LearnKey Blog
IT Leader: Problem solver & Orchestrator
In the world of technology, especially education through video based training, there are a lot of “moving parts”. We are talking hardware, software, desktop support, third party support vendors, streaming – you name it, we have to host and support it. That is why you need great individuals who can solve problems and orchestrate all technology activities to keep us in business.
That is why I am pleased to announce our IT Leader and Orchestrator Ron Larsen is this months LearnKey/Better Learning Systems employee of the month. His nomination comes after some major milestones: centralizing our support and hosting services, improving OnlineExpert’s “up time” from 98% to 99.9%, and reducing some key expenses along the way.
Ron demonstrates our core values: Ease, Value and Trust in so many ways. Here is what one of his peers had to say:
“As LearnKey’s IT manager, he and his team ensure that LearnKey’s Sales, Client Services, Shipping, Accounting, HR, Marketing, and Production Departments are all able to do their jobs. Quite simply, without Ron and his efforts, LearnKey wouldn’t be able to produce it’s content; Ron makes it easy for the employees of LearnKey and provides value in making things happen that many of us never see, and in some cases are not even aware of. He works behind the scenes a lot of the time moving or upgrading servers to provide clients with a better experience and improving efficiency of the LK team. He builds Trust by simply doing what he says he will do.
Learning Photoshop CS6
Last month I was presented with what seemed like a daunting task. I was asked to learn Photoshop CS6 and take the ACA certification exam, so I could assist with Photoshop CS6 training for teachers in New York. I had never used Photoshop before so I was really nervous about having to learn this new skill and then assist in training others in this program. I am not ACA certified yet, but I have learned first hand how valuable our training is when learning Photoshop CS6.
As I prepare to take the ACA exam to become Photoshop CS6 Certified I want to share six things I have learned that will help anyone who is using LearnKey training to prepare for certification exams.
Scheduled site maintenance
We are undergoing some scheduled site maintenance this weekend, and as a result, many of our sites will not be functioning between Friday 5/31 5pm Pacific time and Saturday 6/1 10pm Pacific time.
The following sites will be affected:
LearnKey
LearnKey Blog
LearnKey Veteran Services
LearnKey Product Registration
Better Learning Systems
Know Your Talents
All sites should be functioning again on Saturday 6/1 at 10pm Pacific time.
Cool under pressure – That’s Tayce
Every month I get to brag about one of our team members at Better Learning Systems. Our newest employee of the month is known for leading multiple projects, always being clear and concise with his communications, and demonstrating the unique ability to maintain composure each and every day. That’s right, LearKey’s version of “cool hand Luke” goes to Tayce Robinson!
Not only has he demonstrated his core values, he has done it taking on a new lead role earlier this year as well. Here is what his Senior Lead Brittni Traynor had to say:
“I have been able to work closely with Tayce for over a year now and firmly believe he is the embodiment of the LearnKey core values- Ease, Trust, and Value. While working here, he has been perusing a master’s degree, and has had his share of communal and other professional obligations, but you would never know he is being pulled in so many different directions. He is always willing to take on new challenges and meet increasingly tighter deadlines. He is the Senior Writer of the Writing Team and he leads his team to success on a daily basis. He has the patience of a saint. It doesn’t matter the situation or the amount of pressure, he simply nods his head, shrugs his shoulders, and gets the project done. It is for these reasons, among a long list of others, that he exemplary team player in the Cedar City office. I am not sure what we would do without him”.
LearnKey’s Gregg Akin – always doing his job!
Some of the greatest leaders in the world use the same phrase to describe what they need their team members to do, which is to “just do your job and trust that your other teammates will do theirs”. You hear it time and time again, just watch a Patriots game and you will see their head coach Bill Belichick screaming that phrase to each sub team (i.e. offense, defense, special teams) when they are on the sidelines. Sounds so simple, however, staying focused and reassuring each team member that if they “just do their job” and trust their teammate to do their job too – they will win.
When you have high performing teams, TRUST is the key ingredient to success, which is why it is one of or core values. LearnKey’s Gregg Akin, who is our newest employee of the month, is a perfect example of someone who comes in and does his job, day in and day out. That is why his manager Scott Walker nominated Gregg and had these comments to say about him:
“Gregg has demonstrated our Core values in many ways. He has brought Value to Learnkey by providing a great work ethic, following up with clients that could have easily been lost. He has taken a huge load off of Client Services, by importing thousands of students in the past several months, training teachers and helping them with the ease of OnlineExpert. You can trust him to follow through with any tasks until they are finished – he gets results. He understands the importance and value of our clients. He is very Easy to receive instructions and complete tasks assigned to him, then goes the extra mile to accomplish them to get results.
Gregg is a great asset to LearnKey, and his dedication and hard work show his team members not only is he doing his job, but he is trusting that his other team members will do their job (i.e. selling, creating and producing great video based training).
Continue reading “LearnKey’s Gregg Akin – always doing his job!”
Spring Training offer – 30% off courseware!
Spring Training isn’t just for athletes – it can be for training your brain, too! From now until the end of April, visit LearnKey.com, select from our many certification and personal development courses, and use coupon code SPRING2013 in the shopping cart to receive 30% off your purchase!
Choose from some of our top titles:
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• A+ Certification 2012 • Network+ Certification 2012 • IC³ GS4 |
• Photoshop CS6 • Word 2010 • Excel 2010 |
Offer expires 4/30/2013. Applies to single-user courseware only, excludes MasterExams and books.
eLearningPlanner.com – Try our new career and leadership tool
We recently released a free tool for job seekers: elearningplanner.com – a leadership trait and career pathway assessment that identifies your specific leadership talents and recommends career paths based on your answers to a short (about 2 minutes) survey.
