Tomorrow, millions of Americans will sit down to watch football and fill up on turkey. Then they’ll fall asleep on the couch.
It’s Thanksgiving!
Before the turkey and the football (and the nap on the couch), I wanted to take a little time to share my thanks for so many things I’m grateful for in my journey through the world of L&D this year.
I’m thankful for:
- An awesome job
- At an awesome organization (we cure blindness!)
- With awesome co-workers who make me smile
- And awesome leadership who allow me to engage people with creative, fun, engaging (and hopefully effective!) training
- ATD taking a liking to my blog
- All of you who actually read the words I write. Without you, I’d just be some dude journaling brilliant thoughts, to myself, online. Thank you for reading, sharing, commenting, questioning, challenging and sometimes even rolling your eyes at what I’ve written. It keeps me going.
- Tyrod Taylor (true, he has nothing to do with L&D, but he gives me hope on Sundays, and having hope for a Buffalo Bills fan is something to be thankful for)
- PollEverywhere
- PowToon
- Storyline
- At least 97 other online tools that Jane Hart has compiled in this list.
- The Elearning Heroes community that has helped me out of a Storyline jam on more than one occasion
- An opportunity to get much more involved with my local ATD chapter
- The opportunity to share some lessons learned in a presentation at the eLearning Guild’s Performance Support Symposium
- An impromptu dinner with Tom Spiglanin at that conference (previously, I had mainly interacted with Tom only via Twitter)
- The creation of Project: Soapbox (follow Soapbox on Twitter if you want to get in early on a tool that will transform the way people present; it’s not quite ready yet, but it should be come spring 2016)
- An awesome partner in crime who’s helping transform Project: Soapbox, an idea that I first dreamt up in 2012, into a reality.
- Stumbling upon Melissa Marshall’s TED talk (why would you not watch something called “Talk Nerdy to Me”… especially if it only lasts 3 minutes; that’s shorter than most cat videos on YouTube!)
- Then having the opportunity to work with her in person!
- Being told about the tv show Black Mirror (if you’re in to technology AND The Twilight Zone, you ought to Netflix it… though you may wish to skip over the first episode)
- Getting invited to exchange thoughts and ideas about L&D (among other things) through a HipChat group organized by Melissa Milloway. (Want to join our conversation? Drop me a note.)
- The opportunity to write an article for TD magazine (stay tuned – a second article entitled “Think Inside the Box” should be published in the January 2016 edition)
- My mother who faithfully reads my blog twice a week and sends me notes about what she likes. Hi mom!
- My wife who now refers to herself as Mrs. Flipchartguy and who shoos the kids away (often distracting them with freshly baked cookies) when she sees that I’m in the zone, pecking away at my next blog masterpiece. A while back she even wrote a guest post about John Medina.
- My two kids who remind me daily what it’s like to be excited to learn new things, and who have inspired several blog posts over the past few years.
- A Twitter network that never ceases to amaze me with links to eye opening information and resources that I’d otherwise never be exposed to. (Feel free to add to my Twitter network by connecting with me here)
- Like Tracy Parish’s list of 340 online resources for… well, there’s pretty much a resource for anything you need to do – project management, slide design, fonts, rapid authoring tools, screencasting, scheduling, color scheme picking – you name it.
- A running partner willing to chew up and spit out a few miles with me at 5:30am, rain or shine, darkness or light, crooked pavement or smooth track. With my heavy, ongoing addiction to ice cream and an uptick in my Frappuccino consumption this year, those morning runs might be the only reason I don’t weigh 350 pounds right now.
- 16 trips to India and not a single case of Delhi Belly.
- Wood to knock on after bragging about good health.
- Mr. Sketch (did you really think I’d get through a list of anything L&D related without a shout out to my #1 training buddy?)
- Matchbox (the pizza place in Washington, DC)
- Dan Jolly, who gave me my first job with “training” in the title back in 2006
- An opportunity to screw up… and then learn from it in order to hone my craft and get better at my job.
- AC/DC, the band that knows how to get a guy going on the morning of a training session
There’s my list. Anything in here resonate with you? What are you thankful for as we head into Thanksgiving and the holiday season? I’d love to read your thoughts in the comment section.
