Week 10, August 21-26

I am writing the last two installments for this blog as I wing back to San Diego. I can't wait to go home, but I did fall in love with Boston. Not sure if I would feel the same if I were there in winter. I am also not sure yet I fell in love with the kind of work I did there, but I really enjoyed the experience. I felt I could survive and even thrive in a corporate setting and am now open to the possibility of leaving San Diego, at least for a little while, if the right opportunity presented itself. I was made to feel I have something to offer and that the skills I have learned through the EDTEC program are prized.

This week I finished all my assignments. Everything was wrapped up early Friday afternoon. I was taken to lunch twice by people who wanted to say goodbye and on Friday I had two end of experience wrap-ups. One with Kevin Thompson, who has one of those glass offices, and another final talk with my "mentor/supervisor" PeggyChopp.

Kevin was interested in my "Aha moments." I gave him three. What I related in my earlier posts about the "reaching out" culture, how they were sincerely trying to use the theories and language of EDTEC and lastly about Virtual Teaming. He didn't realize their reaching out culture was so special. However, he said when I explained it in terms of reaching out passes learning, and that it also creates connections that can help youadvance up the corporate ladder, he said he had never thought of it that way, and said it was an excellent observation. He was very pleased I felt they were sincere in their application of EdTec concepts. He said that it was a recent phenomina brought in by the professionalism of Peggy Chopp and Rick Valdez. He related that he recently cancelled a group's proposed training because they had not applied the "A" of the ADDIE model. They had not done enough analysis and planning. Lastly, he said that all the previous companies he had been with did not embrace Virtual Teaming like BAC . He said he didn't like it at first, but after about 45 days he became acclimated to doing business that way. Some days he has up to eight solid hours of phone meetings. On those days it doesn't make sense for him to come to the office, so he just stays home. He did emphasize that there are many things that still cannot be replaced by physical presence.

Later that afternoon, I had my wrap-up with Peggy. We went into one of those glass offices, closed the door and had a private conversation. I reiterated what I told Kevin and told her home much I enjoyed working with her and that I learned a lot from both her words and observing her in action.

She's a career woman in every sense of the word and knows how to survive in the corporate world. She gave me a two final pieces of advice. I mentioned to her that my last class would be one where we create portfolios and that I plan to test the waters, job-wise. She really encouraged me to do this and said one thing I needed to make sure I was able to do was master the interview. "You need to have down the elevator speech about Don Dean." The "elevator speech" corporate-speak for making a pitchabout something in the length of time of a typical elevator ride, about 3-5 minutes. "I'm the master of quickly telling others what PeggyChopp is. I got that way by interviewing a lot. You never turn down an interview. By doing them you not only develop your interviewing skills, you also find out what's out there and you can find out about the company that wants to hire you." (Referring to herself in the third person gave me the impression that she has a corporate persona and a non-corporate one.)

Through the interview you can find out a company's culture, if it's growing or not, etc. She recounted one company that really seemed like they wanted to hire her at first, but they kept interviewing her time after time in this department and that. She realized this was a company that had a hard time making a decision and she decided to not work there. She found out later her instincts were correct and that company is now floundering. She also said monster.com has excellent advice about how to interview. Even though her four year stint there was not a happy one, she did say their online advice is very solid and well-researched. She also saw the Website from the inside, the side only recruiters see. They use a list of questions with potential answers from job seekers. There's an A answer, B answer, C answer, etc. She knows what the A answers are supposed to be, in other words, what they are looking for. She now responds accordingly when interviewed. She said this was her greatest "take away" from that job.

I asked, "So you like to interview for sport?" She said, "Essentially, yes," because she learned to master and even enjoy the process, she's been able to stay employed, even during the down cycles that always come.

The second piece of advice was about age discrimination. I mentioned that I was concerned about my age. She agreed it could be a problem, but to always make sure my resume didn't make me look old. She said when they looked at my current resume they didn't think I could be over 35, but were surprised when I arrived. This was actually a good thing, because I got my foot in the door and they were very impressed with what I could do. She herself is not young, but she always tries to present herself as young as possible so she can get the chance to prove herself. Once you're in, you're in. Then it's a matter of working hard and staying current with the latest trends and technology.

Then she gave me a gift and a complement I'll always treasure. I'm a history buff, which is one of the things I love about Boston. She gave me a book of Boston photos that show what it used to look like and compared to what it looks like today. It was the perfect remembrance of my visit. Then she paid me the ultimate complement in the pantheon of Peggy compliments. She said, "Don, you worked your ass off." That made me grin from ear to ear.

