Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Featured in T+D Magazine

Forgive me!

I forgot to provide a link to a recent article where I was featured in the April issue of T+D Magazine, the trade journal for the American Society for Training and Development. By the way, the picture of the guy in the article - it's not me.

I am delivering an abbreviated version of my "Generation Shift" presentation at ASTD's International Conference and Expo in San Diego the week of June 1-4. If you happen to be attending the conference, my presentation is on Wednesday, June 4 at 8:00 a.m.

Monday, May 19, 2008

A Fellow "GenerationXpert"

As I was poking around some websites over the last few days, I spent the most time at and around www.brazencareerist.com. While viewing a story about working from home, I noticed a blog response from Suzanne Kart, who goes by the moniker "GenerationXpert." I followed the trail to her blog: http://genxpert.blogspot.com. She shares my interest in the generations in the workforce and Web 2.0 tools, spending a bit more time exploring the marketing characteristics of each generation. I hope that you take a look.

Friday, May 16, 2008

Millennial Marketer

Is your organization striving to recruit Millennials? Well you might want to learn from one of their own. Meet Jeff Taylor, the Millennial Marketer.

Thursday, May 15, 2008

DHS Joins Virtual World

From Anne Laurent at The Agile Mind Blog yesterday:

http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20080514_8611.php?zone=ngtoday

Excerpt:

The Homeland Security Department is joining the military services, intelligence community and a growing number of other agencies in the virtual world.

The National Guard plans to hold large-scale training exercises using the platform, in which people are represented by avatars and locations are modeled as generic town squares, where building and street signs change....the DHS virtual classroom will allow real-time communications via Voice over Internet Protocol, instant messaging and exchange of presentations, documents and other materials.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Feds Turning to Online Tools to Capture Knowledge

Here's a great article from the Federal Times:

http://www.federaltimes.com/index.php?S=3521664

An excerpt:

Federal agencies are increasingly turning to online technology to hold on to the decades of knowledge that baby boomers will take with them as they retire in coming years. Officials fear that without robust knowledge-retention programs, agencies will lose details of their histories, or forget how certain programs worked and be doomed to repeat past mistakes.

Officials say videos, articles, blogs and other information programs posted on the Internet or intranets are the best way to efficiently pass that information on to younger employees. Knowledge stored online can be accessed at any time and any place — removing the need for employees to travel to hear lectures — and can reach more people than one-on-one mentoring relationships can, they say.

Monday, May 12, 2008

88% of Millennials Support Public Service Academy

A new study conducted by SocialSphere and sponsored by the McCormick Tribune Foundation reveals strong support among Millennials for a U.S. Public Service Academy.

The Public Service Academy is an idea of two Gen X'ers to create the civilian equivalent of the military academies - an undergraduate institution where students attend for free in exchange for a specified period of service in the public sector.

The idea benefits every generation, encouraging Millennials to consider a career in public service and offering Gen X'ers and Boomers a forum to share their experience and expertise with their successors.

Retiring Boomers and A New Collaboration Web Site

Almost every day, I receive several news articles via Google Alert based on some key search terms like "Generations in the Workforce" or "Government and Wikis." I also belong to several listservs, such as NextGov and GovExec. I scour these multiple resources to make them available in one convenient place. Here is today's round-up of relevant headlines:

1. Retirement Rate Could Begin to Affect Service Delivery: A nonprofit organization warned this week that if federal agencies do not move quickly to recruit new employees and retain experienced ones, impending retirements could affect the services Americans receive from government.

2. Study Documents Baby Boomers' Plans for Working in Retirement: "A succession of surveys over the past decade makes plain the plans of a new generation of older Americans to keep working. Most of this research reveals that four of five boomers are expecting to continue working at the point when earlier generations moved to the sidelines," according to the MetLife Foundation/Civic Ventures New Face of Work Survey.

3. NAPA Launches Collaboration Web Site: If you've ever wished your federal agency could adopt wikies, use You tube or delve into the virtual world but feared the security, technology and political barriers were to high to overcome, take heart. You've got support, and they have success stories.

Friday, May 9, 2008

Federal Hiring Post Baby Boom Brain Drain

Stephen Barr from the Washington Post:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/06/AR2008050602713.html

The article contends that the wave of retirements is upon us with an increasing number of Federal employees retiring in the period 2002-2006: from 30,000 to 45,000 annually. The peak is supposed to be 2008-2010 with 60,000 employees filing for retirement each of those three years.

The Federal Times also had an article this week that discussed a Federal initiative to recruit new, young workers:

http://federaltimes.com/index.php?S=3514196

Coming and going, crisis is also opportunity.

Government in a Wiki World

As I mentioned a couple posts ago, last week I delivered a workshop for Federal training officers called, "Wikis and Webcasts and iPods, Oh My!"

Over the last couple days, there was a great two-part article in NextGov called "Governments in a Wiki World": Part 1 and Part 2.

Also, here's an EXCELLENT article from Governing magazine.

The articles strongly reinforce my suggestion that wikis are powerful tools to promote information sharing and learning within and among government agencies.

OPM Striving to Improve Federal Hiring

A recent Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) survey of new Federal hires revealed that the primary obstacle to employment was the long and cumbersome application process. The Office of Personnel Management is striving to eliminate that obstacle by streamlining the process. Check out this article in today's Government Executive.

Friday, May 2, 2008

Wikis and Webcasts and iPods, Oh My!

This past Tuesday, I delivered a presentation entitled, "Wikis and Webcasts and iPods, Oh My! Tools to Train the "New Learner." The slides and handout from that presentation are found at the following links: Slides and Handout. In fact, I learned about a new website in order to make these documents available on a blog. Check out http://www.scribd.com/ if you want to learn more.

Thursday, May 1, 2008

Young Workers a Headache for Agencies?

In Federal Computer Week, there's an article that addresses the challenges (and positive aspects) of younger workers and their use of technology:

http://www.fcw.com/online/news/152402-1.html

Do you agree with the notion that younger workers create headaches for their organizations or is their aptitude with technology a "net" positive?