Professional Development

Personal & Professional Development for our Extension Staff

As you may have seen in Cornell Cooperative Extension Human Resources Skills for Success (pdf), proactively seeking self-development is an expected behavior in your work for CCE.  There are many opportunities through professional development organizations like ESP, CCE, and through online learning networks connected to Cornell and the Extension system.  Below is information about a number of activities.

• Skills for Success around this area include:
• Be self-aware and act upon performance feedback.
• Seek and act on opportunities for development.
• Take measures to ensure personal well-being and balance.
• Work to continuously learn and improve.
• Apply learning to evolving assignments.

Leadership

Depending on your position, there are a number of professional development opportunities that will grow your leadership experiences within CCE.  While not all of the opportunities might fit your current role – it is good to become familiar with the leadership building opportunities that exist within the system.

• Review:  Staff Site listing for Tools of the Trade: Foundations & Leadership. (url)
• If you have oversight for other staff, plan when you will attend theSupervisor Development and Certificate Program (url) (offered several times a year, should be taken following New Staff Orientation on campus)
• If you have Program Leadership responsibilities (if your position is a Resource Educator, Issue Leader, Association Director, Senior Extension Associate etc.) plan  when you will participate in the Program Development Leadership Cohort (url) (offered once a year, should be taken following New Staff Orientation on campus)

Teaching & Facilitation Skills

Research has shown clear linkages between what educators do (their behavior) and how well the learners or clients learn.  You will have many opportunities to teach and facilitate for problem-solving in your Extension career.  It may be helpful for you to build skills in facilitating, audience engagement, and program planning and evaluation.   Getting to know the science behind teaching and learning will help you to succeed.

Useful resources:

• Review resources about teaching and learningthrough the Journal of Extension (url)
• Read about ways to Engage Students through the Cornell Center for Teaching Innovations(url)

Individual & Group Communication Skills

Being a clear communicator will help you in your work, regardless of your position.  As you may have seen in the Cornell Cooperative Extension Human Resources Skills for Success document (pdf), Communication is a key topic.

Skills for Success includes the following:

• Express thoughts clearly, both orally and in writing.
• Demonstrate effective listening skills; seek to understand and be understood.
• Ask questions and share knowledge and information to help others clearly understand processes and desired results.
• Give, receive and act upon helpful and timely feedback.

You are encouraged to seek regular professional development in this area:

• Review: weekly Extension Insider (url) for upcoming webinars, workshops, and opportunities to grow your communication skills.
• Look for tutorials and resources available(url) through CULearn and Lynda.com.

Networking, Collaborating & Working with Teams

Collaboration, networking, mentoring relationships are all important for the work that we do and your growth as a staff person.  You will have many opportunities to grow your abilities in these areas – scan the following links and create a plan for how you will grow your network.

• Get involved with a Program Work Team (url) – by signing up to get information and messages related to topics that are of interest to you and your work.

• Join a professional development organization (url) like ESP to help you to connect to others outside of your association.

• Review: Weekly Extension Insider (url) for upcoming webinars, workshops, and opportunities.

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

Have you reveiwed your CCE Association Affirmative Action, Diversity, and Inclusion Plan (pdf) (the link is for the general template)? You may discover sections that you need to grow in to fully meet the expectations of your job.  For example – do you know who your potential audience is?  How do you map potential participants?  What data gets reported about participants?

• Review:  other resources on the Diversity, Inclusion & EPO page of the Staff Site (url)