Epilogue

On the flight home the woman sitting next to me is from Tijuana and speaks little English. She's on the flight with her husband and two small children. He's Bangladeshi and in the visitor industry. I was able to use my broken Spanish and carry on a conversation. Struggling with my Spanish and seeing them as a family gave me a warm, I'm-coming-home feeling. I miss San Diego. Most of all, I miss my family. However, I'm excited about what the future may hold.

Week 9, August 14-20



This week I kept working on the the two main assignments I had, cleaning up a previously created course and porting a class from being live to online. I also conducted a study meeting by phone for our team. They wanted me to give an overview of the latest advances in EdTec. Additionally, I made a new friend in the office. The enigmatic man in the corner office who never said hi.

The Assignments

There’s not much more to report about the assignments I was given. I tried to use the interactive features of Lectora and Captivate to emphasize certain information in the courses so the learners would be able to do more than simply read information or look at charts. It’s a baby step toward interactivity.

The Conference Call

On Thursday our team held it’s monthly study meeting. Usually I've been on the receiving end of a conference call. This time I was on the giving end. It's a mixed bag. Since you can’t see who you're talking to, and those attending use their mute buttons a lot, you can’t tell if they are really paying attention or even in the same room as the phone. It’s a little disconcerting and takes some getting used to. Despite the sense of speaking to an empty room, I plunged on.

Since they wanted me to give an overview of the latest developments in Educational Technology I decided to talk about what I had learned in some of my courses at SDSU and my experience teaching mulitmedia and video production in high school. First I talked about podcasting and pointed out that on the subway most people are listening to music using iPods or something similar. Since this is how people are starting to get their media now, this is a method they may have to use in the near future to do their training.

I then shared one of the videos my students made and had uploaded to the Web. They use a site called YouTube, a kind of video MySpace. People from all over the world see them and comment and my students comment back. I emphasized this is how the next generation of bank customers get their entertainment. I also did a search on YouTube for Bank of America. Most of the videos were of skateboarders. There seems to be a whole genre of skateboard videos involving doing tricks on the metal rails and steps in front of Bank of America branches. They had no idea. I also found a bank-produced video that showed how to do online banking (see above). This was an example of an educational video that can now be shown not only on the Web, but also on iPods and cell phones.

Additionally shared some things about GPS and Geotools. I had them do a Zee Map with me. In real time they could show on a map everywhere they were located in the US, or anywhere in the world. They could see a good application for this as an icebreaker when doing meetings. I told them they could also use things like this to show branch locations, ATM locations or whatever, and associate information or even Web sites with the locations. We also talked about the use of GPS with cell phones and how things like GoogleEarth and other Geotools have potential as instructional aids.

I ended with a discussion of gaming and showed them the role playing game that Wells Fargo had created to teach teens how to do banking and handle money. The fact that a competitor had already created something like that really caught their interest. Even though these things may not have an immediate application for Bank of America, they all agreed as the current “digital” generation ages and becomes employees and customers instructional design will need to start using these tools extensively.

The Mystery Man in the Corner Office

Across from my cube is a glass enclosed “private” office. To rate one of these spaces you need to be an upper manager; a manager of managers. For eight weeks the man who worked there never said a word to me. I figured he was really busy. The nights I worked late he worked late, too. Usually he was still there when I left. This week we were both there on Friday until after 8pm. I was trying to get my projects done before I left and was wondering if it were ok to come in over the weekend. Remembering the “Reach out” company mantra, I knocked on his door and asked. He was more than happy to answer. He asked what I do and said he was very impressed with the long hours I worked. He then talked to me for about an hour about what he does and what’s happening at BAC.

His job is compensation. He decides what to offer people to encourage them to join the company or to stay. He’s only been with BAC a few months. He worked long hours in part because his family is still in Virginia and he needs something to occupy his time. He also loves his work and new company. We commiserated about missing our families. He explained to me what the “organic” growth of the company really means. Essentially BAC has bought nearly all the major banking companies that it can in the US. Currently 1 out of every 3 people in North America has a relation with Bank of America, usually through a bank account or a loan. What they are focusing on now is hiring thousands of new employees who’s job will be to increase existing business. He said this will amount to what is essentially an acquisition without an acquisition (a stealth acquisition?). They are in the process of re-examining the traditional way the sales force has done business and are creating a new role that’s more service oriented, less commission driven.

