to pose them for a picture.

Le Grand Tour D'Asia: Day 14 of 58

Winners of the Paper Tower Contest

Thursday, January 21st

Learning Moment: India

I love leading workshops in India.

The attendees are energetic, reflective, and curious.

They fully invest in whatever the topic is. That is such a pleasure.

I learn as much from them as I 'teach' in any session.

Yesterday, we conducted a "Five Dysfunctions of a Team" workshop. As part of the workshop, we did the 'Personal Histories' exercise, where team members share the most difficult time of their childhood and their greatest influence other than their parents.

I felt honored to be able to hear their stories.

I've known most of the participants for four or five years, but I had no idea what many of them had gone through, how hard their parents and other family members worked for them to educated, or how thankful they are for where they are today. It was truly remarkable how many of them could point to one person in their lives and say "I owe everything to that person".

In a world as challenging as the one they grew up in, it is often the prodding of one interested party that makes all the difference. I couldn't help but think about those who prodded me. I also couldn't help but hope that one day I can do the same for another.

Learning the Kirkpatrick Levels

The gang gets together

For the past two days, we've had the pleasure of learning from Jim Kirkpatrick, co-author of "Implementing the Four Levels". In this photo, our team (Mike Gilbert, Brent Bloom, Martin Woodrow, Jim Keller, Kevin Weafer, Jim Kirkpatrick, Keith Bartholomew, and myself) closed out the event.

The workshop helped us identify ways that we can better evaluate the success of programs that we're going to implement during the next fiscal year. We were challenged in many ways, and gained a lot from the experience.

I would highly recommend that you discuss your key learning programs with Jim. You're likely to identify more ways to measure the success or failure of your program.

5 Applications for Video Coaching

Last week, Ken Wells and I co-facilitated a "High-Tech Speaking" Workshop at KT.

The course is excellent. We had a great time working with the attendees.

But this post is about video coaching. The High Tech Speaking workshop uses one-on-one video coaching to help attendees see their strengths and weaknesses. It makes them aware of the gap between what they feel (I feel so nervous!) and what the audience sees (But I don't look nervous!).

Video is a very powerful tool. So powerful, in fact, that I wonder why it isn't used in all training? Here's a list of five places where I would apply video training or coaching.

1. Presentation Skills: This one is obvious. In fact, I'll say that you should never do presentation training without video coaching.
2. Team Activities: We almost always tape team activities (like the spiderweb). Activities create, in 20 minutes, interpersonal dynamics that would take a year to see in 'normal' operating mode. When we capture these on video, teams can see how they ignored one employee, or divided into cliques, etc. One of my favorite uses of video.
3. Coaching: In many of my coaching sessions, coachees want to practice a dialog that they will have with a manager or peer. When they do their 'rehearsal', I sometimes video tape them (just using the video function on my pocket digital camera). We can then replay the video and look at body language, tone, and facial expressions. Very useful.
4. Coaching Role Plays: In courses that teach managers who coach, role plays should be videotaped. It's very difficult for anyone to sense how they come across, and they don't always trust feedback. Video is objective.
5. Customer Interface Role Plays: Used in the same way as Coaching Role Plays. One person plays the hot customer, while the other tries to defuse the situation. Replaying on video allows both to make constructive feedback.

The possibilities are limitless, but I'd start with these five.

How have you used video for training and coaching?

Book Review: Kicked, Bitten, and Scratched

I reviewed Amy Sutherland's "What Shamu Taught me about Life, Love, and Marriage" in a previous post.
An enjoyable, quick read - it was a no-brainer to add "Kicked, Bitten, and Scratched" to my reading list.

I love reading 'behind-the-scenes' articles and books. 

I'm fascinated by processes - always wanting to see a well-made "making-0f" documentary on a DVD.

"Kicked" is exactly that. 

Amy Sutherland spends a year at the Exotic Animal Training and Management (EATM) program in Southern California, where she tracks students and subjects through all the highs and lows you would expect in any school - but where the students are more passionate about learning than most of us were in college and the subjects can literally kill you.

