Approaches to Learning

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A Great Idea on Learning from a Customer.

Many of you know that we, at Learning Without Scars, are very supportive of new and improved approaches we could be taking with our training platform. That is how we have developed from Management Training, that we first offered with Quest Learning Centers in the early 1990s, to the four different approaches we have in Learning Without Scars; The Learning On Demand Program (LOD), The Planned Specific Programs (PSP), The Virtual Classroom (VCR) and the Planned Learning Programs (PLP).

 

Recently we were approached about an idea a client had who is the Director of Operations of a Bobcat dealership. This talented lady asked if anyone had approached the LOD programs as part of a monthly department learning plan. Of course, at that point no-one had suggested this to us or discussed it with us.

 

She wanted to have each of their stores take the same LOD class. At the end of the month, after everyone had completed the program, they would have a Skype Call or a GoToMeeting and talk about the program of that month. That way each team Member and their Manager would have a clear view of where everyone stood on the knowledge scale. They would have a common understanding of what was expected and share common jargon in communications.

 

What a great idea!

 

They had ten stores with each store having one in-store sales person who handled everything; parts and supplies and rentals. They would get a membership for each store ($50.00/store – total $500.00) and then everyone in the store could take classes for the member pricing. An individual LOD is $115.00/student So if there were one person in each store the monthly training cost would be $1,150.00.

 

She thought that they should take the PSP – Planned Specific Program – which covers four individual classes – but do the classes once a month together. That then morphed into a specifically designed program of LOD’s as she saw the need. This would allow her to create a “personalized” learning program for her business and her teams. What do you think about that?

 

The Time is NOW.

Books and Reading #MondayBlogs

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Today for #MondayBlogs, I want to talk about books and reading and their ability to bring about dramatic change.

Learning is undergoing a radical transformation, although you wouldn’t know it looking at our present school structures and systems. You are seeing the internet transforming schooling. You have the Khan Academy changing the early school years and EdX transforming the Universities of today.

The standardization of curricula designed to create efficiency and accountability may fail to tap the intrinsic motivation of students. It may feel especially restrictive to those who have an intense drive to learn, their intellectual wings constrained by too much structure. Innovators and other change agents are not much interested in the standards applied to schooling.

Innovators wanted to dive deep into topics of their own choosing rather than follow the path of a syllabus. They exhibited a true love of learning – even if they had no love for school.”

This is from Melissa A. Schilling, the John Herzog professor of Management at NUU’s Stern School of Business who is the author of “Quirky: The remarkable story of the traits, foibles and genius of breakthrough innovators who changed the world.”

She also notes the power of reading and of books.

“Their stories (the innovators) also highlight something else: the power of books. Books may not seem as glamorous as recent technology-enabled alternatives like videos and webinars, but few learning vehicles can rival what can be delivered with a book. It is far easier to customize how one consumes a book than a video, lecture, or in-class discussion. These latter alternatives are great complements to books, but not substitutes. You can skim sections of a book to see its overall structure; you can study some passages intensely, re-reading them if you want, and pausing to contemplate. You can also easily move back and forth between text and diagrams in whatever pace and pattern works for your learning style. You can take a book home and read it in bed, or out to a park or coffee shop. This is more important than may at first be obvious; some people function better with some level of background stimulation while others require a setting with as little background stimulation as possible. Allowing people to choose is important. And when a book sits on your shelf, it serves as a visual placeholder that reminds you of its content (a large advantage print books still have over digital).”

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that every serial breakthrough innovator I studied had an outsized appetite for books. Books enabled them to choose the areas of expertise they would develop, and to circumvent barriers that might have held them back.

A few blogs ago we exposed to you the reading list from our consulting web site www.rjslee.com and also the articles we have written over the past twenty-five years. Have a look and do some reading. It will help in your personal growth which is, after all, our goal at Learning Without Scars.

The Time is NOW.

Change #MondayBlogs

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The past two weeks I spent reviewing two great dealers in Europe. One was in Norway and the other in Belgium. They were both family owned businesses with a strong history and terrific presence in their markets.

What I wanted to point out, however, is not how good they are at what they do, nor how skilled their employees are or how well their leadership executes strategies. No, it is how they view change.

