The career college sector of higher education has always been mission-driven, and despite a few bumps in the road, has always had students' interests at heart. Particularly in the last couple of years, many institutions have realigned themselves with their core mission and values in the changing career education landscape - still so very much focused on teaching employable work skills to help adults accomplish their career goals and objectives.

I have long been an advocate of mission statements - not just for the aggregate institution, but for individual departments as to how they see their work in concert with who… >>>

Performance Management and Professional Development are ongoing and correlated processes. An effective development plan goes beyond the listing of training courses completed and affiliations maintained. A development plan should link the results of training and other professional activities to improved performance. For example, classroom observation should show how the instructor has applied and implemented the training received and the resulting improvement in identified developmental areas such as successful instructional planning, interactive teaching techniques and effective classroom management.

To make the development plan more meaningful, the observed improvements in faculty performance should be assessed against the desired student outcomes. Those… >>>

One of The Lounge's bloggers and online course participants, Joseph Eid, recently commented that a teacher moving around the classroom is like a manager walking around the workplace. This is another good example of how our learning environment mirrors the workplace.

I like to refer to it as "pulse and pace." When an instructor moves around the classroom or lab, he or she can get a sense of the "pulse" of the environment - where the interest is, where lack of attention might be, where there is understanding and where there may be the lack thereof. Getting into the learning… >>>

I know that many of the Faculty Coaches in the CEE Facuty Development Program have leadership, supervisory and/or management positions with their institutions and so I wanted to resurface a brief blog to overview, in bullet point form fashion, seven principles for leading a diverse educational team. Of course, much of what we discuss in the Faculty Coach Consortium may be in line with the workings of the CEE program, teaching methodologies, and instructional tips and techniques to share with our instructors. From time to time though, I hope that we can also address our supervisory roles and share best… >>>

We have the opportunity to talk a lot about team leadership, but what about the team members themselves? What roles should they play in the successful teambuilding process? Below are just a few bullet points that focus on teambuilding from the member's perspective.

Effective team members  

. Clearly understand their team's purpose as well as their own responsibilities

· Participate in team activities and carry their weight (in other words, they do their part)

· Hold themselves personally accountable for results

· Respect the differing talents and personalities around them

· Develop a sense of trust that carries to… >>>

In our preparation questions, not only should we focus on the desired outcome(s) and skills, but also on the additional planning needed to deliver an effective training experience:

• What resources are needed to deliver the training and to help participants acquire the expected or required knowledge and skills? Prior to training, we must identify the materials and support resources needed for the event or program. These are both the resources required to effectively deliver training as well as what is needed by the participants to engage in the process.

• What delivery strategy, or strategies, will I use to… >>>

Whether it's the classroom or the training room, the adult learner expects the same level of preparation to maximize the learning experience. Here are the first three of six questions that may help as we prepare our instruction and facilitation for the training environment:

1. What overall outcome is required or expected? Every training event should have an overall and definitive outcome - this keeps the focus on the purpose of the training and serves as a foundation to the specific skills needed to support the desired outcome.

2. What knowledge and skills do I want participants to… >>>

I have had the honor and opportunity to blog previously on team-building and team leadership, but I ran into these additional pointers below and wanted to share them. Effectively leading your team to performance results requires 

1. Matching specific tasks to the knowledge, skills and abilities of different team members 
2. Clear expectations from the leader and identified resources are crucial to completing a team project
3. Ground rules are a must
4. Encourage participation through praise
5. Hear, speak, show, do - in other words, lead by example
6. Balanced teamwork among members requires effective delegation
7. Make sure team members know why they have been… >>>