The new year can bring a fresh start, new challenges and new goals. Do any of your new year’s resolutions involve “upskilling” or relate to your career or professional development?
Upskilling—training or education that teaches new skills or advances or upgrades existing skills—is linked to greater satisfaction with one’s job or career, improvement in quality of life, and increased standard of living, according to the Gallup organization.
The HR Employee Learning and Engagement team invites you to participate in at least one learning experience this semester. ELE unlocks the potential of every Vanderbilt employee by offering innovative and meaningful learning experiences, creating space to foster conversations and connections, and encouraging a culture of learning and growth. ELE’s vision is for every employee to feel connected and integral to Vanderbilt’s mission, empowered to invest in themselves and succeed in their role, engaged in the campus community, and inspired to design their best future.
While many new year’s resolutions fall short, yours don’t have to. Think about setting small, attainable goals or steps. For example, if your original resolution was that you want to become an expert in emotional intelligence, your smaller, achievable goal might be to read three books related to emotional intelligence in the next six months. Or maybe you want to expand your knowledge of Excel, and your smaller goal is to complete one self-paced Excel course in Oracle.
ELE welcomes you to engage with us during our live virtual learning experiences, designed exclusively for the Vanderbilt community and led by the ELE team. We know that on some days, you are ready to fully participate in breakout room discussions and activities, while on others, you may want to participate more passively. Our participation levels will guide you in selecting learning opportunities that are a good fit for you, your schedule and your energy. We want you to have the opportunity to participate in the way that is most meaningful, valuable and growth-focused yet comfortable for you. You can learn more about participation levels and where each workshop fits on our website; below, you’ll see levels indicated by 1 (Consume and Consider), 2 (Comment and Connect) or 3 (Collaborate and Create).
The ELE team also has selected self-paced resources on a variety of relevant topics, including career growth, communication, leadership, mentorship and teamwork, to share with you.
To register for any learning experience, please visit the links below or on our website, or search for “ELE” on SkyVU/Oracle under Learning. Please note that ELE workshops are offered at no cost to all VU employees.
Live learning experiences
Jan. 18, 2–3:30 p.m., Five Dysfunctions of a Team (2)
Description: “Not finance. Not strategy. Not technology. It is teamwork that remains the ultimate competitive advantage, both because it is so powerful and so rare.” –Patrick Lencioni
Attend this session and focus on the state of your team. There are five dysfunctions as diagnosed by the author that can impair the performance and success of any team. Due to our virtual environment, teamwork has looked a bit different over the past one and a half years. We want to equip you with knowledge about each dysfunction and strategies for proactively addressing it within the workplace.
Facilitator: Krystal Clark
Jan. 20, 11–11:50 a.m., BRAVING – Exploring the Anatomy of Trust (3)
Description: An essential part of our daily work revolves around relationships with colleagues, whether in close proximity or distant. Trust is a key factor in building and maintaining those relationships. In this workshop, Brene Brown’s BRAVING concept will be explored as it pertains to the anatomy of trust and workplace relationships. Presenting trust as a fundamental two-way street, the workshop aims at highlighting how each person in the professional relationship is responsible for building, earning and maintaining trust. Join us in discovering the positive outcomes of having workplace relationships with trust as the foundation.
Facilitator: TaShunda Franklin
Jan. 24, 1–3 p.m., Design Thinking, Upskilling, and Experimenting for Career Growth (3)
Description: In this workshop, we invite you to explore design thinking, upskilling and experimenting and how you can apply these concepts and tools to your professional life. For example, we will discuss prototyping and how we can explore if our skills might transfer into a specific role in the future, what actions we can take to experiment, and more. Participants will actively engage in discussions around their potential futures, their current role and related skills, and actionable steps to move forward.
While we can’t promise to help you discover your passion and dream job in one workshop, we do promise to help you start moving forward in thinking about your current career path and in creating and leveraging opportunities for growth, both in your current role and beyond. Participants also will explore learning and growth opportunities within Vanderbilt and how they can harness such experiences for professional and personal development.
This workshop is relevant to anyone interested in career growth, either now or planning for the future, and is especially relevant if you are considering pivoting or leveraging your skills in a different way, either in your current role or in a new area. We invite you to invest these two hours in yourself, your career and your future.
