Recently in Rants Category

Holy crap! If this is how the majority feels, then we learning designers will forever be marginalized. What are you thoughts, and please don't give me the shining examples of faculty who "see the light." Talk instead about your typical faculty - do they feel the same? What are you thoughts on all this?

I continue to struggle on how to reach beyond the innovators to at least the early majority in terms of learning design, and when I read comments like this, I am truly discouraged.

It's great to live in a place where you can obtain discounts by clipping out tiny slips of paper you present to a cashier at the time of purchase. My family's done it many times, and will most likely do so in the future. I've no beef with the concept of coupons. The implementation and use of coupons, however, brings me much anger.

Today I stood in line for 20 minutes as the person in front of me presented between 30-40 coupons to the cashier. I think she had a coupon for four out of every five items in her full shopping cart. The cashier had to scan and/or hand enter codes for each and every coupon. The cashier was frustrated, I was irked, and somewhere, joy died.

Stores are not equipped to deal with coupons in a timely manner. Thus, my frustration today, and many other days as well. Yet the solution is so simple, I don't understand why places don't implement it.

Have a coupons-only checkout aisle.

OK, maybe a five or more coupons aisle, but you get the idea. It commonplace to have a 10 items or less checkout aisle for the speedy, in and out folks. Why not an aisle for the folks we all KNOW will take 20 minutes or more EACH, because the store simply cannot process the coupons quickly? For larger stores, this should be fairly simple to establish, and you probably would need it only during peak times. You could still use the aisle if you didn't have coupons, just as you can use a normal aisle if you only have a few items.

Seems simple enough a solution to me.

Working on a major initiative at Penn State is an exciting challenge. It is also sometimes frustrating. My main peeve? Lack of communication from other people/organizations I have to work with and coordinate schedules. I have to constantly send out reminders, ask for status updates, phone people, etc.

Now some of that is just how it is, and things happen that hamper communication flow, but the bulk of it is because people are either lacking communication skills, or just don't care. Everyone I've working with and talked to cares deeply about their work and PSU, so it must be the former.

After a meeting where all agree that we'll dig up some info and inform the others within a specific time frame, is it too much to expect everyone to honor that agreement?

What can be done here? Good notes during a meeting that indicate what you are to communicate, when, and to whom would help. Share your notes afterwards. Sharing a common time line would help. Pushing these "to-dos" out to your calendar would be a big help.

Lack of communication is always the #1 issue facing organizations today. Let's start using all this wonderful technology to assist us here, reducing the noise between sender and receiver.

BTW - Here is the Shannon-Weaver Communication Model. From 1947 no less. Still seems relevant today!