Survey Monkey

Anyone ever use Survey Monkey? I have used it to take surveys other people have developed, but never put a survey of mine on it. A week ago I developed a survey for IAWP awards. The Awards Redesign Team wants to gather input from members about awards before making any recommendations for change. I had a paper survey and decided to try my hand with Survey Monkey. It's a free online product that allows you to put a survey online and send a link to people to complete the survey. The free version allows up to 10 questions and 100 responses. I think it will be a much better way to get responses because people don't have to print a document and fax it or scan and attach it. I have it out to the Team to review before sending it to members. Once it's finalized (hopefully tomorrow) I will send it out to several members and also post in on this Blog.

Meet me in St. Louis

I returned from the IAWP board meeting in St. Louis on Sunday. My compliments to President Rich Vincent and the entire board for a terrific meeting. It's one of the best I have ever attended for keeping on track, discussing the issues, and planning for the future. I felt a real spirit of friendship with everyone on the board. We covered a lot of issues but the one near and dear to me is the online WPDP testing that I have worked on and blogged about over the past couple of months. The board approved my recommendation to divide each of the current study guides into 4 modules and place the exams online using "Hosted Test." Now the work begins of accomplishing the work. There were many other issues discussed and approved and I will blog about them later in the week.

Reading, Reading, and Reading

I am trying to prep for the IAWP board meeting that starts on Friday. I printed off the rather large board packet, double-sided to save a few trees and to make it lighter to carry. If you know me even a little, you know I like to be prepared and am totally off-kilter if I am not. I have made it through the last two board meeting minutes as well as the committee and subcommittee reports. I was starting on the district director reports when I decided to take a blog-break. I am looking forward to seeing my fellow board members and friends and spending a little time getting to know them better. I will keep you posted on the outcome of the meeting.

Google Docs

I was playing around with Google Documents trying to educate myself a little on the technology available these days. I believe technology is to be embraced, even if sometimes the learning curve seems long and involved. I think IAWP can especially benefit from using the latest technology. With these extremely busy times, it can make projects go much smoother and take less time to accomplish tasks. Google Documents is an application where someone can initiate a document or import a document from their computer and share it in real time with others via the Web. I can see this as a good idea for committee assignments, WPDP updating and development, awards collaboration and lots of other things. As I discover more about it, I will blog about it and hopefully get some of you to explore and share other technology.

A Day of Training

The Montana Chapter of IAWP put on a terrific institute. Three main speakers took us though the economic outlook, seeing the best in others, and conflict resolution. There was time for interaction with the group and time to ask questions and give specific examples and "how to" tips. I enjoyed the day and meeting many wonderful Montana chapter members.

District 14 Institute

I had a long drive today from Boise, Idaho to Missoula, Montana by myself today to attend the IAWP District 14 Institute. I almost didn't get to come because my mom has not been feeling well this week but said she was much better today, so I took off at 8:00 am this morning. It's a full 8-hour drive and not hardly a straight stretch of highway in between. (No interstate.) Plus it rained off and on all day, but as soon as I arrived I saw DeeDee Baker, the District Director and immediately felt at home as I always do when I visit Montana IAWP. This is the second time I have been in Missoula for a district meeting, plus I have attended meetings in Kalispel, Bozeman, Helena and Great Falls over the past 30 years and remember each one with very fond memories. Another perk of belonging to IAWP, friendship and camaraderie abound! Remind me again why everyone in workforce development doesn't belong? Tomorrow is a full day educational session which looks like it will very good. I will report on it tomorrow.

Fastest Growing Jobs

According to CNNMoney.com's Fortune, nursing jobs followed by network/data analysts, software/application developers, biomedical engineers, accountants/auditors and veterinarians are the fastest growing jobs in the United States. It caught my eye because my daughter is a veterinarian and my son-in-law is an IT developer. Being in the workforce for 36 years and in the workforce development arena for 31, I have seen a lot of changes in the types of jobs in demand in our workforce. I would like to take credit for the wise career decisions of my daughter and son-in-law but they made them on their own, based on aptitude and interest. They achieved their career goals through education and hard work and I am very proud of both of them. For those of you who work in employment services or job training programs, knowing the labor market and staying informed on the latest information will help customers with their career goals and you might be able to influence your children or grandchildren into sustainable occupations. IAWP is one way to stay informed and updated on the many area of workforce development.

Labor Day

Monday is Labor Day and being that I have worked in the workforce arena for the last 31 years, this weekend is a time to thank everyone who works or has worked in workforce systems. Providing unemployment insurance to workers stabilizes the economy and provides workers with partial income replacement when they are out of work through no fault of their own. Employment Services helps the business community and the worker, bringing both together in a successful partnership. Job training programs help those that are disadvantaged in the workplace by providing on the job training and classroom training to help them reach their workforce goals. I hate to think what our country would be like without these programs. Happy Labor Day to everyone past or present who have chosen to be part of workforce systems everywhere.

Board Report

I completed my board reports today - one for the Awards Redesign Team and the other for the online testing project.

I made a recommendation to the board that IAWP selects HostedTest as the provider of online test services for the Workforce Professional Development Program (WPDP). Another recommendation is to break each of the 4 WPDP modules into 4 components each. This would result in 4 study guides and 4 corresponding tests for each WPDP module. It's my belief that the program will be more attractive if it's presented in smaller chunks. People are more apt to sign up to study a 30 page study guide and take a 25-questions test than the current 100+ page study guide and 100-questions test.

As for the awards redesign, I outlined the plan to look at the membership and individual/group group awards (merit, citation, administrator, UI, veterans, etc.) by December 31, 2010. Then starting in January, we can work on the chapter awards (education, legislation, professional practices, etc.) Our goal will be to have a recommendation on them by the June 2011 board meeting in St. Louis.