What New Team Leaders Should Do First - Carolyn O'Hara Getting people to work together isn’t easy, and unfortunately many leaders skip over the basics of team building in a rush to start achieving goals. But your actions in the first few weeks and months can have a major impact on whether your team ultimately delivers results. What steps should you take to set your team up for success? How do you form group norms, establish clear goals, and create an environment where everyone feels comfortable and motivated to contribute? What the Experts SayWhether you’re taking over an existing team or starting a new one, it’s critical to devote time and energy to establishing how you want your team to work, not just what you want them to achieve. Get to know each other“One of your first priorities should be to get to know your team members and to encourage them to get to better know one another,” says Shapiro. Show what you stand forUse your initial interactions with team members as an opportunity to showcase your values. Principles to Remember Do: Don’t:
Designing for a New Generation of E-Learning. Designer’s Survival Guide: Top 10 Tips As a designer, it’s easy to make pretty pictures. Now try making designs that go deeper. “Deeper how?”, you may ask. 1. Know your audience. 2. Use familiar user interface patterns that your learners are used to in the real world. For example, when designing an iPad® app, it is important to first have a strong understanding of how iPad users already interact with the device. 3. Learners appreciate consistent navigation and repeated tasks for gaining information. 4. Design is a visual translator for the world’s information. 5. As humans we need and crave feedback and direction. 6. Set expectations at the onset of a course so learners know what is coming. 7. Adult learners crave autonomy and the ability to guide their own learning. 8. If your solution is not easy, fast, and fun, it will not be effective. 9. Seeing how learners interact with and perceive your design is critical. 10. As Picasso once said “Good artists borrow; great artists steal.”
Money Talking: How to Tame Your Email and To-Do List Work is messy, but that doesn't mean that you have to be a hot mess at work. This week, as a part of Money Talking's first management conversation, WNYC's business editor Charlie Herman speaks with two experts from the Harvard Business Review on getting organized and maximizing your productivity at the office. Sarah Green is a senior associate editor at HBR and author of the article "8 Ways Not to Manage Your Email (and Five and a Half Tactics That Work)." Here are a few of Green's tips for how to handle that glut of email. Treat your email as an essential part of your job.Devote a specific amount of time each day to managing your email.Find a different method (not email) to manage your to-do list. Herman also talks to Ron Friedman, a social psychologist who specializes in human motivation and author of "How to Spend the First 10 Minutes of Your Day."
Top 10 Competencies of a Gamified Learning Designer Gamified learning is one of the major revolutions happening around us that demands a shift in the mere thinking of ‘learning’. It requires us to unlearn and relearn some of the traditional notions related to learning styles and preferences, and the dimensions and the elements of learning design. In this article, we will take a quick look at the top 10 essential competencies required for a learning designer to design effective gamified learning interventions. It is exciting to be part of the learning revolution happening all around us, with new learning paradigms and technologies emerging almost on a daily basis. Gamified learning is one such major revolution that demands a shift in the mere thinking of ‘learning’. Learning style/preference (Fun, Social Interaction, Competition)New (additional) dimensions to learning (Challenge, Engagement, Motivation)New (additional) elements to learning (Rules, Challenges, Levels, Scores, Badges, Leaderboards) Knowledge Skills Attitude Bottom Line
The Morning Routines Of The Most Successful People Whether you’re a morning person or a night owl, we all start our day at some point. And we all seem to start it differently. Some of us hop online to check social media, others dive in to email, still others eat breakfast, exercise, or pack lunches for the kids. There’re a million different ways a morning could go. Which morning routine might be best? While there’s probably not an ideal morning routine that fits everyone, we can learn a lot from the morning routines of successful people as well as from the research and inspiration behind starting a morning on the right foot. I collected a wide range of opinions on how best to start a day, from the scientific to the successful. Science says: Willpower is highest in the morning, so start strong You’ve maybe heard the advice that your first work of the day should be something meaningful and significant, a task that might take a lot of focus, will, and determination to accomplish. That’s the idea purported by the strength model. P.G.
Top 9 Competencies of an Informal-Social Learning Designer Informal/Social learning is one of the major revolutions happening around us that demands a shift in the mere thinking of ‘learning’. It requires us to unlearn and relearn some of the traditional notions related to the learning style/preference, and the dimensions and the elements of learning design. In this article, we’ll take a quick look at the top 9 essential competencies that a learning designer is required to possess for designing effective informal/social learning interventions for today’s workplaces. It is exciting to be part of the learning revolution happening around us, with new learning paradigms and technologies emerging on a daily basis. Informal/Social learning is one such major revolution (other than mobile learning and gamified learning) that demands a shift in the mere thinking of ‘learning’. Learning style (workplace learning - first, peer learning - next, formal learning - last)Course design (formal learning blended with the right mix of informal and social learning)
the personal potential trap 12 Questions eLearning Developers Should Answer As an Instructional Designer, motivating learners is an important consideration because in reality learners are not always motivated to learn. They’re busy, they have other things to do, they don’t see the course as being important or have had a bad experience in the past. Would you like to motivate your learners based on the ARCS Model? Dr John Keller’s motivational design model, known as the ARCS model, is comprised of four major factors that influence the motivation to learn – Attention, Relevance, Confidence and Satisfaction. The four categories of motivation variables comprise of sub-categories along with process questions to consider when designing eLearning (or any kind of learning): AttentionCapturing the interest of learners, stimulating their curiosity to learn. Perceptual ArousalWhat can I do to capture their interest? RelevanceMeeting the personal needs/goals of the learner to affect a positive attitude. Goal OrientationHow can I best meet my learner’s needs? Keller, J.
The AI model what kind of discussion type are you? The eLearning Designer’s Most Important Decisions The eLearning Designer’s Most Important Decisions Great design is about making smart decisions. And skillfull eLearning designers know this. Let’s take a look and see some of the most important decisions eLearning designers must make in order to avoid broken and inefficient designs: Decision 1: Color Choice What colors have you chosen for your eLearning course? It’s a fact that people react to color in different ways. Considerate the following ideas: Choose a simple color scheme featuring three of the same tone (depth of color; think pastel, jewel hued or primary) colors which are marketed specifically for your target audience.Be meticulous about color combinations and their effect on the visually impaired. Remember, color is a powerful communication tool. Decision 2: Tackling Typography Choosing the right font for your course is not an easy decision. There is definitely more to picking a typeface than choosing the first one we find, or the one that’s most frequently used. Size matters.