Sutherland disappears, simply observing and reporting the events of the year. This is not her story, which is a great choice, as there are plenty of stories here to be told already.

It's been a long time since I picked up a book that I literally couldn't put down.

If you're interested in animals, interested in learning, or just like a good story: pick up "Kicked, Bitten, and Scratched".

What Did I Do All Year?

It seems like a good time to ask that question, right?

• Spent January and Febuary in India, Singapore and Bali. Taught, watched classical dance, ate great food and spent time with good friends.
• Was certified in DISC Profiling at Ken Blanchards in San Diego. Totally abused the champagne brunch at the Hotel Del Coronado with Angie, Tomo and John.
• Was certified in Six Thinking Hats in Phoenix. Visited Taliesen and Sedona.
• Taught in beautiful Tucson. Hiked the desert country.
• Was certified in Leadership Challenge at Sonoma Learning Systems in Sonoma, California with Brent and Ken. Drank a little wine.
• Taught a number of sessions in Yokohama, Japan. Sang some karaoke with Haemi-chan.
• Started my Masters in Adult Education. Completed 5 out of 13 courses by the end of the year.
• Worked with Nancy Duarte (author of Slideology).
• Went to Los Cabos. Spotted whales, coyotes, and Ryan Seacrest. Released baby turtles to the wild.
• Worked towards certification in High Tech Speaking.

Turns out, this was (in the words of Tori Amos) a "Pretty Good Year".

The Facilitation Diamond

If you're at all interested in teamwork, thinking, creativity, decision-making, or facilitation - you should read "Facilitator's Guide to Participatory Decision-Making" and keep it on your shelf for reference.

The book is full of good stuff, but my favorite tool in the book is the Facilitation Diamond.

Everytime I schedule a group facilitation, I have a pre-meeting with the session sponsor.

In the pre-meeting, I draw the Facilitation Diamond on the white board to show how the session will progress.

At this point, I open my toolbox and we decide which tools will work best.

I use seven (or so) sections to the session:

1. Opening: Go over the agenda. Share the diamond flow. Perhaps a quick exercise.
2. Diverging Activity 1: Present traditional or evolutionary ideas.
3. Diverging Activity 2: Stimulate non-tradition, revolutionary ideas.
4. Transition: A break or a brain-cleansing exercise.
5. Converging Activity 1: To narrow the multitude of ideas to some actionable ones.
6. Converging Activity 2: To chose the best one (or 3 - 5 ideas).
7. Closing: Decide on next actions

I have large posters of the image above that I label with the tools that we'll be using. I hang these as the session agenda. 

It allows everyone to see a map of the energy flow for the day.

Here's a pdf that outlines the method in more detail.

Facilitator's Toolbox Updates

I've updated the The Facilitator's Toolbox.

Changes include:

• The addition of the Conscious Competence Model
• More links to my writings about these tools
• And external links for many of the tools that I haven't written about yet.

Play... Reflect... Learn!

image from http://www.theopenworld.net/news/

Book Review: "Don't Shoot The Dog" and the Ten Laws of Shaping

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I've been interested in behavioral training since my visit to Sea World's "Trainer for a Day".

While relaxing in Cabo San Lucas, I finished reading pioneering dolphin trainer Karen Pryor's "Don't Shoot The Dog": a must-read for anyone who teaches, trains, or learns (and yeah, that pretty much covers everyone).

Title: "Don't Shoot The Dog"
Author: Karen Pryor, 
Genre: Behavior, Psychology, Training, Animals

Summary: to quote the book's subtitle, "The New Art of Teaching and Training"

Favorite Quote:  Instead of a quote, here are her ten laws of shaping behavior:

1. Raise criteria in increments small enough that the subject always has a realistic chance for reinforcement.
2. Train one aspect of any particular behavior at a time. Don't try to shape for two criteria simultaneously.
3. During shaping, put the current level of response onto a variable schedule of reinforcement before adding or raising the criteria.
4. When introducing a new criterion, or aspect of the behavioral skill, temporarily relax the old ones.
5. Stay ahead of your subject: Plan your shaping program completely so that if the the subject makes sudden progress, you are aware of what to reinforce next.
6. Don't change trainers in midstream: you can have several trainers per trainee, but stick to one shaper per behavior.
7. If one shaping procedure is not eliciting progress, find another; there are as many ways to get behavior as there are trainers to think them up.
8. Don't interrupt a training session gratuitously. That constitutes a punishment.
9. If behavior deteriorates, "go back to kindergarten": quickly review the whole shaping process with a series of easily earned reinforcers.
10. End each session on a high note, if possible, but in any case quit while you're ahead.

