30 Under 30 for Learning 2012

If you're under the age of 30 and work in the field of learning and development, take a few minutes to apply for the 30 Under 30 Learning 2012 program: http://www.learning2012.com/2012-details/30-under-thirty.html

I was lucky enough to be selected last year and with the support of my manager and the company that I work for, I took the opportunity to attend the Learning 2011 conference. It was a great experience and I encourage all of you to take the leap.

Tips for Business Travel

To be honest, I've only traveled for work once in the last 5 years. Which I'm quite okay with, since at my last job, I was traveling pretty often. Trips to Chicago were entertaining and filled with sightseeing on the side, but other road trips to nearby small towns were filled with evenings of me watching things like the college football Fiesta Bowl or some other game named after a citrus fruit and suddenly caring about who was winning. Here are my top 5 training travel tips, from someone's who's been there and done that.

1) If possible, mail your materials to your training location ahead of time and call to verify that everything arrived. It's no fun checking in a giant box of supplies and if your box gets lost in transit... uh oh! you're off and running to the nearest Kinko's to get new materials printed.

2) Become familiar with your company's rules about expensing items, keep track of your mileage and file receipts in a logical manner. I like to keep a list of my expenses for each day and attach the receipts in order, so that when I go to submit my expense report, I don't need to try to remember where I went for dinner last Tuesday evening.

3) Join your airline's frequent flyer program and hotel's rewards club. Might as well get something out of it. I used to receive personalized welcome treats of cheese and soda in my room upon check-in and access to the hotel's Wi-Fi for free.

4) Keep separate travel toiletries. It's so much easier that way. Go to Target and buy yourself little travel-sized shampoo, toothpaste and lotion and designate a travel toothbrush. Keep those packed, so that when you are preparing for your nexttrip, you'll be ready to go. That way, you won't forget your contact lens case because you didn't pack it that morning (like I did once).

5) Have fun! If you have some time to spare, look up some local attractions. Find highly rated restaurants to dine at, instead of always eating in the hotel lobby restaurant. Enjoy the area and act like a tourist if you have a free evening or if you are traveling over a weekend. Going to Kansas City? Try some tasty BBQ. Chicago? Spend an evening at Navy Pier. Middle-of-nowhere North Dakota? Watch a college football game on TV :)

Safe travels to you!

Handy tools for trainers

Remember these?

Find a great screen capture utility
SnagIt is my personal favorite. It's an easy-to-use program to capture images and has a built-in editor feature. I use SnagIt to blur out sensitive information that I don't want appearing in my training materials, to highlight areas of the screen and to make my screen shots look professional. I think that including screen shots makes training materials and job aids more esthetically pleasing and easier to understand.

Educate yourself on Microsoft Office tips and tricks
If you're using MS Office as your suite of programs, obviously. Take a look at Microsoft's website to learn shortcuts, tips and tricks. Microsoft offers thousands of free templates to use: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/templates/ Some are good, some aren't. But if you can find some that you like, it's worth the time spent. Some of my go-to templates include calendars and banners.

Learn how to use keyboard shortcuts
Save time when creating documentation by learning commonly-used keyboard shortcuts. Make it a point to use them and you'll find that you'll save yourself numerous mouse clicks. My personal favorite keyboard shortcuts are:
- Ctrl-A: Select all- when you don't want to scroll through pages and pages to select the entire document.
- Ctrl-C: Copy- to select the text that you'd like to copy or cut.
- Ctrl-V: Paste- to insert the text that you've copied.
- Ctrl-Z: Undo- if only life had an "undo" key!
- Holding down Shift key while clicking through a list: Selects everything on the list
- Holding down Ctrl key while clicking through a list: Selects specific items on the list (pick and choose)

30 Under 30 @ Learning 2011

It was an honor to share the stage with my fellow 30 Under 30 friends. The videos from our intro and closing sessions  have been posted! http://www.learning2011.com/Videos/30-under-30.htm

My favorite teacher

I've always loved school. I attribute my love for education to my first grade teacher, Mrs. Bowen. I had recently moved to Alhambra, CA with my family from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, when I was enrolled in the first grade at Garfield Elementary School. I vaguely remember sitting in the school office, being shown ink blots and giving my opinion about what the shapes and blobs represented. I also was tested for English as a Second Language and passed, so I didn't have to attend any additional ESL classes. Mrs. Bowen was the first teacher I had in the United States.

One of our school activities included painting boxes to create the characters from the book "The Little Engine that Could". I played the role of the "Little Engine" :). I chanted, "I think I can, I think I can", as I walked around the classroom with my fellow students during the play. Another memorable class activity was collecting empty cereal boxes and other grocery items to "stock" in our pretend store. Once we had enough items, we were given play money and then played grocery shopping. Now that I'm a parent, I watch as my own two kids spend hours "shopping" at the pretend grocery store at the Minnesota Children's Museum. It's easily one of their favorite exhibits. They enjoy pushing around the mini grocery cart, filling it with bread, canned items and boxes and then bringing them to the checkout counter to scan.

