Negotiate Your Way to the Executive Table Without Losing Yourself in the Process
by John G. Shulman, JD

You have five minutes to get the attention of the executive team. If you cannot get the attention of your organization’s senior leaders within these five minutes, you face an uphill battle.

Is this fair? No.

Is it reality? In these days of “do more with less,” it is often what we as human resource development professionals face.

What are these five minutes that matter so much? It is the amount of time you have to make a good impression on the people who control access to the executive “table” where the big decisions are made.

What big decisions? Things like your budget, your future with the organization, sometimes even your career.

High enough stakes for you?

So what is this article about? It is about how you can apply sound academic theory in a practical way to negotiate access to that executive table where those key decisions are made.

The approach I recommend is interest-based negotiation. I first encountered it at Harvard Law School. It really came in handy later, though, when I had to gain the ear—and trust—of senior executives in Fortune 500 companies.

How so? Turns out if you want to become a trusted adviser and long-term participant at the executive table, you must understand the interests, or needs, of those already at the table. In practical terms, you must do three things.

First, you must speak the language of those at the executive table. No one cares about your subject matter expertise if you cannot communicate in a manner that those with power understand. Simply put, use their lingo, not your own. (Speak of net present value [or NPV], not terminal objectives.) By doing so, you are not “dumbing down” your expertise; you are communicating effectively.

Second, you must make yourself indispensable to those with power by showing that your unique expertise and skills help the organization meet its core business objectives. (I use business in the broadest sense of the word. Whether you are in a corporation, governmental entity, or nonprofit, the idea is the same—you must align your work with the organization’s core objectives and demonstrate how you help the organization meet those objectives.) Those at the executive table generally do not care about human performance technology; they care about meeting core objectives. If you can make the connection between the two, you will have the attention of senior leaders.

Third, you must leverage your successes on specific assignments for a “permanent” seat at the executive table. (OK, in this dog-eat-dog world, nothing may seem permanent. But we are talking about gaining a seat on equal terms with the other leaders and power brokers in the organization.) When senior leaders come to you for help in a crisis, have the courage to negotiate up front for an opportunity to participate in future decision making that may help avert such crises in the first place. If the organization is only as good as its people, and you can demonstrate an ability to improve people’s performance, then you should be at the executive table.

When you negotiate access to the executive table in a principled way, you are not selling out, and you will retain your core values. In a world that so often asks us to make uncomfortable choices between our principles and the short-term objectives of our organizations, what could be more desirable!  You should be at that executive table on your own terms. You deserve it. Your people need it. Go negotiate for what is rightly yours!

Note: Article is adapted from Negotiate Your Way to the Executive Table Without Losing Yourself in the Process by John G. Shulman.

John G. Shulman, JD, is President and CEO of Alignor. He will be presenting a one-day workshop at ISPI’s upcoming conference, Strategically Negotiating Your Way to the Executive Table. John may reached at jshulman@alignor.com.

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TrendSpotters: ROI Job Aid
by Carol Haig, CPT, and Roger Addison, CPT, EdD

We welcome Ken Silber, CPT, PhD, to TrendSpotters this month. As president of Silber Performance Consulting, Ken, wiseoldken@aol.com, is focused on using the HPT process to identify opportunities and problems related to the client organization’s business strategy and solving them collaboratively with the client. An active member of ISPI for many years, Ken won the coveted Outstanding Publication award for his book Writing Training Materials that Work. He is also a coeditor for the Instructional Design and Training Delivery section of the upcoming Handbook of Training and Improving Workplace Performance. Ken is currently on the faculty for the well-regarded Principles & Practices of Performance Improvement Institute, teaching in both live and online workshops, where his ROI Job Aid is an included resource.

Genesis of this Tool
The ROI Job Aid explains the many possible ways to calculate return on investment in an accessible format that performance improvement practitioners can easily adapt for use with their clients. Ken developed the ROI Job Aid to help his clients who were investing in expensive multiday workshops and books that could be replaced with a short job aid and one hour of coaching. With a special thank you to Lyle Spencer, who developed the original techniques for calculating benefits, Ken shares this valuable tool that does double duty as an HPT solution.

