“NEED A SPECTACULAR SPEAKER FOR UPCOMING EVENT?”

Dear Conference/Meeting Planners and Directors of Centers and Faculty Development:

Have you picked your speakers for your fall 2011–2015 events or next decade yet? No? Then you need to get on the stick.

Have I got a speaker for you! I just saw him in Calgary and San Diego and he will blow your beach chair right out from under you.

With all of the financial cutbacks, you may be crunched for funds to import super-star speakers, but you can consider those lower on the food chain or not even on the food chain, but dangling on a hook like bait.

For example, I know this speaker personally (he sends me birthday e-mails) who will work with you to cut expenses, plus he will pay your mother’s social security in August if the President doesn’t.

This means he will

1. sleep in your garage (with a bucket of ice if you don’t have ac) instead of a hotel, but not before washing your vehicle,
2. fly WITH Southwest’s free baggage,
3. hitch a ride from the airport to your garage,
4. walk to his home airport (25 mi) to save mileage and parking fees,
5. deliver his handout to faculty door-to-door,
6. eat just navel oranges & Fig Newtons,
7. drink tap water only, and
8. not tip anyone.

Those sacrifices can make a major dent in the expenses. He will also slash honoraria under 5 digits to fit your budget. Should I continue? Is this a dream come true?

Anyway, he speaks on 17 topics on humor and multimedia, Net Generation, multigenerational classroom/workplace, stress reduction, student assessment, faculty evaluation, and PowerPoint. Abstracts are available on his Website (www.ronberk.com). His most popular topics appear on his LinkedIn profile (www.linkedin.com/in/ronberk) and 2011 brochure.

Testimonials by buckets of clients, some of whom may be your peers, and a few extraterrestrials are listed on the brochure and posted on those sites FYI.

If you would like further information, please contact the speaker, who is currently preparing his PowerPoint in a garage in Biloxi, which is in Wyoming, while sucking key limes.

Have a wonderful decade and go pick up your beach chair!

An anonymous blogger

COPYRIGHT © 2011 Ronald A. Berk, LLC

“SURVIVOR: THE AMERICAN COLLEGE PROFESSOR ON TODAY’S CAMPUS!” Symptoms

SYMPTOMS OF CUTS
How have the departmental cuts and changes affected you? How are you feeling the pinch? What’s changed in your daily modus operandi?

Do you feel like

• your comfort zone has been disrupted?
• you experience more disappointments and rejections than usual?
• there are delays in your timetable that throw off your “to-do” list?
• you are under more stress and pressure than before?
• there are challenges to your character with new temptations?

How are you responding to these hits and difficulties? You have a choice in your response: either “negative and destructive” OR “positive and constructive.”

How do you want to leave this island when the rescue team arrives? Better or worse for the experience than when you entered? Or like the end of Lost, totally confused!

Whether you have experienced this professional drought or these limitations previously or any of these metaphors is irrelevant; it’s how you respond to this one that matters. You can be a role model for your colleagues and set a positive example OR drag them down with you. It’s YOUR CHOICE! Consider your options in my next blog. You can weigh the negative responses against the positive ones and then decide your course.

COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC

A DOZEN STRATEGIES TO INCREASE ATTENDANCE AT FACULTY DEVELOPMENT WORKSHOPS

 

As a follow-up to yesterday’s list of faculty comments on their resistance to attend teaching events with or without speakers on teaching methods, this blog will proffer some practical, “successful” ideas to increase attendance. They are derived from the experiences of faculty developers over the past decade, plus a sprinkling of marketing techniques I’ve learned over the past couple of years.

 

A DOZEN STRATEGIES TO INCREASE ATTENDANCE
Here are a few suggestions you might want to consider. You may have tried many of these already. I hope there’s 1 useful idea in the list:

 

• Conduct an anonymous, short, online survey to determine topics that interest them; give them ideas to check off. (Note: If they don’t respond, shrug it off, dust yourself off, and start all over again. After shrugging and dusting, elicit ideas from your peer developers at similar institutions and don’t use “off” 20 times in a sentence.)

 

• Pick topics in which faculty have interest or need information based on the survey results

 

• Package the event so that it is salable; make believe you’re Steve Jobs promoting the latest iGizmo.

