My early writing for Curious Lion was terrible. I used to be a decent writer, back when I wrote about things that interested me. But I couldn’t find my voice writing about online training. Every other week I’d get a piece of content out that was as dry as the paper it was written on. […]
Why You Need Two Kinds of Groups to Power Group Learning Read More »
There’s this concept in the movie Inception, that you never quite know how a dream started. You always just find yourself in the middle of it. It feels incredibly real, and you’re completely focused on what happens next. This makes me think about the decisions I’ve made in my life that have led me to
Don’t Sweat the Big Decisions Read More »
Stories from the first 3 years leading Talent Development for a high-growth company This is a co-authored blog post between a passionate talent development professional (Phylicia Jones, “PJ”) and Curious Lion (told by founder, Andrew Barry, “AB”). Together we share our lessons and learnings on how to work together to create amazing learning experiences. Year
What It’s Like to Work with Curious Lion Read More »
Writing is the iterative process, optimized by involving others, of adding detail to the pillars of a single idea. Romantic visions of writers depict them holed up in a cabin in the woods or sitting at a sun-soaked window in the top room of an old hotel where they seem to be the only guest.
Writing is Not a Solo Pursuit, it’s a Process Read More »
As a team, we read and write a lot of scripts for training videos. If there is one thing I’ve learned it is that there is no perfect script (or essay or blog post or email). But there is a process for writing that you can use to approach perfection. Before that even, you need
I recently finished a podcast on the future of online learning. David Perell sat down with Skillshare CEO Matt Cooper to discuss the online learning industry. Among the many fascinating topics, I picked out a few tips for anyone developing training material. One or two may surprise you. Shorter courses do better in online learning
13 Online Learning Lessons from Skillshare Read More »
I’ve been working closer to a 4 day workweek during the 3 months of lockdown. But I haven’t been any less productive. If anything, I’m more productive, writing more and making bigger decisions. The step back has afforded me a new perspective. I’m thinking long-term. This has meant scaling back my lead generation service and
How About a 4 Day Workweek? Read More »
Let me tell you about the mistakes I’ve made building a training material development process for Curious Lion. On one project, I found out far too late that the developers we’d hired to create eLearning modules had no idea what they were doing. I learned a valuable lesson that day: prototype and test. Rapidly. Test the
A Complete Guide to Training Material Development Read More »
When faced with the Covid-19 pandemic, medical experts confronting the coronavirus first consulted their prior knowledge of similar viruses to look for clues to contain this one. When you are learning how to use a new piece of software, you are unconsciously looking for ways it’s similar to software you’ve used in the past, and
Prior Knowledge: The Most Important Factor for Learning Read More »
Instead of asking how to create a productive organization, ask how not to do it. Then avoid what causes the opposite of what you want to achieve. This approach to solving problems came from Carl Jacobi. Jacobi was the first Jewish mathematician to be appointed professor at a German university. He is also known for teaching his research students
9 Tips for a Productive Organization from the CIA Read More »