Tool Description
The ROI Job Aid has several valuable components:

• It provides formulas for the four most common ways organizations view return on investment. Giving clients the option of choosing how to calculate ROI is an excellent strategy for gaining their buy-in.
• Categories, definitions of project costs, and ways of calculating them throughout the project life cycle are included.
• The most challenging aspect of ROI—calculating the project results or benefits, both in total and those attributable to the HPT intervention—is made accessible, along with an appropriate formula.
• Questions to use to obtain productivity estimate data from a variety of clients are also included.

ROI Job Aid
Calculating benefits is the most difficult and controversial part of the ROI process and is the one component of the Job Aid included here. Remember that this is not a precise process and that it is not research. It is based on what decision makers consider to be benefits, rather than on any objective reality of what benefits are. Underlying what follows are some basic principles to remember:

• What clients consider to be valid data are valid data.
• Gather data for each of the elements of the formula from the clients themselves.
• Estimates are OK if they are acceptable to clients and come from the clients.
• Different formulas lead to different results; whichever is valid for the client is correct.
• We compare performance gain to a performance criterion, not to past performance.

 Formula for Calculating Benefits

© 2008 Kenneth Silber. Used with permission.

For more formulas, details, and a worked example, please access Ken’s article Calculating ROI.

• Select the formulas and numbers to be used in the ROI calculation in concert with your client, and do so before project inception.
• Ensure that the productivity to be measured is drawn from the organization’s key strategies and metrics.
• Collect the data at intervals from before the project begins through the completion of implementation.

Success Story
A telecommunications training manager wanted to calculate ROI for new hire sales training. The ROI Job Aid helped in five ways:

• Working together, Ken and his client determined which ROI formulas and numbers the organization would accept.
• The client realized that current performance data collection methods in the field would not allow an accurate ROI calculation, which led to a recommended change in the sales organization’s data reporting and aggregating process.
• The training manager and his sales client were able to collaboratively establish pre- and postsolution performance levels and determine if they were aligned with corporate goals.
• Ken and his client presented a draft report of three different ROI calculations to senior management so they could provide feedback on which would be acceptable to present.
• This process created buy-in for the ROI number so that it was unanimously supported at presentation and enthusiastically accepted by the sales organization, establishing new-found credibility for the training function.

Advice to Users of the ROI Job Aid

• Be sure to understand how your organization reports and thinks about ROI in its financial reports. Typical terms include return on assets, return on sales, or return on equity. See Silber and Kearny’s “Business Logics Model” in Chapter 3 of the 3^rd edition of the Handbook of Human Performance Technology.
• Work collaboratively with your client from project contracting through implementation to decide which data to collect, how to collect and analyze them, and how to report them.
• For your first use of the ROI Job Aid, choose a small but critical project where there is likely to be
  • Agreement about the desired productivity outcomes
  • Clarity about the metrics used and their importance to the organization
  • A cooperative client
• Always be open about the ROI process and adapt it freely to the client organization’s culture.

Links to the Performance Technology Landscape
The ROI Job Aid supports these principles of performance technology:

Application Exercise
Take your client organization’s finance person to lunch and find out

• The key productivity measures the organization is concerned about, such as financial, customer, or product measures
• What the organization calls ROI and how it is reported

Then, before your next project begins, take out the ROI Job Aid and do it!

TrendSpotters Open Toolkit
Visit the TOT to view a valuable array of tools and models that you can download for your use. In addition, you may browse all the past TrendSpotters interviews published since March 2002.

You may contact Carol Haig at carolhaig@earthlink.net or at http://home.mindspring.com/~carolhaig; and you may contact Roger Addison at roger@ispi.org.

