Networking--Finding People for Jobs and Jobs for People

I received two contacts today from headhunters (recruiters).  One was an e-mail with a position the recruiter thought might be right for me.  The second was a telephone call asking my help in finding someone bilingual in English and French who might be interested in telemarketing for a Canadian technology company.

I network with companies who provide services I endorse (see http://www.joelmonty.net/information_links/information_links.htm).  I decided to add a job board to my joelmonty.wikispaces.com website.

I also went to LinkedIn and joined two groups who may have contacts which could help someone find that job.  For one of the groups I actually posted a link to my job board page.

Why help someone who is looking to find someone a job?  These days, so many people need jobs it only makes sense to help people who are looking to fill jobs.  In fact, people who have a job still may need contacts for a supplementary (or next) job.

I'm still looking for clients and, in the mean time, I'm happy to help others be more successful in their own jobs and in finding jobs for others.

Learning and Change--Action Steps for Teams and Organizations

Teams and organizations are created for different purposes.  In general, they have goals and intend to work together somehow to achieve these goals.    This post is a continuation of yesterday's post on Learning and Change.  There is a follow-up post focusing on individual learning and change.

Sometimes teams are more successful than at other times in achieving their goals.  Over time meta-models have been created that help explain what is going on in the groups and teams that make some more successful that others.

The Team Tracking Tool (see slide 12) is reproduced below.  Notice the "Do Not Enter" sign at the top.  Many teams and organizations think they can go immediately from inputs to outputs without moving through the process steps required.  Almost 100% of the time this spells disaster and the team or organization has to undo or redo everything--as well as recover the lost trust that failure promotes.  Note the trust building elements of the tool.  Blake and Mouton developed a Managerial Grid explaining the different focuses of people and production in teams.  (A variation of that grid is reproduced below the Team Tracking Tool and a link to Blake and Mouton's model is also provided here.)

(Click on the picture to see it separately and completely.)

Blake and Mouton created a management grid to explain the relationship of people (maintenance) focus and production (task) focus.  The grid is reproduced on Wikipedia.

(Click on the picture to view it separately and completely.)

 Both task and maintenance functions are critical to the successful progress of teams and organizations.  Over emphasis on one or the other delays the development of trust and the effectiveness of teams.  In my early career in Change Management, I learned to make people my task--thus ensuring that both task and maintenance functions were completed.  Trust is the bonding that allows teams to function well and is a critical maintenance function.

(Click on the picture to see it separately and completely.) (See slide 11.)

 If trust is not allowed to develop, synergy--the energy that allows the output to be greater than what could be produced by the sum of its parts (people) will be missing.  As new people are added to a team, group, or organization and as the vision changes, building blocks of trust need to be revisited to allow for the group energy to move freely to the next area.

NSB-Project

Yesterday I was approached by a former colleague who had volunteered with me on a CPR Sunday project we did for the American Red Cross and the city of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, in November, 1991.

Her goal was to create a new community service project or event for New Smyrna Beach, Florida.  At this point it is just a dream and I agreed to help her get it started and planned.

DrM-Resources has set-up a collaborative project page and is posting discussion questions to start the brainstorm.  After watching Julie and Julia, I believe that the evolution of this community service project/event would be a good candidate for a blog, focused on the positive and on overcoming challenges.

The blog could both document the planning and be a resource to others considering taking on such an event.  CPR Sunday was based on a successful event held in California and the NSB-Project could be the start of a series of projects/events to benefit communities throughout the USA and the world.

We are at the planning stages and have only two people actively registered on the collaboration web site so far.

Human Computer Interface and Learning--New Working Paper

Human Computer Interface and Learning

Today I was asked for a publication I have completed on human computer interface (HCI) and learning.  In looking at my research to date, I found that I didn't have one on that topic.  Most of my education research focused on best practice, curriculum, and assessments.  I have done a lot with Web2 and Wikispaces over the past year and just had never had the occasion to document what I had done.

After doing a little research on HCI, I created a new working paper today and have published it on my research page as the last article/working paper.  It's pretty short and I may revise it before I send it on to the Education Resources Information Center for publication.

I'm attaching the figure from the working paper here to give you an idea of what the launching page for students looked like last year.  You can visit it at http://drmontgomery.wikispaces.com.

(Click on the image below to make it larger.)

Learning from Experience and History--Finding Patterns that Work

Speaking with a friend the other day, I shared some meta-models that identify patterns at work.  By being aware of these patterns of behavior, positive changes can be made to improve processes, workflow, and results of organizations.  Two of these meta-models are the Team Tracking Tool (Slide 12) and the Shame Affect Decision Model (Slide 2).

These models capture processes at work that allow for the identification of what works and what may be missing or improved at work.  They were developed by observing hundreds of hours of interactions and have proved reliable over time.  In the course of our conversation it became clear that sometimes leaders in the workplace do not want to be made aware of these processes or be responsible for being able to make decisions to change what they are doing at work.

The idea of learning from experience and history are the essential ideas in my post from yesterday concerning animal spirits and the economy.   The concept is also reflected in Dan Brown's two books, Angels and Demons and The DaVinci Code.  I saw another example in a documentary today Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed.

The challenge is to reflect on our experience and on history and to learn from these reflections.  Models of processes can help in this process and, if leaders are not willing to engage in the reflection and learning process, they miss opportunities to improve and change.  These opportunities may have a small window of opportunity as the economy and world events change around them.

Representing Yourself to Businesses--in the AGR Age (After the Great Recession)

AGR--After the great recession--Perhaps resumes no longer had the value they had in earlier times in representing ourselves to businesses.  (See my profiles on the Title link.)

Resumes today seem to be an awkward way to represent ourselves in and to businesses.  More and more people have the job of filtering resumes--unless the job can be turned-over to a computer.  One of the more creative ways to produce a resume or a profile is to have a multimedia Microsoft PowerPoint presentation.  The challenge becomes more difficult as we add education, wisdom, and experience to our careers. 

Who needs to see our background?  Potential clients or customers, potential employers, potential mentors, colleagues, coaches, business partners, . . . .  The list continues to grow.  Some of the people who may want to see it will have different expectations from others who need the same information.  How do we cover the bases in ways that are most effective?

For some, a functional resume may serve--Microsoft Word 2007 has a template for a functional resume.  Many job search services offer professional advice and, for a fee, rewrites of resumes.  These may not result in the kinds of resumes or background you want to share with clients or colleagues.

Social Networking sites like LinkedIn ask for a "profile" that includes former employers and educational institutions.

Some job boards available online and employer websites want information provided in a certain way they can use to filter and sort the data for multiple candidates for positions.  Few of these sites can deal effectively with a functional resume.

I'm working on my multimedia resume for clients, customers, colleagues, mentors, and anyone else to use.  I'll let you know when I have it available.