The Mindtools L&D Podcast

It’s a wrap! In what is traditionally our ‘least listened to’ and ‘most unhinged’ episode of the year, we’re celebrating the festive season with some reflections on the biggest talking point in L&D: the emergence of generative AI. And we’re joined by special guests, ChatGPT (our first AI guest!) and Bedford Falls’ own George Bailey (making his annual appearance). Ross Garner is joined by Owen Ferguson and Ross Dick to discuss: ·       How have tools like ChatGPT and Bard evolved over the year? ·       How are we using them? ·       What’s coming next? ChatGPT then asks its own questions, with a spattering of festive zingers. And George shares his observations on the prevalence of AI, and provides an insight into the Baileys’ favourite drink at this time of year. In ‘What I Learned this Year’, Ross Dick recommended two newsletters: Platformer and One Useful Thing. And Ross G wanted to provide the phone number for Samaritans: 116 123 You can also visit their website: samaritans.org For more from us, including access to our back catalogue of podcasts, visit mindtools.com/business. There, you'll also find details of our award-winning performance support toolkit, our off-the-shelf e-learning, and our custom work.    You can also email rgarner@mindtools.com Connect with our speakers    If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with our speakers: ·       Ross Garner ·       Owen Ferguson ·       Ross Dickie

Hey listeners! Here's a fun stocking filler for you: Throughout this year, Rosses D and G have been writing The L&D Dispatch, a weekly newsletter from the Mind Tools Custom team. In this bonus episode of The Mind Tools L&D Podcast, we reflect on the effort involved to write a newsletter, the personal benefits we've experienced from doing so, and how our use of AI tools for content production has evolved over the last 12 months. Never heard of it? Subscribe now at lddispatch.com

In the past, we’ve always talked about Virtual Reality training in the context of skills that are expensive to learn or dangerous to practice. But Lucie Coudret and the team at Cappfinity are using VR for coaching and leadership development. In this week’s episode of The Mind Tools L&D Podcast, Ross Garner and Owen Ferguson speak with Lucie Coudret, to discuss: ·       The advantages of VR for coaching and soft skill development ·       How to overcome the cost and technical hurdles of providing VR learning experiences ·       How the VR ‘fad’ has continued to evolve and improve, even if it’s not always in the spotlight, During the conversation, Lucie referenced PwC’s study into the effectiveness of VR for soft skills training. She also referenced the DICE model (Dangerous, Impossible, Counterproductive, Expensive). Details of the VR EY Summer Internship, developed by Cappfinity, are on YouTube. Ross referenced the popularity of Snapchat’s ‘My AI’, which by June of this year had been sent 10 billion messages. In ‘What I Learned this Week’, Owen recommended Lenny’s Newsletter. Ross recommended The Rest Is History podcast. For more from Lucie, see luciecoudret.com For Cappfinity, see cappfinity.com For more from us, including access to our back catalogue of podcasts, visit mindtools.com/business. There, you'll also find details of our award-winning performance support toolkit, our off-the-shelf e-learning, and our custom work.    You can also email rgarner@mindtools.com Connect with our speakers    If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with our speakers: ·       Ross Garner ·       Owen Ferguson ·       Lucie Coudret

Ever launch a workshop that no one attended or an e-learning module that nobody accessed? It’s surprisingly common: and one reason is that we’re not always great at marketing our L&D initiatives. In this week’s episode of The Mind Tools L&D Podcast, Ross Dick and Owen Ferguson seek to reverse this outcome with the help of Ashley Sinclair from MAAS Marketing – the world’s only (we think) marketing agency focusing specifically on L&D. We discuss: ·       Why L&D teams need a marketing strategy ·       What an effective marketing strategy looks like ·       How to measure the ROI of a marketing strategy   For more from Ashley, visit maas-marketing.co.uk Ashley’s podcast is at maas-marketing.co.uk/podcast The Mind Tools reports that were mentioned are available at: mindtools.com/business/research Ashley also mentioned the LPI’s ‘Workplace Learning Report’ In ‘What I Learned this Week’, Ross D discussed the BBC’s new series on Shakespeare., He also the Netflix series ‘Big Vape: The Rise and Fall of Juul’. For more from us, including access to our back catalogue of podcasts, visit mindtools.com/business. There, you'll also find details of our award-winning performance support toolkit, our off-the-shelf e-learning, and our custom work.    Connect with our speakers    If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with our speakers: ·       Ross Dickie ·       Owen Ferguson ·       Ashley Sinclair

AI Conversations using ChatGPT offer safe practice for difficult conversations, providing realistic feedback. Discussion on feedback, user capability impact, and references to research papers. Mention of World Economic Forum's report on future jobs and HuddleCraft for peer support. Exploration of generative AI applications, hybrid skills in career choices, and the value of liberal arts degrees in the job market.

Explore the 'rider' and 'elephant' in decision-making for behavior change. Discuss reasons for non-compliance and designing effective workplace learning. Delve into willpower, marketing psychology, and reducing compliance training costs. Learn about systemic changes, exercise enjoyment, and challenges of untrained managers.