He said that nowdays fewer people are getting into the banking field and the competition for good employees between the major players is now fierce. He himself was lured to BAC from another firm. Now he helps lure others. He mentioned that the coming 5-10 years will be an exciting time for BAC and the need for trainers and instructional design for the new hires is going to be great. Just like financial service people the pool of qualified instructional designers is shrinking, which means they will be able to command higher compensation. Maybe this will be a new golden age for Educational Technologist?

He then gave me some great career advice about how to increase my chances for a job offer for any company I may want to be an employee. Since that conversation we now talk a lot. He’s been nothing but encouraging and very friendly. You never know what surprises await behind those glass walls.

Week 8, August 7 – 13

This week I kept working on the projects I was given, especially the Lectora created training for Portfolio Edge, a financial investment product. I had an interesting conversation with Mary di Mora about her background, the virtual office, and where I could fit in with BAC. I spoke with Greg Nicossi about his feelings toward the virtual office, too. I also heard about a new marketing trend – Virtual People on MySpace.

Mary Dimaria

Mary Dimaria  was not originally an Educational Technology professional. She entered the field through the banking industry, specifically stocks and bonds.

In college she got a bachelor’s in psychology and then an MBA. The MBA led her into working for an investment company. Initially she was assisting one of their top stockbrokers. Then the company had all the assistants for their top people obtain their own broker’s licenses so they could perform some of their more mundane work. While she was with this company they started to transition to online stockbroking. The old-line brokers were scared to death of the new technology. Mary embraced it and was soon tapped to start training the old pros. Eventually, doing this informal training turned to holding regular formal classes. Next, her company developed a business of training other companies in the new technology. Mary, who has a warm, open personality, combined with strong organizational skills, was a natural to create and conduct the courses.

Mary explained the financial industry is very cyclical. In boom times companies do a lot of hiring. When there’s downturns many of those employees become consultants. She said as long as you understand these cycles you can do well as a trainer in this industry.

I asked Mary how she handles being a mother of three and her work responsibilities. She said that one thing that really attracted her to work for BAC is their embrace of the virtual office. It allows her the flexibility to be both a mom and a professional. She emphasized that you actually end up working longer hours at home than at the office, but you can more easily take care of a family responsibility, such as participating in a carpool, when you need to.

In fact, the book her group has selected to use next for professional development is Virtual Teaming by Jude-York, Wise and Davis. She said it describes methods to help office workers in virtual teams interact better and become more productive. Especially important is being able to build comradery, trust and avoid miscommunication.

One thing Mary mentioned was the importance of phone communication as a substitute for face-to-face interaction. One technique the book mentions is to try to match the voice of the person you’re speaking with. If they are speaking fast, speed up your voice, if slow, reduce your speech rate. If the other person speaks in high tone, raise your tone a bit, too. According to the book it makes the other person feel more at ease and improves mutual understanding. Another interesting idea was to do things socially together by phone, such as eat lunch together and talk about personal things, not business. She said you do have to meet in person from time-to-time, though, to really get to know the other person. There is one person on her team that lives in Dallas. They had not met in person for two years. About a year ago they finally got their entire team together in person offsite and held some team-building activities. She said that made all the difference. Even though she hasn’t seen this other person since, their working relationship is vastly improved.

Another employee, Greg Nicossi, seconded what Mary told me. He works from home 2-3 days a week. His supervisor is in Charlotte, so I doesn’t matter to her where he works, as long as the work gets done. He's thrilled. His wife is about to have their first baby, so this flexibility is very welcome. He also said he actually works longer hours at home, too. When he comes into the office it’s a one hour commute each way, then he needs to spend time getting ready for work. When he’s home, he still takes a shower and brushes his teeth, but he doesn’t spend the time getting “suited up” and especially driving to the train station and riding on a crowded train. (In this office no one drives a car to work. If they drive, it's to a train station.)

However, the phenomena that I started to experience teaching online is that after a while you feel like you’re on call 24/7 and you’re never really off work. Students demand your attention on their schedule. In addition, there’s a real sense of disconnect after a while. I'm hoping to use some of the techniques I learned here when I teach online.