Each part of the world seems to view change through a different lens. In North America one would think that American Companies would be right our front about innovation and change. Not so fast. In Canada you might be thinking about the conservative Canadian being more entrenched in tradition and not that open to change. Hang on there. Europe with all the centuries of tradition would be another case. Similarly, the South and Central America, the Middle East, Asia Pacific, Russia and Africa. All areas approach the need to change differently.

Change is difficult and except for a very small number of us would not be part of our lives. We love predictability. We struggle to learn how to live on our own, or the changes required when we get married or have children. We struggle to learn our jobs and get good at them. And once we get comfortable with our lives BAM along comes change.

I grew up in the late fifties and sixties, the 1900 version folks. Do you think the “baby boomers” see and have seen change? For starters think about this: The “Baby Boomers” were the first generation to have credit cards. No matter what you think about credit cards they have had a dramatic impact on the lives of everyone in the developed world. But the element of the credit card that I want to focus on is the unintended consequence of debt. We all have too much debt. Right? Look at governments, then look at credit card debt, then look at student debt. Need I say more?

Next look at Technology. I took a minor at University in Computer Science and learned how to “wire” Unit Record equipment. That is true. Most people would think about Unit Record computing in the same way that they would think about an “Outhouse” and indoor plumbing. But look how far the “computer” has come in the last seventy-five years. The last set of disc drives that I had to purchase cost over $1,000,000 that is right one million dollars. There were two banks of disc drives each four drives requiring a control unit. Each disc drive held a removed 44-megabyte storage unit. That eight-disc drive set up gave me 352 mega-bytes of disc storage and the cost was more than $1,000,000. Imagine that. Today I can buy a thumb drive with 8 GIGA-BYTES of storage for less than $20.00. How about that? Then we have cellular telephones. They are everywhere. They didn’t exist a short ten years ago. And what about AI, Artificial Intelligence? Big Blue, from IBL, beats the best chess player in the world. Watson wins Jeopardy. The self-driving car, the Roomba Robot vacuum, photography and on and on and on.

Jack Welsh, when he was CEO of General Electric is famous for saying “when the world around you is changing at a rate faster than you are, the end is near.” Look around you. The world is changing very quickly and shows no signs of letting up anytime soon.

We need to embrace change as difficult as that might seem to many of you. To resist change is to be run over. So, look around. What could you do differently? What do you do that you don’t even need to do anymore? The world will be a better place and your job will be more enjoyable if you do things more effectively. The only thing in life that we don’t have enough of is time. Take advantage of all the time you are given. Make you job and your world a better place.

The Time is NOW.

Learning #MondayBlogs

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Education has undergone many changes over the years.

From the 1800’s to now learning has changed dramatically. From the days of Aristotle, Plato and Socrates, the heroes of teaching and learning we have been on an interesting road. The quality of education has appeared to be based on the number of PhD’s on the faculty. Nobody talked abut the quality of the TEACHING. That has been one of the flaws of the education system.

In the 1960’s Clark Kerr gave a series of lectures at Harvard that were put into a book called “The Uses of the University.” Harvard had created the “elective” system whereby the student chose the curriculum. This resulted in a lot of people who graduated with very little “learning.” Kerr developed the California system with the UC system on the top, then private Universities, then Junior Colleges. The UC system for the ‘smarter” students to the others at the private to the lower skilled to the Junior Colleges or Technical schools. Imagine.

Yet there still exists a HUGE hole.

Who is it that qualifies the teachers?

How do we measure learning?

Today we have HUGE student loan debt.

How did we get here? When I went to University I paid less than $500.00/year plus books and lab fees. Today we are talking about more than $25,000/year plus, plus, and I am being very gentle. This level of tuition inflation is becoming ridiculous.

There was something else going on at the same time. Parents in the US had been convinced that their children would be better served if they went to a University. They would make more money over their lifetime. As a result, less than 10% of the population had a bachelor’s degree in 1960. That passed 20% in 1970 then 25% in the 1990’s and over 33% today. At the same time, it is said that 50% of the technical schools in America closed for lack of attendance. Quite a commentary isn’t it?

Many ideas of how people think and learn are a mystery to most people. However, at a few Universities learning scientists and computer engineers came together and started to develop educational tools that could be far more effective in teaching and learning. Mark Kamlet, the provost of Carnegie Mellon University, opines that 25 to 50 Universities are the total of the Universities that will survive over the coming decades. That is because teaching and learning are changing. The current universities are creating their own destruction. They are conducting research and they are trying to make things better.

