Better Resume Development Through Teamwork

Here are some of my thoughts on ways to develop or update your resume. Working with a colleague who also needs to update their resume can allow you both to effectively update your resumes. It is important to have a current resume even if you are not currently looking for another position. There are many good reasons to have a current resume. Maybe your manager wants to present expertise in their group; maybe you will be invited to speak to a class about what you do. There are many other circumstances in which a current resume is a good thing to have, so take the time to update your resume. You won’t be sorry.

To begin with, keep in mind that your resume is what you are presenting to the reader about yourself. It is what you are saying about yourself and your background. Therefore it is unwise to say how great you are, as the reader won’t be impressed with you just saying you are the best thing since sliced bread. You need to share accomplishments and results that tell your readers what you have done rather than having a statement that says you are wonderful but doesn’t explain why.

Maybe you think you need help in presenting your accomplishments. One way to get this help is to work with a colleague to identify what you each have done that shows experience and success. Here are some things that I recommend you do. Starting with documenting everything as you go along. You may not use everything, but you won’t know what you want to keep until you are done.

In general I have found that people find it much easier to talk to someone else’s accomplishments instead of their own. Here are some pointers to consider:

• List 3 work related things that they did in their current role that resulted in successful outcomes
• Describe each of the outcomes; explain what made them successful
• Explain how the knowledge and skills used to create each outcome could be applied to one or more different situations. Describe some of the different situations
• For example your colleague created a new process for handling requests coming in to the organization. You can talk to how the process could be used for other types of requests or inquires.
• Now look at what your colleague documented about your successes. Is there anything you can add to what they said about your accomplishments? What did you do that was different but yet could also be applied to another situation?
• For example you documented a process and identified where things could go wrong and the steps needed to mitigate issues
• When you are both satisfied with the 3 activities from your current role go ahead and add as many additional key accomplishments for your colleague as you can. Use the same process.
• Review the accomplishments developed for you. Are there any additional accomplishments that you want to add that your colleague may not be able to document? If yes, go ahead and add them using the same process.
• Next move down through each of your prior roles. It is likely that you will have to develop the accomplishment statements for yourself as your current colleague most likely didn’t work with you in your prior roles. Use the same techniques you used for developing statements about your colleague. Maybe you only want to list a few accomplishments or maybe even one for a previous role. That is OK; go ahead and work through your prior roles.
• When you have completed this activity, which at this point is still a draft, review what you have. Are there things that you don’t want to do again? If yes, delete them. You do not have to list everything you have done in the past if it isn’t something you want to do again.
• Do you like the way these statements are presenting you? If not work with your partner to modify them until you are comfortable with the way the statement presents you.
• Step back and consider whether there are accomplishments that are not yet listed. Work with your partner to document them.
• When you are comfortable with your success statements it is time to consider if you have too many. A resume should be no more than two pages, with white space for notes. Consider that you also need to add your education. You may also want to add a summary statement at the top.
• Once you are done you may want to share it with others to get their feedback. Does it effectively communicate what you want a reader to take away from your resume? Essentially you are field-testing your resume.

I hope you find this process helpful and that you wind up with a current resume that you can add to as time goes on. As you add things, remember that a two-page resume is ideal. If need be, find line items to delete.

Good Luck!

Evaluating and Adopting Change

We live in an age where change is constant. In the learning field there are a lot of new products, processes and methodologies that we as learning professionals should review, consider and hopefully, find some that will work for us. As we review the new, we also want to keep in mind what is already working and add or augment to what we know works for us.

As Crystal Kadakia and Lisa M.D. Owens point out you can update what you have, refreshing and adding without getting rid of what is good.

https://www.td.org/Publications/Magazines/TD/TD-Archive/2017/03/Modernizing-the-Learning-Design-Process
Association for Talent Development (ATD)
Wednesday, March 01, 2017 – by Crystal Kadakia, Lisa M.D. Owens

“Don’t throw away your existing programs just yet. You can modernize them by adding a few of the nine elements commonly seen in modern learning:
• accessible 24/7
• autonomous
• chunked into smaller bites
• easily updateable
• experiential
• self-selected
• hyperlinked to related content
• MVAK—that is, multimedia, adding visual, auditory, or kinesthetic input
• social.”

Here is another list from early in the year about the new topics for 2017:
http://www.yourtrainingedge.com/top-learning-and-development-trends-in-2017/
Top Learning and Development Trends in 2017
By Guest Contributor – 01/16/2017

Your Training Edge: Your Online resource for Corporate Training
• Mobile Learning
• Social Learning
• Adaptive Learning
• Virtual Reality
• Measuring Effectiveness

Both of these lists are good because so much is going on these days. I think when the 2018 review of the 2017 new trends and predictions for 2018 come out we will once again read about a multitude of new and innovative ways we can enhance and improve learning events in our organizations.

I think the guest author of the “Top Learning and Development Trends in 2017” has it right.

“As an astute professional, you need to keep a close eye on every development in the training and development space and other areas. Connect the dots and use newer techniques even from outside the learning and development domain to make your strategies unique and innovative.”

