A few weeks ago, my kids got together with the neighbor’s kids and put up a lemonade stand outside our house. Thanks to several charitable parents and a few good natured neighbors, the kids walked away with $4 in profits that they could split equally among themselves.

This past Saturday, our budding entrepreneurs were at it again, this time with a bake sale. They declared that all the proceeds would be donated to earthquake victims in Nepal.

This morning I will have the opportunity to walk up to my organization’s director of development and hand over about $70 in cash that can go toward re-building efforts in Nepal. It was quite a boost over their previous ($4) effort!

From the perspective of a parent, this bake sale idea to raise money restored my faith in humanity. From the perspective of a learning and development professional, I just couldn’t leave well enough alone. I began to ask a few questions about what they thought was the difference between the lemonade stand and the bake sale. I uncovered several words of wisdom from these elementary school kids that talent development professionals would benefit from incorporating into their own practices, such as: Continue reading →