In 1955 Herbert Simon attended a conference at Dartmouth where he and a small group of scientists gave a name to a new field of research called “Artificial Intelligence.” Learning is not a matter of accessing information but rather a matter of organizing and making sense of it. Cognitive scientists started asking the fundamental question. “How do people think and learn?” It is clear that our brain is a very complicated tool. The importance of thinking patterns and expertise means that learning needs to be looked at in different ways. The trouble with this is that this making developing courses very difficult. It is not easy to simulate working environments. Believe me we are in that business. But that is where as a society we are going. The University of Everywhere is here now and will become even more significant going forward.

We are perpetuating the class society with our education system.

Clark Kerr institutionalized this within the California system. If you have access to money you can get into a different school. Not a good approach to anything.

The new barriers of entry should be based exclusively on ability. Wouldn’t that be a nice change? That is where learning Management Software is taking us. That is where non-traditional teachers are coming from. We have to be extremely alert to the changes in learning.

We are mindful of these changes and watch the result of the student assessments from our online programs, not just to evaluate the student but also to evaluate our ability to transfer information. That is where we all have to go. Making learning easier and more effective.

The Time is NOW.

Where Do We Go From Here?

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In our last post, we talked about thinking outside the box (or triangle).

For those of you who have previously taken our classes, you know I often ask about “the box.”  Why is there a box?  Who decided to get me into this box in the first place?  I hate the idea of being penned into one set of ideas and one way of thinking nearly as much as I HATE discounts.  You are all well aware that I hate discounts immensely.

I think that doing things the way we have always done them is what constitutes the box we find ourselves stuck in so much of the time.  It is human nature to find a routine to follow.  It’s against our nature to reassess that routine and push for change.

Every time someone tells me that change isn’t all that difficult, I tell them to go home and suggest to their spouse or partner that they switch sides of the bed.

Change is tough.  Pushing for change and constantly striving to stretch and grow has a lot to do with changing our way of thinking.  To gain a different perspective, we must see differently.  To see differently, we must look, as Proust said, with new eyes.  To have those new eyes, we need a new mindset.

Education is key.

This year, let’s challenge ourselves to grow and stretch and move our paradigms with ongoing education.

That’s the way to find constant growth and improvement, both within our careers, and within ourselves.

The time is now.

Outside the Box

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Welcome 2018!

After my assessment of how far we’ve come in 2017, I wanted to have the first blog post of this new year focus on where we are going.

Thinking Outside of the Box.

It seems I have been looking for the guy who first said “thinking outside of the box” and I finally found him. His name is Edward de Bono and he is a very accomplished individual. He qualified in Medicine at the University of Malta, then he was award a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford where he read Psychology and Physiology, followed by a PhD in Medicine, and another PhD from Cambridge. Suffice it to say this is a very well educated and intelligent individual.

He is a speaker at some of the most prestigious institutions in the world and has written more than 60 books on various subjects. He is a thinker and is very critical on our abilities to think. He goes back to the big three of teaching in Plato, Socrates and Aristotle, the men who were celebrated as “Absolute” heroes. They applied logic to discover what was deemed to be the truth. De Bono suggest that is a dangerous road. It has led us somewhat astray.

In 1967 de Bono wrote a book called “The Use of Lateral Thinking,” a phrase that struck a chord with the public. Lateral Thinking is the notion for changing perceptions.

This is the thesis of many people one of whom is Rory Sutherland.  The circumstances of our lives may matter less than how we see our lives, says Rory Sutherland, and he makes a compelling case for how reframing things is the key to happiness. From unlikely beginnings as a classics teacher to his job as Vice Chairman of Ogilvy Group, Rory Sutherland has created his own brand of the Cinderella story. He joined Ogilvy & Mather’s planning department in 1988, and became a junior copywriter, working on Microsoft’s account in its pre-Windows days. An early fan of the Internet, he was among the first in the traditional ad world to see the potential in these relatively unknown technologies. An immediate understanding of the possibilities of digital technology and the Internet powered Sutherland’s meteoric rise. He continues to provide insight into advertising in the age of the Internet and social media through his blog at Campaign’s Brand Republic site, his column “The Wiki Man” at The Spectator and his busy Twitter account.