Virtual People

As an aside to Virtual Teaming I just heard of a new trend in marketing a couple days ago. They are now creating virtual people. This mostly revolves around MySpace.com, the personal Web page phenomena. For instance, movie promoters are creating mySpace pages for fictional characters and and pretending they are real people. For instance Ricky Bobby, aka Will Ferrell, of the movie "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby" and some of the Pirates in the “Pirates of the Carribean” movie have their own sites on MySpace where they give personal infomation and even respond to email. SecondLife is also a big venue for this, but there you interact with 3D avatars instead of Web sites.

The worlds depicted in “The Matrix” and “Minority Report” are getting closer to reality.

Week 7, July 31 - August 6

This week was somewhat calmer than the last two. My supervisor, Peggy went on vacation. Even though I was somewhat on my own, I was given several assignments that more than occupied my time. The highlights this week were a conversation with Rick Valdez, who's Peggy’s supervisor, my visit to Siggraph at the Boston Convention Center, and a visit to Maine to see my brother and his family. I also found out B of A is a not how employees are supposed to refer to the bank (and especially not bofa).

SIGGRAPH2006

SIGGRAPH2006 was the 31st International Conference and Exhibition on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques. This year it was in Boston (next summer it will be in San Diego). It's put on by AMC SIGGRAPH, which stands for "The Association for Computing Machinery Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques." A real mouthful. I’m a card carrying member of AMC SIGGRAPH.

Holding the event in Boston allowed easier participation by Boston’s tech community, especially MIT’s renowned Media Lab. There were also more European companies in attendance than usual. This put the focus more on research and less on Hollywood.

I was able to attend Sunday afternoon and Monday after work. My general impression was what’s coming in media is much more intuitively interactive and able to mimic and alter reality at a high level. Also, everything is on a convergence course with things like cell phones, ipods, televisions, home appliances, cars, and even clothing. I also found out our EdTec program is keeping up with the cutting edge by teaching things as how to use ipods, gaming and GPS in education. SecondLife, a role-playing game platform we used in the gaming class, and GoogleEarth, use in the GPS/Geotools class, both had impressive booths. One of the keynote speeches was given by John Lassiter of Pixar/Disney – via ipod video.

Speaking of cloth, I saw a presentation by Autodesk, a company that creates 3D modeling and animation software, of an amazing breakthrough in how to digitally reproduce the effects of cloth. They were never been able to accurately reproduce this before. The writing of the algorhythms took years of research. They demonstrated it by showing how they could adjust the movements of a dress on a dancing model. When the 3D model stopped dancing the dress she wore kept moving due to their momentum just as it would in real life. By altering the properties of this digital cloth they were able to get even more unexpected effects. For instance the "cloth" could accurately reproduce ocean waves and incredibly realistic skin, complete with effects that mimic how skin can hang down a little and wobble as someone moves.

Another clothing related breakthrough was a fiber-optic thread that could be woven into cloth. They showed how this could be used to make clothes that became computer displays or even a kind of wearable computer. Talk about wearing your emoticons on your sleeve!

Much of what I saw was controlled interactively by touch. For instance there was a screen similar to the one used in the movie "Minority Report" that eliminated the need for typing. You simply touched and pointed to operate the computer.

What does this mean for Educational Technology? It’s hard to predict but certainly it provides exciting channels for learning and makes digital multimedia assessable practically anywhere at any time by ever smaller devices. A lot of people in EdTec are also hoping for the day they can get rid of their keyboards and use speech, touch, or even thought, to enter and manipulate information. It’s also a challenge for educators to stay abreast of the latest and greatest technology. If they don't they risk being irrelevant. This creates more work for instructional designers. The other challenge is to not be so wowed by the technology that well-thought-out courses take a back seat to doing cool stuff. The good news is that many of the advances make technology more user friendly than ever.

Conversation with Rick Valdez

Rick Valdez is from Utah. He did undergraduate work at BYU in psychology, but became interested in practical applications for the psych theories. He heard about the Instructional Technology program at Utah State headed by Dave Merrill and made the switch. He considered it to be applied psychology – a chance to apply cognitive and behavioral science to learning.

In graduate school he worked for a research group that created an early version of an online authoring system. This experience led to a job with a company that was making laser disk training for the Air Force, an early version of interactive e-learning.

In fact, his career has followed the arc of development in interactive technology. First it was slides stored in carosel viewing machines, then laser disks, CD Roms, and now the Web. In each case a technology with a high capacity was replaced by one with an initially lower capacity because the new method was more convenient and cost effective. However, the amount of information that the new technology could convey always soon exceeded the old technology.

