FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. – The installation’s workforce development program is on a constant mission to build up the Army’s premier civilian employees, and one of their newest innovations is a series of microlearning videos meant to support professional development.
The Directorate of Plans, Training and Mobilization, or DPTMS, has released five videos in the series so far through its Training Integration Branch’s YouTube channel. Each one features a different garrison employee covering the key points of a professional development topic in two to four minutes.
“Our goal is to allow employees who maybe can’t come to traditional training to access this information in small bites they can get when they want to in a format that’s available to them,” said Leslie Herlick, training program coordinator, Training Integration Branch, DPTMS. “Not everybody can attend a three-hour class when they have work to do, but this allows them to be able to show up.”
Viewers can expect insights from subject matter experts on time management, goal setting, conflict de-escalation techniques and other more specialized topics.
“We also try to give resources if you want to learn more, so maybe a book or video,” Herlick said. “We’ll try and link a resource to the page as well so if somebody wants to learn more after watching the video they can go and do that.”
The next video in the series will feature Debbie Sutton, equal employment opportunity specialist, Fort Campbell Equal Opportunity Program, discussing the importance of emotional intelligence.
“We take a pulse of the garrison and the things we see going on, and we talk to somebody in that realm who’s a good example,” Herlick said. “Debbie Sutton is a phenomenal communicator, she’s very energetic and enthusiastic about EEO and she champions it. To ask her to do a video makes sense, and it gets her message and the message of EEO out there to the workforce for people who might not run into her on a daily basis or be able to come to a class she teaches.”
Sutton said she was inspired to create the video after seeing the emotional burdens the COVID-19 pandemic placed on workers, particularly during the lockdowns in its early stages.
Although many people found themselves working from home at the time, Sutton said that made communication all the more important – including its emotional component.
“Emotion has never been completely welcome in the workplace,” she said. “Most of us have traditionally been conditioned into leaving our emotions at home and believing that to be effective, we need to base our team strategies and decisions on cold, logical intelligence. But emotions are a fundamental part of who we are, and they can’t be left out of the picture when we’re working with each other.”
Sutton’s video – and other upcoming parts of the series – will be available through the Civilian Employee One-Stop Shop and the DPTMS Training Integration Branch’s YouTube channel, as well as social media platforms like Facebook.
Herlick said it is important for the video series to be a collaborative process between garrison employees and hopes viewers can gain valuable insights from each one.
“The message can’t always just come from us,” Herlick said. “We have a wealth of knowledge and experience in our garrison, and the best teachers are the people out there doing the jobs. Seeing the people who are experts in their fields delivering the message is what we need to have, and it helps people with not only professional development but personal development.”
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