News from Learning Without Scars.
We have been busy around here for the past six months or so and you have been able to enjoy a rest from my incessant blabbering on about something or other.
I will bore you with some of the details that have interrupted the nice flow of life.
I suspect the thing of most interest is that Marlene and I have finally moved to Hawaii. We have been planning this for what seems like forever and have finally done it. As of December 29, 2016, we became residents of Hawaii. We didn’t have to move furniture as we purchased a furnished apartment. However, there was a lot of housekeeping with closing businesses in California and opening them in Hawaii. Getting banks set up and post offices and accountants and lawyers. You know the drill. Thankfully Marlene is the professional at these items and I don’t have to worry too much about them at all. But it is a lot of pressure on Marlene.
That is the positive side of things and of course there is a negative side as well. The Yin and Yang of life continues. Our daughter Caroline, her spouse Joanna, and our grandchildren are still in California. Not being able to see them on impulse is not so much fun. We miss them and their growing up and life experiences and their energy. We have to adjust our approaches as a family when we are together and really take advantage of every minute we are able to be together.
Another thing that happened is that I have completely stopped soliciting consulting work. I have clients, to be sure, that continue want to work with me in the businesses. I am blessed with wonderful clients. We started the consulting business in June 1980 in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada not too far from where I was born in Mannville, Alberta.
I am not sure but I think winding down the business has been more traumatic for me than starting it was in the first place. One was hard work, while the other is emotional work. You have an identity as a worker that to some degree defines who you are and when you stop doing the work you have the potential to lose who you are. I am sure someone could say that much more eloquently than I, perhaps Caroline.
Then we created Learning Without Scars in 2015. Well it is now a Hawaii Corporation and the California business was closed as of December 2016. While that was going on Caroline was doing the yeoman’s work in converting all of our learning products to an internet based Learning Management System, and getting all this material fresh copyrights and trademarks. Our training business started with Quest Learning Centers. We started with Classroom courses with three levels and four modules per level. These management training programs were created in the early 1990’s. We took that material and compressed it into Webinars starting in the early 2000’s. But as a teacher, I wasn’t happy with the format of a slide show with a voice talking – so we changed things and used a high definition camera and injected me walking into the camera frame and talking to the learners on their computers. Those of you that know me know I like to talk. With the internet option, we had to convert these webinars, of which we had developed over ninety different programs, to the Learning Management Software. This meant a heavy learning curve for Caroline and a lot of work for me. Everything had to be redone. The text content all had to be updated and upgraded. Then we needed to create audio files to go with the text. Then we had to run prototypes so we could have input from actual learners. Those learners wanted to inject me into the program like we had in the webinars so we are working with a Professional, Paul Baumann, from XFINIGEN Media, and creating Vimeo files which we will insert into the learning products.
We have the new website created by Brian Shanahan, who did a wonderful job in presenting us to the world. Brian has upgraded on R.J. Slee site so that the “look and feel” is similar.
And finally, I think, Caroline is working with the IACET, The International Association of Continuous Education Training to have all of our learning programs certified so that they will earn CEU’s, Continuous Education Units credits that would apply to Colleges, Universities and Junior Colleges across the world. That, too, is a big task but one that will bring us, we believe, nice results.
We have been, and continue to be, busy. Life is good.
I don’t know how many of you know that my mother was a teacher, a well-recognized teacher in her day as one of the pioneer teachers of the Pittman reading program, which accelerated the ability of very young children to read. Kindergarten and Grade One specifically were reading newspapers and comprehending. My grandmother was a teacher. She received her Master’s Degree from the University of Manitoba in 1913. Granny, or “Granny the Great” as Caroline called her, taught in a one room school house and I had the pleasure of meeting several of her students when they attended her eightieth birthday party. I suspect she had an impact on them, don’t you?
Well I started as a teacher, first at a country club in the Laurentians, north of Montreal, teaching summer sports. Then moving to an instructor position with McGill University, which morphed in two programs within the Department of Physical Education from Teaching students how to teach swimming and also how to Coach the Swimming discipline. I am quite pleased that several of my students went on to coach at the national level for men and women in the Olympics and Commonwealth games. I had to give up the McGill teaching when I started at the caterpillar dealer in Quebec, Hewitt Equipment. My daughter Caroline is a teacher. She teaches in the California School System. We must have some teaching chops in the genes. I know I get excited when I see the lights go on in peoples’ eyes when they “GET” something.