1. Provide adequate info on each workshop, including title, detailed abstract, speaker bio and pic, links to speaker’s publications, Websites, blogs, etc.
2. Select a title that will grab their attention, not an “academic” title
3. Post an abstract that will pique their interest and suck them in
4. Prepare copy like a business marketer, not academician
5. Send out multiple announcements and reminders that are worded differently; be creative; use a video promotion

• Tease or encourage attendance with special perks, such as free books from the speaker or a trip to Hawaii

 

• Require registration at each workshop to provide the illusion of importance; that will also help you to gauge deployment of personnel and resources

 

• Open the workshops to staff on topics of broader appeal, such as coping with stress, time management techniques, how to conduct meetings, and suggested activities during furloughs

 

• Promote aggressively to area institutions to increase attendance and build positive PR with those institutions; request their financial support; you’ll get the regional reputation for quality workshops and speakers

 

Please let me know your experience with any of the above. Suggestions are also welcome to share with others.

 

COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC

OLYMPIANS AND YOU ARE NOT THAT DIFFERENT! Part I

“Are you kidding me? Bending over to pick up the newspaper in the driveway is a major athletic event for me. I’m so glad it’s not timed.” I’m not referring to athletic conditioning. Consider the athletes’ preparation and performance as a professional. Do you share any characteristics in common with those super-athletes? Can you learn anything from their work ethic and practices?

OLYMPIC JOB REQUIREMENTS
Their journey to the Olympics involves the following dozen attributes. These are the job requirements of an Olympian:

• major work commitment and ethic
• commitment to excellence (aka “to be the BEST”)
• unwavering focus on the prize
• ability to overcome obstacles and setbacks
• ability to deal with pressure and stress
• ability to persevere in spite of physical pain and injury
• engaging in your quest because you love doing it
• positive attitude toward attaining the ultimate outcome
• commitment to years of rigorous training
• serving as a role model for the next generation
• willingness to make significant sacrifices
• obtaining financial support for training and preparation

YOUR JOB REQUIREMENTS
Although the Olympians get to march in the opening ceremonies and you don’t, think of the above list as your job requirements. Do you possess any of those attributes as a professional in academia, business, or a semi-illegal activity on 24? Let me ask this another way: Which of those requirements DO NOT apply to you? They seem relevant to faculty and administrators. If some of them don’t apply, you might need to carefully examine what you’re doing and why you’re doing it.

What are the differences between Olympians and YOU? The next blog will answer that.

COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC

MAJOR TIME SAVERS TO INCREASE YOUR PRODUCTIVITY: Part IV

4. 10 More Time-Saver Destinations: “The Rest of the Story”


If you’ve been following this blog series, then you know that this blog is supposed to cover the highlights of my Hawaiian vacation. Haha. A little blog humor. No! Of course, I’m supposed to provide you with 10 more destinations where you can produce ginormous quantities of work to use your time super-duperious efficiently. As promised, here they are:


• Sitting in the waiting room for a doctor’s, dentist’s, lawyer’s, or accountant’s appointment or examination room waiting for someone to show up while your body or teeth are rotting


• During dull and boring parties (or just leave), such as some Super Bowl parties


• Waiting for your initial or connection flight at the airport, especially O’Hare, Cincinnati, or Newark during the winter in U.S. and Heathrow, DeGaulle, or any airport in Italy


• Waiting for sports events to begin or during boring periods, timeouts, or half-times at baseball, football, soccer, hockey, or basketball games


• Waiting in line for Passport Control as you enter the airport of an international city, such as Moscow, Kiev, Belgrade, Tel Aviv, or Dubai; the one exception is Amsterdam (Note: There is no line at Passport Control or Immigration at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam. You just fly through. Schiphol is such a joy. What could you possibly bring into The Netherlands that isn’t legal and on display there already?)


• Waiting at the police station or in jail on DUI or drug charges until someone bails you out (Note: Armed robbery and other felonies will have longer wait times.)


• Waiting at the courthouse for someone to pick you up after you are released on your own recognizance


• Waiting in the hospital emergency room as a patient or relative/friend (Note: Try not to get blood, vomit, or other bodily fluids on your articles, books, or laptop.)


