Posts Tagged ‘Training’

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Seminar B: Organization Strategies

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

From Dissonance To Harmony: Strategies For Organizing Your Career

The objective of the seminar is to help equip classical singers to gain long-term professional fulfillment through the discipline of career self-management. Getting and staying organized is the key to being empowered, positive, and ready to move up to the next stage. In this seminar, singers establish the core administrative and technology skills that lead to success.

The Details:

Target: For students and young artists.

Honorarium: Please email info@velvetsinger.com for pricing.

Duration: The seminar is designed to last two and a half (2.5) hours.

Workbook: The seminar uses a customized workbook, which provides an efficient and practical platform for rich discussion. Please Download the Workbook completed with example answers.

Objective: The seminar focuses on cutting edge technology, planning and organizational skills. Rather than asking “top-down” open-ended questions, this seminar is a “bottom-up” equipping experience. Getting and staying organized is the key to being empowered, positive, and ready to move up to the next stage, and technology can help.

Impact: Each singer leaves with a tangible plan in place. After establishing a priorities list and aligning goals, the seminar culminates in a proclamation of one “action item” from each singer. We make an audio recording of the action items and then email each individual clip following the seminar.

Technology: Participants should bring their laptop computers. They will learn how to take full advantage of several cutting-edge tools including Google Alerts and OperaBase. Attendees will also earn a free trial of Velvet Singer Software and receive hands-on training during the workshop.

Singers will learn:

  • How to run an effective freelance business
  • What information to track in a professional journal
  • How to develop priorities, goals, and action items
  • How to maintain organization over the long-term

Workbook with Example Answers

Click on any page to pop open a larger view.

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Northwestern Seniors — Part 2

Friday, January 22nd, 2010

We met on a Saturday afternoon over at the library. Great facilities at NU.

I have now created an automated tutorial in the software. It is the first thing that the user comes to — a 27 step tutorial that takes about 5 minutes to complete. This was the first time I have gotten the opportunity to incorporate the tutorial into the seminar and it worked quite well. I have since tweaked a few questions, but all in all, it taught the fundamentals of databases quite well.

We were able to dive deep with this group. We finished by discussing how to integrate with Google Calendar using iCal and iPhone. I think we bought some time toward the end because of the new automated tutorial.

More to come.

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Northwestern Masters Workshop in “Multi-Media Room”

Saturday, January 9th, 2010

We followed-up with a few Northwestern Master’s students in a great spot over in the Library. This time I plugged in directly to a high-resolution flat screen TV. So much better than projectors. Way to go Northwestern.

As with DePaul, we followed a highly structured tutorial to learn the skills and benefits of using a database.

It was a small group so we were able to address really specific questions which again was a great learning experience for me. One of the students had direct experience with FileMaker through a marketing research “day job.” It was thoroughly helpful for me both in learning about how people use Velvet Singer and also in brainstorming ways to reach more people. Thank you, thank you.

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DePaul 2010

Thursday, January 7th, 2010

It was a beautiful snowy day in Lincoln Park, and it was quite a pleasure to return to my Alma Mater.

We had a perfect setup packed into the conference room. Internet connections (for most), good sound system, fine projector setup.

Most importantly, the students were really energetic and engaged. This was actually only the second seminar I have done without a teacher present — perhaps they felt free to really engage with the material and have some fun too.

Per usual, I changed a few things up. We walked through a more structured tutorial to learn the basics of databases. We learned how to edit, create, delete, sort, and find records. We learned a bit about reporting and the power of “entity-relationships.” It was quite amazing to see lightbulbs going off, and not always where I expected them to.

For example, the system asks the users a lot of questions and it attempts to guess the answer. If you create a new coaching, it will ask you what you sang, who it was with, how much you paid. They were clicking happily along, and then when they returned to the Event detail layout, that is when they saw all of the well-organized data they just created. That is when the light bulbs went off, not THAT the system could do this, but just HOW it does.

Great group. Go Blue Demons!

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Goals-Centered

Sunday, November 8th, 2009

A ship can’t sail without a rudder. Your professional development will take off when you set:

  • specific goals – ie. ‘sing 20 auditions this year’ versus ‘sing well at my auditions’,
  • actionable goals – ie. ‘learn a standard Italian role’ versus ‘win competition x’, and
  • measurable goals – ie. ‘sing 3 competitions’ versus ‘sing several competitions’ and are
  • kept accountable to meet them

Velvet Singer will be your partner every step of the way including shaping how and when you revise your goals (we call this an ‘iteration’).

William Bennett, software designer of Velvet Singer, gained his degree in whole-systems engineering at The University of Virginia. Systems engineering is using science and research to solve real-world problems. Bennett’s plan is to integrate the most modern theories and time-tested practices from the engineering discipline into the business of singing, to help you be more efficient and effective.

Setting goals will give you the confidence that you are on the right path and that you can achieve success as only you can define it.

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