There are some great things about a new year—fresh energy after the holidays, well-considered resolutions, and a fresh new calendar. But then those overcast skies move in, and sometimes that energy fizzles. Why not pencil some one-hour webinar dates into your calendar? They’re super opportunities to source new ideas for your business. And at 29 days this leap year, little February isn’t so little; it’s one day longer and it’s packed with free web events. Check them out—we hope they help rekindle your love of learning.

Tuesday, February 2, 2016, 8AM – 9AM PST: Masters Series: Evidence-Based Certifications: Is This for Me?

Join in for the first webinars of their kind,  a new series called "Reflections with the Masters."

In this exclusive series, top subject matter experts engage with participants in direct conversations about today's top training challenges. To facilitate the highest quality of interaction, sessions are limited to 30 or fewer participants.

For a limited time, participation is available to all members of Training Magazine Network: basic, standard, advanced and premium. After this introduction, these sessions will be available only to standard-level members and above, so these preview sessions are a very special, limited opportunity.

Participants will be selected randomly. For confidential participation, the sessions will not be recorded.

In our L&D field we have been bombarded with the need for certifications, the demand for certifications and the hunt for certifications!

In your quest for the right “fit”, perhaps you should be exploring Evidence-Based Certifications. An Evidence-Based Certification provides you the opportunity to demonstrate your proficiency in real-world workplace situations.

Here are some of the benefits of earning an Evidence-Based Certification:

• Validates the multiple ways you have learned and developed proficiency.

• Recognizes your expertise in achieving business results.

• Demonstrates your value to your business partners.

• Attests to your knowledge as a professional.

• Distinguishes you from your competitors.

Wednesday, February 3, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: 10 Powerful Principles for Creating Impactful e-Learning

The shared perspective from learners and designers on e-learning is that much of it is not very good: It's boring, the interactions don't teach, the media are unhelpful, and so on. This is despite the fact that well-meaning instructional designers are following long-established models and doing exactly what most authoring tools have made easy. When pushed, many designers know what they are doing is flawed, but there's little guidance on how to do anything better. Many learners find that e-learning courses are not complex or difficult to achieve — designers need to focus on the essential aspects of learning that have been overlooked in the haste to rely on technology alone.

In this webinar, Ethan Edwards, Chief Instructional Strategist at Allen Interactions, will share 10 powerful principles to guide e-learning design. The principles focus on feedback, learner actions, usefulness of templates, motivation, risk and content. Appropriate for any content and applicable to any authoring tool, these principles will empower designers to make concrete design changes that will improve the impact of their e-learning courses.

In this webinar you will learn:

• 10 principles to increase the effectiveness and engagement of your e-learning designs.

• To evaluate “best practice” guidelines offered by authoring systems and design models for effectiveness.

• The importance of context, risk, motivation, and media impact in design decisions.

• To identify effective design elements in completed e-learning modules.

Thursday, February 4, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: Emotional Intelligence for Sales Success

Lack of emotional intelligence skills is the one of the biggest and overlooked reasons for missed revenue goals. Often, salespeople know what to do; however, in tough selling situations, they let non-productive emotions take over. They discount too soon, write practice proposals without proper qualification, and continue to meet with non-decision makers. Their inability to execute the right selling behaviours during stressful situations leads to poor sales results. When it comes to sales, emotional intelligence skills are every bit important as hard selling skills.

In this interactive presentation, participants will:

• Learn the neuroscience behind effective selling and influence.

• Avoid fight-or-flight responses when meeting with challenging prospects.

• Bridge the knowing-and-doing gap by integrating hard sales skills training and soft skills training.

• Learn how specific emotional intelligence skills such as empathy, assertiveness, and impulse control directly affect successful sales outcomes.

• Discover how to create emotionally intelligent sales cultures that are competitive and collaborative.

What's Your Sales EQ? 

Thursday, February 4, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: How to Accelerate Learning Transfer Through Competency-Based Learning (Free for ATD members)

Competency models identify what the organization needs people in a particular role to do in order for the organization to succeed and create competitive advantage. They intrinsically motivate people to achieve. In essence, they provide each person with a road map for how to be great. The responsibility of the talent and learning and development teams is to provide the best chance for learning transfer to occur so that business results follow. If the competency models define the required skills, then you need to make sure you have, or create, competency-based learning. In this webcast, we’ll show you the process for mapping models to learning. You’ll learn how to:

• Link competency models to existing learning opportunities.