The point of highlighting these two gentlemen is that as people we seem at times to get stuck in ruts. Joel Barker called them Paradigms. This is the social equilibrium that we experience in our jobs and at times even in our lives. Everything is just OK.

Well all of us have goals in our lives. We want to leave a mark somewhere and somehow. That is not going to happen if we are just OK.

Edward de Bono says quite bluntly that “Schools waste two-thirds of the talent in society. The Universities sterilize the rest. Does that strike a chord with you? It sure does with me.

I have been blessed in many ways in my life and career. I was raised in a family that valued school and education, my maternal grandmother got a Masters Degree in the early 1900s, rather unheard of at the time. I had a wonderful childhood which led me to teaching and leadership positions with amazing mentors who inspired me. When I finally got into a career I had incredible men take time to counsel me and encourage me and push me. I was, and still am, a very lucky guy.

I have never been a particular fan of the status quo. That made me very impatient as an employee and let me to a much better career as a consultant where I could move from one business to another and thus never get bored. It led me back to teaching when we started Quest, Learning Centers in the early 1990’s and it is now moving me to Learning Without Scars with my daughter in developing and producing dynamic internet based learning programs.

To me it is all about putting information in front of people and then helping them implement change. Learning is a voyage, it has no end destination, it has no end point. But once you see the lights go on with an individual and watch the excitement grow, well to me that is a wonderful thing.

So, in 2018 I want you to consider thinking, not outside of the box, but outside of the triangle. Look at everything you do and see if you can make everything just a little bit better. Read more, think more, laugh more and have more fun. Don’t forget that all work and no play will make all of us very dull indeed.

Happy New Year to each and every one of you.

Out with the Old and In with the New.

The Time is NOW. If not now WHEN?

The Year in Review #MondayBlogs

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2017 has been an eventful year for us.

We have been very busy.

The product offerings are filling out. We will have more individual subject specific classes (Learning On Demand – LOD) than anyone in our Industry. We introduced Job Function Specific Programs (Planned Specific Programs – PSP) this year and have ten available currently. We also have introduced the Virtual Classroom – VCR series which allows each employee within the Parts and Service groups to develop and obtain all the knowledge required to work effectively. Our foundation, management and supervisory training, we now call the Planned Learning Programs – PLPs. We are excited about all of these programs. We are well along the road to obtaining International Association for Continuous Education Training certification. We have created over five hundred minutes of film clips which we add to our learning programs to provide dynamism. We have opened a Vimeo Channel which contains some of our film clips as a “taste treat” for companies and individuals who are interested in seeing for themselves our style and content. And importantly, we introduced Socrates our mascot to the world.

Our goal is to provide you with the learning tools to allow your employees to become the best that they can be.

Let’s turn to your employees and their personal development. What is your goal for them?  What is their goal, personally?  What is their purpose in their job or their career? What is the purpose of your business? Surveys clearly indicate that people want to work for companies that have a clear purpose. Clarity of purpose is not that common in businesses today. In America surveys tell us that over 80% of business fails to achieve their strategy.  This failure in achievement is caused by lack of clarity. 95% of employees cannot state the strategy of the business.

There are a few truths to be exposed.

  • Know your goals and what can be achieved.
  • Have clear targets but recognize they are constantly moving.
  • Don’t let technology take over – business is very personal
  • Seek common ground with your market and customers
  • Constantly be doing research
  • Celebrate your successes don’t be afraid to be good.
  • Be extremely visible
  • Make it personal
  • Seek outside opinions
  • Keep it simple.

Skilled people are strong in building and maintaining relationships with your customers. They are your heroes. Let’s not forget to invest in their continuing education.

The time is now.

What Is Training? #MondayBlogs

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During the economic downturn, the first budget to be slashed was the training, or employee development, budget.

When it’s time to tighten our belts, training is the first thing to go.

But it is clear that employees need to invest in your business, just as you invest in your employees.  One of the things I teach in our classes is that our procedures and methods must be understood, and agreed upon, by the team.  In other words, your employees must not only understand what they are doing and why they are doing it, but agree with the goal and the approach to that goal.

