Organizational Development: How to continue your progression in the field

One of the questions or dilemmas from a class for Organizational Development was how would I continue to learn and apply knowledge of organizational development when the work we do is never transactional and the dynamics we experience in our organizations will challenge us to think differently and pointedly.

I posted this as an answer to this dilemma/question:

"I think that a great first step now that the class is wrapping up is to reread the textbooks at one’s leisure. Also, analyzing one’s organization or workplace, really looking at the benefits, the policies and procedures they have in place, then using what we learned here to ask where the organization can grow or do better for their employees.

There are also a bunch of Organization Development (OD) and OD related organizations that have free newsletters online or email lists that cover various topics which deal with LMS systems, Training and Development techniques to free downloads for presentations, which I have signed up for and assisted me in my school work or the workplace.  It is a matter of signing up for the right one is the challenge because some of these sites are just merely trying to sell you something.

Another way I am applying my knowledge of Organization Development is by writing a blog on subject matter that revolves around the field, then I am also connected through blogs and on social media with other professionals that discuss best practices and operational tips that consistently give them success in the field."

Hopefully, this may have some “tips” or make some light bulbs come on when you are thinking about what you are going to do as you leave graduate school and make your way out into the field. Possibly you can be a professional looking to extend your reach and brand hopefully this old posting can help. Are there any other tidbits that you can think of that may help other professionals or students learning about the field just near them in the comments section below.

Organizational Clarity: upcoming topics

Looking through old assignments and found a couple of useful things that I can post upon here to help give some clarity to the field of organizational development. I noticed that many students and professionals post a few blog posts online with some great information but after a while either get disillusioned and quit or did it for an assignment then stopped after completion.

I started the blog as an assignment but decided to add more to it because there just is not a lot of information about the field out there. Plus, if there is any information it is usually disjointed or all over the place, giving the researcher multiple sources with bits and pieces everywhere. Hopefully, these new posts will streamline that process for everyone and make researching for material and sources easier for everyone.

Organization Clarity (OC) blog collections on Google Plus part 1

I have created two collections on Google Plus for the Organization Clarity (OC) blog and public usage, these are just basic logos and a bunch of ROI mockups. I have posted about twenty-two ROI mockup images and about twelve Organization Clarity blog wallpapers. I am just testing some images because of the lack of content out there and for our own use, my audience (you) and I. You may notice that for the Organization Clarity blog wallpapers I focused on using the Blogger address first, that is because this site gets the most views however I will be working soon on the Wordpress site of the OC blog.

I love creating my own images even as basic as they are, this way I have the freedom to tighten up the image and manipulate it as much as I want. I hope that everyone can enjoy these images and add them to their day to day blogs. I will be adding more images as time goes on, to increase, the amount of materials that students, professionals and anyone else can use. I used Microsoft Powerpoint and Paint.Net for these images so they are very basic, however, visuals are very important in presenting information, with this fact very well known, you will be seeing these images in future posts on the Organization Clarity (OC) blog.

Organization Clarity (OC) blog wallpapers collection:

https://plus.google.com/u/0/collection/QSGUHE

ROI mockup images collection:

https://plus.google.com/u/0/collection/QbAhCE

Organizational Clarity: “25 Creative Image Effects for Stock Photos in E-Learning #156” article

From the Articulate community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “25 Creative Image Effects for Stock Photos in E-Learning #156” by David Anderson.

This article ties 25 projects that emphasizes the use of creative image effects for stock photos when you are using them in the E-Learning process. This allows you to bring the learner’s attention to the object or main idea of the presentation, this helps the learner maintain a visual of the subject matter and retain the knowledge learned at that time.

Each link is simply discussing the methodology or reason each presenter took as they approached this issue, in maintaining the focus of the learner. They are very brief so even though this article gives you a lot of links and examples it is really not that time consuming, you may even find some ideas you can use in your own presentations.

If you want to know more just click the link here:

https://community.articulate.com/articles/image-styles-and-effects-in-elearning

Organizational Clarity: “PowerPoint '13: Whimsical Course Template” free download

From the Articulate community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “PowerPoint '13: Whimsical Course Template” by Trina Rimmer for a free download.

This Microsoft PowerPoint presentation download was made with the 2013 version of PowerPoint made up of fourteen slides and would give any presentation or training session, a great look and feel to it.

Although it's free, this download contains great characters, icons, layouts and presentations of multiple uses. This is just one of those free downloads that have a lot of thought put behind it, to the point that it looks very professional as if done by the Microsoft Corporation itself

If you want to know more and download this PowerPoint just click the link here:

https://community.articulate.com/download/powerpoint-13-whimsical-course-template?

Organizational Clarity: “Why are Organizations Migrating From Classroom Training to E-learning?” article

From the CommlabIndia community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “Why are Organizations Migrating From Classroom Training to E-learning?” by Aruna Vayuvegula. Creating a LMS for an organization that has international or a global reach is a challenge, to keep costs down the basic tenet is to stop training or allow in-house training by managers.

However, this is not always effective, so getting the organization’s training department around the world or at two or more sites simultaneously an organization must think outside the box. This is one of the reasons that organizations choose E-learning as a usable option to meet these challenges as an extensive global organization.

E-learning is a great option to reach employees no matter where they are and assist in their professional growth in and out of the organizational span.

These are the five reasons why organizations move from Classroom Training to E-Learning:

1.       Need to update skills to match growing business needs

2.       Compulsion to keep training costs low while not compromising on training hours

3.       Need to train a large and dispersed workforce

4.       Demand for flexibility in knowledge transfer

5.       Need to track training completions and effectiveness

After reading these five reasons you can understand the desire for many organizations to move from one theater to another. Meeting the employees halfway on these training courses by allowing them to complete sessions on their own time, goes a long way to achieving the cooperation and involvement of employees in the learning process (for the organization). If you want to know more just click the link here:

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-design/migrating-from-classroom-training-to-elearning

Organizational Clarity: “New Employees Will Love These 5 Fresh Org Chart Freebies” free download

From the Articulate community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “New Employees Will Love These 5 Fresh Org Chart Freebies” by their Community team.

It is always stressful when new employees enter the organization for both the new employee and established employees (and management) this article gives links to free downloads which will help relieve some of that anxiety. In order for the new employees to be able to put a name to a face and reduce the time it takes to explain who’s who in the organization these downloads take all the hard work and effort in making sure “everyone knows everyone”.

In the article are links to downloads for organizational charts, where you can add pictures of established employees and their titles. So that the “chain of command” in the organization is clearly established from the beginning, new employees then know who to turn to for possible questions or problems that face the “newbies” in their first 90 days in the organization.

If you want to know more just click the link here:

https://community.articulate.com/articles/new-employees-will-love-these-5-fresh-org-chart-freebies

Organizational Clarity: "ETEC 561 Fall 2012: Section 4: Human Performance Technology" blog

This is a blog that briefly discusses Human Performance Technology the main thing you can take away from this is the graphic of the ASTD HPT Model and possibly, if you are a student you can use as that much needed reference for a project. Please click the link to learn more:

ETEC 561 Fall 2012: Section 4: Human Performance Technology: Not all problems in learning and/or performance require an instructional one. Many times a non-instructional approach is a more ap...