• Use competency models to identify learning opportunities you need to develop.

• Keep your mapping current.

Thursday, February 4, 2016, 10AM – 11PM PST: Moving from Training to Performance Consulting: 3 Key Considerations

So what's the difference between being a training consultant and a performance consultant? And why should you care? When performance is the question, training is your sixth answer.

This fast-paced session will highlight some of the key ideas from Bob's two day pre-conference at Training 2016—Moving from Mere Provider to Trusted Advisor: How to be a Performance Consultant.

In this session you'll learn:

• The critical difference between a training consultant and performance consultant.

• What the Performance Solutions Cube is—and why it is important.

• What the key difference is between being a trusted advisor—and a mere provider.

Tuesday, February 9, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: Provoking Leadership vs. Faking It

You've likely seen the great video about the importance of the First Follower, popularized by TED Talks. In the book The Righteous Mind, Jonathan Haidt shares this quote: "...focusing on leadership alone is like trying to understand clapping by studying only the left hand." He claims that the correct question is not why people want to lead, but why people want to follow. Haidt says that people will follow leaders who:

• Establish credibility to the followers around they are the leader.

• Will be fair and just, and avoid playing favourites.

• Most importantly, make a convincing argument that there can be only one leader (him or her).

How much of the time do you fake leadership? How much time do you actually spend leading? Is your investment appropriate or lacking? We must prioritize the time and energy to make the team feel like a family, with shared values but differences that create “a whole brain.” Having everyone eat at their desk alone is not driving trust and teamwork. Things like celebrating birthdays, project success, or here in Indy, an afternoon at the Indy 500 practice, have long been eliminated to focus on real work. Leadership is real work. “Not leading” is faking it.

In this session, you will re-visit the beliefs you have about practising leadership, and learn how to build a leadership process rather than a leadership event.  

Wednesday, February 10, 2016, 11AM–12PM PST: Coaching Skills for Leaders (Free for ATD members)

We have all heard leadership concerns about managing Millennials, as if they require completely different things from their employers than the rest of us. However, if you listen closely to Millennials, what they want is no different from what research has proven all employees want in the workplace—a sense of purpose, transparency, and a say in what they do.

The difference is that Millennials have been more vocal and insistent, and employers are now being forced to take notice. Although previous generations may have accepted older, more regimented leadership styles and corporate cultures, Millennials have made it clear that they will not. So if leaders want to attract the power that Millennials and the new economy offer, they must adopt a new style of leadership.

The issue isn't just about how to deal with Millennials in the workforce. It's about engaging employees across all generations. But can leaders do this effectively and still be productive? Absolutely. Nothing engages people better than listening to them—asking them for their input and opinions. And nothing works better at fostering good listening than coaching.

Thursday, February 11, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: Zombie-Proof Your Organization: How to Breathe Life into the Disengaged Working Dead

Is your organization employing a workforce of motivated and vibrant human beings? Or is the office full of lumbering, disengaged zombies barely able to pillage snacks from the kitchen and groan in meetings? Don’t let your employees become the working dead. You can save them!

In this webinar you’ll learn how to keep your organization from being overrun by an army of unthinking, unmotivated, and undead employees. Alex Khurgin, Grovo’s director of learning, will share a wealth of tips, insights, and strategies for invigorating your workforce using a 21st-century development strategy.

In this session, Grovo’s director of learning, Alex Khurgin, will use his trademark blend of philosophy and humor to explore:

• Why learning is the key to reviving disengaged employees in 2016.

• How to transform brain-dead workers into people who love what they do.

• The business value of meaningful learning initiatives in a digital economy.

Please note: There is no handout planned for this event.

Thursday, February 11, 2016, 11AM–12PM PST: Project Management (Free for ATD members)

We all have good intentions, but once we start a new training project along with all the other projects we've got going, the projects can take on a life of their own. This webcast, developed in partnership with Russell Martin & Associates, will present concrete steps to improve your project management skills. Participants will learn critical project management strategies, helping them deliver learning and performance solutions that better support their business goals.