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HPT Connections
by Brian S. Grant, 2008 Conference Committee and ISPI Online Community Implementation Taskforce Chair

The Performance Improvement Conference 2008 promises to be like none other. You have already heard about the exciting New York City location and the amazing speakers, but there is so much more! For instance, the improved Community Center explodes out into the conference foyer itself. It will be at the epicenter of all the action and will definitely be the place to be. Mixing together old favorites and fresh new features, the Community Center offers something for everyone. Network Breaks will continue to provide the caffeinated fuel powering more of us than we are willing to admit. Yet the buzz around the Community Center is all about the new Connection Corner.

The Connection Corner is your interface to connecting with new people both inside and outside the conference:

• Sign up for the Dinner Network: Make new friends while engaging in riveting conversations over a gourmet meal at some of New York City’s finest restaurants.
• Participate on the Photo Wall: Bring your camera, take photos, and share your favorite conference pictures. Don’t forget to project your best smile!
• Give a Shout Out: Sign up to have your message projected for all to see among the rotating photo wall images during a network break.
• Learn details about other Community Center activities, such as the “So You Want To…” tables, the graffiti wall, and more.

Yet why wait for the opening session for the New York Conference to begin? The all-new ISPI social network community (HPT Connections) has launched so your conference experience will begin when you join the community. Create a profile and collaborate with colleagues in ways never before possible.

Looking for someone to share a Marriott hotel room with? Want to sign up for Dinner Connections to avoid the rush? Want to discuss conference speakers and events? Just join HPT Connections (community.ispi.org) and visit the 2008 New York Conference Group. If you still have not joined by April, there will be a station in the Connection Corner where we will help you create your HPT Connections profile. Now the conference does not have to end with the closing banquet. It continues on in our new social network community.

Get Connected
As an ISPI member, to access the HPT Connections network, you will be required to enter your ISPI member ID as both your username and password. Your member ID is available on your ISPI website profile page, which is different from the HPT Connections web site (and login). To find your member ID, please go to www.ispi.org and login. Your member ID will be located under your name on the left menu.

What’s New Online?
Visit the conference website to view the educational sessions or listen to a sample of the content from 2007 through an audio download.

There simply is not enough space here to describe all the dazzling possibilities at the New York Conference. You will just have to attend and see it for yourself.

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SkillCast: Learning Without Leaving Your Desk

Are you finding it a challenge to keep up, professionally? Got a stack of books and articles you keep meaning to get to? Let ISPI provide that vital professional boost with our new SkillCast series. Designed to enhance the skills and knowledge of the performance improvement professional, each month ISPI will feature the latest thinking from the experts you rely on for your continued professional development. In just an hour a month, you’ll come away with new ideas, perspectives, and tools that you can put to work immediately. Put your focus on your own results, for a change, and join us online!

2008 Schedule of Events

• February 12, HPT: 7 Tips for Sustainability with Judith Hale, CPT, PhD
• March 12, A Manager’s Guide to Improve Workplace Performance with Roger Chevalier, CPT, PhD
• April 16, The Supervisors Role in Performance Improvement with Miki Lane, CPT
• May 14, Overcoming Workplace Complexity and Performance Uncertainty with Brian Desautels, CPT
• August 18, Measuring Mentoring Results with Margo Murray, CPT
• September 10, Connecting with Tomorrow’s Workforce with Diane Gayeski, PhD

For more information, or to register, visit www.ispi.org/webcasts.

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Change, Choices, and Consequences:
What Do You Choose?
by Roger Kaufman, CPT, PhD

Our field is currently awash in suggested tools, techniques, frameworks, dogma, and just plain junk. There are also some good concepts, tools, and guides. Arguments abound about whether or not ISD, HPT, training, e-learning, learning objects, expert systems, balanced score card, Six Sigma, quality management, or constructivism is the way to go. Arguments are usually based on biases about means and not upon research and the pragmatic feedback from sensible application. We must do what is right, not just do things right.

