Stakeholder Alignment Advice
That’s Stella Collins in the photo above with me at Learning Technologies UK in London in May 2023. She approached me this week to provide an insight for a report she is writing on what’s causing L&D teams friction in their LD processes and how to reduce it. She asked me: What piece of advice would you give to L&D to help them align with key stakeholders? (50 words max). My advice is: Make it all about them! Build relationships
EduTech 2023: On Being a Connector and Catalyst
On 30 March this year I met with Elizabeth Paterson from Terrapin. Elizabeth was the producer of this year’s EduTech conference. Laura Overton joined us. Elizabeth was looking for input on the speaker lineup for the Workplace Learning stream. Laura had already been engaged to do the opening keynote for the stream, and she and I would also be doing a session on engaging managers with learning. We advised her to feature high quality practitioner case studies for the remaining
Resetting my Blog Habit Implementation Intention
On 23 April I set an intention to create a new blog writing habit, which I wrote following following the ‘implementation intention’ format from James Clear. I wrote this goal up as: I will spend 20 minutes writing a personal blog post when I first sit at a table with a coffee every morning. I did well for one week, then it got patchy, after which it went downhill to sporadic. How did this habit fall apart so quickly? I
Learning Uncut Podcast Turns 5!
On 10 June 2018 the first episode of Learning Uncut podcast was published. I had been feeling pulled to the idea of starting a podcast for some time when I sat next to Karen Moloney at an industry awards ceremony in late 2017. While I loved the idea of interviewing people for each episode, I was concerned about the amount of work involved, particularly on the editing and production side. I was also unsure about the technology side of setting
A Year in Collage – Dr Cathryn Lloyd
It is serendipitous that I found myself in Brisbane on an unplanned visit at the same time as my industry colleague and friend, Dr Cathryn Lloyd, has an art exhibition running. Even better, when I visited the exhibition today to find that she was there! Titled ‘A Year in Collage mm365’ the exhibition consists of 365 postcard sized collages, one created every day in 2022. I’m drawn to examples of daily practice as a way of learning and building a
LTUK Connection Story Final Version
When I introduce myself as a speaker at a conference or in a webinar I normally say something like ‘I have the privilege of working alongside L&D leaders and their teams shaping learning strategy and building the capability of L&D teams, helping them to respond to and consolidate shifts.’ I’ll do this using a slide that features my photo, awards and the logos of some of the organisations that I’ve worked with. At least it’s not long! At Learning Technologies
LTUK Connection Story Feedback
I’ll be running a session on learning strategy at the Learning Technologies UK conference tomorrow. Time to fine-tune the connection story I’m using to build rapport and let the participants know a little about me at the start of the session. I sent an audio recording to my story coach/partner, Mark for feedback. Good news is that I’ve picked an appropriate story. Key improvements: statement up front to establish relevance to topic turning point – decision to move from consultant
Using Bing Image Creator
Talk about AI is everywhere! Yesterday Laura Overton showed me artwork she had created using the DALL-E AI image generator. She demonstrated creating a cartoon style image of my daughter fixing a stuck plug in a bathroom basin (long story!). It caught my imagination. Yesterday I spent around 20 minutes trying to find a personal photo to put in my blog post – to no avail. I gave up and used an image I’d previously downloaded from Shutterstock. Bland. Boring.
My connection story for LTUK conference
In three days I’m speaking about learning strategy at the Learning Technologies UK conference. Some of the 100 L&D professionals joining my session will be familiar with me as host of the Learning Uncut podcast. For others it will be the first time they’ve come across me. My session is well crafted. The slides are beautiful. I’m sharing some excellent video from my clients, L&D leaders just like those in the audience. I know that the voices of their peers
Using the habit loop to create a daily blogging habit
Back in 2014, when I was living in Sydney, I faced an hour-long public transport commute to work every day. When I discovered the concept of Working Out Loud (WOL) I decided to use those precious 60 minutes as the foundation of my WOL practice. It became a joy to connect and interact with people on social media about professional interests. This regular practice not only made my commute more enjoyable but also allowed me to expand my network, deepen
