Remote Development for Faculty and Staff
Dear Staff and Faculty Colleagues,
As a follow up to the Remote Work and Travel Update for Faculty and Staff update we sent on March 15, the Office of Human Resources is pleased to introduce a new remote learning solution for our community for career development: Learn From Where You Are. We recognize that these are unprecedented times, and we are all challenged with working in new and different ways. This is one of the ways we hope can help us embrace this challenge.
At a time when thousands of us are now working remotely at Northwestern University, Learn From Where You Are offers a simple, innovative way to learn and stay productive with hundreds of hours of on-demand and virtual development opportunities. Our team has developed, revised and curated Northwestern-relevant content for you. The learning options cover topics such as working remotely, leadership, performance excellence and diversity and inclusion, among others. We also will add new content over the coming days and weeks.
Remote development affords every member of our community the opportunity to work with their managers and colleagues to refresh or acquire knowledge and skills that will help them improve performance and develop for the future. For hourly employees, in coordination with their managers, time spent on this learning can replace or supplement remote work activity and will be treated as regular work time.
During this unprecedented experience, how we come together as a community will look – and feel – different. It is important that we continue to engage with each other to strengthen our bonds and promote our well-being. Learn From Where You Are will give you access to live virtual development opportunities, which can help you connect with colleagues as you learn about interesting and meaningful topics together. We have converted our Unconscious Bias training, for example, into a virtual platform that will be provided twice a week starting next week. We also will provide “book club”-style modules that managers and teams can facilitate themselves, helping to build teamwork and engagement.
We realize this does not replace the richness of face-to-face development experiences, nor the familiar comfort of working alongside colleagues and friends. But this effort will provide a valuable resource for our community at a uniquely difficult time. This program is an invitation to learn together, no matter where you are, and to turn a collective challenge into a collective, generative experience.
We welcome new topic suggestions, and we invite you to contact us at workplace-learning@northwestern.edu if you are interested in delivering development-focused content on-demand or virtually. Please continue to stay safe and healthy.
Sincerely,
Manuel Cuevas-Trisán
Vice President | Chief Human Resource Officer