Strengths: Entertaining and clear with excellent examples.

Weaknesses: No photos?

Conclusion: As I said earlier - a must read for teachers, trainers, and learners.
Follow all these steps and you might get this result (a dolphin even I can ride!).

Post-it Flags: 37 flags

* Each time I find an interesting quote, model, image, or idea in a book, I mark it with a Post-it flag. The more flags, the more value I found in the book.

Trying to Keep Up with Tom Peters

Today, we started a new 'lunch and learn' program in our cafeteria.

We kicked it off with one of  my heroes, Tom Peters, by playing  "Tom Peters Live: Re-imagine! Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age".

Tom Peters, 65 years young, has more energy than three 20 year-olds. And more anarchy, too! At $29.99, there is absolutely no reason for you to not experience Tom Peters. 

The ultimate management provocateur, Tom cannot go ten minutes without challenging the status quo. Whether he's refuting Jim Collins, ripping on MBA programs, or mocking Old White Male Syndrome - Tom certainly doesn't mince words.

We had 25 or so attendees, a lot of laughter, and even more nodding heads.

Here are three great take-aways from the presentation (Tom likes to quote others).

• “Reward excellent failures. Punish mediocre successes.” - Phil Daniels, Sydney Exec
  
• “The ‘surplus society’ has a surplus of similar companies, employing similar people, with similar educational backgrounds, coming up with similar ideas, producing similar things, with similar prices and similar quality.” - Kjell Nordstrom and Jonas Ridderstrale, Funky Business
• Michelangelo: “The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.”

Build Better Slides with Nancy Duarte's slide:ology

That's me stealing valuable camera space from Nancy

As I mentioned yesterday, I attended the slide:ology seminar at Duarte Designs today.

Author Nancy Duarte facilitated most of the session, and injected it with obvious passion.

Using "An Inconvenient Truth" and the TED conferences as examples, Nancy believes that Power Point and Keynote can change the world. By the end of the session, she'll have you believing as well!

This 'one-day degree' in design is destined to become a 'must-see' in corporate training, so get ahead of the curve and ahead of your competition.

Masters Update - Is it worth it?

Since July, I've been working on my Masters Degree in Adult Education and Training from the University of Phoenix. It's an online degree, which was important to me, given my travel and work schedules.

Three months and three classes have passed, so here's a status report.

I'm going to use Edward de Bono's PMI tool (Plus, Minus, and Interesting) for this report.

Pluses

• Convenience - I don't have to drive to school. All participation is online. The schedule is extremely flexible. I can attend anywhere, anytime.
• Learning becomes a habit. You know the '21 days theory'? Do anything for 21 straight days and it will become a habit. I find online learning to be like that. Participation is required four days a week, but it's easier to log in for about 30 minutes everyday. It then becomes a habit.
• Course Content - The content has been extremely interesting. I'm reading books I would never read (Action Learning), learning concepts I would never learn (ontological humility) and having discussions (text messaging in the classroom) thatI would never have.
• Diversity - I'm getting to interface with a diverse audience of school teachers from all over the US. It's been very interesting to hear their challenges and passions.
• Virtual Teams - I'm learning how to work on a virtual team - a critical skill.
• Forums - I love answering questions in a forum. You have time to think, everyone participates, and you can go back to reread interesting questions and answers.
• Access - to the University online library.

Minuses

• Not Business Focused - While I enjoy the presence of so many school teachers, there are not enough corporate students for my taste. The discussions often end up focusing on school issues.
• Virtual Teams - It can be hard to work on the teams remotely. There have been a couple of frustrating moments when classmates dropped out or didn't do their work. But hey... that's just like 'real life'.