After the workshop, participants will be able to:

• Differentiate between project management and project work.

• Define the roles of the project manager, project sponsor, and other key individuals working on a project.

• Create a project charter.

• Build a project plan that includes schedules, resource allocations, and budgets.

Tuesday, February 16, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: Learning Technology for an Evolving, Mobile Workforce

The modern workforce is remarkably different than it was just ten years ago. Workers today are more mobile, social, collaborative and tech-savvy than ever before. So why is it that we keep trying to deliver learning in the same ways we were before the launch of the iPhone?

There is an immense amount of potential for learning in mobile, collaborative, and cloud technologies, and companies need to catch up to their people’s expectations. Millennials are quickly becoming a majority of the workforce, armed with mobile devices and a desire for relevant, personal experiences.

Join David Wentworth, Principal Learning Analyst with Brandon Hall Group as he examines the most recent findings from BHG’s Mobile Learning Survey and how companies can begin to embrace new learning modalities to meet the needs of their workforce.

Discussion topics include:

• The current mobile learning landscape.

• The benefits and advantages of mobile learning.

• Mobile’s role in an expanded learning ecosystem.

• Best practices of high performing organizations.

Tuesday, February 16, 2016, 11AM – 12PM PST: Unified Talent Management: How HCR ManorCare Made Their People the Priority (Free for ATD members)

Patients are every healthcare organization’s main focus, so HCR ManorCare knew that to provide the best patient care they needed to first prioritize their biggest resource: their people. Join us for this webcast as the presenters discuss their approach to implementing a talent-management strategy. It was an ever-changing process as they welcomed a new chief operations officer, faced adjustments in the organization’s strategy, and had to manage funding struggles to keep up with healthcare-reimbursement changes. Their approach focused on improved employee learning, succession planning for key positions, and linking performance management to training and succession.

Attendees will learn:

• How to link their talent management approach to their organization’s strategy.

• Strategies for adjusting their approach in response to internal and external issues that will occur during implementation.

• The importance of doing a full organizational assessment prior to implementing a talent management strategy.

Wednesday, February 17, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: Research Spotlight: Insights into Measurement and Analytics

The datafication of the workforce continues, and software solutions make it increasingly easier to collect and report on that data. But this has only created a new set of challenges for HR professionals. The obvious issues are what data to pay attention to and what to ignore, but there is also the issue of how best to present and explain that data in a way that helps create change.

Participants of this webinar will:

• Learn the most common HR analytics issues.

• Find both typical and creative solutions to handling people data problems.

• Discover trends in HR analytics for 2016.

• Hear some of the possible complications in using people data in the future.

Thursday, February 18, 2016, 12PM – 1PM PST: Accelerating Experience-Based Learning for High Performance

Experts, scientists, and learning specialists agree that experience is one of the better ways to help learners learn. The more experience the learner and worker have, the more they perform on the job. In typical learning environments, “experience learning” is not encouraged. Consequently, learners try hard to learn the theory and yet forget it as soon as they finish the courses. To prevent this from happening, effective learning incorporates experience-learning before, during, and after the learning process—and is continually encouraged on the job.

Topics covered:

• What scientific studies demonstrate that experience-learning is far more effective than other methods?

• What are the key elements of experience-learning—its design, methods, platform, and culture?

• What aspects of your training plan warrant experience-learning methods?

• How do you use problem solving, analytical studies, trouble-shooting, action-research, and peer-to-peer learning to strengthen experience-learning?

Monday, February 22, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: Building Change Leadership: There’s a Gap for That (Free for ATD members)

Change is in every organization’s DNA and plays into everything that leaders, talent managers, and employees do, regardless of hierarchy or rank. The future belongs to change-capable leaders and agile organizations. Whether your organization is targeting a new growth agenda, refocusing its strategic priorities, or building its leadership pipeline, the ability to navigate change is the ultimate competitive advantage in today’s global market. Change is here to stay, and the lackluster state of change leadership today shows that the world needs better change leaders.

Executives are looking to talent managers to help create more agile organizations and develop more change-ready leaders. As a result, talent managers need to rethink how they prioritize and develop change capabilities.

Join this webcast to discover how to:

• Identify and leverage your role as a strategic change agent.