However, I also want to mention that we should not lose sight of several other factors to consider in modernization the way we plan and create learning materials. I believe the most important element is still the need to begin with identifying the end result at the beginning of any effort. The end result is what we want learners to be able to do as a result of what they have learned. In this way we can develop the training with a focus on what needs to be included to achieve that end result. Yes, this isn’t new, but it needs to be considered in our modernization activities.

We need to continue to focus on both how we present learning events as well as how people learn. We also need to look at things like explaining the concept or process that needs to be learned. In addition, we need to include examples, practice, feedback, and an explanation of where things can go wrong and how to prevent or fix issues. Yes, again, these things are not new but they need to continue to be mentioned as sometimes we get wrapped up in the new and we forget what still is relevant and important.

Development of learning products can be roughly divided into a few areas, formatting the content of the presentation, looking at how people learn, and determining what has to be integrated into the learning event to make learning happen. We need to give learners the ability to assess how well they are doing, which practice exercises allow them to do. In addition to practice questions about the concepts or processes, we need to provide the learner with situations that allow them to use what they have learned to solve problems. It is not enough to ask learners to explain a concept or a process; they also need to apply their learnings to real world situations. A very good way to do this is to develop scenario questions. Scenario questions describe a situation in which the learner has to apply what they have learned to respond to the question. Feedback explaining how and why things need to be done to address the situation described in the questions is critical for learning to occur. Learners need feedback and they also need pointers to places where they can learn more.

In the last few years we have really begun to make good progress in finding ways to enhance learning events. But we still need to pull all the components together, test how well they are working, and see what else we need to do. It is great that we have new tools and that we can make things available 24 seven but we still need to focus on how learning happens and what is needed for learning to occur. So let’s continue to find new ways to design, develop and deliver learning products.

Keeping Up To Date

Just about everyone should have a current (or almost current) resume just in case you want or need to make a move. But getting your resume updated – or developed from scratch – is a major undertaking. Understandably, people tend to put it off or at most add a line item from time to time.

Yet even when you do have a current resume, is it really ready to serve your needs? What I mean is, does your resume present you and what you want to do next as effectively as you’d like it to?

There are lots of places on line, in books, journals and many other places, where resume development advice is given. It seems like there are all sorts of recommendations about how to format and what to include on your resume.

There are, of course, additional steps before you get to adding, revising or beginning a resume from scratch. However, before getting to these steps I believe that you should begin with an assessment of who you are and what you want to do next. But this first step is crucial and that’s why I want to talk about it in this blog. This step will allow you to define your foundation, finding what you what to do next. Once you work through the process for this step it will be much easier for you to develop or add to your resume.

So where to begin? I suggest that you begin with a conversation with yourself. Maybe you don’t know what you want to do next. That is OK but it isn’t a reason to not work on your resume. You can begin by writing a list of the things you like to do. Choose from things you have done before. Do not limit yourself to work-related things. List everything you really like to do. At this point it is even possible that you won’t list any work-related items on this list.

Next look at your list, do you have 5 to 7 unique activities? If you have more than 7 combine some so that you have no more than 7 areas of activities that you enjoy. If you really can’t combine any of them find some that you can drop off the list. It is important to focus on a few areas rather than trying to explore too many roles. If you find you want to you can go through this process again with additional roles.

Now you have a draft list of the things you have done before and would like to do again in a job role. Take each item on the list and write a few words about what you did and when. Also write down why you liked doing what you did. If there are several times when you did this activity in different situations list all of them.

Next identify all of the activities that you did as part of a job or those that could be done in a job role. For those that are left, list a few situations where those activities can be done. Do an Internet search to see if there are places where this is something that can be done as part of a job role.

Now list all the jobs you have held beginning with you most recent role going down to your first role. Next if you have listed activities that you did outside of a job role add where you did them to your jobs list. List it chronologically so that it is listed with your job roles, as these are job roles too. Give them a title that describes where you carried out the activities. For example school, volunteer activity, social event, political, etc.

Now expand each statement. Explain what you did, what the result of what you did was and how it impacted the business or other entity. For the non-job related activities review what you found in your Internet search. Find people to contact for informational interviews or request information from these people about their job roles. Not everyone will respond but usually someone will get back to you. Find people to contact on-line, on LinkedIn or perhaps talking to people who might help you find people in those roles. Tell them what you have done and why you think you could contribute to an organization in this type of role. There are usually organizations hiring people to do what you did even though when and where you did it you were not being paid to do it.

I encourage you to give yourself an opportunity to work and enjoy what you do and also have an income stream that will support you too.

Writing Certification Exam Questions

This blog talks about some of what goes into the development of a certification exam. It is not intended to cover every aspect of exam development. If you have specific questions or want more detail about certification exam development, let me know and I might cover your questions in a future blog. There is much more that can be said and I plan to present additional blogs on this topic.