People are often—too often—looking for quick fixes, magic checklists, and comfortable ways to make a living without risk and without problems. We look at conventional ways of doing things rather than selecting the appropriate tools and concepts to go with actual realities. This will not work, at least not for long. As professionals, we are responsible for what we use, do, produce, and deliver in terms of the value we add or subtract from our internal and external clients.

Since all of us face change, have to make the choices relative to the change, and are responsible for the consequences of these choices, why not make justifiable and sensible—not just conventional and temporarily safe—choices? Will we be the masters of change or the victims of it? Should we not be able to tell any client, internal or external, that we can show him or her how to be successful and prove it?

There are some sensible and sensitive guides that we can choose. These are based on both applied research and successful practice:

• Think and act strategically, not just tactically and operationally. Correctly align what we use, do, produce, and deliver to measurable value added.
• Find, define, and justify valid and useful objectives based on performance data.
• Use and align three levels of planning and results: societal, organizational, and individual.
• Collect needs (not wants) assessment data and use that for deciding your choices of where to head, what you do, and what you deliver.
• Select the right tools (such as Six Sigma, balanced score card, e-learning, learning objects, etc.) for measurably improving performance based on needs assessment data. Do not start with a solution before you know the problem.
• Be rigorous about evaluation and continual improvement to add value within and external to your organization.

All of this is possible. And ethical. And professional. And we know how to do it.

Roger Kaufman, CPT, PhD, is professor emeritus, Florida State University, and Director of Roger Kaufman & Associates as well as Distinguished Research Professor at the Sonora Institute of Technology (Mexico). He consults with public and private organizations in the United States and around the globe. Roger is a founding member of ISPI as well as a past president. He has been awarded ISPI’s top two honors: Member for Life and the Thomas F. Gilbert Award. Roger has published 39 books and over 250 articles. He will be presenting a one-day workshop at ISPI’s upcoming conference, Change, Choices, and Consequences: How to Define, Justify, and Achieve Measurable Success. Roger may be reached at rkaufman@nettally.com.

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CPT News from Around the World

New CPTs
Please join me in congratulating our newest CPTs:

• Kerry Alan Bennington
• Evelyn I. Eubank
• Paul K. Fisher
• Erin Andrea McAvoy
• Lucy Surhyel Newman
• Michelle C. Painchaud
• Sean A. Rea
• Robert Tolin

Special Work by CPTs
Barbara Gough, CPT, volunteered to analyze the CPT recertification applications to determine where they went for professional development. She analyzed 449 applications. Here is a brief overview of what was learned:

• 6% got recertification credit for having written a book.
• 15% got credit for writing articles for professional and trade publications.
• 37% got recertification credit for giving presentations, the majority of which were for ISPI.
• 42% got credit for teaching, the majority of which was for universities.
• 16% got credit for serving on committees; the majority served as reviewers for conference proposals.
• 29% served as board members of local chapters (both ISPI and other organizations).
• All attended conferences, workshops, and chapter programs.

What was insightful was the number of CPTs attending university classes, taking classes on the web, and going to local ISPI chapter programs. Stay tuned as we learn more.

Upcoming Practice Analysis of the Profession
In an effort to better understand what practitioners do, whether they are CPTs or not, ISPI will conduct a major study of the profession this month. The study is in two phases. Phase I is a detailed review of the current standards. CPTs and managers will be asked to give the current standards a hard look in terms of whether or not they still reflect best practice and the needs of customers. Phase II is a practice analysis. A survey will be sent to international and chapter members and CPTs. It contains questions about what we do, and how often we do specific tasks. The results will be used to update ISPI’s Standards of Performance Technology and the requirements to be a CPT.

Your Story
If you have a story to tell that you think others would value, send it to judy@ispi.org.

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It Is Time That “We Teach a Man to Fish”
by Roger Chevalier, CPT, PhD

There is an old Chinese proverb that most of us are familiar with: “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” All too many of us have been giving HPT to managers and supervisors when we should be teaching HPT to them.

