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Jerry Connor

April 2013 - TD Magazine

A global merger between U.S. and Chinese companies required the development of a leadership philosophy that combines Eastern and Western cultures.

When East Meets West

The ATD Forum—a membership consortium for senior talent and learning practitioners to connect; collaborate; and share knowledge, best practices, and company experiences—is hosting several sessions during ATD21, including two sessions each on the future of learning and post-COVID-19 work.In the upcoming session “How Do I Show Up? Leading for Organizational Impact,” attendees will learn techniques they can take away and apply to their everyday work to demonstrate leadership capabilities and attain positive results. Specifically, senior-level panelists from five companies—Alissa Weiher, Cochlear; Dana Alan Koch, Accenture; Jay Erikson, Hitachi Vantara; Marguerite Samms, Intermountain Healthcare; and Suzanne Frawley, Plains All American Pipeline—will share how they lead other L&D professionals and how they continuously upskill and reskill themselves, both via formal and informal means. MJ Hall, ATD Forum content manager, will serve as moderator.Among the practical tools and practices the leaders use are self-reflection to gain clarity on their own goals, values, and purpose and self-assessments to gain greater awareness of themselves and how they come across to other people. The session will be held Wednesday, 10:30 to 11:30 a.m. MT in the Wasatch Ballroom at the Radisson Hotel.Today at 4:15 p.m. MT in the ATD Store, located in Hall A of the Salt Lake City Convention Center, ATD Forum members will be signing copies of the book Leading the Learning Function: Tools and Techniques for Organizational Impact (ATD Press). The book is filled with essentials for leading talent in the 21st century and includes contributions from more than 50 individual Forum members. And on Wednesday, from 9:20 to 10:05 a.m. MT, Weiher, Frawley, and Jerry Kaminski, Consumers Energy, will lead an author chat in the ATD Theater.The ATD Forum is likewise sponsoring a Forum Connection room, located in the Wasatch Ballroom, throughout ATD21 for Forum members to come together in person and discuss any talent development challenges they may be experiencing and learn from others. Check the program guide on Pathable, the conference platform, for the hours each day. Learn more about the ATD Forum at atd-forum.td.org.

Learn Leadership Capabilities From the ATD Forum

Low morale among federal workers has been the key takeaway from the OPM Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey and the nonprofit Partnership for Public Service’s Best Places to Work in Government survey. A March 27 letter to Comptroller General Gene Dodaro from members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Commitee asks for a Government Accountability Office (GAO) study to uncover why this is happening.“Stakeholders, including federal employee organizations, have noted that federal workers have become increasingly dissatisfied with their employment, and that this may be compromising the federal government’s ability to serve the American people,” write Reps. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts, and Gerry Connolly of Virginia.Specifically, the lawmakers’ letter asked GAO to consider seven areas of inquiry to assess the morale and effectiveness of the workforce, includingrecruitment and retentionperformance and productivityachievement of agency missionsextent to which OPM helps agencies improve employee engagementlessons to be learned from agencies that have significantly improved employee engagement.The letter not only asked GAO to identify “root causes” of poor engagement, but to offer steps the government can take to alleviate it.A GAO spokeswoman told Government Executive that the agency will follow its normal process in considering the request over the coming weeks.

Jerry Connor

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