Interesting

• The Teaching Portfolio - We haven't used it yet, so I'm looking forward to seeing how it is applied.
• Adaptation -Seeing how I've adapted to an online environment.
• Presentations? Doing Power Points in an online environment. I'm very close to listing this as a negative, but I'll wait. It seems to be reinforcing the idea that Power Point is a suitable vehicle for emailing communication (hint: It's not!!).
  That idea isn't just wrong... it's dangerous... to business, anyway.

So, do I believe that spending time on this degree is worth it? So far... you bet!!

Book Review: "What Shamu Taught Me about Life, Love and Marriage" by Amy Sutherland

I'm curious about learning theories and I've always been fascinated by animals, so when I heard that I could book a "trainer for a day program" at SeaWorld two years ago, I had to do it.

It was a great event. I learned a lot about dolphins, a lot about training, and... I got to ride a dolphin.

That's me in the photo below, and it's a heckuva ride!

Since that time, I've been looking for a good book about animal training.

Not a 'how-to', since I'm not looking to train animals, but a look at behavioral training applied to animals in comparison to human training, with some pointers.

I'm sure there's a very good book in this, but I haven't found it yet.

It certainly wasn't "Whale Done!" which - besides it's awful title - is too lightweight to be of any real interest.

So, I was intrigued when I saw "What Shamu Taught Me about Life, Love and Marriage" by Amy Sutherland. In this book, Amy discusses lessons she learned from animal trainers that she then tried to apply at home.

Title: " What Shamu Taught Me About Life Love And Marriage"

Author: Amy Sutherland

Genre(s): Self-help, Relationships, Behavioral Training, Animals

Summary: “Lessons for People from Animals and Their Trainers"

Favorite Quote: I'll give you five lessons from the book instead:

1. Consider what you are reinforcing - Any interaction is training. We're always teaching or reinforcing some behavior, so be clear what it is you want to reinforce.
2. Ignore what you don’t like - Negative feedback rarely works. Better to ignore and redirect.
3. Use incompatible behaviors - A dog can't chew on the coach and a tennis ball at the same time. An employee can't chitchat and clean up the stockroom at the same time. Substitute
4. Know your species - Know them really well. Know what makes them tick and what pisses them off. Know their patterns so you see when they're off. Know what you cannot change.
5. Don’t act like a prey animal around a predator - Don't be a victim...

Strengths: It's an engaging read. There are some interesting lessons. Amy Sutherland is a likable guide through this world of animal training.
Weaknesses: It’s written more as a memoir than as a ‘how-to’. If you’re looking to steal some training tips, this probably isn’t the best book.

Conclusion: My search continues. I like Amy Sutherland’s writing style and will be reading “Kicked, Bitten, and Scratched”, but I’ve also started reading Karen Pryor’s “Lads Before the Wind” as I continue my search for the book that gives me some clear tricks and tips.

Post-it Flags: 17 flags
* Each time I find an interesting quote, model, image, or idea in a book, I mark it with a Post-it flag. The more flags, the more value I found in the book.

Identifying Your Training Weaknesses

I'm a book geek. One of the few things I like better than a bookstore is a used bookstore.
Petaluma, California has a very good one called Copperfields, where Angie and I spent a couple hours yesterday.

I bought a mint copy of "101 Stupid Things Trainers Do to Sabotage Success" there and leafed through it last night.
The book serves as an excellent reminder of how many things can go wrong in a training situation.

My pet peeve is #64 - Foolish Icebreakers. I hate icebreakers. If a class is properly designed, the introduction of attendees should happen organically. If you want me to do a formal introduction, fine... but don't ask me to pick which animal is most like me. Just ask me to introduce myself. Better yet, give us a topic-relevant exercise that requires us to meet each other.

Two that I could be better at would be #41 - using inappropriate humor - occasionally my filter doesn't work quickly enough, and #86 - flopping flip charts. I'm a frequent user of flip charts, but this book reminded me that once you flip the page, people can't see what you wrote. The book suggests hanging the important sheets (and they're all important, or you wouldn't be writing them, right?) so the group can refer back to them.
Great suggestion, and a good book.