One of the critical roles that managers and supervisors have is that of improving the performance of their divisions, departments, and workgroups. They routinely assess the present level of performance and compare it to a desired or planned level of performance. They then identify the potential causes for performance shortfalls and come up with solutions that they implement. They then evaluate the results to see if the difference between where they are and where they want to be has been closed. Sound familiar? This is the systematic approach that is defined by the last six Standards of Performance Technology.

Wouldn’t it be better if, instead of personally applying HPT at a tactical level, we teach managers and supervisors to do this, leaving us time to apply HPT on strategic problems? Imagine a workforce where all managers and supervisors have a consistent approach to identifying performance gaps; determining causes; selecting, designing, and developing a range of solutions; implementing those solutions; and then evaluating the results.

A starting point for developing the performance improvement skills of your managers and supervisors is gap and cause analysis. At the supervisor level, gap analysis can be described as the difference between the present and desired levels of performance in measurable terms for quantity, quality, time, and cost. Once this is done, the supervisor needs to set a reasonable goal that can be accomplished in a relatively short time that will serve as a milestone for measuring progress in closing the performance gap.

Once the performance gap has been described, the causes for the present level of performance can be described with driving forces and restraining forces, those environmental and individual factors working for and against closing the gap. These can be displayed and weighted using Kurt Lewin’s force field analysis methodology.

 

Further structure can be added to this analysis by presenting a means for identifying environmental and individual causes of performance shortfalls. Solutions are found by strengthening or adding driving forces and by weakening or removing restraining forces. Evaluation is done by measuring progress toward the reasonable goal and closing the performance gap.

Part of any HPT implementation strategy should include embedding the Standards of Performance Technology throughout the organizations we serve. It is not enough that a select few know and use HPT. Line managers and supervisors are the ones ultimately responsible for improving performance, and it is time that we focused on delivering our systematic HPT approach to them. It is time that we teach them how to fish.

Just before The Performance Improvement Conference in New York this April, Roger will present a one-day preconference workshop, A Manager’s Guide to Improving Workplace Performance, which will reflect his new book of the same name. This workshop may be the excuse you need to invite one of your managers to the conference.

In addition, Roger will host a SkillCast on Wednesday, March 12, at 1:00 pm ET. During this educational program, he will provide you with a performance aid for managers and supervisors to define a performance gap; set a reasonable goal; and systematically determine, weight, and display the causes.

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ISPI Invites Chapter Contest Winners to New York City

The International Society for Performance Improvement wants to thank our chapters and their members for participating in the annual drawing for a free registration to attend The Performance Improvement Conference. We received over 300 contest forms from 15 chapters. We hope the chapters found this to be a beneficial tool for generating new chapter members and promoting ISPI’s conference. Congratulations to the chapter members who won this year’s contest.

Chapter Drawing Winners

• Armed Forces, Brett Christensen
• Arizona, Mary Lee Madison
• Atlanta, Kris Turnbull
• Chicago, Laura Swidorski
• Dallas/Ft. Worth, Linda Thomas
• Front Range, Colorado, Jennifer Lampert
• Los Angeles, Annette Shaked
• Massachusetts, Elisa Abel
• Michigan, Mark Shear
• New Mexico, Diana Spendlove
• Ohio Heartland, Kim Campbell
• Orange County, California, Christine O’Connell
• St. Louis, Pat Farber-Garey
• Tampa, Art Stadlin
• Vancouver, BC, Teresa Comey

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All Crossed-Up in Cross-Functional Relationships: Learning Matrix Management Skills
by William R. Daniels

The boundaries between groups within an organization are both formally defined and psychologically defended. Working near these borders has always been recognized in social research as psychologically hazardous. Helping managers learn to do this hazardous work is one of the most urgent HPT challenges.

Since the late 1940s, organizations have recognized the need for better cooperation between its functional divisions (i.e., between its groupings of technical specialists). Organizations have attempted to address the problem with matrix management. The common practice of matrix management is to set up an organization in which project managers try to push the development of products across the functional divisions. The question always comes down to, “Who controls the money: the product managers or the functional divisions?” Or to put it more bluntly, “Who is the beggar?”

