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Many of today's business leaders champion learning as essential to business success, backing their belief with massive investments in Training and Development (T&D). In fact, T&D investments reach $56 billion per year in the U.S. alone. In this era of unprecedented opportunity, the time is right for T&D to become a full-fledged "player" in the world of business.
At issue, the authors contend, is T&D's inability to seize this opportunity and deliver unmistakable value to its most influential customers-the exectuvies who pay for trainiing services but are unable to see clear business value being returned on their companies' training investments. The authors also contend that T&D must alter the traditional precepts that keep it "separate form the business" and "out of the loop" strategically.
Van Adelsberg and Trolley suggest that the key to delivering unmistakable business value lies in transforming T&D-in spirit and in practice-from a funciton to a business. The authors draw on their experiences working inside Moore Corporation, DuPont, Mellon Bank, Kaiser Permanente, Texas Instruments, and other top businesses to illustrate how "Running Training Like a Business":
1. Eliminates the many hidden costs of training;
2. Re-focuses T&D from delivering training content to addressing business issues;
3. Makes T&D a full stategic partner in business decision making;
4. Ensures that training measurement is "baked in, not bolted on";
5. Improves the effectiveness and efficiency of internal and/or external T&D organizations.
Trolley and van Adelsberg lead the reader through a proven four-step process for transforming traditional training organizations into training enterprises capable of delivering unmistakable value, quarter after quarter and year after year.

Bestselling authors and renowned diversity consultants Fred Miller and Judith Katz bring their long-awaited new book that shows any manager or member of a team how to create safe environments for everyone in their company.

Some organizations pay a great deal of attention to ensuring the physical safety of their team members, but do the team members feel safe enough to speak up and raise tough concerns? Share bold and still-in-formation ideas? In this book, bestselling authors and inclusion experts Frederick A. Miller and Judith H. Katz introduce the concept of “interaction safety” and demonstrate how it can help create a work environment of trust, inclusion, and collaboration.

Interaction safety encourages reasonable risk-taking and inspires every individual to be brave enough to reach for higher goals and more ambitious possibilities. When interaction safety exists, people know they will not be penalized, ostracized, demoted, made small, discounted, or shunned because of their thoughts, contributions, and conversations. Individuals feel encouraged, empowered, and can achieve more together than they would alone.

Miller and Katz provide a four-level model for assessing and increasing the interaction safety in organizations, illustrated by short scenarios taken from real-life situations. They offer concrete actions team members, leaders, and organizations can take to build and maintain a productive, collaborative, and innovative environment in which people do their best work individually and collectively.

When interaction safety is a way of life, the energy people used to spend walking on eggshells, trying to get their ideas heard, navigating minefields, or avoiding those they distrust can instead be put towards doing their best work and winning bigger for the organization. With a culture of openness and true collaboration, both the organization and individuals can soar!

Bestselling authors and renowned diversity consultants Fred Miller and Judith Katz bring their long-awaited new book that shows any manager or member of a team how to create safe environments for everyone in their company.

Some organizations pay a great deal of attention to ensuring the physical safety of their team members, but do the team members feel safe enough to speak up and raise tough concerns? Share bold and still-in-formation ideas? In this book, bestselling authors and inclusion experts Frederick A. Miller and Judith H. Katz introduce the concept of “interaction safety” and demonstrate how it can help create a work environment of trust, inclusion, and collaboration.

Interaction safety encourages reasonable risk-taking and inspires every individual to be brave enough to reach for higher goals and more ambitious possibilities. When interaction safety exists, people know they will not be penalized, ostracized, demoted, made small, discounted, or shunned because of their thoughts, contributions, and conversations. Individuals feel encouraged, empowered, and can achieve more together than they would alone.

Miller and Katz provide a four-level model for assessing and increasing the interaction safety in organizations, illustrated by short scenarios taken from real-life situations. They offer concrete actions team members, leaders, and organizations can take to build and maintain a productive, collaborative, and innovative environment in which people do their best work individually and collectively.

When interaction safety is a way of life, the energy people used to spend walking on eggshells, trying to get their ideas heard, navigating minefields, or avoiding those they distrust can instead be put towards doing their best work and winning bigger for the organization. With a culture of openness and true collaboration, both the organization and individuals can soar!

Bestselling authors and renowned diversity consultants Fred Miller and Judith Katz bring their long-awaited new book that shows any manager or member of a team how to create safe environments for everyone in their company.


Do you feel safe enough at work to share your ideas, thoughts, and experiences? Raise tough issues? Deal with conflicts? Do your best work?