But one thing I can tell you is that Learning is HARD. I know we have been told how to learn over and over again. It is repetition. Do it over and over again ad nausea. That never really worked for me so that is not how I taught. I wanted to people to understand something so that they would remember it. Not memorize it so they could forget it.
It turns out that the instructions from schools and teachers about highlighting and underlining and sustained reading and rereading notes and texts are not that appropriate. Endel Tulving, a psychologist, at the University of Toronto challenged this traditional model of learning and remembering through a series of investigations starting in the mid-1960’s. Tulving found that the learning curves were statistically indistinguishable between the tried and true learning pattern recommended above and random learning models that were not based on repetition. Well that is how we have designed the internet learning programs. We want you to Learn and to Know, not to memorize.
I am excited about this new venture and we are busy releasing new programs every month. We have the first two years of the management and supervision in the market now. We also have the first program for a specific job function, the first of many, which we released in March. It is for the Telephone and Counter sales personnel in the Parts Business. More on the product side in future blogs.
Well that is it. I hope you understand better now what has been happening and why there has been such a gap in my communicating with you.
The last time I wrote here was when I introduced “Socrates” our mascot. Talk to you soon.
The time is now.
The More Things Change #MondayBlogs
News from Learning Without Scars.
We have been busy around here for the past six months or so and you have been able to enjoy a rest from my incessant blabbering on about something or other.
I will bore you with some of the details that have interrupted the nice flow of life.
I suspect the thing of most interest is that Marlene and I have finally moved to Hawaii. We have been planning this for what seems like forever and have finally done it. As of December 29, 2016, we became residents of Hawaii. We didn’t have to move furniture as we purchased a furnished apartment. However, there was a lot of housekeeping with closing businesses in California and opening them in Hawaii. Getting banks set up and post offices and accountants and lawyers. You know the drill. Thankfully Marlene is the professional at these items and I don’t have to worry too much about them at all. But it is a lot of pressure on Marlene.
That is the positive side of things and of course there is a negative side as well. The Yin and Yang of life continues. Our daughter Caroline, her spouse Joanna, and our grandchildren are still in California. Not being able to see them on impulse is not so much fun. We miss them and their growing up and life experiences and their energy. We have to adjust our approaches as a family when we are together and really take advantage of every minute we are able to be together.
Another thing that happened is that I have completely stopped soliciting consulting work. I have clients, to be sure, that continue want to work with me in the businesses. I am blessed with wonderful clients. We started the consulting business in June 1980 in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada not too far from where I was born in Mannville, Alberta.
I am not sure but I think winding down the business has been more traumatic for me than starting it was in the first place. One was hard work, while the other is emotional work. You have an identity as a worker that to some degree defines who you are and when you stop doing the work you have the potential to lose who you are. I am sure someone could say that much more eloquently than I, perhaps Caroline.
Then we created Learning Without Scars in 2015. Well it is now a Hawaii Corporation and the California business was closed as of December 2016. While that was going on Caroline was doing the yeoman’s work in converting all of our learning products to an internet based Learning Management System, and getting all this material fresh copyrights and trademarks. Our training business started with Quest Learning Centers. We started with Classroom courses with three levels and four modules per level. These management training programs were created in the early 1990’s. We took that material and compressed it into Webinars starting in the early 2000’s. But as a teacher, I wasn’t happy with the format of a slide show with a voice talking – so we changed things and used a high definition camera and injected me walking into the camera frame and talking to the learners on their computers. Those of you that know me know I like to talk. With the internet option, we had to convert these webinars, of which we had developed over ninety different programs, to the Learning Management Software. This meant a heavy learning curve for Caroline and a lot of work for me. Everything had to be redone. The text content all had to be updated and upgraded. Then we needed to create audio files to go with the text. Then we had to run prototypes so we could have input from actual learners. Those learners wanted to inject me into the program like we had in the webinars so we are working with a Professional, Paul Baumann, from XFINIGEN Media, and creating Vimeo files which we will insert into the learning products.
