Author: Graham Cook

Antifragile Education Two years ago I read Antifragile by Nassim Taleb, and, ever since, I’ve waited to see some evidence that the undoubted common sense in this book would translate into the world of corporate learning. Taleb himself identified education as a bastion of fragility. He made a great case for real learning only ever happening ... Read more...

As I am contemplating yet another very large order of blindfolds from China (we sell lots of blindfolds as components in our Colourblind® training activity!) it has me wondering about what other uses that blindfolds can be put to – in a training & learning context! A blindfold may be an inexpensive training tool, but it can be very versatile... Read more...

For many organisations, the idea of having a permanent workforce has gone for good, and with it any notion of working teams that have any kind of stable membership. A study by software company Intuit suggests that by 2020 there is likely to be more than 40% of the US workforce who will be classified as “contingent” (freelancers, temps, part-... Read more...

RSVP Design, based in Paisley, has been designing training materials for organisations like Apple, TNT and Walt Disney since 2003, and through its partnership with the Center for Creative Leadership in the US, it has signed an agreement to be the first UK organisation to distribute their experiential learning tools. This is great news for local ... Read more...

Client Enquiry: How much time should I allow for a review after using an experiential activity? RSVP Design Response Our rule of thumb when working with RSVP Design activities is to schedule a minimum of the same amount of time for the review as for the activity itself. So from a learning facilitation point of view run your activity until a ... Read more...

If you have a professional interest in Leadership Development, then sooner or later you will need to move away from exploring what leadership is, and focus on what leaders really do. Coming from a background in experiential learning this seems just so obvious, yet it’s becoming more and more frequent that I encounter leadership development ... Read more...

I see it in so many places, the company encourages you to be innovative, you want to be innovative, you think you're being innovative, but after a while it all just seems a little forced. The initial impetus has gone flat and, day-to-day, the obvious opportunities for innovation seem increasingly elusive. So what went wrong?   &... Read more...

  Client Enquiry: We are reviewing experiential activities that help a leader learn how to build a team, not a team building game for an existing team or group. We want to get something for a class of leaders to experience building the team best practices.  Any ideas? RSVP Design Response There are many management and leadership skills ... Read more...

Having worked in continuous improvement and systems management for many years, I know all about innovation. I have had many a senior team member come to me about how to “innovate” my systems for them to use.  Some have been un-useable suggestions, some ideas even contain anatomical implausibilities, while some have been highly amusing.  ... Read more...

Tasked with building a truly innovative team most professionals will measure their success in terms of creative output. Try thinking of the job as one of making innovation the new routine. Process not Product I’ve been working in the field of innovation for many years, and over that time I’ve gone through a profound change in the way that I ... Read more...