Many people feel unsafe in work interactions. They hold back, hesitate, and make themselves smaller out of fear of ridicule or retribution. The lack of safety is why new ideas and new people often have such a hard time succeeding in today's organizations, and directly contribute to why stress levels are so high. Many people have the skills they need to do their best work and the ideas to solve problems but lack the safety to apply them. This book describes what constitutes a safe environment and the actions-by both leaders and team members-necessary to create collaborative, inclusive workplaces in which people feel safe enough to be their best selves. Written in plain, everyday language, Safe Enough to Soar identifies the default mindsets and behaviors that create hostile work environments and block collaboration, engagement, partnership, and the acceptance of new ideas and new people. Expert authors Fred Miller and Judith Katz chart a simple, step-by-step process that will enable organization's individuals, work-groups, and teams to skip past the dysfunctional mire of defensiveness, micro-aggressions, cover-your-ass compromises, and judging, and launch them into the innovation-inspiring, collaboration-fostering zone of organizational bravery. When people feel safe enough to act and interact, they step up, speak up, and fully engage…and they and their organizations spread their wings and soar.

NEW EDITION, REVISED AND UPDATED One of America’s historic strengths is the ability to incorporate aspects from many different cultures to create a stronger whole. Our music, literature, sports, architecture, food, and fashion have all benefitted. But current leadership approaches are overwhelmingly written by White males and remain distressingly Eurocentric. Juana Bordas has set out to change this. In this influential book, she shows how incorporating Latino, Black, and American Indian approaches can enrich leadership and offers a more viable model for our expanding multicultural society.

NEW EDITION, REVISED AND UPDATED

One of America's historic strengths is the ability to incorporate aspects from many different cultures to create a stronger whole. Our music, literature, sports, architecture, food, and fashion have all benefitted. But current leadership approaches are overwhelmingly written by White males and remain distressingly Eurocentric. Juana Bordas has set out to change this. In this influential book, she shows how incorporating Latino, Black, and American Indian approaches can enrich leadership and offers a more viable model for our expanding multicultural society.

A much-needed revised edition of the only book that presents a multicultural leadership model integrating eight practices from African-American, American Indian, and Latino communities-an alternative to the heavily or exclusively Anglo-American based concepts of leadership presented by most leadership books. The first edition has sold 20,000 copies, was the winner of the International Latino Book Award, Best Business Book, and was on the Rocky Mountain News Bestseller list.

“Maya Hu-Chan shares a blueprint for becoming a more empathetic, self-aware, and inclusive leader. Saving Face guides us to consider different perspectives, to think first and speak last, and to respect others above all else.”
—Frances Hesselbein, former CEO, Girl Scouts of the USA, and Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient

Organizations now need to attract, retain, and motivate teams and employees across distance, time zones, and cultural differences. Building authentic and lasting human relations may be the most important calling for leaders in this century. According to management and global leadership specialist Maya Hu-Chan, the concept of “saving face” can help any leader preserve dignity and create more empathetic cross-cultural relationships.

“Face” represents one's self-esteem, self-worth, identity, reputation, status, pride, and dignity. Saving face is often understood as saving someone from embarrassment, but it's also about developing an understanding of the background and motivations of others to discover the unique facets we all possess. Without that understanding, we risk causing others to lose face without even knowing it. Hu-Chan explains saving face through anecdotes and practical tools, such as her BUILD leadership model (Benevolence, Understanding, Interacting, Learning, and Delivery). This book illustrates how we can give face to create positive first impressions, avoid causing others to lose face, and, most importantly, build trust and lasting relationships inside and outside the workplace.

“Maya Hu-Chan shares a blueprint for becoming a more empathetic, self-aware, and inclusive leader. Saving Face guides us to consider different perspectives, to think first and speak last, and to respect others above all else.”
—Frances Hesselbein, former CEO, Girl Scouts of the USA, and Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient

Organizations now need to attract, retain, and motivate teams and employees across distance, time zones, and cultural differences. Building authentic and lasting human relations may be the most important calling for leaders in this century. According to management and global leadership specialist Maya Hu-Chan, the concept of “saving face” can help any leader preserve dignity and create more empathetic cross-cultural relationships.