Lately, we’ve seen more room for employee development again in the budgets.  We have also seen employees taking a greater role and a more vested interest in their business’ success when they are provided with a foundation through training.

People are our greatest asset.  They are your heroes with your customers, and they help to build the relationships that give a business “customers for life.”

It is crucial that we never forget that, although our industry is equipment, it is the people who make or break it for a business.

We must make an investment in the future through providing our employees with the training and tools they need to grow in our business.  This is an investment that benefits every aspect of the business.

The time is now.

 

How Does Training Work? #MondayBlogs

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To say that we are excited about our employee development programs would be an understatement.  We know that what we do is groundbreaking for our industry, and a positive movement for employers, employees, and customers alike.

For too long, training budgets were non-existent.  Now that we have clear paths forward for employee growth and excellence, the video below shows you a glimpse of how a Learning Without Scars program works.

The time is now.

 

Ed Gordon on Apprenticeships

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Each month, I receive a report from Edward E. Gordon at Imperial Consulting Corporation.  These reports are timely and well worth the read for those of us in the realm of business education.  Lifelong learning is a key to every aspect of success.  In this month’s report, which I have included below, Edward focuses upon the apprenticeship model of teaching and training.

I hope this sparks your interest.

 

KNOWLEDGE SHOCK Series Part 3: Apprenticeships & Other Gateways to Good Jobs
Apprenticeship through the Ages
In the 1920s my father, Earl G. Gordon, attended Bowen High School on Chicago’s south side. He was a great athlete and a member of the school’s football team that won the Illinois state championship in 1929. His dream to study at Michigan State University to become a coach was crushed by the Great Depression.
Apprenticeship in a carpenter’s union, however, provided his lifeline in those difficult economic times. In 1937 after passing his final test by designing and building a spiral staircase, he became a union carpenter. Fifty years later he received his union’s Gold Card. Until he retired at age 80 from a profession he loved, my father spent a lifetime building homes and doing custom remodeling.
Today in the Austin neighborhood on Chicago’s troubled west side, poverty is rife, and many students entering high school test as low as the 4th-grade-level in reading and math. Alex was a typical student. He didn’t attend class very often. When he did go, he spent most of his time selling drugs or making trouble. Alex didn’t see any point in attending class because, “They weren’t teaching anything I needed to know and I needed to know how to make some money.” A teacher convinced him to take a few classes at the newly opened Austin Polytechnical Academy. “Man I really took to working with the machines,” Alex recalled. He earned industry certifications that prepared him to work as a skilled machinist. After graduation, Alex was hired by a local manufacturer. He not only is considered a model employee, but he also is pursuing further training to upgrade his skills. When asked what his family thinks of him now, he speaks with pride, “I have two cars, I’m taking care of my daughter, and I make around $70,000.” He choked up when he said, “My mom is real proud.” (Philanthropy Journal News, January 3, 2017)
The Current Status of Apprenticeship & Allied Initiatives
As these two accounts show, apprenticeship and high school career academies can be keys to satisfying and gainful employment. Today about 500,000 individuals are enrolled in U.S. apprenticeship programs, about half sponsored by unions and half by businesses. But this number is not nearly enough as there are growing shortages of skilled workers in many business sectors.
Across the nation over 200,000 construction jobs are unfilled. “Contractors would hire more workers if enough qualified applicants were available,” said Stephen E. Sandherr, chief executive officer of the Associated General Contractors of America. Their recent survey of 1,600 members showed that 70 percent are having difficulty filling hourly craft jobs.
Regional initiatives to increase apprenticeship numbers are gaining momentum. They include an outreach program that provides high school students in southwestern Pennsylvania with information on apprenticeship opportunities. The Builders Guild of Western Pennsylvania that represents 16 building trade unions and 6 contractor associations forecasts that to keep up with demand the region’s training centers will need to double or triple the number of apprentices entering their program. The Chicago Regional Council of Carpenters has participated in a television series, now in its fourth season, titled “Built to Last” that is designed to showcase “the positive impact a skilled union labor force has on people’s day-to-day lives.” In a recent full-page Chicago Tribune advertisement, the council both promoted this series and also encouraged readers to learn about its apprenticeship program.