We have the new website created by Brian Shanahan, who did a wonderful job in presenting us to the world. Brian has upgraded on R.J. Slee site so that the “look and feel” is similar.
And finally, I think, Caroline is working with the IACET, The International Association of Continuous Education Training to have all of our learning programs certified so that they will earn CEU’s, Continuous Education Units credits that would apply to Colleges, Universities and Junior Colleges across the world. That, too, is a big task but one that will bring us, we believe, nice results.
We have been, and continue to be, busy. Life is good.
I don’t know how many of you know that my mother was a teacher, a well-recognized teacher in her day as one of the pioneer teachers of the Pittman reading program, which accelerated the ability of very young children to read. Kindergarten and Grade One specifically were reading newspapers and comprehending. My grandmother was a teacher. She received her Master’s Degree from the University of Manitoba in 1913. Granny, or “Granny the Great” as Caroline called her, taught in a one room school house and I had the pleasure of meeting several of her students when they attended her eightieth birthday party. I suspect she had an impact on them, don’t you?
Well I started as a teacher, first at a country club in the Laurentians, north of Montreal, teaching summer sports. Then moving to an instructor position with McGill University, which morphed in two programs within the Department of Physical Education from Teaching students how to teach swimming and also how to Coach the Swimming discipline. I am quite pleased that several of my students went on to coach at the national level for men and women in the Olympics and Commonwealth games. I had to give up the McGill teaching when I started at the caterpillar dealer in Quebec, Hewitt Equipment. My daughter Caroline is a teacher. She teaches in the California School System. We must have some teaching chops in the genes. I know I get excited when I see the lights go on in peoples’ eyes when they “GET” something.
But one thing I can tell you is that Learning is HARD. I know we have been told how to learn over and over again. It is repetition. Do it over and over again ad nausea. That never really worked for me so that is not how I taught. I wanted to people to understand something so that they would remember it. Not memorize it so they could forget it.
It turns out that the instructions from schools and teachers about highlighting and underlining and sustained reading and rereading notes and texts are not that appropriate. Endel Tulving, a psychologist, at the University of Toronto challenged this traditional model of learning and remembering through a series of investigations starting in the mid-1960’s. Tulving found that the learning curves were statistically indistinguishable between the tried and true learning pattern recommended above and random learning models that were not based on repetition. Well that is how we have designed the internet learning programs. We want you to Learn and to Know, not to memorize.
I am excited about this new venture and we are busy releasing new programs every month. We have the first two years of the management and supervision in the market now. We also have the first program for a specific job function, the first of many, which we released in March. It is for the Telephone and Counter sales personnel in the Parts Business. More on the product side in future blogs.
Well that is it. I hope you understand better now what has been happening and why there has been such a gap in my communicating with you.
The last time I wrote here was when I introduced “Socrates” our mascot. Talk to you soon.
The time is now.
Friday Filosophy: Socrates
Most of what we know about Socrates we have learned from his students, especially Plato. We know he was a Greek philosopher and a teacher. From his teachings, we developed the Socratic Method: a style of teaching that involves the asking of multiple, open-ended questions of the students.
It was Socrates who told us, “I cannot teach anyone anything. I can only make them think.”
As we have learned in the many centuries since then, thinking is the foundation of all learning.
From this Greek Socrates, we have named our Learning Without Scars “mascot.”
We felt that the owl was apt, as owls symbolize wisdom. And naming him Socrates took our commitment to continuing education into the perfect symbol.
At Learning Without Scars, we are dedicated to continuous improvement for people: managers, supervisors, salespeople, counter people, and every individual working to make your dealership a profitable and effective business in today’s market.
Let us show you what happens when you have highly trained staff who are confident in the job that must be done.
Join us in 21st century, online employee development. You won’t be disappointed.
The time is now.
Getting Personal #MondayBlogs
My daughter wrote on her Friday Philosophy recently about “Outliers” and framed it in a manner that my granddaughter did regarding athletes. It is interesting, as many of us will relate to Malcolm Gladwell’s book entitled “Outliers.” That gave us the famous 10,000 hours as the floor for being an “expert.”
