Footprints on the Mountainside

There seems to be an impression floating around in companies that serious training happens indoors, and outbounds are for having fun.

While ther is nothing wrong with having fun in the outdoors, I find it disturbing to see such programmes called training programmes.

Somewhere, I find that this reinforces an unconscious desire in participants to resist change and is harmful for the overall learning environment of the organization. Most of the outbound training enquiries I get focus on the “activities”. The more exciting, the better, the more exotic, the more adventurous, the more…. something-or-the-other. Pursuit of adventure is fabulous. I make money from it. But why wrap it up as a self-development programme or management training?

From a very simple angle, you get to save money from the trainer’s fees as well as training session time to invest fully into the desired adventure experience. From a deeper angle, there is no pretense - there is a certain honesty to going after what is really desired.

I suspect some of this is about “We have a training budget….” as an HR professional had candidly explained to me. Stated almost directly in that conversation was the objective that they wish to utilize the training budget so that it doesn’t get cut down, but they really don’t have any training in mind at the moment.

What I find telling in this is the inability to see beyond fixed concepts. This is a rigidity in perspective that is only manifesting itself with me in this way in the first fifteen minutes of conversation. What is this rigidity doing everyday, to the person, to the people who are influenced by their choices and to the organization?

How do I see this rigidity? I see it when an entire document about training is read and the important issues for discussion are about travel, accommodation, activities and food. I see it when outbound training becomes a way of organizing an outing under training budgets. I see it when there isn’t the least curiosity about if an outbound training programme is a new service called thus to provide that utility of training budget, or if it really has any value to deliver.

Of course, not all companies are like that. I have conducted programmes where participants on the outbound actually needed to be told to lighten up and go with the flow, because they were so focussed on learning, that they were almost unable to “be”.

And I have found the perfect participants as well - people who had arrived with full knowledge that they were out on training, and knew that they would be spending time in the outdoors and were fine with seeing what happened with the flow.

Why do I call these the perfect participants? Because they are utilizing their value for money, because they are investing their time actively and because it brings me a glow of pride in being able to work with them, to see their transformations and celebrate being a part of it. It brings me a high to see the changes being wrought still alive in participants when I meet them on some future programme….

It brings me the joy of having companions along on a journey of discovery, and I find few things that are headier than that.

As usual, ready for something new!

I had heard about blog advertising a while ago, but their “regular posting requirements” had me stumped, as until recently, I was caught up in so many things that I rarely had time to post regularly here.

For a blog to be selected with them, it must have 20 posts in the previous 90 days….. which I finally have, huh? This is a celebration for me, because it means that I am now able to live up to the commitment of keeping bringing in something new for you readers… that I’d been promising for a long time now.

So what is PayPerPost? As the name suggests, its a site which offers reviews for other sites and products. Advertizers who want to create a buzz about their product can pay for bloggers to review them, bloggers earn money…. for me, the reason is something different.

Money, yes. Who doesn’t like money? But if I know myself, I will not be able to write about things I don’t care about. This is, actually a good opportunity for me to discover different kinds of sites and services that I otherwise would never have known about. If I like it, great. If I learn from it, still better and if I earn from it…. what more do I want?

But, if you think this is going to change the “feel of the blog”…. I don’t think so. I’m too much in love with this place to let its charm go. What I am planning to do, is look at the different sites that are promoting something, and see if I can bring it here for you. In short, I’m going to go on an exploring spree!!!

I invite you to fasten your seat-belts and join me. And yes, if you find something interesting to share…. money or not, let’s go for it!

Isabs is an important part of my life now. I find that I believe in the process of development through T-Groups and the ISABS methodology more than any individual facilitator there, and I would like to become a certified trainer with them.

I have finally taken my first step in that direction when I completed my “Phase A” which is the first part of their professional development programme which leads to the certification of behavioural trainers through the T-Group methodology. This is the only kind of certification available for T-Groups in India.

The programme was full of insights and shifts in myself, as well as the way I see things. Strangely, the more I accept that my emotions and experiences are the property of the group and a part of our learning, the more I can acknowledge them and look at them freely and learn from them.

This Phase A comprises of two labs of the usual length and was far more eventful for me than all my previous labs. Part of this is also because I was far more ready to understand my behaviours and experiment with shifts that could lead to changes I desired. This readiness and acceptance of what I was, as I was led to me flowing and changing freely with very little stress.

I may or may not eventually write about my learnings, but they are an inseparable part of me now. I am living by them.