“Face” represents one's self-esteem, self-worth, identity, reputation, status, pride, and dignity. Saving face is often understood as saving someone from embarrassment, but it's also about developing an understanding of the background and motivations of others to discover the unique facets we all possess. Without that understanding, we risk causing others to lose face without even knowing it. Hu-Chan explains saving face through anecdotes and practical tools, such as her BUILD leadership model (Benevolence, Understanding, Interacting, Learning, and Delivery). This book illustrates how we can give face to create positive first impressions, avoid causing others to lose face, and, most importantly, build trust and lasting relationships inside and outside the workplace.

“Maya Hu-Chan shares a blueprint for becoming a more empathetic, self-aware, and inclusive leader. Saving Face guides us to consider different perspectives, to think first and speak last, and to respect others above all else.”
-Frances Hesselbein, former CEO, Girl Scouts of the USA, and Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient


Organizations now need to attract, retain, and motivate teams and employees across distance, time zones, and cultural differences. Building authentic and lasting human relations may be the most important calling for leaders in this century. According to management and global leadership specialist Maya Hu-Chan, the concept of “saving face” can help any leader preserve dignity and create more empathetic cross-cultural relationships.

“Face” represents one's self-esteem, self-worth, identity, reputation, status, pride, and dignity. Saving face is often understood as saving someone from embarrassment, but it's also about developing an understanding of the background and motivations of others to discover the unique facets we all possess. Without that understanding, we risk causing others to lose face without even knowing it. Hu-Chan explains saving face through anecdotes and practical tools, such as her BUILD leadership model (Benevolence, Understanding, Interacting, Learning, and Delivery). This book illustrates how we can give face to create positive first impressions, avoid causing others to lose face, and, most importantly, build trust and lasting relationships inside and outside the workplace.

With scenario planning, leaders, executives, and decision makers can develop strategies for multiple futures, making their organizations resilient, agile, and capable of adapting to new circumstances at the speed of change. Here Thomas Chermack addresses the method's complexities and, unlike other books, deals not just with developing different scenarios but also with applying those scenarios and assessing their impact.

This is the most comprehensive guide available to the scenario planning process, offering a thorough discussion of the method's theoretical foundations and detailing a five-phase scenario planning system. Chermack uses a real-world case study to illuminate the entire process—from project preparation to scenario exploration, development, implementation, and project assessment. He provides specific techniques and tools for gathering and analyzing relevant data, structuring and managing projects, and avoiding common pitfalls.

Scenario planning helps organization leaders, executives and decision-makers envision and develop strategies for multiple possible futures instead of just one. It enables organizations to become resilient and agile, carefully calibrating their responses and adapting quickly to new circumstances in a fast-changing environment. This book is the most comprehensive treatment to date of the scenario planning process. Unlike existing books it offers a thorough discussion of the evolution and theoretical foundations of scenario planning, examining its connections to learning theory, decision-making theory, mental model theory and more. Chermack emphasizes that scenario planning is far more than a simple set of steps to follow, as so many other practice-focused books do—he addresses the subtleties and complexities of planning. And, unique among scenario planning books, he deals not just with developing different scenarios but also with applying scenarios once they have been constructed, and assessing the impact of the scenario project. Using a case study based on a real scenario project Chermack lays out a comprehensive five phase scenario planning system—project preparation, scenario exploration, scenario development, scenario implementation and project assessment. Each chapter describes specific techniques for gathering and analyzing relevant data with a particular emphasis on the use of workshops to encourage dialogue. He offers a scenario project worksheet to help readers structure and manage scenario projects as well as avoid common pitfalls, and a discussion, based in recent neurological findings, of how scenario planning helps people to overcome barriers to creative thinking. “This book is about action and performance. Compelling and thoroughly researched, it offers every business executive a playbook for including uncertainty in the organizational change process and driving competitive advantage”. -- Tim Reynolds, Vice President, Talent and Organization Effectiveness, Whirlpool Corporation

Scenario planning is, now more than ever, crucial to any organizational venture, but much of what has been previously published leans more on theory rather than practice. Thomas Chermack's academic credentials in tandem with his tenure in industrial scenario planning roles grants him the knowledge to support theory with the experience to outline process and practice.

Millions of working Americans talk, act, and vote as if their economic interests match those of the megawealthy, the multinational corporations, and the politicians who do their bidding. How did this happen? According to Air America radio host Thom Hartmann, the apologists of the Right have become masters of the subtle and largely subconscious aspects of political communication. It's not an escalation in Iraq, it's a surge; it's not the inheritance tax, it's the death tax; it's not drilling for oil, it's exploring for energy.