If you have expertise in an area where a certification exam is planned, you may be asked to participate in the development of the blueprint or exam questions. Blueprints are developed to guide the development of the exam questions. In general, the people who participate in the blueprint development do not also participate in the development of the exam questions based on that blueprint. Participants in the item development process use the blueprint to guide the development of questions. In addition to item developers, people knowledgeable in an area are also invited to review questions. Reviewers are assigned a subset of questions and asked to provide feedback. Generally several people are asked to review each of the questions.

The blueprint developers determine how much of the test will be devoted to each topic and the question developers review and revise as necessary. Generally speaking the item developers review topic areas and validate the assigned percentages. But, these are guidelines. It may be decided during item development that more or fewer questions on a topic are needed.

While there are many ways to develop certification exams, the key goal is to be able to certify that someone who has completed the exams for a specific area can be certified by the exam organization to be proficient in that area.

In general, certification exam item development processes require sufficient questions for multiple versions of the exam and also a practice test. The practice test is generally made available for review prior to taking the actual exam.

Most people who are involved in the development of exam questions have expertise in the subject areas covered by the exam. Very few of them have expertise in learning or exam development. Good question development is based on science. The science of how people learn and the application of that learning is an important element of exam development. This leads to better outcomes for both the exam takers and the organizations that might employ them.

In developing test questions it is important to consider what people will need to be able to do on the job. Too often questions ask for information that is a small component of the larger needed area. For example a question might ask which tools a service tech should have in their toolbox. However, knowing which tools are needed doesn’t indicate whether or not the test taker knows how to use those tools. There would need to be additional questions about the use of the tools.

One of the best ways to test the application of knowledge is to present a scenario that describes a situation. Then ask a series of questions that test the concept or skill needed to perform the work. Often the test delivery tool is limited to multiple-choice questions. However, there are ways to test complex activities or concepts using multiple-choice questions. For example a question can be posed about the order in which steps need to be taken.

Example: A tech needs to determine why a product isn’t working properly. What steps does the tech need to take and in which order?

Steps: (Which 4 steps are needed and in which order)
1
2
3
4
5
6
Answer choices:
A. 1,2,3,4
B. 3,1,5,2
C. 4,5,6,1
D. 6,4,2,1

A small scenario can be described and several questions about the scenario can be developed.

For example: Jane and Joe are driving on a road in an unfamiliar area. They need to get to a destination by a certain time to meet with the manager to discuss the services their company offers. They encounter a detour that is going to add time to their trip. What steps do you recommend they take and why?

Steps: (Which 4 steps do you recommend)
1
2
3
4
5
6
Answer choices:
A. 1,2,3,4
B. 3,1,5,2
C. 4,5,6,1
D. 6,4,2,1
Why do you recommend these steps:
A.
B.
C.
D.

Regardless of the exam delivery tool, you can – and should – develop items that ask about end results. Some delivery methods provide more question format options than others, but by keeping the necessary end results in mind, you can develop questions that will test what is required on-the-job.

Less is More

As a course developer you want to cover each topic and overall module content sufficiently to provide learners with enough information for the job or real life situations. But, what should you include and what should you exclude? You want the learner to be able to perform the work, but you shouldn’t try to teach them everything there is to know about the topic. You want to ensure they learn what they need to know to do the work but not get lost in a forest of information. So how do you decide what to teach them and how much of each topic to cover?

Recommended steps:
1. Write objective statements
2. Develop questions which will test the learners’ ability to perform the objectives
3. List what learners will need to be able to do
4. List what they will need to know for successful performance of the objectives
5. Outline steps that need to be taken to do the work
6. Map each step to “need to know” statements
7. Identify any problems someone might encounter while completing each step
8. Add the steps that need to be taken to address identified problems to the outline of steps needed to do the work
9. Add examples that show how it is done

Add whatever words are needed to communicate these ideas but don’t add anything new at this stage. This is you minimalist unit of instruction.

Ray Jimenez has a wonderful short piece addressing these concepts.

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs130/1011065179978/archive/1122903861032.html
Cut the Crap!!!
Ray Jimenez, PhD

As Ray Jimenez says “Simplifying your content is a conscious design choice. It means getting into the shoes of your learners and including only what you have thoroughly assessed and determined they really need. What’s not necessary is dropped and what is retained are only the stuff that matters.”

Now look at the questions you wrote for the objectives. Do they cover everything you have outlined? Is there anything that needs to be added to either the questions or the outline based on this review? If yes, add what is needed. What you have now produced is your draft lesson. If possible find one to three members of your target population to pilot the lesson. If you don’t have members of your target population available to field test the training, find someone who doesn’t know the topic and ask them to work through the instruction. Sit with the field test participants as they work. Ask them to identify anything that isn’t clear or if they have any questions. Consider what they say and make revisions that you believe are necessary. Unless you believe something really should be revised immediately, collect and compare all field test comments before making any revisions, and then only make revisions that are critical for understanding the objectives.

This may seem a bit involved but like anything else, a good foundation will prevent or decrease problems down the line. Later on in the process it will likely be more difficult to make revisions.

And following my own advice from this mini lesson, here is where I will stop and ask for feedback. Please provide feedback, questions and comments.

Thank you!