Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Funny Training Stories

I’m now a job search trainer and coach but I started my career as a corporate trainer (now called Learning and Development Analyst). Over the years I designed and presented hundreds of programs in a variety of topics including management development, consulting, work/life balance, new hire orientation (now called on-boarding), interviewing for managers, competency development, performance appraisal and even Sarbanes Oxley. Training was and still is the favorite part of any of my work.
Throughout my career I have experienced the good and the bad and the funny.

A while ago I asked some of my LinkedIn training group members for funny instructor stories. I got quite a few and none of them were the “you had to be there” type. Here they are, along with some of my own.

The Wind Beneath My Wings
I was late wrapping up a management development class and missed my flight home. After calling the office, they suggested I take a helicopter back to the airport, something I had never done before. While standing on the tarmac listening to the pilot explain where I was to sit, the propeller draft caused the skirt of my dress to fly over my head and I honestly couldn’t get it back down. I don’t know how I got into the helicopter but the hem of the dress was around my neck as I was seated and I had to listen to the snickers of the three other (male) passengers for the trip back to NJ.

There Is No ASCII
"I was supervising a group of administrators who were producing a manual in differential equations using WordPerfect. One of them was searching for a specific symbol in the WP symbol menus using CTRL + W, and couldn't find it. "Did you try the ASCII for that character?" I asked.
"There's no ASCII on my keyboard," she replied. She thought I said "ass key"! I still chuckle at the mental picture of a key with a little butt on it!"

I Don’t Have Enough Fingers for That
"When training Word, I explain that the quick way to get to the very top of your document is CTRL+Home and the quick way to get to the very bottom of your document is CTRL+END. After having several people press CTRL+N (because of the way I say it), I decided I would start spelling out the word “end.” During one class, I said, “Press CTRL and the END keys, that would be the CTRL key plus the E – N – D key.” Well, one participant thought I meant that he should press the CTRL, the E, the N, and the D keys – all four at the same time."

You’re Supposed to Plug It in First
"Maybe 14 years ago, I was teaching a database programming course and everyone had to connect to my instructor machine to run queries and execute the programs. Students were complaining that they couldn't connect, so I spent a lot of time that morning walking around to the student workstations, troubleshooting the client software, pinging other machines, etc. One of the other trainers came in, and when I asked him what might be wrong, he walked over, looked at my instructor machine, and handed me the unconnected network cable with a wry smile. OOOOF! What could I do? Meekly I just shrugged my shoulders and said "By the way, the most important thing you can do when troubleshooting your network is to check that you are, indeed, connected to it." 

Can You Hear Me Now?
"Early in my career, when PCs had just become more mainstream, a bunch of mainframe programmers were sent to our company to learn PC programming. One of the students actually held the mouse in his hand and talked into it. He said "double click" and other commands but was getting nowhere."

You Mean Like This?
"At the instruction to place his mouse over a particular button, a student picked up the computer mouse and literally placed it over the button on the computer screen. Thankfully, my trainer maintained his composure and calmly explained to the gentleman that he should move his mouse along the desk to place the cursor on the screen in particular places."

A Pregnant Pause
I was making a presentation to our division of about 200 people when I was about 7 months pregnant when the power in the microphone went out. No big deal. I stepped away from the crowd and told them that I would speak louder, using my diaphragm. Someone in the back of the room yelled out that it looks like I lost my diaphragm several months ago.  I couldn’t stop laughing along with everyone else in the room. Every time we’d try to go back to the presentation we would all crack up. I think that if that person were to say that today, he’d get in trouble with HR.


If you have any stories about the funny things that happened to you while you were training, I'd love to hear from you.

Sunday, March 29, 2015

Job Search Site Recommendations

I'm often asked for the names of the best job search boards. I don't have an answer to that question because every need is different and jobs run from entry level through executive. I did come up with a list of the sites that I personally use to help my clients and here they are in no particular order:

Collegerecruiter.com: https://www.collegerecruiter.com/blog/
AfterCollege: https://www.aftercollege.com/
Youtern,The Savvy Intern:http://www.youtern.com/thesavvyintern/ 
Undercover Recruiter: https://twitter.com/UndercoverRec
Article on the Five Best Sites for Finding Internships: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/her-campus/the-5-best-websites-to-fi_b_2860722.html
Niche Job Board (or Google a board specific to your industry): https://www.smartrecruiters.com/blog/best-50-niche-job-boards/

Like anything on-line, look it up, make sure it is a secure site, don't send money or give credit  card information unless you know that it is safe (why do that anyway when there are so many free quality sites?), and Google or look up the companies that are suggested to see if they are bogus. Many times I'll receive a notice about a job opening and use the "Review" selection of Glassdoor.com to get specific company feedback.  

Good luck!

Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Is Your Resume SMART?

Did you ever have to write out your annual goals while working for an organization? If you did, chances are you were asked to make them SMART; Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely.  You can use this for creating your resume too. Let’s look at an example.

I ask:  "What do you do?"
You say:"I am a learning and development specialist."
I ask: What do you do in that job?"
You say: I create training programs for my clients.”
I ask: "So what?"
You say: "So what? This is a huge undertaking..."
I ask: "That's what I'm saying, "so what" does it involve and how have you made a difference in your former company?"

And so it goes.  You need to ask yourself, "So what?" for everything you put into your résumé to make it SMART.  If you don't, your resume will sound like a job description and will be tossed in the trash. Like a SMART goal, your resume statements need to be SPECIFIC and MEASURABLE (remember data) and you have to constantly ask yourself about the results of your efforts (the So What?).  Keep in mind the timely aspects of your achievements and if anything went above and beyond the scope of your position. Now, let's add a bit of 7th grade journalism to the mix. Remember the who, what, when, where, why and how lesson that all good reporters use? You can use some of those questions to beef up your resume statements. Just use the questions that you think will pull out the best information.

Let's look at the Learning and Development example again.  Instead of saying “I create learning and development programs for clients”, the “So What?” can include the following questions:
WHO are your clients?  4000 global and domestic clients in the financial services industry.
WHAT do you create? Employee development programs including performance management, coaching, employee development.
WHAT does this involve? Assess, design, development, implementation, media selection, and evaluation.
WHAT were the results? 98% retention and 96% job satisfaction on internal employee satisfaction survey.
WHEN: According to project schedule
WHY: To increase employee engagement and retention.

Then put it together:
Led the Financial Services department in the design, development and implementation of a worldwide employee engagement and performance management initiative. This model was the global standard used within the organization and resulted in 98% employee retention and 96% employee satisfaction. Responsibilities included assessing employee and management needs via gap analysis, program design and development, vendor management, program implementation and measurement. 
See the difference? If you use the SMART acronym for each of your position responsibilities as well as the "So What?" analogy, you'll be well on your way to creating a stronger, focused resume.

Please Visit a Dermatologist

Today I had surgery for a Stage 0 Melanoma. It was discovered about a month ago when I went to my dermatologist for my annual skin screening...