Sixty years of warfare between the project and functional managers has not yielded an acceptable answer. Organizational performance continues to suffer. For instance, product-development projects have a high mortality rate. They are often cancelled after significant operational costs have already been incurred, and disappointed customers are often lost. Even those projects that get completed are still averaging nearly 80% scheduling and budget overruns!

Furthermore, the problem has gotten more complicated. It is no longer just a two-way conflict between concerns for product and concerns for technical quality. Because of globalization and increased competition, two new substructures have joined the fray: site management and customer management. Matrix management is now a struggle for resources involving four equally important management structures. The relationships between these structures are so complex that you cannot represent them with an organization chart!

The key management concepts you have to learn become the basic assumptions of the organizational culture. For instance: Seek common goals and align your priorities. Share resources. Accept overwhelming complexity. Know what you know and also what you do not know. Stop trying to be the master of the universe and accept interdependence. Be as transparent and trustworthy as you know how to be. Keep deciding, noticing the feedback, and deciding again. Express your frustrations through problem solving. You cannot get a piece of the pie until you have baked a whole pie; and you cannot bake a pie one piece at a time.

However, learning to manage in a highly matrixed organization cannot be taught simply as a set of concepts. The concepts have to be expressed in behaviors, specifically the behaviors required for good group work. In fact, the only way to even think about a four-way matrixed organization is to think of it as a system of meetings. The organization design comes down to getting the right people to talk to each other about the right things at the right time. It is the sort of learning objective that is perfect for the use of an action-learning simulation!

Here are the design constraints for such a simulation:

1. Set up an organization that must deliver an output that meets all four of these concerns:
   • Efficient use of many different technical specialties
   • Product design that will maximize revenue to the company
   • Variation of features to satisfy many different customers
   • Deliverable in regions with unique legal and cultural constraints
2. Make all the participants perform managerial roles all the time (i.e., make decisions about what to do with the organization’s resources).
3. Make success a function of integrating thousands of managerial decisions.
4. Make the feedback loop on the quality of each decision rapid and frequent.
5. Keep increasing the complexity (not uncertainty) of the simulation so that no individual can possibly solve the problems alone (i.e., require group work).
6. Provide sufficient time for personal feedback, reflection, and change.
7. Make it possible for at least 80% of the participants to discover the system of decision-making meetings that leads to success in matrix management.
8. Get the learning done in a one-day workshop.

Fifteen years ago, this assignment was given to me as a management development consultant. Six years later, we finally had a simulation that met all of these requirements. Thousands of managers have been put through the simulation. They say it is as challenging and stressful as the real world—but exhilarating as they begin to succeed. They also say that they will never again ignore the importance of management meetings. “You have to get focused on some common outputs and priorities and get on with making the necessary decisions, and that has to be done in meetings.”

Though the simulation stands alone as a learning experience, it is often used on one of the last days of a multiday, in-residence management academy. It is used as an integrated practice of all the management skills taught earlier in the program. For this reason, it has become know as the “dress rehearsal”—it is the last practice before doing the real performance.

I am very proud of this piece of work and am pleased to offer it to ISPI members and nonmembers as a one-day, preconference workshop in New York in April. We offered Matrix Management: Key Management Practices for Maximizing Cross-Functional Cooperation for the first time in San Francisco last year. The participants in that workshop enthusiastically recommended it for an encore. It is an intense and satisfying experience of learning. It is also a good demonstration of how to design and use an active-learning simulation.

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Joys of a Visit to NYC
by Evelyn Eubank, CPT

One of the joys of a visit to New York City is the chance to take in a Broadway show. For those of you not familiar with the Broadway scene, here are some helpful tips on shows, tickets, and making the most of your Broadway experience.

My favorites are Broadway musicals. There is a great selection on stage from which to choose. For tickets and a full listing of shows, go to www.telecharge.com. This website will give you links for reviews and descriptions plus is the best place to buy tickets without a broker markup. If you have no idea what you would like to see, I will give you a quick overview and my picks for must-see shows.