So why I am interested in this concept is that I believe in “Options.” Well this is where I come from on many things in life. I believe in the almost unlimited capacity of mankind. As people we have done and do today and will do in all of our tomorrows incredible things. I am certain that I am just like everyone else – an incredibly talented person in some form or fashion, I just haven’t found what it is yet. So that brings me back to “Options.”
George Bernard Shaw said “Youth is wasted on the young.” I think he was jealous. My granddaughter and grandson are experiencing lots of options in their lives. They have a loving home, terrific schooling, access to music and athletics and the comfort and security to pursue whatever they want within the boundaries established by their mother. What a gift.
So they have “Options” and thus they can find out in what manner they can be “Outliers.”
So I continue to tilt at Windmills.
I continue to believe that each of us can learn more, and do more and become more. We are our own limit. To that end I enjoy teaching or training people.
I was very blessed myself in the mentors that I have had in my life. My grandmother who received her Master’s Degree from the University of Manitoba in the 1914. Imagine that? To my mother and father and my sister for the opportunity that I had to grow up with schooling and music and athletics. To my complete working life starting at The Lac Marois Country Club where I learned a whole bunch of stuff and learned to teach and lead. To the nondenominational Church which introduced me to Priests, and ministers and Baptists and Rabbis and all manner of differing philosophical belief systems. To the bar where I played piano (I would not get arrested if there was a raid as I was underage) but as an employee I was safe. To the various part time jobs including selling encyclopedias. Then to the teaching work at McGill University establishing programs on instruction for outliers – early infant swimming and older fearful swimming, and then teaching people how to teach and coach in water sports. To the Boy’s Farm and Training School which had my great grandfather as one of the founders. This was initially a “Home for Wayward Youth” which morphed into a cog in the prison system in Quebec where I was taught to do personality profiling, amongst other things. (I nearly had a breakdown with that one, as part of my job was to reside on site and act as a warden.) To finally arriving at Hewitt Equipment, the Caterpillar dealer in the Province of Quebec in 1969. This was a strange happening as my mother got a call from the parent of one of my students at McGill who asked “Didn’t he take Mathematics and Physics at University? Which led to him asking her to have me give him a call. (He was the VP Finance at Hewitt, his name was John Swift.) This led to my being engaged on a “one-year contract” to find and fix a problem with the computer system that was driving parts inventory control. Then the real mentoring opportunities came into being.
There was the Senior partner from Urwick Currie, Mr. Steele, in Ottawa who had sold the system to Hewitt who spent one day a week with me for months helping me learn the system and general business application software. (I had a minor in computer science which in those days was programming and the like.) There was Larry Noe, at Caterpillar Tractor who was one of the early employees in Dealer Data Processing (DDPD), which was the batch system offering from CAT to their dealers in the late sixties and early seventies. There was Bob Kirk who smoked his pipe while regaling you with stories about parts inventory management. Then Ian Sharp of I P Sharp Associates who introduced me to the programming language APL and the Internet in the early 1970’s. The list goes on and on. I was very fortunate to have so many people take an interest in my career. All of this prepared me for my consulting career and allowed me to develop a training business and financial modelling business. From 1969 until now, I have been working in this Industry now for forty-seven years. As another of my mentors, Burton Grenrock, said “Whodathought.”
So now it is my turn to transfer some of my experiences and knowledge to the people that are following me in this Industry.
We started Quest, Learning Centers in 1994 and closed it in 2014. We opened Learning, Without Scars, in 2015 and it continues to go forward. It will become a Hawaii Corporation in 2017 when we move from California to Hawaii.
And this is where it gets interesting. For me that is, if for no one else.
With the driving force of my daughter, Caroline, we have created quite the learning platform for adults in the capital goods industries. Learning Without Scars is supposed to indicate that the “students, the learners” do not need to experience the scars that I have received over my career. They can learn from me and avoid those scars. I have many clients who disagree most vigorously on this Company Name. They tell me there is no such thing as learning with me Without Scars – rather they say there are lots of SCARS. But that is an opinion, right? And everyone has opinions.
Learning Without Scars has created products to fit into the learning environment of the 21st Century.
As I said it is exciting for me to be involved in these leading edge learning programs.
