Before she became a trainer Melanie was a manager for Sun Microsystems. After establishing a track record of delivering software releases at Sun's Silicon Valley headquarters, the company transferred her to the Beijing office, where she became a manager and then senior manager for the R&D team there. Recognizing Melanie's strong leadership ability and passion for people development, the company recruited her to become an internal trainer. "As soon as I walked into the training room for the first time, I knew I would do this full time one day," she says. In 2010 she launched her career as a full-time trainer and has received consistently high praise from her clients ever since.
Flexibility
Melanie's clients often point out her ability to adapt her style and even content to suit their needs. She checks in with participants on breaks and asks sincere questions about how she can tweak the class to suit their needs better. At times she has set aside the standard role playing dialogues in the material and allow participants to generate their own scenarios that reflected their work environment more closely. Once she ran a class with no participant workbooks. "There was a logistical snafu and the materials didn't arrive for the class but it was okay," she says. "We did what we had to do. The participants and I brainstormed scenarios that we could use for the role playing dialogues. In a crazy way, it was sort of fun working without the materials I'm used to having."
Integrity
Melanie models the Crucial Conversations skills even as she's facilitating a course. During one particularly difficult class in which the participants were drifting in and out of the training room to take urgent calls throughout the morning, she stopped the class and sat down to have a crucial conversation then and there. She described what she was observing and shared her interpretation of the facts, namely that the participants weren't getting much out of the training because they weren't focused. They acknowledged her concern and joined her in a brainstorming exercise to see how they could keep up with the most urgent matters at work, while also getting the full benefit of the training. "We finally agreed that if they had to step away to take a call, when they rejoined the class they would share a quick summary of what they were dealing with and the rest of us brainstormed how crucial conversation skills might apply in that case."
Passion
"Melanie started the class by telling her own personal story of how this material changed her life, and from that moment I was hooked," says one participant. "I can tell that she believes in the power of these principals and that she's applying them in her own life." Melanie's passion for her work is evident in the way she manages the training room and engages with participants.
Melanie holds a B.A. summa cum laude in German and French from the University of Alabama and a M.A. magna cum laude in Interpretation and Translation from the Monterey Institute of International Studies. She in a Certified Trainer for VitalSmarts and was named IOR Global's Instructor of the Year in 2014. She is certified to deliver Crucial Conversations, Crucial Accountability and Change Anything.
Before she became a trainer Melanie was a manager for Sun Microsystems. After establishing a track record of delivering software releases at Sun's Silicon Valley headquarters, the company transferred her to the Beijing office, where she became a manager and then senior manager for the R&D team there. Recognizing Melanie's strong leadership ability and passion for people development, the company recruited her to become an internal trainer. "As soon as I walked into the training room for the first time, I knew I would do this full time one day," she says. In 2010 she launched her career as a full-time trainer and has received consistently high praise from her clients ever since.
Flexibility
Melanie's clients often point out her ability to adapt her style and even content to suit their needs. She checks in with participants on breaks and asks sincere questions about how she can tweak the class to suit their needs better. At times she has set aside the standard role playing dialogues in the material and allow participants to generate their own scenarios that reflected their work environment more closely. Once she ran a class with no participant workbooks. "There was a logistical snafu and the materials didn't arrive for the class but it was okay," she says. "We did what we had to do. The participants and I brainstormed scenarios that we could use for the role playing dialogues. In a crazy way, it was sort of fun working without the materials I'm used to having."
Integrity
Melanie models the Crucial Conversations skills even as she's facilitating a course. During one particularly difficult class in which the participants were drifting in and out of the training room to take urgent calls throughout the morning, she stopped the class and sat down to have a crucial conversation then and there. She described what she was observing and shared her interpretation of the facts, namely that the participants weren't getting much out of the training because they weren't focused. They acknowledged her concern and joined her in a brainstorming exercise to see how they could keep up with the most urgent matters at work, while also getting the full benefit of the training. "We finally agreed that if they had to step away to take a call, when they rejoined the class they would share a quick summary of what they were dealing with and the rest of us brainstormed how crucial conversation skills might apply in that case."
