Category: TechComm

Posted on

Training & Development in Belize

by Jen Weaver Follow us on Twitter View our profile on LinkedIn

Let's take an island adventure to Belize and explore some common cultural facts (and their impact on the training and development market).

Test your knowledge of Belizean culture with the true or false questions below:

  1. True or False? Belizeans take a relaxed approach to most things.
  2. True or False? The official language of Belize is English.

Quick Tips for Training & Development in Belize1:

  • Facts alone do not substantiate a convincing argument. A person's feelings and individual perspectives are considered valuable when identifying the "truth" about a topic.
  • The relaxed culture of the Belizean people lends to risk taking, but Belizean's tend to avoid high-stress situations or direct confrontation.
  • Belize is a very masculine society. Women are not common in government or executive business roles. Keep this in mind when localizing images for business use and in forming your training teams.
  • Belizeans take a casual approach to time in relational settings but expect foreigners to be punctual for business appointments. Project deadlines are typically seen as guidelines or suggestions rather than final completion dates.
  • You will find it difficult to conduct business in Belize unless you are a native Belizean or can hire a local contact to represent your firm.
  • Belizeans base business decisions on relationships and personal affinity.
  • Business communications occur in English not English Creole.
  • Spelling follows British English not American.
  • Many Belizeans have lived or spent time in the United States (so American gestures are familiar).

Culture Quiz Answers:

  1. True. Island culture prevails.
  2. True. English is the official language however the local dialect is a form of English Creole that is incoherent to most English speakers. Spanish, Plautdietsch (a German dialect), and other indigenous languages are also spoken in Belize.

References:

1Morrison, Terri, and Wayne A. Conaway, Kiss, Bow, Or Shake Hands, 2nd ed. (Avon: Adams Media, 2006).

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Developing international training and development materials?Contact Jen at Carmazzi Global Solutions.

Posted on

Adobe Captivate: Quick Clicks and You’re Texting to Speech

by Kevin Siegel Follow us on Twitter View our profile on LinkedIn

The ability to convert text to speech using Captivate's built-in text to speech agents is awesome. All you need to do is select the slide note(s) you want to convert and then click the Text-to-Speech button.

Assuming you have installed NeoSpeech (a program that come with Captivate but needs to be installed manually), you will be able to choose from any one of five voices from the Speech Agent drop-down menu.

In addition to the five voices you get with Captivate, any voices that have already been installed on your computer will also appear in the Speech Agent drop-down menu. In the image below, Microsoft Anna, which comes with Windows, is also listed among the Speech Agents. 

After selecting an agent, all you need to do is click the Generate Audio button to convert the selected text to an audio file. Simple! Of course, if you follow these simple steps, you won't get the agent you were hoping for in the generated audio.

In the image below, notice that I have selected Kate from the Speech Agent drop-down menu. However, Microsoft Anna is shown at the right of the dialog box. Most new Captivate developers (and even some vets) miss this little detail. If I were to click the Generate Audio button now, I'd end up with an audio file containing Microsoft Anna, not Kate.

Kate selected as the Speech Agent

There is one subtle thing you have to do before selecting an agent and then clicking the Generate Audio button: click just above the text you'd like to convert and ensure the space above the text turns gray (see the image below).

Kate re-selected as the Speech Agent.

If you miss this one simple click, you won't be using the agent you want… instead, you'll be using the default agent (which, as shown earlier, would have been Anna for me).