Retreats That Work: Everything You Need to Know About Planning and Leading Great Offsites (Pfeiffer Essential Resources for Training and HR Professiona)

Whether you're planning to lead an offsite retreat for the first time or the ninety-ninth time, this easy-to-use, one-stop resource provides:

Remember when you were an undergraduate and freshman composition seemed so irrelevant to your life? After all, you were going to conquer the world with technological know-how. Your spellcheck software would handle the details. Now that you're a professional - pitching an idea, vying for a contract or grant, or presenting at a meeting - getting your point across effectively suddenly seems pretty essential for success, doesn't it?

Fear not. This light-hearted text, brimming with proven techniques, good advice, and real-world examples that you can easily apply to your own case, will turn you into an adept communicator. Written expressly for technologists, this is a simple, concise, and practical guide to the communication dynamics of writing, presentation delivery, and meeting interaction.

Herbert Hirsch, in-demand consultant who developed these techniques for his own prolific engineering career, teaches you how to use "scripting" to plan for communication events. More than a mere outline or storyboard, scripting is a powerful technique that assists you in getting the right structure and content, in the proper order.

The first part deals with written documents, part II with formal presentations, part III with informal discussions, part IV about cross-culture communication. Each part tackles the three important aspects of communication: planning, building the right attitude, and finally producing. Communication requires that one knows what one wants to communicate and how to do it. This book will change your way of thinking about effective communication.

The book features information on:
The Basics of VC Funding
Approaching a Venture Capital Firm
Presenting a Business Plan
General Valuation Methods
Maintaining the Partnership after the Deal Closes
Investments in the Post-Boom Era
Troubleshooting - Getting Turned Down
Simple Advice for Error-Free Approaches

Succeeding at Your Interview: A Practical Guide for Teachers uses an effective interactive format to present core information about interviewing for a teaching job, document a wide variety of interview processes, guide teacher candidates in developing strategies for interviewing, and increase their confidence in communicating their professional knowledge. In a spiral process, readers are asked to consider scenarios, respond to questions, contemplate the perspective offered by the authors, and modify their responses. The goal is to help teacher candidates develop and articulate a clear idea of their own professional knowledge and of the culture of the schools at which they are interviewing.

Special features:
*Eleven detailed chapters and five interview scenarios engage the reader in continuous reflective practice in the multifaceted activities integral to interviewing--beginning with organizing the job search and proceeding through the entire interview process.
*The scenarios implicitly develop knowledge and the chapters explicitly detail the information.
*Specific interview situations engage readers in articulating their professional knowledge, linking theory and practice.
*"Keep in Mind" comments, Margin Notes, and Decision Trees provide opportunities to reflect on the issues and develop personal responses.
*Sample documents, formats, questions, and responses enhance understanding of evaluation processes.
*Graphic organizers at the beginning and end of each chapter provide visual representations of the concepts and concerns addressed in each chapter, assisting the reader in identifying chapters relevant to their current needs in the job search and in synthesizing, organizing, and reviewing the information contained in the chapter.

The prospective teacher will gain confidence by becoming familiar with the variety of interview formats. The 5 scenarios are-
1. An Initial School Based One to One Interview
2. An Initial Interview with a School Based Team
3. A District Based Interview with Several Principals
4. A School Based Interview with Role Playing
5. A School Based Interview with a Demonstration Lesson

Becoming familiar with the varied possibilities can prevent being caught off guard and will present a secure, confident candidate.
The reader is exposed to interviewers' questions and techniques in evaluating them. There are 7 issues that are usually discussed in interviews. These issues are reviewed with practice exercises. The questions covered are on the topics of-
1. Yourself
2. Learning Principles
3. Supporting Learning
4. Impressions of Teaching
5. Classroom Lessons
6. Personal Approaches
7. Your Questions

This book also provides guidance with gathering information about potential teaching positions, organizing the application process and suggested readings.

"Succeeding at Your Interview" is a most valuable tool for the prospective and experienced teacher before interviewing for a position as well as for the teacher on the team involved in the interviewing process. Get this book for success!

Whether a bride-to-be, married, widowed, or divorced, this clear, up-to-date guide is an education in financial well-being, providing important advice on pooled incomes and shared investments, separate bank accounts, wills, prenuptial agreements, insurance and divorce settlements, and much more.