Passion
"Melanie started the class by telling her own personal story of how this material changed her life, and from that moment I was hooked," says one participant. "I can tell that she believes in the power of these principals and that she's applying them in her own life." Melanie's passion for her work is evident in the way she manages the training room and engages with participants.
Melanie holds a B.A. summa cum laude in German and French from the University of Alabama and a M.A. magna cum laude in Interpretation and Translation from the Monterey Institute of International Studies. She in a Certified Trainer for VitalSmarts and was named IOR Global's Instructor of the Year in 2014. She is certified to deliver Crucial Conversations, Crucial Accountability and Change Anything.
Crucial Conversations for Mastering Dialogue
Format: _ minute [keynote, workshop, breakout, etc..]
This program is perfect for:
- [type of employee or situation]
- [type of employee or situation]
The audience will leave with:
- [takeaway 1]
- [takeaway 2]
[1-2 paragraphs here with more description]
Crucial Conversations for Accountability
Format: _ minute [keynote, workshop, breakout, etc..]
This program is perfect for:
- [type of employee or situation]
- [type of employee or situation]
The audience will leave with:
- [takeaway 1]
- [takeaway 2]
[1-2 paragraphs here with more description]
Influencer
Format: _ minute [keynote, workshop, breakout, etc..]
This program is perfect for:
- [type of employee or situation]
- [type of employee or situation]
The audience will leave with:
- [takeaway 1]
- [takeaway 2]
[1-2 paragraphs here with more description]
3 recommend Melanie
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Sun Microsystems
On-Site
L.Y., OD Director, Sun Microsystems
I have partnered with Melanie in delivering leadership academy programs for Sun's leaders and Crucial Conversations program for both IT professionals and leaders. I have to say she is an excellent partner and instructor, her ability to articulate key concepts and learning points with amazing stories, personal and work experiences and visual aids (such as drawings/pictures/news clippings) has impressed me and her audience. In the class, she was able to engage with audience from different countries with her international background and impressive language capability as she speaks fluent German, Japanese and Mandarin in addition to her English mother tongue. It is such a joy working with her over the past years and I would love to work with her again in the future. Melanie has my highest recommendation.
Toastmaster's International
On-Site
H.L., Club President, Toastmaster's International
Our Toastmasters Club in Beijing (CHIC and CCTMC) asked Melanie to deliver a 90-minutes training session on communications. Her topic was Effective Communication with Your Western (US) Boss. She was incredibly well prepared for the topic, demonstrated by the examples she provided. For the training, she did her research by surveying her colleagues and attaining real-life example. Her interaction with the audience was very personal and natural, as she was able to engage everyone in thoughtful conversation and mutual discussion. She successfully lead the audience's reaction into her material, giving the audience a sense of ownership of the knowledge. Overall, terrific speaker, facilitator, and speaker. We hope that she can train more members in other Toastmasters club in other topics as well.
Intellect Associates
On-Site
N.Z., President, Intellect Associates
I rank Melanie as one of the best trainers I ever worked with. In May and June 2011 my company engaged Melanie to deliver a number of business writing courses to Societe Generale and Merck Serono, two of my company’s largest clients. I would say Melanie did a marvelous job. The clients (both managers and the participants) were very happy with the training results and feedback from them was exceptionally positive. I would say Melanie has a gift in facilitation. She builds rappport with clients and participants very easily. She is able to explain complicated concepts and deliver the key messages of training courses in a very clear and effective way. She is highly engaging and interactive during the training courses and in the meanwhile very sensitive to participants’ responses and needs. She is also a very humble and quick learner. It’s a pleasure working with Melanie and I think she is a valuable asset to any organizations she works with.
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