Share: Ritch Hochstetler | September 23, 2022 Research suggests that successful teaching is based on a ratio of 50% knowledge and 50% communication skills. Teachers play many roles and wear many hats including behavior management specialist, counselor, social worker, tutor, evaluator, and court jester to name a few. Of the many hats that teachers wear that call upon their superpowers, skilled communicator ranks right at the top. The question is, what are the essential skills needed to communicate with students and how do you grow them? First Essential Communication Skill: LISTENING For al ..read more

Share: Ritch Hochstetler | August 26, 2022 The fundamental question, that has become a universally tired cliché, is, “How do you get everyone on the same page?” Every organization has a mission and important work that must get done. Yet, even the strongest teams often find themselves struggling to sustain a culture where ownership and engagement remain strong in the emotionally stressful and incessantly busy world of work. In the aftermath of a raging pandemic, the disconnect has been exacerbated by splitting team members into remote and in-person sub-groupings. What if, for all the time ..read more

Share: Ritch Hochstetler | August 12, 2022 At trainings I often ask people, “Raise your hand if you love teambuilding experiences?” A typical response is 2-3 people who respond positively out of an entire team. My reply is, “Don’t worry, we’re not going to be doing any happy-crappy teambuilding activities or trust falls during this experience!” Why is it that so many people have a negative reaction to activities, experiences or processes designed to improve human interaction and collaboration? Maybe it’s because by the time a facilitator is called in for an intervention, communication is s ..read more

Share: Ritch Hochstetler | May 6, 2022 The Crisis At Ground Level According to a survey of young American’s just released by Harvard, the mental health crisis among our children is escalating dramatically. Over 50% of youth reported feeling down, depressed, or hopeless for several days over a two-week period. Depression, self-harm and suicide are all on the rise with almost a quarter of youth surveyed reporting thoughts of hurting themselves or being better off dead. Suicide rates, which remained stable from 2000 to 2007, jumped by nearly 60% by 2019 according to the Center for Disease Con ..read more

Share: Ritch Hochstetler | April 22, 2022 There’s an old joke about a Sunday school teacher who was planning on using a squirrel as an object lesson. To increase the curiosity, she put the stuffed animal in a paper bag and said, “I’m going to describe something to you, and I want you to raise your hand when you know what it is.” All the children nodded eagerly. “This lives in trees (pause) and eats nuts (pause)…” The children were looking at each other but still no raised hands. “And it jumps from branch to branch (pause) and chatters and flips its tail when it’s excited (pause)…”. Still n ..read more

Share: Ritch Hochstetler | April 8, 2022 The memory of that day will forever be etched in my mind. My parents sat me down and shared that my cousin Tracy, 7 years old, was struck and killed while riding his bike on the country road that passed by our house. Tracy and his parents lived in the house next door, and I would often spend time babysitting and playing with him. More than a relative, he was my little buddy. His sudden death crushed me. Then something happened. The waves of emotion that washed over me that day and in the ensuing weeks unveiled a mystery that created a hunger for mea ..read more

Share: Ritch Hochstetler | March 28, 2022 Recent survey results in the Harvard Business Review state: • 65% of people don’t feel any sense of community at work • 76% reported difficulty making connections with teammates • Over 40% feel physically or emotionally isolated in the workplace The Pandemic of Loneliness Though we may be through the worst of the pandemic, the ensuing “hangover” continues to wreak havoc on our teams and workplace cultures. Over 50% of educators and youth workers are leaving the field earlier than they had planned. The new sickness seems to be a deadly variant which ..read more

Share: Ritch Hochstetler | February 25, 2022 I was teaching in a freshmen class when a student in the front row asked, “What’s that smell?” By this time all the students were looking around the room, and as I glanced up from my notes, there it was! On a normal morning, I stood at the door as students were entering the room to personally greet them. But on this morning, I was running late and feeling not quite ready to deliver the lesson, so I was hunkered down at the desk instead of greeting students at the door. The impact of my shift in practice was a bit shocking. Two young men who were ..read more

Share: Ritch Hochstetler | February 11, 2022 Winter weather in northern Indiana has forced me to ditch my morning walk for a 30-minute stationary trek on an exercise bike. The only thing that makes it palatable is re-watching episodes of The Office that are currently streaming on Peacock. Even with a complete awareness that the dysfunctional leadership, low staff morale, and crazy office antics are hyperbolized for comedic value, I can’t help but see streams of current reality playing out before my eyes. The reality is, many staff teams are emotionally spent, if not completely bankrupt. Ac ..read more

Share: Ritch Hochstetler | January 28, 2022 Have you ever found yourself on the listening end of a conversation, and based on your response, it becomes abundantly clear that you have not listened to a word they said? Author and reporter Celeste Headlee, from her book, We Need to Talk: How to Have Conversations That Matter, states: “Being a good talker doesn’t make you a good listener, and being smart might make you a terrible listener.” Though we would all agree that intuitively this makes sense, the reality is that we could all use some help developing our listening skills in order to avo ..read more