For the last couple of years, in between lockdowns, we’ve slowly been fixing our house which happens to be quite old compared to Melbourne standards. Built in the late 50s, with 80s decor inside, I’m not fussed with what it looks like inside as much as what I want the house to be functional and […]
Search Results for: co working
Second Hand Books
I love old book stores. Yesterday I found the City Basement Book shop hidden away between a couple of shops. A small single non-descript door and a long flight of stairs down into a squirrels den of musty, dusty books. I remembered going into this store back in the early 1990s and now that I’m […]
Community Service
I’ve been thinking a lot about community service as it’s something that I have missed recently in my life. After many years in the military (you may not be aware that I served as an officer in the Royal Australian Navy (in the category of Education Specialist) for 10 years followed by a further 11 […]
Learning a Language Through Coursera
About a few weeks ago, I found the Etudier en France course on Coursera that is at a B1-B2 level. I hadn’t completed a Coursera course for many years and when I saw this, I thought it was time to get back into it again. If you do a search on MOOCs (massive open online […]
Remember the Days When People Commented on Blog Posts?
I’ve been a blogger since way back. This is my second blog that I started after deciding to ‘rebrand’ myself to have a more “professional” persona online and came up with Activate Learning Solutions or @activatelearn back in 2014. (Standby, this will soon change again as I start change it from a business to a […]
Working and Learning Out Loud
I have written a lot of transparent work and learning practices on this blog over the years so I thought I’d revisit the theme again. The reason for this was a recent Twitter conversation started by a question asked by Jayne Davids (@Jaynedavids) who is my ‘go to’ expert in my Personal Learning Network on […]
CoVid Lockdown Version 2.0
I haven’t written much in my blog about what I have been experiencing in lockdown and in all honesty, I have no idea why. When I think about it, I keep thinking that my Twitter feed is enough to tell you how frustrating it has been because it hasn’t been consistent. In the first lockdown, […]
Re-Assessment During Covid
This time of isolation and lockdown has been an eye opener where I have re-assessed a lot of things in my life. To be fair however, I think this re-assessment has been happening for quite a while for me, at least the last few years. The pandemic has simply confirmed my actions. Where in the […]
Couch to 5K
One of the activities I began during isolation when the world was cooped up in their homes was a daily morning walk – a long one at that for a full hour and many times, an hour and a half. Throughout this time, I continued to work three days a week so remote work was […]
Discover 2 Learn
In the early days of COVID when countries all around the world were going into lockdown, I was approached by Jane Hart (@C4LPT) who I have long since admired and respected in the field of learning to be part of her idea to create a website of curated learning activities for people in lockdown. This […]
Skills After Corona: Advanced Facilitation Skills
I’ve been an early riser for a while but at this time of home isolation, I’ve been getting up earlier than usual around 3:30 am to 4:30 am and feeling as if I’ve had my fill of sleep. I don’t feel tired during the day but if I do, I have a little cat nap […]
LinkedIn Stories is Coming!
By now you would have heard that LinkedIn will be adding Stories to its functionality. For those uninitiated to the Stories feature which is ephemeral content that allows users to capture content through the day in a chronological way and share to their followers, you may be thinking, what’s the big deal? Over the years, […]
Are Competency Frameworks A Thing Anymore?
Back when I was working in corporate learning and development, when the mere mention of the two words “competency frameworks” in any team meeting, there was an audible groan. My experience of these have always been negative. Although I’ve never been involved in creating one, it seemed that I was always in departments that had […]
Incorporating Learning into the Workplace: Lessons of LearnTec2020
This year I had the wonderful opportunity upon invitation by Jane Hart (@c4lpt) to present at LearnTec2020, Europe’s largest technology conference. I jumped at the chance more so with the opportunity to work with Jane directly – and to also meet Jane Bozarth (@janebozarth) in person who for many years, I’ve been chatting with online […]
The Expertise Economy – Book Club
Started the Expertise Economy by @kellylpalmer today with big thanks to @srjf for pointing me out to it. It’s my Christmas reading. So far, so good! pic.twitter.com/oRG8yRNDSy — Helen Blunden #AlwaysBeLearning????? (@ActivateLearn) December 24, 2019 The following are my responses to Simon Fogg’s (@srjf) book club questions for The Expertise Economy by David Blake and […]
Reflections of Being a Community Reporter at Microsoft Ignite
I have just returned from one of the best and unforgettable experiences of my life. This year, I was privileged and honoured to have been selected as one of ten global roaming reporters for Microsoft’s largest technology conference, Microsoft Ignite which was held in Orlando Florida. I heard that over 29 000 people attended the […]
Working Through My Process of A Presentation
For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been mulling over what I’m going to talk about at LearnTec2020 which will be hosted in Karlsruhe in Germany next year on 28-30 January. I was kindly invited to speak at this conference by Jane Hart whose work I have followed, shared and respected for many years now. […]
Bits and Bobs of Different Projects I’m Working On
It feels as if it’s been ages since I last wrote in my blog. Every time I come into it, the same thing happens. I apologise for the delays between posting. Then I say how it’s always been at the back of my mind. Well, it has. I thought I’d quickly jot down some things […]
Microsoft Service Adoption Course on EdX
This month I started another MOOC on EdX designed by Microsoft’s Principal PM Manager Karuana Gatimu and Content Developer Brandon Neeb called Microsoft Service Adoption Course. The course was published this year and had been shared across social media through many Microsoft consultants who are responsible for programs that involve the adoption of collaborative systems. […]
A New Way to Use Social Media Video as a Coaching Tool
Many of you know how much I love Snapchat as I have written much about it on this blog. Out of all the social networks I have used, it’s the one that has provided me with most personal development (storytelling, video creation and public speaking), as well as connected me to a global audience of […]