by Ashley Andrus, President of Zoe Training & Consulting

Even when times are good and budgets are flush, it can be easy for managers to view training and development as a cost rather than an investment towards bottom-line returns. When the economy is tight, and your boss has ordered you to cut your 2009 budget by 15 percent, and across-the-board spending freezes are the order of the day, justifying programs can feel like an uphill battle.

When done right, people development pays long-term dividends for your organization: morale is better, turnover drops, your ability to recruit qualified employees improves—and that’s all above and beyond the resulting skills enhancement and performance efficiency improvements (that result). Even in lean times, workforce development remains a “must-do” for forward-thinking organizations.

The question then becomes prioritizing possible initiatives and stretching the most that you can out of your training and development budget. Some practical suggestions for maximizing your resources include: Read the rest of this article »

by Gina Schreck

In the past 7 days, I have Linked In with 23 people, written on my daughter’s Face Book wall, sent 3 Jott messages to myself (my memory isn’t as good as it used to be), and read at least 12 Jott messages from our daughter’s soccer coach, who uses it constantly to send broadcast messages out to the parents and girls. I set up a new Ning network to check it out and see what that has to offer after reading an article in Fast Company. I have attended 3 different meetings in Second Life with my avatar, where I met two new business contacts on our island, and even “followed” my husband’s appointment activities using Twitter.

In that same week, I listened to 3 podcasts on different business topics, took some short video footage of my daughter’s winning football toss at field day using my Flip Video camcorder (where, by the way, she whooped all the boys), and then loaded them onto YouTube so her friends could watch them. I constantly use the Bluetooth connection in my car to talk on my cell phone, and can’t live without “Gloria,” my GPS (Gloria Petunia Schreck is the name my daughters gave her), to find me the closest Starbucks!

At Synapse 3Di, not only am I one of the founders, but I am the DIGITAL IMMIGRATION OFFICER. My job is to help those of us over the age of 35 immigrate into this foreign land of digital technology. While I have accounts and profiles at all of these places and I am more connected than a person really has a need for, I do not consider myself a “hyperconnected” individual. I check my email and text messages throughout the day, but check in on most of the other accounts perhaps 3 or 4 times a week. But look at those 20-somethings in our work environments or in our homes: they are connected 24/7—at work, home, restaurants, everywhere. They are hyperconnected! Read the rest of this article »