Now let me introduce you to Socrates. Our logo is the symbol of “wise” with a mortar board of accomplishment. And the Socratic method of teaching is still alive and well even today. This logo is the product of my Daughter in Law, Joanna who is an extremely creative woman.
This is Socrates:
So I started from Caroline’s Friday Philosophy of “Outliers,” which to me are those special people who have made the tough choices in their lives to strive to reach their potential. Which leads me to the various “Options” that have been available to you over your life and career.
And that takes me to the end of this rather long Blog entry. Which will be the switch point for me from the career of “Doing” through Consulting Work and “Teaching” through the Classroom work to the career of developing Learning Products for the Internet Age. Please wish me well if you would.
It wasn’t very long ago that Caroline dragged me, under protest, onto Twitter and social media. Now, the modern technology is opening still more options. It’s an exciting time.
The time is now.
Friday Filosophy #2016-27
Many of you know that I often say that I don’t really believe one person can motivate another person. BUT. I do believe that any person can demotivate any other person. I really resent when on person demotivates another person. We need to respect each other and have respect for the dignity of work. Do you best at whatever it is that you do. Our elder in our church when I was growing up took an interest in me. He said to me “Be happy in your work OR work and be happy. You don’t have a choice – the HAVE to work.” It was and continues to be great advice.
Here are some quotes on motivation to give you a lift in this Friday Filosophy #2016-27.
Good, better, best. Never let it rest. Until you good is better and your better is best.
St Jerome.
It always seems impossible until it is done.
Nelson Mandela
A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.
PLEASE REMEMBER: No one has to lose for you to win.
Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.
Arthur Ashe
It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.
Confucius
Never forget:
Good is the enemy of doing things better.
Better is the enemy of what is possible.
Never settle for what is – strive for what is possible.
The time is now.
Friday Filosophy #2016-26
Well I enjoyed Independence Day and I hope you did as well. Then we had an interruption in life with some surprise surgery in the family. Everything is going well again and we are back to our Friday Filosophy #2016-26.
We continue to see the attack on the status quo in Turkey tonight and hope that everything can be resolved with little loss of life.
Some quotes on adapting to change.
Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change.
Stephen Hawking
Reasonable men adapt to the world around them: unreasonable men make the world adapt to them. The world is changed by unreasonable men.
Edwin Louis Cole
Adapting is a common, natural way for people to adapt to their environment.
Joe Barton
Adapt or perish, now as ever, is nature’s inexorable imperative.
H.G. Wells
Adapt yourself to the things among which your lot has been cast and love sincerely the fellow creatures with whom destiny has ordained that you shall live.
Marcus Aurelius
Enjoying success requires the ability to adapt. Only by being open to change will you have a true opportunity to get the most from your talent.
Nolan Ryan
The time is now.
Friday Filosophy #2016-25
What a week! Starting last Sunday with Father’s Day. That followed our comments on the status quo and disruption. And we were given a gift on Thursday with Brexit. Not a gift in the manner in which you are thinking, but in the manner of following the thoughts on status quo and disruption. I believe that we constantly need to be challenging the status quo which brings me to the topic of Friday Filosophy #2016-25: dreams.
Some quotes on dreams.
Reality is wrong. Dreams are real.
Tupac Shakur
Why does the eye see a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination when awake?
Leonardo Da Vinci
You have to have a dream so you can get up in the morning.
Billy Wilder
Like all dreamers, I mistook disenchantment for truth.
Jean-Paul Sartre
A dream doesn’t become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination and hard work.
Colin Powell
Every dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.
Harriet Tubman
All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.
Walt Disney
My thoughts go out to the citizens of the United Kingdom who have retaken control of their own destiny. Best wishes and lots of luck.
The time is now.
Friday Filosophy #2016-24
One of the most special gifts I received in my life has been fatherhood. My daughter is a very special woman. (I am sure she will poo poo this when she reads it but it is true.) Although with my work and the travel it entailed it was difficult at times, as I missed things. We tried not to travel during school breaks and that was a very special time for me. The only problem I have as a father is that my daughter is almost identical to me. Make no mistake she has her mother’s manner and instincts and pleasing personality but there is no misunderstanding that she is my daughter.