*This workshop will include about 10-15 minutes of pre-work. Please consider whether the participation level is a good fit for you: This workshop is Level 3: Collaborate and Create, and you can expect breakout rooms, exercises and activities. Discussion and feedback are critical to the design thinking process, and we’ll do these in a supportive and inspiring environment.
Facilitator: Krista Vaught
Jan. 31, 11:30 a.m.–noon, A microlearning series on positive psychology: awe (2)
Jan. 31, 1–3 p.m., Atomic Habits (2)
Description: Vanderbilt head football coach Clark Lea frequently discusses the importance of “heartbeats and habits,” and there’s no time like the present to begin building new habits.
Atomic Habits has been called “the most comprehensive and practical guide on how to create good habits, break bad ones, and get 1 percent better every day.” This book, by James Clear, encourages people to think deeply about the systems that need to accompany new habits.
What new habits do you want to develop for the workplace? What old habits are you ready to be rid of in the workplace?
Learn about Atomic Habits and leave with an action plan to implement these practices into your work at Vanderbilt.
Facilitator: Krystal Clark
Feb. 1, 1–2:30 p.m., Digital Body Language: Is That What They Meant?! (2)
Description: Every piece of digital communication is subjective. In the workplace, seemingly subtle choices can lead to miscommunication, inefficiencies and challenging interpersonal dynamics.
Have you ever experienced a supervisor sending a meeting invitation without a subject for the late afternoon, a colleague responding with one word when your email outlined multiple questions and priorities, or a message that the sender marked urgent that was not urgent at all? From emails, video calls and texts to emojis, punctuation, phrasing, tone and more, this workshop will explore how digital body language influences your relationships, effectiveness and understanding. We will discuss how brevity, response time and medium, seemingly meaningless word choices such as adding “very” or another adjective for emphasis, and other non-verbal virtual cues can impact our message.
Together, we will explore strategies to enhance and clarify our digital communications so that our messages are fully received in the way that we intend, and so that we’re giving our colleagues the benefit of the doubt when we interpret their messages. For example, we can shift our response to a proposal a colleague shares from “I like your ideas here, but … ” (which can feel invalidating or can, at the least, make others focus on what negative feedback might be coming after the “but”) to “I like your ideas here, and I wonder … ” We can limit our use of words such as “kind of” and “just,” which can undermine our message, and we can limit saying “I’m sorry” (such as, “I’m sorry to bother you … ”) to times that truly call for an apology.
This workshop draws from multiple resources, including Harvard Business Review, TEDx talks, Erica Dhawan’s Digital Body Language: How to Build Trust & Connection, No Matter the Distance, and various other articles.
Facilitator: Krista Vaught
Feb. 2, 1–2:30 p.m., CliftonStrengths for VU Employees (2)
Description: The CliftonStrengths Assessment is a tool that provides insight into your natural recurring talents and abilities. In this session, we will provide you with an opportunity to complete the CliftonStrengths assessment to unlock your Top 5 Talent Themes and explore how they impact your work.
Facilitators: Krystal Clark and Chance Ryon
Feb. 7, 11:30 a.m.–noon, A microlearning series on positive psychology: gratitude (2)
Feb. 8, 2:30–4 p.m., Dealing with Change at Work (2)
Description: “There is nothing permanent except change.” –Heraclitus
Working within a thriving and evolving workplace means that change is constant. We all handle change differently, and it’s important to continue developing strategies that allow us to deal with change effectively. This session will focus on the point of view of being on the receiving end of change and not being the formal leaders of change. How can you use personal leadership skills and influence as an informal leader to lead yourself and support others through change efforts?
Attend this session to fill your toolbox with practical go-to tips to help you navigate change.
Facilitator: Krystal Clark
Feb. 14, 11:30 a.m.–noon, A microlearning series on positive psychology: mindfulness (2)
Feb. 16, 1–2 p.m., Professionalism: What It Is and Is Not (2)
Description: We hear it said frequently—“That’s so unprofessional”—but what exactly is professionalism? Is it the way we dress, talk or behave? Or is it about one’s approach to work? This workshop is designed to challenge conventional ideas and make the distinction between what professionalism is and what it is not. If you’re ready to show up for work with a clearly defined take on professionalism, don’t miss this learning opportunity.