Conservatives didn't intuit the path to persuasive messaging—they learned these techniques. There is no reason why progressives can't learn them too. In Cracking the Code, Hartmann shows you how. Drawing on his background as a psychotherapist and advertising executive as well as a national radio host, he breaks down the science and technology of effective communication so you can apply it to your own efforts to counter right-wing disinformation. It's both an art and a science—as Hartmann explains, political persuasion is as much about biology as ideology, about knowing how the brain processes information and how that influences the way people perceive messages, make decisions, and form a worldview.

Throughout the book, Hartmann shows you precisely how to master this technology, providing examples dating back to the time of the Founding Fathers. As you read deeply in this book, you'll see things you hadn't realized were there—in everything from advertising to political rants—and discover abilities you didn't know you had. Whether you're a politician, an activist, a volunteer, or a concerned citizen, you'll develop a strong sense for how to reach into that part of the collective human psyche where we truly do have the power to create a new world.

By the bestselling author and XM and Sirius Satellite radio host heard on more than eighty radio stations coast to coast seven days a week Reveals how the middle class, nurtured as the backbone of democracy by our Founding Fathers, is being undermined by so-called conservatives Shows how we can reverse the erosion of the middle class and restore the egalitarian vision of the Founders Expanded edition with a new chapter on immigration and a new afterword by Greg Palast The American middle class is on its deathbed. Ordinary folks who put in a solid day's work can no longer afford to buy a house, send their kids to college, or even get sick. If you're not a CEO, you're probably screwed. America wasn't meant to be like this. Air America Radio host Thom Hartmann shows that our Founding Fathers worked hard to ensure that a small group of wealthy people would never dominate this country--they'd had enough of aristocracy. They put policies in place to ensure a thriving middle class. When the middle class took a hit, beginning in the post-Civil War Gilded Age and culminating in the Great Depression, democracy-loving leaders like Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and Dwight Eisenhower revitalized it through initiatives like antitrust regulations, fair labor laws, the minimum wage, Social Security, and Medicare. So what happened? In the last twenty-five years, we've witnessed an undeclared war against the middle class. The so-called conservatives waging this war are only interested in conserving--and steadily increasing--their own wealth and power. Hartmann shows how, under the guise of "freeing" the market, they've systematically dismantled the programs set up by Republicans and Democrats to protect the middle class and have installed policies that favor the superrich and corporations. But it's not too late to return to the America our Founders envisioned. Hartmann outlines a series of commonsense proposals that will ensure that our public institutions are not turned into private fiefdoms and that people's basic needs--education, health care, a living wage--are met in a way that allows the middle class to expand, not shrink. America will be stronger with a growing, prospering middle class--rule by the rich will only make it weaker. Democracy requires a fair playing field, and it will survive only if We the People stand up, speak out, and reclaim our democratic birthright.

Nationally syndicated radio host and bestselling author Thom Hartmann exposes the covert war conservatives, and corporations are waging against America's middle class-a war that's reducing the rest of us to a politically impotent working poor. This book asks: How did this happen? Who's benefiting? And how can we stop it?

Nationally syndicated radio host and bestselling author Thom Hartmann exposes the covert war conservatives, and corporations are waging against America's middle class-a war that's reducing the rest of us to a politically impotent working poor. This book asks: How did this happen? Who's benefiting? And how can we stop it?

"What might happen," John Izzo writes, "if we began to think of innocence as a quality we bring to our lives, a perspective and a way of looking at the world, which is not replaced by experience but which influences our experience? When we choose innocence as a frame to experience the world, the qualities of hope, idealism, openness, and faith nurture the experience of wonder and joy in our lives."
In the tradition of Robert Fulgham and Richard Carlson, Izzo uses his experiences as a son, husband, father, employee, minister, author and corporate speaker to inspire readers to see the world from this new, rejuvenating perspective. Chapters with titles like Full Speed Ahead In The Wrong Direction, Choose Your Glasses Carefully, Getting Past Your Expiration Date, The Burned-Out Buddha and The Power of Not Now explore how to reclaim our innocence in four realms --- daily life, faith, work, and relationships.
"It is not that experience should not shape our idealism", Izzo tells us. "In fact, our initial innocence must be shaped by our experiences. To hold on to our innocence is a life long process and it is our ability to foster the quality of innocence that continues to bring us to the edge of what is possible in our lives and in our communities. That we may choose innocence and idealism while incorporating the harder experiences of living is the core premise of this book."
Both practical and inspiring, Second Innocence combines wonderful stories with an inspiring philosophy to help us maintain our idealism and enthusiasm throughout our lives.