We couldn’t just leave it at that though – we LearnKeyed it up a notch by matching eLearning bundles with your selected career paths, and to top it all off, every user receives a free Career Readiness 101 course at the end! So not only do you have a prescribed eLearning plan to become career-ready for your chosen path, but we give you some free Microsoft Office basics to get you started!
To give you an idea of what kind of results you can get from the assessment, I decided to be the test subject and go through it myself and post my results.
My Leadership Talent: Patience
With the leading talent as patience, you will naturally be a dependable, persistent leader. You will be most efficient in leadership when you can manage to a process or system. You value making a difference for others and therefore naturally earn respect and create harmony in a group or team. Naturally, you will like support and serve your team, allowing them to have the praise and recognition for their accomplishments. You will do well when you have clearly defined deadlines for meeting team goals and objectives.
My Recommended Career Paths
Finance & Accounting Professional
Administrative Professional
Graphic Design Professional
Now for accuracy: notice how “Graphic Design Professional” is on my list of recommended career paths? While I manage LearnKey’s online marketing and social media, my strengths lean toward graphic design and layout. As for my leadership style – a structured, clearly defined environment has always been where I thrive the most. Scheduling projects all willy-nilly throws off my workflow and I’m nowhere near as productive as I could be. My results show exactly that!
If you’re interested in finding out what your ideal career paths and leadership talents are, be sure to visit elearningplanner.com and take the survey for yourself. Be sure to sign up for the free Career Readiness 101 course at the end!
Team player exudes talent and “can do” attitude
Team player exudes talent, builds trust and makes cool courses!
One of the most enjoyable parts of my job is sharing to the world what great people we have as part of the Better Learning Systems/LearnKey family. What is even better is when newbies join the team and spread their positive energy making an immediate impact and generating positive results.
That could not be more evident than when Marian Eckley joined our Salt Lake City production team last October. From the day she started it’s been a “breath of fresh air” for the entire team. For someone who is new to a team and to build trust with the existing team members so fast is amazing. In the beginning it was not easy the transition happened fast and the team was required to not miss a beat as we were beginning full production of our Adobe CS6 rollout. What did Marian do? Not only did she “dig” in and learn what we were doing, but she also drove higher expectations and confidence to a group that welcomed it.
Here’s what her manager Liz McEuen had to say during Marians nomination:
“I have had the opportunity to work side-by-side with Marian for the last several months and she naturally embodies our core values of trust, ease and value. Anyone who works with Marian knows they can trust her to finish a project on time and with a production value. When you are working in video production problems and questions may come up but not to worry. She will solve the problem with ease and a clear understanding of what needs to happen to achieve the result we are looking for”.
We are so proud of Marian’s success as she has made several changes to our editing process and these changes have lead to a better product in a shorter amount of time making her extremely valuable to the company.
Continue reading “Team player exudes talent and “can do” attitude”
Employee Appreciation Day
Even though this post is a little late, I wanted give everyone a peek into our Employee Appreciation Day festivities. I want to start off by thanking everyone at LearnKey for all that they do, to create fantastic training and experience for our customers. We couldn’t do it without you, so once again THANK YOU! Due to our busy production and work schedules each office celebrated on different days. Technically that would mean that we celebrated Employee Appreciation Month right?
Each office celebrated in their own way by providing lunch for their employees, along with other activities.
In the corporate office located in St. George, Utah they treated their “ROCK STAR” employees to deli sandwiches served with fruit, veggies, chips, and cookies. Each employee wore their rock concert T-shirts, and throughout the day employees had the opportunity to answer questions about LearnKey and Rock music with the opportunity to win $10.00 gift certificates to local lunch spots.
The production office in Cedar City, Utah celebrated with BBQ pulled pork sandwiches with mac and cheese. During lunch employees participated in LearnKey Quote Book Jeopardy and employee based crossword and word search puzzles. Winners of these activities received certificates for double scoop ice cream cones and cash. Cedar employees enjoyed having a break and spending time bonding over the LearnKey quote book sayings.
In behalf of all LearnKey employees I want to thank the management team for showing their appreciation and recognizing all of the top notch employees that work at LearnKey. I know that everyone appreciates not only the free lunch, but everything that you do for each of us.
Have a question about LearnKey training or support? I bet KJ has the answer!
At Better Learning Systems, while supporting hundreds of thousands of users, we get a lot of questions about training: how to use our learning systems, technical support, how to deliver our courses to third world countries with no internet… the list goes on and on. It really makes you appreciate those employees who spend the time to have the product knowledge and experience to answer those questions. One person who prides himself in helping people is Kevin Jacobsen our February employee of the month. It’s the one thing we can get right each and every time we interact with our customers when they ask for our help. Kevin truly takes pride in being professional, knowledgeable, respectful and courteous at all times.
Kevin’s leadership team had this to say about his nomination and selection:
“Over the past two months Kevin has demonstrated our core values in several ways. Providing great value by putting in additional hours, supporting customers’ inquires over the phones, in addition to assisting employees with technical needs internally. He is considered a Trusted resource as he will always follow through with what he is given. He has transitioned into a new role and made it easy for all parties who interact with him regarding technical support.
Continue reading “Have a question about LearnKey training or support? I bet KJ has the answer!”