• Waiting for surgery to begin as a patient (Note: Once your IV sedative or anesthesia has kicked in, don’t bother reading; working on your 1st novel, murder mystery, screenplay, or grading papers is okay) or during surgery in the waiting room as a relative/friend


• During your recuperation in the hospital or at home (Note: If organs or body parts are removed, plan for pain medications and long wait times with lots of writing materials. Your writing ideas can reach new imagination levels under various meds.)


BONUS: Waiting for a theatrical performance to begin or at intermission instead of hunting down a $9 1oz. bag of M & Ms



What have I missed? Tell me. I can take it. I even write blogs on rejection.



Consider all of the work you could possibly accomplish at the 21 destinations I’ve listed. These could be missed opportunities to relieve the workload stress you may now be experiencing. I have accomplished buckets of writing at most of these venues.


Consistently and persistently working at these sites can really spike your productivity level and put a dent in your stress level. It’s amazing what you can complete if you stay focused on the tasks on your “to-do” list at these everyday destinations.



Let me know your thoughts and experiences with any of the above, especially places I’ve missed. Now go relax at one of those sites.



COPYRIGHT © 2009 Ronald A. Berk, LLC & Coventry Press

Rejection and Failure in Academe: How Do You Deal?

As academicians, it seems as though we are gluttons for punishment. We feast on rejection. We are the Hannibal Lecters of disappointment and failure. It comes with our territory. I would guess that only performers (actors, singers, dancers, and stand-up comedians) encounter more rejection than we do. Consider the number of opportunities for rejection:

1. Articles, book chapters, and books submitted for review
(Personal Note: During my first couple of years at Johns Hopkins, I accumulated enough rejections from journal editors to wallpaper my office. About 22 years later, my 1st book on humor in teaching--Professors Are from Mars, Students Are from Snickers--garnered 30 publisher rejections. My acceptances have been disproportionately small compared to my rejections.)
2. Proposals for research funding
(Personal Note: With an 80-90% rejection rate for federal RFP submissions, how can one not experience a life of rejection in a research university?)
3. Promotion and tenure review
(Personal Note: It doesn't get any more demeaning than the promotion process. Even for an overachiever like me, when you're promoted, it's anti-climactic. I will never forget the day the committee met to review my credentials for "professor." No one ever called to tell me the decision. I finally called at the end of the day to find out what happened.)
4. Teaching
(Personal Note: Getting whacked by your students on end-of-course evaluations is not a pretty sight. When you put an enormous effort into your teaching and receive personal attacks by a few students, it always hurts. Peer observation can also be a humbling experience.)
5. Miscellaneous
(Personal Note: There are so many other ways our bosses (chairs, associate deans, and deans) can undermine our spirit and demoralize us in the way they treat us; there are too many to count. Academe has found so many ways to discourage their best and brightest faculty and devour their newbies. It should be ashamed.)

If none of the above applies to you, consider yourself blessed beyond description. For those of you to whom one or more of those forms of rejection apply, how do you respond? Just buck up, shrug it off, and keep on moving? That's easier said than done.

Obviously, perseverance is involved. I'd like to pass on an inspirational quote that I present in my keynotes on stress management that's in DVD form. It's from one of America's most creative screenwriters and actors: Sylvester Stallone. The context is Rocky Balboa talking to his son, who is discouraged, hates his job, and blames his dad for his predicament. Here's the quote:

Rocky Balboa (2006):

“I don’t care how tough you are.
It [life] will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it.
You, me, or nobody is going to hit as hard as life.

But it ain’t about how hard you hit;
it’s about how hard you can get hit,
and keep movin’ forward.
How much you can take and keep movin’ forward.
That’s how winning is done.

Now if you know what you’re worth,
now go out and get what you’re worth.
But you gotta be willing to take the hits and not pointin’ fingers, sayin’ you’re not where you wanna be because of him or her or anybody.
Cowards do that and that ain’t you.
You’re better than that.”

This quote is such an eloquent expression of what to consider when we face disappointments, rejection, and failure inside academe as well as outside. I hope it will touch your mind and heart as it did mine. Stay focused, honor your commitments, and "keep movin' forward."

COPYRIGHT © 2009 Ronald A. Berk, LLC