If you like rock and roll, past or present, you will really enjoy Jersey Boys, Mamma Mia, Hairspray, Grease, or Rent. Mamma Mia and Hairspray are essentially comedies with lots of energy, dancing, and fun. Jersey Boys tells the story of the Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. Rent is more of a drama and is roughly based on the opera La Boheme—but the music is modern and fabulous. And Grease—well unless you have been under a rock for the last 30 years, you know all about Grease.

For big production, classic Broadway musical fare you cannot beat Phantom of the Opera, A Chorus Line, Legally Blonde (the musical), Spamalot, and Wicked. Phantom of the Opera is the big production musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber that has been around for many years and is wonderful. A Chorus Line played on Broadway for years and years and is a marvelous story about life on stage (amazing music). Legally Blonde is the musical version of the movie and is upbeat and fun. Spamalot is a musical version of Monty Python and the Holy Grail and is fun and zany. Of this group, my favorite is Wicked. Wicked is marvelously staged with fabulous music by Stephen Schwartz, the composer of Godspell and Pippin. It is about the Wicked Witch of the West and tells the “rest of the story.”

For fun, avant-garde, and clever, try Avenue Q (performed with actors plus onstage puppets) or Spring Awakening (last year’s Tony winner for best musical). Of the Disney shows on Broadway—The Little Mermaid, The Lion King, and Mary Poppins—I recommend The Lion King because the costumes and staging are absolutely amazing.

There are many more shows that I cannot fully review here, but whether you go to a stage play or a musical, I hope you thoroughly enjoy your stay “On Broadway.” If you have questions you cannot easily find the answers to online, contact me at eieubank@embarqmail.com, and I will be glad to help out.

Evelyn Eubank, CPT, is a partner in Momentum Business Group, LLC. Besides presenting at ISPI national conferences and consulting with organizations on improving work engagement, she enjoys the arts, singing, and performing. She gains her musical knowledge from a long-standing love of theater and her husband who produces amazing high school musical productions every year, the latest of which was recently featured nationally on Good Morning America.

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Performance Marketplace

Performance Marketplace is a convenient way to exchange information of interest to the performance improvement community. Take a few moments each month to scan the listings for important new events, publications, services, and employment opportunities. To post information for our readers, contact ISPI Director of Marketing, Keith Pew at keithp@ispi.org or 301.587.8570.

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ISPI Membership: Join or Renew Today!

Are you working to improve workplace performance? Then ISPI membership is your key to professional development through education, certification, networking, and professional affinity programs.

If you are already a member, we thank you for your support. If you have been considering membership or are about to renew, there is no better time to join ISPI. To apply for membership or renew, simply click here.

Newsletter Submission Guidelines

ISPI is looking for Human Performance Technology (HPT) articles (approximately 500 words and not previously published) for PerformanceXpress that bridge the gap from research to practice (please, no product or service promotion is permitted). Below are a few examples of the article formats that can be used:

• Short “I wish I had thought of that” articles
• Practical application articles
• The application of HPT
• Success stories

In addition to the article, please include a short bio (2–3 lines) and a contact e-mail address. All submissions should be sent to april@ispi.org. Each article will be reviewed by one of ISPI’s on-staff HPT experts, and the author will be contacted if it is accepted for publication. If you have any further questions, please contact april@ispi.org.

About PerformanceXpress

Feel free to forward ISPI’s PerformanceXpress newsletter to your colleagues or anyone you think may benefit from the information. If you are reading someone else’s PerformanceXpress, send your complete contact information to april@ispi.org, and you will be added to the PerformanceXpress emailing list.

PerformanceXpress is an ISPI member benefit designed to build community, stimulate discussion, and keep you informed of the Society’s activities and events. This newsletter is published monthly and will be emailed to you at the beginning of each month.

If you have any questions or comments, please contact April Davis at april@ispi.org.

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