Some quotes on fathers for our Friday Filosophy #2016-24.
My father gave me the greatest gift anyone could give another person, he believed in me.
Jim Valvano
One father is more than a hundred schoolmasters.
George Herbert
A father is a man who expects his daughter to be as a good a woman as she meant to be.
Frank A Clark
I am not ashamed to say that no man I ever met was my father’s equal, and I never loved any other man as much.
Hedy Lamarr
One of the greatest gifts my father gave me – unintentionally – was witnessing the courage with which he bore adversity. We had a rollercoaster of a life with some really challenging financial periods. He was always unshaken, completely tranquil, the same ebullient, laughing, jovial man.
Ben Okri
I know that I will never find my father in any other man who comes into my life, because it is a void in my life that can only be filled by him.
This is the price you pay for having a great father. You get the wonder, the joy, the tender moments – and you get the tears at the end, too.
Harlan Coben
The time is now.
Friday Filosophy #2016-23
Last week we talked about the status quo. Now, in Friday Filosophy #2016-23, I want to move to technological disruptions. Conventional wisdom, which is another oxymoron for the status quo, states that disruptive technologies change everything. Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen see disruptive technologies upsetting apple carts all over the globe.
Here are some thoughts on disruptive technologies.
Disruption is, at its core, a really powerful idea. Everyone hijacks the idea to do whatever they want now. It’s the same way people hijacked the word “paradigm” to justify lame things they’re trying to sell to mankind.
Clayton Christensen
Supply chains cannot tolerate even 24 hours of disruption. So if you lose your place in the supply chain because of wild behavior you could lose a lot. It would be like pouring cement down one of your oil wells.
Thomas Friedman
The key is to embrace disruption and change early. Don’t react to it decades later. You can’t fight innovation.
Ryan Kavanaugh
Employees speak of being fearful opening emails and feeling increasingly helpless in the face of the deluge. Physiologically, we now know that the state of continuous disruption puts us into a constant state of hormone-induced stress.
Noreen Hertz
The First Amendment was designed to allow for disruption of business as usual. It is not a quiet and subdued amendment or right.
Naomi Wolf
True disruption means threatening your existing product line and your past investments. Breakthrough products disrupt current lines of business.
Peter Diamondis
The time is now.
Friday Filosophy #2016-22
We just had a dismal jobs report posted yet the jobless rate continues going down. This just highlights the visible disconnect between “government” metrics and real life. The job participation rate is 62.6% :nearly at a forty year low. There are 94.7 million people who are outside the labor force. How dismal is that. Perspective is everything and the status quo is a serious threat to our families and the future of the country.
On that note, for our Friday Filosophy #2016-22, here are some thoughts on status quo:
The status quo sucks.
George Carlin
I don’t accept the status quo. I do accept Visa, Master Card or American Express.
Stephen Colbert
The riskiest thing we can do is just maintain the status quo.
Bob Iger
People who demand neutrality in any situation are usually not neutral but in favor of the status quo.
Mas Eastman
The history of storytelling isn’t one of simply entertaining the masses but of also advising the status quo.
Therese Fowler
Entrepreneurs are misfits to the core. They forge ahead, making their own path and always, always, question the status quo.
Maximillian Degenerez
I am not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it.
Niccolo Machiavelli
The time is now.
Friday Filosophy #2016-21
This weekend is a special one: Memorial Day. This is the day to remember all of the men and women who have died in the service of our country. They gave everything to allow us to enjoy our freedom. I am an immigrant to this country. I am thankful to be a citizen of this country. For this Friday Filosophy #2016-21, I want to focus on this idea of country.
May Heaven be propitious, and smile on the cause of my country.
Zebulon Pike
Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism.
George Washington
On what rests the hope of the republic? One country, one language, one flag.
Alexander Henry
Who sows virtue reaps honor.
Leonardo da Vinci
I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.
Nathan Hale
Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.
Mark Twain
In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.
Martin Luther King Jr.
Respect your efforts, respect yourself. Self-respect leads to self-discipline. When you have both firmly under your belt, that’s real power.
Clint Eastwood
I am not concerned with your liking or disliking me…all I ask is that you respect me as a human being.
Jackie Robinson
The time is now.