Rick and Allison Rosset’s paths crossed when he used to work for Click to Learn. They met at a conference and he asked to come on campus to do some recruiting. He sat in on one of her classes and was very impressed with her and our program. He’d like to renew his connection with EdTech at SDSU. He feels it’s one of the top three programs in the country, especially now that Dave Merrill is no longer with Utah State.

Their first meeting was also a little embarassing for him. His company was demonstrating a new technology at the conference. An interactive computer character that could give verbal responses to scripted questions. At the conference there was a glitch and the computer character either gave the wrong response or didn't respond at all. Allison kept ribbing him about this when they ended up sitting next to each other at the conference.

Rick has developed a couple instructional design theories of his own. One he calls Reusable Learning Architecture, or RLA. His idea is that Reusable Learning Object work best if combined with RLAs. In other words RLOs, the Legos of learning, should be contained within a repeatable structure, meaning that courses will use a similar look and feel. This helps reduce development time dramatically, while providing the learner with a familiar learning environment that allows them to focus more on content and less on delivery method. We are instituting this at the bank by archiving our classes and creating a number of templates that can be adapted for nearly any use. He's also working on another theory. It is a learning approach that's a kind of corporate version of Project Based Learning, that takes a holistic approach to how people learn. He's published a white paper about it, but it's still a work in progress.

I told him I recently heard that the bank doesn't like to be referred to as B of A. BAC is preferred. He said he used to make the same mistake when he was with Click to Learn, but instead they were calling the bank bofa (pronounced bow-fah). He found out it was frown upon when his company helped produce some cutting edge training for BAC, that ended up being abandoned. He then told me the story and said it's a case study that illustrated the importance of not using technology for the sake of using technology and the importance of doing solid analysis before creating training.

One of the learning managers at the bank was given a blank check to create world-class training for bank tellers. She decided to create a virtual environment where the employees could see a 3D computer representation of a teller station and interact with it. Included was going to be special gloves the future tellers could wear to count virtual money. One of the things this project required was the purchase of very expensive computers that could only be used for the training. It cost $1 million for the computers alone and they would no other use. This set off alarm bells in Rick's mind. Another thing was the special gloves for counting virtual money. You never touched real money, and money counting requires physical touch, not simply counting techniques. Rick said, "You always train to the required skill." Why buy special computers when the tellers had to be able to count real money anyway? Wouldn't real cash or a facsimile be more effective and less costly? In the end the "black check" wasn't really a blank check and a bank official nixed everything.

The company that was making the virtual teller environment was located in Sweden. Rick got a nice trip to Stockholm an was able to learn a lot about virtual worlds, before the plug was pulled. Plus he had a good lesson in the importance of doing proper analysis before going on a spending spree creating an educational product.

Personal Notes

I had another wonderful weekend at the Kennebunkport home of my brother’s parents-in-law. This time I rode the train up. It was stress-free compared with fighting the weekend traffic. I wish trains were more convenient to use in San Diego.

We spent Sunday morning on a sailboat off the Maine coast. We saw Bush the Elder motor past in his high-powered cigarette boat, similar to the ones used in Miami Vice. His secret service detail could barley keep up. They even let me operate the tiller for a while.

My brother and I haven’t been very close over the years. This was a chance to renew our ties and become like brothers again. I applied the BAC spirit of reaching out to make the effort to contact and visit them. In a personal sense this is the most valuable thing I’ve learned this summer.

Week 6, July 24-30, 2006:

This was a light week at work. We made our deadline, then made some minor fixes to the published training. Team members were relieved and giddy. I was finally able to schedule a lunch meeting with my supervisor, Peggy. She also assigned me to another project. As a reward to myself I went to see "An Inconvenient Truth" which was both scary and inspiring.

A Sense of Triumph

In the middle of last week there were a lot of worried executives. They thought we wouldn't make our deadline. At that time there were still a lot of things to correct and the simulations in a couple chapters had yet to be finished. On Friday the course was published on time. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Our team started getting email message from top executivcongratulationing us. My name was mentioned by the Vice President of Learning in an "all hands" meeting praising my contributions. A number of people came to my cubicle to personally congratulate me. Apparently, to be mentioned at this meeting is a real honor. Needless to say, I felt good.

There were others who worked much harder, especially Chris in San Francisco who pulled several all-nighters and worked the weekends to make the deadline. Being both a student and teacher, I'm used to working nights and weekends, so the extra work I did wasn't a stretch for me. Long hours do wear on you after a while. I hope for a more regular schedule, someday. But not because I'm out of work.