Facilitator: TaShunda Franklin
Feb. 21, 11:30 a.m.–noon, A microlearning series on positive psychology: connectedness (2)
Feb. 24, 3–4:30 p.m., Public Speaking & Facilitation (3)
Feb. 28, 11:30 a.m.–noon, A microlearning series on positive psychology: self-compassion (2)
March 1, 1:30–3 p.m., Sunday Scaries (3)
March 2, 10–11:30 a.m., Burnout in the Modern Workplace (2)
March 22, 11 a.m.–noon, Perspective Taking: Expanding Beyond Your Viewpoint (2)
Description: What is perspective taking? How does it differ from empathy? From mitigating implicit bias to enhancing team performance, perspective taking can have a positive impact in the workplace and beyond. Learn more about its benefits and put this powerful tool to use through hands-on practice in this engaging workshop.
Facilitator: TaShunda Franklin
March 24, 1–2:30 p.m., CliftonStrengths for VU Employees (2)
Description: The CliftonStrengths Assessment is a tool that provides insight into your natural recurring talents and abilities. In this session, we will provide you with an opportunity to complete the CliftonStrengths assessment to unlock your Top 5 Talent Themes and explore how they impact your work.
Facilitators: Krystal Clark and Chance Ryon
March 29, 1–2:30 p.m., What is Employee Engagement and Why Does It Matter? (2)
Description: Would you describe yourself as an engaged, not engaged or actively disengaged employee?
Gallup defines engaged employees as those who are involved in, enthusiastic about and committed to their work and workplace.
Join us as we discuss Gallup’s 12 elements of employee engagement and how you as a formal or informal team leader can design an engaged workplace.
Facilitator: Krystal Clark and Chance Ryon
March 30, 1–3 p.m., Mindsets, Grit, Positive Intelligence, Intellectual Humility and More (3)
Description: Do you have grit? Is your mindset fixed or growth-oriented, and is it based on scarcity or abundance? How’s your mental fitness? What’s your Positive Intelligence Quotient? Are you intellectually humble? Wait … what does any of this even mean?
In this workshop, we’ll break down mindsets, grit, mental fitness, positive intelligence and intellectual humility into easy-to-digest language; we’ll share an overview of the research on each; and we’ll explore strategies to leverage each concept to optimize our performance and foster creativity, innovation, success and ongoing growth.
Facilitator: Krista Vaught
April 11, 11 a.m.–noon, A microlearning series on positive psychology: savoring/final experience (2)
April 14, 1–1:20 p.m., Uniquely You at Work: A Micro-Learning Series – Part 1 (2)
April 21, 1–1:20 p.m., Uniquely You at Work: A Micro-Learning Series – Part 2 (2)
April 26, 1–2:30 p.m., CliftonStrengths for VU Employees (2)
Description: The CliftonStrengths Assessment is a tool that provides insight into your natural recurring talents and abilities. In this session, we will provide you with an opportunity to complete the CliftonStrengths assessment to unlock your Top 5 Talent Themes and explore how they impact your work.
Facilitators: Krystal Clark and Chance Ryon
April 28, 1–1:20 p.m., Uniquely You at Work: A Micro-Learning Series – Part 3 (2)
May 25, 1–2:30 p.m., CliftonStrengths for VU Employees (2)
Description: The CliftonStrengths Assessment is a tool that provides insight into your natural recurring talents and abilities. In this session, we will provide you with an opportunity to complete the CliftonStrengths assessment to unlock your Top 5 Talent Themes and explore how they impact your work.
Facilitators: Krystal Clark and Chance Ryon
Available on demand (recorded sessions)
- Creating Presentations That Stick: Design Principles
- Creating Presentations That Stick: Engaging Your Audience
- Zoomed Out: Virtual Meeting Fatigue and How to Combat It
Please note that the ELE team will add additional development opportunities throughout the semester. For the most up-to-date information, please visit the ELE website.
If you would like to offer feedback on potential professional development opportunities, suggest topic ideas or are interested in hosting a workshop for your department or team, please email ele@vanderbilt.edu.