Cultivate’s Blog – Thoughts on employee development

Eiffel Tower Queue - Alexandre Duret-Lutz from Flickr. Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike

Yesterday Cultivate added a long awaited feature for our users – queues.  This will allow users to check out multiple titles at a time, and have them sent in sequence.  No more logging on every time you want a title.  It’s been a long requested feature – there must be a lot of Netflix users out there!

Here are the details of how we’ve implemented it so far.  Keep in mind this is version 1.0…we will be rolling out some enhancements to it shortly.

- Users will be allowed to have 5 titles in their queue at a time.

-We’ll ship the titles in sequence, unless we have an inventory problem….then we’ll send the next title on your list.

-Users will receive a shipping confirmation email letting them know a title is on the way

-Users can check the status of their queue by logging on and clicking on the Manage Account link in the nav bar.

This release is the first of many to come.  We’re almost finished with a complete rewrite of our entire codebase into a more flexible and scalable architecture.   In simpler terms it means that very soon we are going to be able to add new features much more quickly!

Thanks to all of our users for your patience, and enjoy the queues!

Congratulations to Cultivate client Beers + Cutler for winning a 2009 Apollo Award!  The Apollo awards are presented by Helios HR and SmartCEO Magazine.  The award recognizes Washington DC area companies that do a superior job promoting and investing in employee development.  Way to go B+C!!

A list of all the winners can be found here:  http://www.helioshr.com/PR-2009-06-05.php

After taking a break from audiobooks so we could add 100+ podcasts to the library, we’re back to audio.  21 great additions to the library!  Up next?  Queues!

How To Have A Great Day Everyday!

Always Looking Up: The Adventures of an Incurable Optimist

How to Get to the Top: Business Lessons Learned at the Dinner Table

Emotional Freedom

Nonviolent Communication

Speaking Peace

Showing Up for Life

10-10-10: A Life-Transforming Idea

The Power of Small: Why Little Things Make All the Difference

The Smartest 401(k)* Book You’ll Ever Read: Maximize Your Retirement Savings the Smart Way! (*Smartest 403(b) and 457(b), too!)

Ten Lessons to Transform Your Marriage: America’s Love Lab Experts Share Their Strategies for Strengthening Your Relationship

The Education of an Accidental CEO: Lessons Learned from the Trailer Park to the Corner Office

The Game-Changer: How You Can Drive Revenue and Profit Growth with Innovation

The Three Big Questions for a Frantic Family: A Leadership Fable…About Restoring Sanity To The Most Important Organization In Your Life

The Three Big Questions for a Frantic Family: A Leadership Fable…About Restoring Sanity To The Most Important Organization In Your Life

The Spectrum: A Scientifically Proven Program to Feel Better, Live Longer, Lose Weight, and Gain Health

Making a Good Brain Great: The Amen Clinic Program for Achieving and Sustaining Optimal Mental Performance

Leadership Is an Art

The Exhaustion Cure: Up Your Energy from Low to Go in 21 Days

Be Happy Without Being Perfect: How to Break Free from the Perfection Deception

Ageless Memory: Simple Secrets for Keeping Your Brain Young-Foolproof Methods for People Over 50

Eight Weeks to Optimum Health, New Edition, Updated and Expanded: A Proven Program for Taking Full Advantage of Your Body’s Natural Healing Power

Over the last week we’ve added a significant new section to the Cultivate library – a directory of podcasts that fit within our theme of personal & professional development.

To start we’ve added 75 podcasts, and we’ll be adding more in the coming months.  Why did we add podcasts?

- It adds a downloadable component to the library for people who want to use their MP3 player or blackberry

- It allows us to add content that just isn’t available on audiobooks.  We can begin to address more niche areas that our customers employees are interested in.

- Podcasts keep fresh content constantly coming in to the library.

You can access the podcasts by clicking on the ‘Podcast’ category once you’ve logged in to the library.  Feel free to contact us with any questions – hope you enjoy the additions!

Today 18 new titles were added to the library – ranging from Social/Emotional Intelligence to Sales to Persuasion.  Enjoy!

The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First
Managing Transitions, 2nd Edition: Making the Most of Change
Yes!: 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive
Enough Already!: Clearing Mental Clutter to Become the Best You
Who:  The A Method For Hiring
Squawk!: How to Stop Making Noise and Start Getting Results
The Power of Presence
Satisfied Customers Tell Three Friends, Angry Customers Tell 3,000: Running a Business in Today’s Consumer-Driven World
The Heart of Change
Saving the World at Work: What Companies and Individuals Can Do to Go Beyond Making a Profit to Making a Difference
Stumbling on Happiness
Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships
Mindfulness @ Work  -  A Leading with Emotional Intelligence Conversation with Jon Kabat-Zinn
The Power of Truth: A Leading with Emotional Intelligence Conversation with Warren Bennis
Working with Presence: A Leading with Emotional Intelligence Conversation with Peter Senge
What Makes a Leader?: A Leading With Emotional Intelligence Conversation with Jack and Suzy Welch
The Breakthrough Company: How Everyday Companies Become Extraordinary Performers
What the Customer Wants You to Know: How Everybody Needs to Think Differently about Sales

DVD's, Podcasts, or Online Video?

For the past few months we’ve had a poll on most of the library homepages asking whether you’d like us to focus on adding more DVDs, Online Video, or Podcasts.  Well the results are in and it’s…..a tie!  Overwhelming support was given to two of the options – DVD’s and Podcasts.

So today we’ve added 14 more DVD’s – including some more workout videos, a number of pregnacy fitness/health videos, and some cooking DVD’s.  Please let us know what you think and what else you’d like to see added!

We’re currently working on adding Podcasts – that’s a larger project but we’re on the case.  Podcasts are exciting because it will allow us to point people towards material that just isn’t available in an audiobook.

Here are the DVD’s we added.  All of them have been added to the DVD category (clever, we know) and to the New titles For 2008.  Enjoy!

New DVDs for Cultivate December 2008

We’ve been nominated for an award called The Crunchies – which focuses on tech based startups.  You can help us out by voting for us.  The good news?  It’s only 2 clicks!

It’s quick and easy – click on the badge below, and then on the Nominate button.  You can vote every day (and we would certainly appreciate that) but we’ll be happy with 1.  Feel free to let other people know as anyone can vote for us.   Thanks for your vote!

Yesterday we sent out our November newsletter to almost every one of our subscribers.  Obviously that generates a big rush of orders, and we’re always amazed at the variety of titles that get ordered.  Here’s a few examples just from yesterday:

• Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make The Leap…And Others Don’t
• Happy for No Reason: 7 Steps to Being Happy from the Inside Out
• A Beginner’s Guide to Meditation
• How to Talk so Kids Will Listen…And Listen So Kids Will Talk
• Death By Meeting: A Leadership Fable
• Developing The Leaders Around You
• You: The Owner’s Manual

I think the lesson to take away from all these orders is the importance of having a broad range of employee development resources (and having a broad definition of ‘employee development’.)   Every company in America is made up of employees just like the ones who ordered these titles.

Here’s a site we think our users will appreciate!  If you like books, and you like lists, then this is a site for you.  It’s called Flashlight Worthy Books.  Their tagline says it all – ‘Recommending books so good they’ll keep you up past your bedtime’  There is a business, self-help, and parenting section (as well as many many more.)

Check them out at:

http://www.flashlightworthybooks.com/