Meeting with Peggy

Peggy has been an Instruction Design professional for many years. Her career ranges from working for a defense contractor, a major manufacturer, dot com companies, and, now, the Bank of America. She's professional, hard-nosed, detail-oriented, passionate about training, very knowledgeable, and has some great war stories. She's also been more than kind toward me. She's been generous with her time and knowledge, given me a lot of encouragement, and fought to make sure I have what I need to do the work.

She began as a speech therapist, primarily for autistic children. She noticed a trend among her peers. They were dropping like flies. The work was burning most of them out within 2 to 5 years. She began looking for a new career.

Her parents, who lived in St. Louis at the time, invited her to stay there a while. Her father suggested she get a job with McDonald-Douglas. That's where she began her career in instructional design. The great thing about McDonald-Douglas, she observed, was that they are a defense contractor. This means that the model they used for instructional design comes straight from the military, the fountainhead of the field. She didn't like defence work that much, but she did discover she loved instructional design.

A year and a half later she moved back to Boston and got a Masters Degree in Instructional Design at Boston University. She also began working for the Gillette Company, which was headquartered in Boston. (They were recently purchased by Proctor & Gamble.) In fact, a few blocks from my office is where they make the razor blades. She really enjoyed working there. Her job was to help create the training for work procedures to manufacture some of their new products. This was a challenge because most workers did not speak English. This helped her learn the importance of knowing your audience.

The next most memorable times in her career, though not necessarily the best of times, was her stints with dot com startups. One dot com shall remain nameless and the other was monster.com. She didn't work long at either.

A friend, telling her about the millions of dollars employees were making through IPOs, lured her to work for the startup. She suggested Peggy work there a couple years, then cash out with a huge nestegg.

She recalls the first day she drove into the company parking lot in her sensible compact. Here was a Porsche, there was a Porsche, everywhere a Porsche. In fact there seemed to be nothing but Porsches, until she saw the Lamborghini. Later, she attended a company party. Everyone was dressed somewhat professionally, except for one guy in torn jeans, long hair and a t-shirt. She asked about him because he looked so out of place. He was the mail-room clerk -- and the owner of the Lamborghini.

The management was disorganized and money crazy. All they would talk about was their expensive cars and the latest homes they purchased. When they had meetings they would eventually devolve into shouting matches and nothing was decided.

Without doing any analysis they demanded training programs to teach the sales people how to increase sales. Soon Peggy realized no amount of training could help. The problem was one of motivation. When their company went public, before Peggy came onboard, all employees were given a large amount of stock that increased in value astronomically. However, they cannot sell that stock for at least a year after the IPO. She discovered the sales people didn't care about sales because they didn't have to work to make money. All they had to do was wait out that year making minimum effort. Then they could cash out, become millionaires, and retire.

She got out of there as soon as she could and is glad she did. It turns out their previous comptroller was backdating stock for people so they could take advantage of the IPO bonanza. This came to light when that comptroller left and was replaced by one who knew the law and was honest. When the new comptroller pointed out the illegality of backdating to management and refused to do it, she was fired for her troubles. She then reported them to the Securities and Exchange Commission. Not only is this company now bankrupt, the employees are being investigated for insider trading. Large fines and jail time for some are in the offing. I wonder what happened to the Lamborghini?

Monster.com, was more of the same, though not nearly to the same degree. There, too, some employees are now being investigated for insider trading. The major problem with monster.com, according to Peggy, is that they kept changing their marketing plan every month. They couldn't decide what they really wanted to be or do, besides offer job listings. This was an impossible situation for a trainer. She often felt like a Den Mother to a group of Cub Scouts. Gratefully, she was laid off. Luckily, the Bank of America position fell into her lap soon after.

In my first post I mentioned that everyone here seemed to be with the company a short while. It was a mystery at the time. Now I know why. It's because the company has changed direction from growing through acquisition to growing organically by increasing the business from the customers they have. The divisions we service, Global Wealth InvestmentPremiereent and Premeire Bank & Investment, are two new groups dedicated to organic growth.

After her experience with the dotcoms she's glad to be somewhere that has a professional and careful approach to business. She said right now is a good time to be in training here because the bank is now very training-minded, and is very open to being much more innovative in how they conduct training. They are not just trying to be more innovative with training, they are also constantly innovating the way they do business, which creates a need for training.