The menopause, a natural transition that women experience, is finally becoming an open discussion topic in more communities. Does this mean that women have the understanding and support they need to thrive during this time of their lives?  In this episode of The Mind Tools L&D Podcast, Gemma is joined by coach Jayne Saul-Paterson, and Nahdia Khan to discuss women’s experiences and how they can be improved. We talked about: ·       The workplace difficulties experienced by some women during their menopause transition ·       How women can seek help during this time ·       How organisations can better support women.     Jayne referenced several resources during the episode.    The BSI Group’s ‘Understanding menopause and menstrual health – Guide’   NICE Guidance Menopause: diagnosis and management   Fawcett Society report Menopause and the Workplace   balance’s Menopause homepage and Menopause at Work survey results   In What I Learnt this Week, Nahdia noted important points from the Better Management Report: ‘Taking Responsibility – why UK plc needs better managers’ For more from us, including access to our back catalogue of podcasts, visit mindtools.com/business. There, you'll also find details of our award-winning performance support toolkit, our off-the-shelf e-learning, and our custom work.   Connect with our speakers    If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with our speakers: Gemma Towersey Nahdia Khan  Jayne Saul-Paterson RCDP  www.gspcoaching.com Instagram @coachjsp

Healthcare is a difficult environment to work in, where decisions literally mean life or death. Combine that pressure with diverse roles, shift-based workers and difficulty getting time away from the frontline - and you have less-than-ideal conditions to promote learning and career development. So how do you support colleagues if you have an L&D role in such an organisation? In this week’s episode of The Mind Tools L&D Podcast, Ross Garner is joined by UMass Memorial Health’s Liz Ferro, Diana Avery and Matt Pfleger to discuss:  the role of digital in engaging non-desk-based workers how to create space for people in stressful jobs to learn and develop whether working in an evidence-based environment leads to more evidence-based learning design. During the discussion, Matt referenced a project that the team worked on with Ross. You can see an overview of that project on YouTube and in our case study. In ‘What I Learned This Week’, Matt referenced a Family Guy clip, which is available online. Liz discussed how you can remove a background from a video in After Effects, even when you didn’t use a green screen. Diana referenced UMass Memorial Health’s mindfulness programs. And Ross discussed President Joe Biden’s Executive Order on AI, as well as Nicholas Thompson’s concerns that it would stifle competition. For more from us, including access to our back catalogue of podcasts, visit mindtools.com/business. There, you'll also find details of our award-winning performance support toolkit, our off-the-shelf e-learning, and our custom work.   Connect with our speakers    If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with our speakers on LinkedIn: Ross Garner Liz Ferro Diana Avery Matt Pfleger

In small organisations where everyone knows each other, it’s possible to spot what individuals need and offer tailored health and wellbeing support.   But what about organisations with thousands of employees?  In this episode of The Mind Tools L&D Podcast, Gemma is joined by Sanaa Khan from Lloyd’s bank and Owen to find out how larger organisations can nurture and protect their employees’ health and wellbeing. We discussed: The benefits of large organisations supporting workforce wellbeing Wellbeing goals and creating a wellbeing culture How to support the health and wellbeing of high numbers of employees. In What I Learnt this Week, Owen talked about the cost of Copilot. Here are articles from both sides of the argument:  Microsoft is losing money on Copilot The Register’s article ‘Microsoft reportedly runs GitHub's AI Copilot at a loss’  Microsoft is not losing money on Copilot ARK Invest’s newsletter ‘#388: Is Microsoft Really Losing Money On GitHub Copilot?, & More’ The rapidly decreasing costs of AI The Unsupervised Learning Substack article ‘Why Databricks Bought Mosaic and The Rapidly Decreasing Costs of AI’ Sanaa summarised research from an article in the Children, Youth and Environments journal For more from us, including access to our back catalogue of podcasts, visit mindtools.com/business/. There, you'll also find details of our award-winning performance support toolkit, our off-the-shelf e-learning, and our custom work.   Connect with our speakers    If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with our speakers on LinkedIn:  Gemma Towersey Owen Ferguson Sanaa Khan

In our globalised world, we work and learn with people from diverse cultures. How can we facilitate multicultural training, for instance, so that the sessions are not only inclusive, but get the best from everyone. This week on The Mind Tools L&D Podcast, Gemma is joined by Gaëlle Watson, director of SyncSkills and our very own Nahdia Khan. We explored: The benefits and challenges of multicultural representation in facilitated sessions  How to best adapt your design and delivery approaches as a facilitator How to avoid pitfalls such as stereotyping. Gaëlle refers to a number of resources that are well worth exploring. Geert Hofstede's book Cultures and organisations: Software of the mind.   This ‘Country Comparison Tool’ from The Cultural Factor Group is based on Professor Geerte Hofstede’s research: https://www.hofstede-insights.com/country-comparison-tool?countries=france%2Cpakistan%2Csouth+africa%2Cunited+kingdom   Mind Tools explores the characteristics of countries exhibiting each dimension and what these mean for how you can most effectively work together in the article “Hoftstede’s Cultural Dimensions”: https://www.mindtools.com/a1ecvyx/hofstedes-cultural-dimensions   Gaëlle contributed to CIPD’s 2021 “Effective virtual classrooms: An evidence review”: https://www.cipd.org/globalassets/media/knowledge/knowledge-hub/evidence-reviews/effective-virtual-classrooms-practice-summary_tcm18-102661.pdf  In What I Learned This Week, Nahdia recommended a series of videos from the School of Systems Change. Here’s a link to the first video “What are systems and what is systems change?”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_02X3O2kIUU&t=5s   Gemma encouraged budding language learners to check out Radio Lingua’s ‘Coffee break’ podcast series: https://coffeebreaklanguages.com/   For more from us, including access to our back catalogue of podcasts, visit mindtoolsbusiness.com. There, you'll also find details of our award-winning performance support toolkit, our off-the-shelf e-learning, and our custom work.   Connect with our speakers    If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with our speakers.  Nahdia Khan Gemma Towersey Gaëlle Watson - @gaelledwatson  You can find out more about SyncSkills here: https://syncskills.net/working-with-us/virtual-training-production/