Professional Development Articles

We’re curious people by nature. And we love to teach others what we’ve learned. So explore our blog to gain fresh insights from our expertise in areas ranging from culture to AI.

SEP Wins TechPoint’s 2024 Innovation Service Partner of the Year Mira Award

SEP Recognized as Indiana’s Top Innovation Service Partner, Winning TechPoint’s Prestigious Mira Award Westfield, Indiana - SEP has been named the Innovation Service Partner of the Year by TechPoint at the 25th annual Mira Awards. The Mira Awards, Indiana’s largest…
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Friday’s 13 Tips to Overcome Design Workshop Facilitation Nerves

Facilitating design workshops can oftentimes feel as scary as Friday the 13th. The nerves that build up moments before meeting with a client can feel the same as the nerves I would get as a kid while watching the classic 80’s slasher film as Jason skulked around Camp Crystal Lake. In both scenarios, I was/am […]
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Networking Engineers

One of the most useful skills I picked up during my Ph.D. studies was how to turn light refreshments into a whole meal.  The trick is to combine hunger and the ability to ignore shame for personal gain. Then one needs only spend an awful lot of time at the end of an event milling […]
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Why I cancelled my sprintly manager meeting

… and started meeting weekly instead. (gotchia 😉) Some people enjoy small talk. Some of my closest friends are small-talkers. I have nothing against the small-talkers. I just am totally incapable and – if I’m being honest – a little socially inept since all this quarantining started. Meetings with my manager were always dangerously close […]
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man reading book - Flow

This one’s for you, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi fans

If you’ve read Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, or even if you’ve just seen a diagram like this one and it inspired you to figure out which activities put you in flow… boy, do I have a blog post for you ???? I have to admit I never read the book, […]
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What Does It Mean to be a Senior Engineer?

As a team lead, I coach and mentor many junior engineers. One topic that always comes up is “What does it mean to be a Senior Engineer?” That’s easy, you just… have a four-year degree from an accredited college? Work for 10 years and don’t get fired? Learn 3 front-end technologies? Check some boxes on […]
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Introducing the Professional Development Canvas

It is a developed skill to take all the different things in my life and answer two questions, “What should I learn next,” and “How am I going to learn it.”  I’ve had twenty years to figure out how to self-direct my learning.  In addition, I’ve had some semi-professional experience in developing my training materials […]
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Why We Started Book Clubs at Work

We started book clubs at SEP over a decade ago. Since then, we’ve had over 100 book clubs, with more than 75% of the company participating in at least one book club! Book clubs have been such an integral part of SEP’s group learning for a long time – how did this happen anyways? Why […]
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Why We Look for Professional Development When Hiring

Let’s start with a situation that’s familiar to me working with SEP as a recruiter. I’ve woken up at five-thirty in the morning so that I can make it to a college campus by seven-thirty. We expect our first student candidates to meet us at eight. We’re a bit early so we need to wait. […]
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Conference Talk Roadmap

Co-authored by Jordan Thayer and Robert Herbig Presenting information to your peers is an important part of an any career, especially engineering: Teaching a subject reinforces your own understanding and mastery Presentation and communication skills are essential to team based work Sharing knowledge helps improve the teams you’re working on It helps bring in new […]
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