I walk the exact same 1.5-mile route to and from the office every day, so I'm probably not a shining example of someone who embraces change. Consistency, yes; change, not so much.
But after recently reading John Kotter's penguin fable, "Our Iceberg Is Melting," I was inspired to work on my change mind-set (it seems to be working as I wouldn't have thought of putting a penguin on the cover of Training before). I admit I was a little embarrassed to be seen in public reading what appeared to be a children's book with its humongous print and full-page penguin illustrations. But I furtively huddled in my seat on the Long Island Railroad and soon became immersed in the story of how Fred the emperor penguin discovered his home was melting and teamed up with his cohorts to find a solution, even though it meant dramatically changing their thought processes and lifestyle.
The correlation to today's competitive business environment is clear, and companies would do well to train their employees to embrace and lead change. See Changes with Penguins for an exclusive Q&A with Harvard guru Kotter and case studies of three companies—MasterCard Worldwide, Kaiser-Permanente, and Black & Decker—that are successfully implementing change initiatives.
Convincing employees that change is good is no easy feat, but persuading them that forced ranking—a performance-based comparative evaluation tool—is a good thing may well be impossible. Controversy continues to rage about this system, but most agree it is here to stay. Check out Keep Forced Ranking Out of Court to see how trainers can play a crucial role in helping their organizations to deploy the system effectively, consistently, and fairly.
Forced ranking can help to identify high-potential employees—and so can Training magazine. With the help of our Editorial Advisory Board, we chose the 2008 Top Young Trainers age 40 and under. See California Teamin' for coverage of the awards program held May 5 during the Training Leadership Summit at the Rancho Bernardo Inn in San Diego, CA. I also want to welcome the Top 10 Young Trainers to our Editorial Advisory Board; I look forward to your input and insight.
Looking ahead, on the events side, Training magazine Events now is accepting speaker proposals for the annual Training 2009 Conference and Expo (to be held February 9-11, 2009, in Atlanta). Submit your proposal online here.
And now for the moment you've all been waiting for (judging by the e-mails flooding my inbox)…the 2009 Training Top 125 application is now available! Please visit www.trainingmag.com/msg/training/top125/index.jsp to download the application, which is due September 22, 2008. Also, please participate in our 2008 Salary Survey. If you have any questions about the Training Top 125 application or Salary Survey, please call me at 646.654.4497 or send me an e-mail. I look forward to hearing from you.
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