March is here, but winter remains. Tame cabin fever with a trip to a local coffee shop to read these top five stories from CLOmedia.com for the week of March 3.
1. Iron Mountain Sentinels: Certified Peer Coaches: Iron Mountain shook up traditional, supervisor-led training efforts by certifying employee coaches so employees who do jobs every day can teach their peers. As a result, mistakes declined markedly, as did turnover and workers’ compensation claims. Journalist Katie Kuehner-Hebert has more.
2. Amid Recovering Economy, L&D Spending Heats Up: Spending on learning and development picked up in 2013, according to a new study, as companies aim to prepare to fill leadership gaps for the future. Editor Eric Short has the story.
3. Survey Reveals Most Memorable Excuses for Being Late: Nearly one-quarter of employees admit to being tardy at least once a month on average, according to a new survey, with 15 percent admitting to arriving late at least once a week.
4. The Power of Counterintuitive Thinking in Leadership Development: Developing exceptional leaders requires a counterintuitive, strengths-based approach, because great leaders are differentiated by profound strengths and not the absence of weaknesses. Bob Sherwin, chief operating officer of Zenger Folkman, a leadership development firm, has more.
5. Go Mobile?: Mobile learning is often viewed as the next big thing in learning delivery. But while many organizations have used the method effectively, it is not always the best choice. Journalist Katie Kuehner-Hebert has more in this issue’s special report on learning delivery.
On Another Note …
Rote, or busy, work is likely part of everyone’s job. Deleting old emails, surfing the Web for contact information or other administrative, sometimes mindless tasks take up a good portion of most people’s day.
But according to a new study led by Gloria Mark at the University of California at Irvine, profiled in The Wall Street Journal this week, there are hidden pleasures in mindless work.
For one, completing mindless tasks gives people a sense of accomplishment without actually exerting a lot of energy or thinking. In many cases, workers included in the study reported being happier doing mindless work, while reporting less happiness having to do work that required more thinking. Read more here.
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Also, here’s what everyone is doing wrong at networking events, courtesy of Business Insider. Read here.
