Diplo Learning Corner

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Category: Learning (Page 16 of 25)

Learn, Unlearn, Relearn

01/10/2015 /

The Diplo calendar 2015 realized by Stefano Baldi and Ed Gelbstein presents a selection of the wisdom accumulated by humanity over the centuries that has stood the test of time and remains as valid as ever. The hope is that it will inspire you and lead you to explore the thoughts of the people who in one way or another have changed human history for the better .

For the month of October the selected quotation is by Alvin Toffler (b. 1928) – American writer and futurist known for his works discussing the digital, communications and corporate revolutions arising from technological innovation.

Oct2015

Photo credit: Anne Davis – (CC BY-NC 2.0)

10 Invaluable Books for Moving Hearts and Minds

30/09/2015 /

The Roman philosopher Epictetus once said, “Books are the training weights of the mind”.

Reading is an exercise that enriches the way we think, feel, and behave. Reading makes it possible to reach a new understanding about ourselves and the world and to expand our knowledge.

In this article, Paul Jun draws up a subjective list of the books he feels are timeless and helpful in both our personal and professional endeavors. Actually reading reflects a willingness to learn and change minds, to be open to new ideas and concepts that may indeed bolster both personal and professional endeavors.

 

Jet lag: an unexpected threat for diplomats

17/09/2015 /

What do the Suez Crisis and George H.W. Bush vomiting on the Japanese Prime Minister have in common? They both generated from jet lag. Years after the 1956 Middle-East crisis, John Foster Dulles recognized that cancelling the Aswan agreement with the Egyptian leader Nasser, which opened the way for the Soviet Union to improve its relationship with Egypt, was a significant mistake and was due to the effects of jet lag. Similarly, the gastroenteritis attack that in 1992 caused former President Bush to vomit on him and the Japanese Prime Minister, was brought on by the effects of the trip to Japan.

These are only two examples contained in the article “How jet lag hurts diplomats, without them even realizing it“, in which Dan Caldwell and William Hocking stress that the symptoms of jet lag – fatigue, loss of appetite, headaches and irritability – could crucially impair high-level leaders and diplomats who engage in significant negotiations and discussions. With a view to obviate to these bad effects, the authors suggest that exposure to sunlight and rest can help re-synchronize circadian clock and operate at the height of mental acuity. In this sense, the selective use of pharmacological agents including melatonin may be of benefit. As an alternative, Caldwell and Hocking suggest that policy-makers may return to rely on resident diplomats to represent their country’s interests and positions to foreign governments.

 Jet lag

Image source: Flickr – Hernán Piñera – (CC BY-SA 2.0)

 

Eight Deadly Ways to Kill Employee Motivation

15/09/2015 /

In this article, Lolly Daskal singles out eight ways that can kill employee motivation. In order to avoid this risk and to provide your employees with an environment in which they can thrive, it is important to pay attention to the following aspects:

  • Minimizing the damages caused by toxic people in the workplace. They spread negativity and suffocate the positive;
  • Encouraging the professional development of your employees. They will learn and grow every day;
  • Understanding the “big picture” and sharing it with your employees;
  • Showing people you value them by showing them you value their time;
  • Showing that a clear flow of communication benefits everyone;
  • The more collaboration, the more investment and the more motivation!
  • Rewarding your employees by saying ‘Thank you!’;
  • Starting with developing your own leadership, then hire and grow the best leaders at every level.

Allagash Bee Hive has a new queen!

Image source: Flickr – Allagash (CC BY 2.0)

 

 

What we’re learning from online education

08/09/2015 /

Does eLearning kill creativity and make traditional universities disappear? Or should we start to view online education and its advantages as inevitable?

Stanford professor Daphne Koller is making the college experience available to anyone through her startup, Coursera (cofounded by Andrew Ng), an innovative model for online learning. By doing this, she is enticing top universities to put their courses online for free — not just as a service, but as a way to research how people learn.

She believes that a new model—in which information is given online and classrooms are used for interactive experiential learning rather than for lecturing—could help to improve education.

Discover Lonsdale’s approach in her TED talk.

 

 

Seven Smart Habits of Great Innovators

03/09/2015 /

According to Lolly Daskal (President and CEO, Lead From Within), to stay on top you need to keep innovating.

These 7 habits will help you:

1) Constantly connect the dots, in order to gain new insight and see relationships that were invisible before;

2) Commit to asking questions, by asking new questions you get new perspective;

3) Actively try new things, the real innovation is not in seeking new horizons but seeing the horizon in a new light;

4) Find points of intersection with Others, for ideas to germinate  a diverse set of perspectives, thinkers, questioners, and doers is required;

5) Have a sense of purpose, great innovators are powered by their passion and use it as a sense of purpose;

6) Cross-pollinate ideas, creativity happens when two things collide to create a whole new idea;

7) Make innovation a daily routine, if you want to become a master of anything, it takes discipline and commitment;

Innovation Adoption Curve

Image: Flickr: Jurgen Appelo  – Innovation Adoption Curve (CC BY 2.0)

7 steps to improve your time management

23/07/2015 /

Although there is no one size that fits all solution, Carthage Buckley, on Coaching Positive Performance,  lists 7 steps that can help each of us improving our time management and the quality of our results.

1. Become aware : if you want to create real and last change you need to understand exactly where your time is going

2. Analyse your data: collect the time and the percentage of time spent on each activity and consider the results, are you happy about that?

3. Identify tasks which are not necessary: very often a task is being performed for no other reason than it has always been done

4. Identify the tasks that can be automated

5. Identify the tasks that can be delegated or outsourced: if you work alone and you have nobody to delegate to, consider the possibility of outsourcing

6. Make gradual changes: Pick 2-3 small changes that can have a positive impact on your time management

7. Right task, right time: examine your energy levels and make the best use of them. Assign your most important tasks to periods of highest energy

For more: How to improve your time management quickly

Time management

Salvador Dalì – The persistence of memory, 1931

 

 

09/07/2015 /

In this interview by Meredith Bell, Denny Coats explains why it takes time to ingrain a leadership skill. Every action that we do comes from the brain. It is only by repetition that we can strenghten the neural pathways in our brain in order to make our behaviour pattern more natural.

How to master leadership skills

Image source: Flickr – Borghy52 (CC – BY – NC – ND – 2.0)

 

Boxing with your time

02/07/2015 /

Time management is the hardest challenge of our everyday life. Because of multitasking we often struggle to focus on a single task and to well accomplish that.

Timeboxing is a special approach to time management. It consists in setting a certain ammount of your time in completing a task. Once the time is over, you must switch to another task. This approach forces you to be more efficient in order to accomplish the task before the end of the time available.

Timeboxing can be used to schedule your day but also with your team. It can b every useful in order to avoid distractions and keep the focus on waht you are doing.

This article describes this innovative approach in time management.

Boxing with time

Image Source: Filckr – Eric Montfort (CC – BY – NC – ND – 2.0)

 

 

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