Peggy also gave me some words of warning about this field. For any company, the training department is usually perennially under-funded and understaffed. This is good news and bad news. The good is you always have plenty to do. The bad is you can easily burn out if you don't pace yourself. Another negative to keep in mind is when there are layoffs, training is usually the first go and the last to be brought back.

When asked about the value of getting a PhD., she said at this level it wasn't necessary. However, if you wanted to work with leadership training and organization building a PhD. would be a real plus. She said organization building is less interesting than training, but the pay is higher.

Another place a PhD. would be needed is if you wanted to work in the educational technology department of some place like Harvard. Her dream is to be able to work there. She said it's nearly impossible to get in, but it's important to have a dream.

About My New Project

My new project is to take a current course that was last delivered live and convert it to one given online. In addition to the change from live to online, the product has been updated because of new regulations and some problems they had with it in the past. In my next post I'll write more about that experience.

Personal Notes:

An Inconvenient Truth

Last Tuesday I celebrated the completion of our project by treating myself to seeing, "An Inconvenient Truth." The global warming message was incredibly powerful and brought home by a brilliant series of computer generated graphics on PowerPoint type slides. The images of how many highly populated areas would be underwater if the seas only rose a few feet were especiasideffective. Putting asside the message of the movie, it was the way the information was presented that blew me away. They made a dull facts seem exciting and urgent.

This is my dream -- to combine my love of images, film, computers, animation and writing to create effective and compelling presentations that help teach others an important skill so they can advance in life -- or help give them the knowledge and wisdom needed to make this world a better place.

I told my roommate about this film. This morning, before I left for work, he showed me he bought Al Gore's book, An Inconvenient Truth. He said I inspired him to get it. At this time he doesn't know much about the environmental problems, but he now wants to educate himself about it. He said perhaps it was good Al Gore didn't become president. He suggested he would be remembered in history for awakening humanity to this problem.

Since he's in the Korean Foreign Service, who knows how his decision to study environmental issues will affect his nation or the world in the future. Perhaps he will become a high official in his government or even the United Nations and help influence a change. Time will tell.

SIGGRAPH is Coming! SIGGRAPH is Coming!

Even without Paul Revere I found out SIGGRAPH is coming to Boston July 30 - August 3. This is the 33rd Annual International Conference and Exhibition on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques. I bought a ticket to attend. More to come next post.

Week 5, July 18-23, 2006:

This week my family returned to San Diego and I started putting in 12-14 hour days so we could meet our Friday deadline. On Sunday I went to Harvard Square to have sushi with an adjunct professor who teaches at the prestigious Berklee School of Music. We had an interesting and wide-ranging conversation that among other things touched on the frustrations of being and adjunct and global warming.

Since we were scrambling to finish our project on time and error free the week is somewhat of a blur, however there were some things that stood out. One was how I saw the “reach out” B of A culture in action, another was how in the midst of the craziness they took time to still hold a monthly meeting where they study an instructional design together, and I developed a confusion about writing objectives I need to clear up.

Reaching Out in Action

One of the tasks they gave me was to create a graphic that illustrated a step in the sales process using the Client Connections Integrated Desktop. In order to match the typeface of the original graphic I had to obtain a font I didn’t have in my computer. I asked Peggy, my supervisor, what to do. She suggested I send and email to woman in the marketing department. I did and got a phone call back from her almost immediately. She said that font is not an approved B of A font, but understood when I said the art was created by an outside vendor. She then gave me someone else to email. He didn’t have the font, but knew where I could get it. He forwarded my request. By the next morning the font was in my email.

I don’t know who I was dealing with, where they were or anything. They didn’t know me either, or even what I was doing, exactly. However, because we were working on a project for the bank I got all their attention immediately and they quickly responded to my request. Reaching out really works.

Monthly Study

Even though they were working very hard to finish the CCID project they still took time to reflect and study for an hour on Thursday. Each month this team holds a semi-formal meeting where they discuss some general items, then study one or two chapters of a book together. They then discuss what they read in context of the work they are currently doing for the bank. After that they reassess their accomplishments the previous month and renew their determination to get closer to their department goal for next month.

The book they studied was Performance Consulting: Move Beyond Traning by Dana and Jim Robinson. The main point of discussion was to strive to get to the consultant level of performance analysis. In other words, those who are creating the training get to the point where they are consultants instead of order takers.