What are your biggest training weaknesses?

My Five Attempts at Chiasmus...

I always preach learning in action... so here goes...

Having just finished a book on chiasmus (see the post below), I've attempted to write five chiasmus. No promise that these are original - just that I wrote them spontaneously.

1. Doing what you know is as important as knowing what you do.
2. I'll remember to remind you, if you remind me to remember. (this is a conversation that Angie and I had on multiple occasions, sadly)
3. It's not the fall that hurts - it's the hurt who fall.
4. A heart should not hold a love that blooms. A heart should be a bloom that loves.
5. She sure was pretty.... at least, I'm pretty sure.

Your turn!

Top Five Benefits of a Peer Review

Peer Review

This comic illustrates perfectly what a peer review shouldn't look like.

I'm doing a major redesign on one of our core classes, and it's a normal step for us to request a peer review when we've got something substantial to show.

As I just finished my draft of the 100+ page workbook, I asked the crew for a 1 hour review this morning.

For us, a peer review is informal - taking place in our sofa-furnished brainstorm lab, with post-it notes for everyone.

Here are my top five benefits of a peer review.

1. Everyone gets to know what you're working on - This kills any duplication of effort, consolidates resources, and makes sure you don't end up on anyone's project plan ("I didn't think you were busy").
2. You learn - I got six great suggestions from the team. Things I wouldn't have thought of on my own.
3. You build momentum - Seeing their enthusiasm re-doubled my enthusiasm. After all the work, I was a little burnt-out. Not any more!!
4. Talking brings clarity - I worked on this course in silence for too long. It's really helpful to get words out of your head and into the air, so you can hear how dumb they sound - and then improve them.
5. You get buy-in - No one can tell you later that it sucks, unless they're willing to assume some responsibility.

Now, depending on your team dynamics, all five of these could be potentially frightening.
Fortunately, my team is fairly functional (if you don't count me...), so these are productive sessions.

Do you do peer reviews? Tell us about them...

Crushed by Curiosity

I'm destined to die under a pile of books... not a bad to go, though.
Today I stopped by Recycle Book Store, in San Jose.
It was either a great idea or a terrible idea. I'm not sure.

What I do know is that I bought 10 more books, on top of the 20-some that I bought a couple weeks ago, during another used book buying spree.

I bought:

• "The Dip" by Seth Godin
  
• "Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes" by Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw
• "Research Methods in Cultural Anthropology" by H. Russell Bernard
• "Musicophilia" by Oliver Sacks
• "Writing Up Qualitative Research" by Harry F. Wolcott
• "Effective Training Strategies" by Davis and Davis
• "Bottom-line Training" by Donald J. Ford
• "Encouraging The Heart" by Kouzes and Posner
• "Lateral Thinking" by Edward deBono
• "Rhetoric & On Poetics" by Aristotle

It was a pretty exciting haul for me in many ways.

• I'm a huge fan of Oliver Sacks. "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat" is one of my favorite books.
  
• The ethnography books look really interesting. I'm curious about using ethnographic techniques at work.
  
• I already own copies of "Encouraging The Heart" and "Lateral Thinking", but I couldn't pass up clean, hard-copy 1st editions of either.
  
• And I have "Rhetoric & On Poetics" as well. This copy is hardcover, with readable typeface, though. That's pretty unusual.
  

Now I just need time to read them...

Mindmapping huesworks

click image to enlarge

Here's a mindmap of huesworks. I created it at bubble.us.
It's a cool, easy site to use.

Row one lists five areas of focus.
I spend most of my days exploring and working in these areas.
This blog will focus on these areas as well.

• MLT - Management, Leadership & Teams
• LT - Learning and Training
• CIT - Creativity, Innovation & Thinking
• DC - DesignComm or Design in Communication
• GC - Global Culture

Row two lists resources and activities that I leverage in my exploration of these areas.
A number of them, like books, occur in all areas.

Finally, row three lists my offerings or outputs in these areas.
You'll find more information about these from the offerings tab at the top of this blog.