Training Industry Blog

It's the end of the year and it's a good time to sit back and reflect on some of the things the industry has taught me this year. My bet is you will agree with some, and others may strike a chord.

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This year has been one heck of a year and one that evokes the full range of emotions…. anger, worry, conservation, uncertainty, desperation, and in the background the mere fact that we are here should be viewed as being blessed. If we take just one bit of time to disconnect ourselves from these fear driven emotions we would realize that no matter what the future might bring, and what the past has slapped us with, we still can have hope be our guide.

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In a recent article, in the Huffington Post titled Microsoft's Kinect Selling Twice As Fast As The iPad. It was stated that while the adoption rate of the iPad was fast, Microsoft has sold more units of it’s Kinect product faster than the iPad. It has sold over 2.5 million sensors within the first 25 days on the market.

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TV fans are in for a good show next February, when “Jeopardy” presents a unique event, pitting its two top human champions against Watson, an artificial intelligence computer created by IBM. For the training industry, this is more than just another ratings stunt: It’s a good glimpse into a possible future that’s not just powered by technology, but driven by it. Answer: A brave new world where computers do more than store data. Question: What lies ahead?

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Hark the herald, the season’s here, it’s time to enjoy, some holiday cheer. With another December drawing to a close and another new year waiting in the wings, now is the perfect time to celebrate the season while we celebrate the successes behind and ahead of us. So fill a cup of egg nog, bask in the glow of your holiday lights and take a peaceful moment to reflect. Oh come all ye faithful, training is triumphant.

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As if social media didn’t have a hard enough time getting off the ground in corporations, the repercussions of the WikiLeaks drama will certainly put a damper on organizations thinking in terms of internal correspondences. First people might confuse all wikis with something like WikiLeaks which is not the case. Wiki is just the name of a web site that is fast and easy to update. Second, and more importantly, social media might get painted in an unflattering light based on the actions of one web site.

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The following is a guest blog by my colleague, David Spader, which I’ve decided to run at this time because of its timeliness for those companies currently running the risk of self-delusion’ from such patterns as market-given success and increasing industry consolidation being pushed by OEM’s. David is a consultant with Spader Business Management (ddspader@spader.com), a company with a proven track record of providing both financial and human performance guidance for a variety of industries for the past thirty years. In his most recent book, How the Mighty Fall, Jim Collins shares interesting insights related to the decline of successful companies. One of the key practical applications of his research is that this process of decline is like a ‘disease’---harder to detect in the early stages but easier to...

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As one of the world’s largest shipping companies, Maersk Line certainly knows about moving goods from one place to another. But sometimes the internal flow of knowledge and information travels a less direct route. That’s about to change: The company is on the verge of implementing a new process for working with outsourced suppliers, a process designed to reduce the time to competency for Maersk Line’s global workforce and create more strategic partnerships for the delivery of learning & development. All aboard: This ship is about to set sail.

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Anyone that has engaged in or explored the possibility of outsourcing will tell you that there is an abundance of information on how to choose a location, prepare your organization for political fallouts and pick a supplier and negotiate a sound bargain that may result in many rewards (as well as post contract transitioning, engagement administration, and contract renewals). What they don’t tell you , and many won’t share, are some of the intricate details that de-rail and often result in a catastrophic sourcing experience.

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