The difference is consultants are brought into the process at an early stage and help decide what kinds of training are needed and how to approach it. The current reality is still a top down approach. Management decides what needs to be done and somewhat directs how to do it. They discussed the need to "push back" a little more and insist on more analysis before a project is undertaken. They feel they’ve made progress in this area, but have a ways to go.

I was impressed by their spirit to never stop studying and to help each other deepen their understanding of the field. I guess you could also call this an Instructional Design Book Club.

Peggy asked me to deliver the training at their next meeting. She wants me to tell them what’s new and interesting in this field. Guess I better figure this out quickly.

Objectives

Writing objectives is a big deal here. It’s considered an essential step in all the training and built in to forms used for planning. However, I’m a little confused.

The way I learned about objective writing in EdTec 540 was similar to the ABCD method below:

• Audience – Who? Who are your learners?
• Behavior – What? What do you expect them to be able to do? This should be an overt, observable behavior, even if the actual behavior is covert or mental in nature. If you can't see it, hear it, touch it, taste it, or smell it, you can't be sure your audience really learned it.
• Condition – How? Under what circumstances or context will the learning occur? What will the student be given or already be expected to know to accomplish the learning?
• Degree – How much? How much will be accomplished, how well will the behavior need to be performed, and to what level? Do you want total mastery (100%), do you want them to respond correctly 80% of the time, etc. A common (and totally non-scientific) setting is 80% of the time. http://tlt.its.psu.edu/suggestions/research/Write_Objectives.shtml

The thing that always seemed to be missing from the objectives written for our training at the bank is the condition. I seem to remember that you’re not supposed to say upon the completion of this training the learner will be able to do such and such. Instead, you’re supposed to be more specific with your conditions. However, all our objects start with upon completion of this chapter, or course, etc.

Then I was looking through the textbooks I use for the courses I teach. They each had the same thing for objectives – “Upon completion of this chapter, you will be able to…” Is this a legitimate condition or not?

Conversation with J.T., Berklee Adjunct Professor of Music

An organization I’m a part of has a chapter in Boston. I went to one of their activities recently and met J.T., an adjunct professor at the world-renown Berklee College of Music in downtown Boston. We struck up a friendship and decided to go to Harvard Square for sushi. He knew a place that was cheap and good.

Before we went he gave me a demonstration of ProTools, a Mac-based system for music production and mixing. He’s an old-time jazz guitarist who stays on top of the latest technology. At my high school we’ve just obtained ProTools and I have yet to master using it, so I really appreciated the demo.

J.T. is an author of one or two books about guitar playing, a composer, and has played with many of the jazz greats all over the world over the years. The piece he played for me that he made using ProTools was a kind of experimental, smooth jazz. He personally played all the parts on the recording except drums and had recorded it in his apartment. The guitar was synthesized so it actually sounded like an organ. He's an incredible musician.

I asked him about his experience teaching at Berklee. He said teaching there was one of the major goals in his life. The place is music heaven, especially jazz music. A perfect place for someone like him. However, it’s become a little frustrating teaching there. He’s been there over 12 years, but they still keep him two hours a week below the level of a regular professor so they don’t have to pay benefits or let him accrue tenure. He laments the politics involved in faculty decisions. He’s planning on leaving Berklee in the near future if something doesn't change soon.

I fully understand his situation. I’ve been with one community college for going on 7 years. I’ve made three attempts to be hired full-time. The last time they wouldn’t even interview me. I originally entered the EdTec program to improve my chances for full-time employment at a college. I’ve all but abandoned that dream and am starting to seriously look at the corporate world. On the other hand I love what I’m doing at my high school, MVAS. I just wish they paid a wage that matches San Diego's cost of living.

The adjunct system is cruel. Once you enter it seems almost impossible to advance. I heard a commentator on NPR describe adjuncts as bottom feeders. She said once a school realizes you’re willing to work under those conditions they try to keep you there. For those who have another job and teach to simply pick up some extra money, it has advantages, but for those who desire to do it as a career it’s an unfair two-tier system. Especially galling is what I’ve read recently about the pay abuses in the UC system. Something needs to be done to make this situation more equitable.

It turned out J.T and I have a lot of mutual friends, so we reminisced about that, but at one point we started talking about global warming. We talked about the recent killer heat wave in Europe. He said he used to climb mountains there and that a friend recently sent him pictures of some of the glaciers. They have receded dramatically. For so many years people pooh-poohed this. Now there seems to be a sea change in attitude. It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the near future.