Professional Development

The Dots have been attending professional development on how to do professional development. This is being taught by the Professional Development department, of course. While they have some interesting tips and tricks, the PD department doesn't seem to have a very good attitude about professional development. They also make a lot of noise about not doing "drive-by" training, that is, training without follow-up. Of course, they pretty much absolutely forbid follow-up trainings. (We have to remember they work with the Black Queen, the ultimate seagull manager. She flies in, makes a lot of noise, craps all over everything and flies out again. ) The PD people seem to feel that purpose of training is to keep people from asking questions. That is NOT how the Dots do training. The Dots do training to create empowerment, to forge alliances, to make sure people are comfortable enough to ask questions, comfortable enough to experiment, to try new things, to learn new things. Maybe we should call it coaching? After all most of the information is in manuals or on websites. However, only when we get together, do we figure how to make the information work for us.
Happy Valentine's Day!!