• Build change leadership across the organization.

• Assess your team’s change agent capabilities.

Tuesday, February 23, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: Five Question Leader: Work Less Hard, Have More Impact (Free for IPL members)

Managers and leaders find themselves stuck in three vicious circles. They're frustrated by teams who have become over-dependent on them. They're overwhelmed by the amount of work they have to do. And they're disconnected from their own Great Work—the work that has impact, the work that has meaning. Sound familiar? Breaking out of those vicious circles is simpler than you might think. Mastering five essential questions can help managers and leaders increase the focus, courage, and resilience they need to have more impact in the work they do.

In this practical, interactive, and engaging webinar participants will:

• Discover the three vicious circles that keep managers—and their teams—stuck.

• Understand how breaking out of these circles can help them work less hard and have more impact.

• Learn the five core questions they need so they (and those they lead) can focus on the work that matters.

• Find the Best Coaching Question in the World (and it has just three words).

Participants will not only leave with a plan to do things differently, but will also get access to a special Box of Crayons report: Four Surprising Phrases to Supercharge Your Conversation and Boost Your Manager IQ. 

Wednesday, February 24, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: 6 Strategies to Boost the Impact of Your Learning

As L&D professionals, we strive to create and implement learning and development solutions that equip leaders, managers, and individual contributors to perform at their best. Despite the fact that we know training events on their own aren’t enough to ensure lasting performance improvement, it is easy to get caught up in the pressure to push out programs quickly, while neglecting the factors that dictate whether the learning will improve performance. Genuinely enhancing individual and organizational results requires leveraging best practices for successful implementation.

In this webinar, you’ll learn 6 strategies to elevate any learning effort from program to performance improvement initiative.

In this practical session, you will learn to:

• Align learning with your organization’s strategy to secure successful business outcomes

• Expand your view of the learning initiative to encompass application to the job.

• Elevate your learning implementation to a strategic initiative by leveraging the 6 best practices.

• Gain ideas, tools, and techniques to help you provide training that impacts the success of your organization.

Wednesday, February 24, 2016, 11AM – 12PM PST: New Year, New Sales Training Approach: A Self-Assessment Guide to Your Sales Training in 2016 (Free for ATD members)

The New Year is a built-in moment for sales teams to reflect on their training efforts: what worked, what didn’t, and what to push for in 2016. Sales training should be interactive, accessible, memorable, and measurable. We should look at training as not simply a New Year’s resolution, but as a continuous process with long-lasting results.

In this interactive webcast, we will walk you through this all-important reflection with a self-assessment guide so you can understand how best to improve your sales training moving forward.

This webcast will:

• Go through a series of self-assessing questions to evaluate your current sales training.

• Provide insights as to where you need to improve your sales training programs.

• Give you tips on how to achieve these changes for the New Year and beyond.

Thursday, February 25, 2016, 10AM – 11AM PST: The Barefoot Spirit: Engage and Empower Your People to Ignite Sales

What happens when you fit every employee in your company into one of two divisions: sales or sales support? Suddenly, everyone knows his or her “real” job is to create customer and co-worker experiences that drive sales. This shift in perception will drive every decision your employees make. Michael Houlihan and Bonnie Harvey built the iconic Barefoot Wine (a top global brand) using this simple business structure.

In this presentation, they’ll reveal their secrets, including:

• Why a sales-focused culture produces the kind of results that foster and sustain customer loyalty.

• How to spot the entrepreneurial spirit and DNA in every applicant.

• How to orient all new employees toward sales on day one.

• How to enforce the sales support relationship with sales through:

  • Performance-based compensation.

  • Know-the-need,” not “need-to-know.”

  • Leader/employee relationships based on permission, acknowledgment, and validation.

Attendees will receive a free PDF of key chapters from their new book, The Entrepreneurial Culture, 23 Ways to Engage and Empower Your People.

Friday, February 26, 2016, 9AM – 10AM PST: Career Management for Young Professionals (Free for ATD members)

If you're a young talent development professional, don't miss this special members-only Ask-a-Coach webcast with career development expert Wendy Terwelp. Wendy, author of the Rock Your Network® series, will answer common questions from young professionals as well as queries posed by you.