My love for education encouraged me to pursue my graduate degree and I never looked back. I've always wondered where Mrs. Bowen is today. If I had the opportunity, I would thank her for the great childhood memories she helped to give me in the first grade.

Worst Trainer of the Year: 5 Easy Ways to Win the Award

This article has been published in the Learning 2011 Perspectives e-book (page 7), available here: http://learning2011.com/ebook/

There are many ways to go about polishing your facilitation and instructional design skills to win the coveted "Worst Trainer of the Year" award. Here are 5 quick and simple tips to guarantee your win!

1. Go with the flow. Instead of spending time preparing your material and searching for the next great quote or example, be spontaneous. Trainees will appreciate watching the process of how you work and how you are able to come up with thoughts and ideas on the fly.

2. Practice reading PowerPoint slides. Audience members enjoy having presentations read to them, so that they don't need to read it for themselves. It's best not to have details potentially lost in translation. Practice "being green" by minimizing your presentation's font size and maximizing the amount of information on each slide.

3. Theory, theory, theory. Participants will take you seriously only if you provide them with all of the research that back up the theories that you are providing to them. Don't waste time on real-life examples when you can create hypothetical situations to explain your material. Avoid telling stories to illustrate your point. Attendees might find them too engaging and focus on them, when instead, they should be concentrating on memorizing facts and figures.

4. Take the time to explain all of the details to your audience, no matter whether it relates to their job or not. After all, they might need to know about it later on down the road. It's best not to assume that they have experience in the subject matter you are training about. Give them all the information that they might need to know, while you have their attention. If you are training a technical computer system, explain and have a discussion about each and every button, window and field that appears. It’s best not to leave anything out. Your trainees will appreciate your painstaking attention to detail.

5. Speak in a slow and even tone. Participants might find loud and over-enthusiastic tones to be jarring. Try to keep your volume low and your pace controlled. You will know you are successful if your audience members embrace the full experience of your presentation by closing their eyes.

If you snag the award, it's likely that word about your skills will spread quickly and you might soon see an impact on your attendance levels. But have no fear, facilitating fewer classes will free up more quality time to work on winning this award again for next year.

Karen Hanson is a Minneapolis-based Professional & Technical Trainer. A passionate classroom instructor, Karen enjoys on-boarding new hires and training technical systems-based classes. Originally from Malaysia, Karen relocated to Minnesota to attend college. Karen holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration- Marketing & Management Information Systems and an MBA. Karen lives with her husband Bryan and their two children, Sophie and Jack. Her favorite food is mac and cheese (the real stuff, not the bright orange kind).

Learning 2011- live blogging

30 Under 30

I am so grateful for the opportunity that my company gave me to attend Elliot Masie's Learning 2011 Conference. As a 30 Under 30 participant, I was able to engage in extra speaker sessions and projects available only to us. The other 29 learning leaders under the age of 30 were an impressive group of well-educated and experienced professionals. It was an honor to meet them and I hope to continue to learn more about them on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. I appreciated the guidance we received from Elliot, Bob Baker, Nigel Paine and Meghan Cernera.

Some of of my highlights from the Learning 2011 Conference:

- meeting and working with the other 30 Under 30 participants and then getting up on stage with them in front of 2,000 conference attendees.
- learning about how CNN has shortened their technical training into "blitz" training. Nice to know vs need to know.
- hearing Doug Lynch from the University of Pennsylvania express his views about calculating ROI on training and what he thinks about management books like Good to Great (he's not a fan of either).

President Bill Clinton

- watching 2,000 people play heads or tails to win a night's stay at Cinderella's castle!
- Hamburger University @ McDonald's- transforming from traditional instructor-led classrooms to using simulations and blended learning. Amazing use of technology in their classrooms- electronic flip charts, pod-style tables, smart boards.
- meeting the producer of Undercover Boss, Stephen Lambert.
- getting advice from the founder of Boston Scientific, John Abele.
- hire the right people and train them for the job. They know how to have fun at Southwest Airlines. I'm curious how their training team will handle the AirTran merger.
- connecting IRL (in real life) with fellow Twitter-ers.
- listening to Bill Clinton give his keynote speech. He was amazing!

John Lithgow

- participating in the reverse mentoring session and giving advice to three "30 and older" leaders in the learning and development industry.
- meeting new mentors and having the opportunity to ask them a few (quick) questions during the speed mentoring session.
- learning about what it's like to work at Facebook and how they approach learning and development.
- watching John Lithgow perform his one man play, "Stories by Heart".
- thinking about ways to incorporate Creative Commons material/photos into what I do.
- getting inspired by the innovative mind of Dean Kamen, inventor extraordinaire.
- hearing more about non-profits such as Head Held High and FIRST Robotics.