Manufacturing is another business sector reporting difficulty in finding qualified applicants. A July 2017 Society for Human Resource Management survey reported that 43.3 percent of respondents in the manufacturing sector reported increased recruiting difficulty. Only 20 percent of U.S. apprenticeships registered with the U.S. Department of Labor are in the manufacturing sector (Wall Street Journal, 6/17/2017) . The Manufacturing Institute forecasts that within ten years U.S. manufacturers will face a shortfall of 2 million qualified workers. In the Greater Chicago Metropolitan area there are over 30,000 vacant jobs in high-end manufacturing. There are another 19,000 vacancies in the rest of Illinois.
One notable initiative in the Chicago Area to address the skills-jobs gap is Manufacturing Renaissance, a non-profit organization, that was recruited by Arne Duncan, then the Superintendent of the Chicago Public Schools, to offer a pre-engineering program for high-end manufacturing careers in a Chicago public high school. The result was Austin Polytechnical Academy of which Alex earlier profiled in this report was a graduate. It has now evolved into the Manufacturing Connect program at Austin College and Career Academy. Since 2007 the Manufacturing Connect program has had over 100 manufacturers as partners. In the last 7 years, its accomplishments include: 420 work experiences including job shadows, paid internships, and summer jobs in manufacturing; 421 nationally recognized industry credentials earned by 215 students; 73 graduates earning between $20,000 and $70,000 per year plus benefits in full-time manufacturing jobs; and initiating the only current Chicago Public School dual-credit manufacturing technology class in which students earn college credits as well as industry credentials. The pre-engineering program begun at Austin College and Career Academy is being expanded to two additional Chicago public high schools, Prosser Career Academy and Bowen High School.
Manufacturing Renaissance is an excellent example of a Regional Talent Innovation Network (RETAIN) that is cooperating in a variety of programs to increase advanced manufacturing skills. It raised the private funding needed to establish the WaterSaver Faucet Manufacturing Technology Center, the only accredited machining training facility on Chicago’s west side and in Chicago Public Schools. Manufacturing Renaissance began an adult manufacturing training program that has assisted adult trainees to secure jobs or earn promotion at their current employment. This program is now being operated by the Jane Addams Resource Corporation. It is the model used by the SAFER Foundation in their very successful training program for formerly incarcerated individuals. In addition, Manufacturing Renaissance has recently been awarded funding from the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity to expand youth pre-apprenticeship educational opportunities.
Manufacturing Renaissance is expanding its reach in Cook County and showing the way for other RETAINs to begin similar efforts. It illustrates that for a RETAIN to be successful there must be strong cooperation among educational entities, the business community, unions, government agencies, and non-profit partners.
Focus on Vacant Jobs
The August unemployment rate reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics was 4.4 percent. However the average duration of unemployment was 24.4 weeks, which is higher than any level since 1982.
Wage levels are still not rising in most occupational areas. One factor is that 20 percent of new jobs during the past year were in the restaurant sector, one of the lowest paying fields. The Department of Labor’s August JOLTS survey reported that job openings increased 8 percent to 6.2 million, the highest on record since 2000.  Finding workers with the requisite education and skills levels remains a big problem for an increasing number of businesses of all sizes. Many now rate finding and retaining skilled workers as their most important challenge. The August Federal Reserve Beige Book reports that a shortage of workers is stifling employment growth in many industries.  The Minneapolis, Atlanta, and St. Louis Federal Reserve Districts reported that firms have turned away business due to a lack of skilled workers. The Dallas and San Francisco Districts saw wages rising because of labor shortages.
Yet over 39 million prime-age workers (aged 16 to 55) have given up looking for work. Although their labor force participation rate has improved somewhat, at 62.9 percent it remains far below the participation level of the 1990s. If these American were added to the unemployment calculation, the unemployment rate would be a more accurate 18.5 percent.
Until more U.S. businesses increase their job training programs to help fill job vacancies, the skills-jobs gap will continue to retard economic growth across most of America. From 1995 to 2016, the proportion of U.S. businesses providing training fell from 35 percent to only 20 percent. Unless U.S. business get more skin in the game including support for cross-sector education and training programs, we can expect job vacancies to continue their dramatic rise. Without significant initiatives to upgrade training and education-to-employment systems, it is possible that 14 million jobs may be unfilled in the United States by 2022 driven both by massive baby-boomer retirements and the continued mismatch of worker skills and job requirements.