""The secret of education lies in respecting the pupil" Ralph Waldo Emerson

Contractor for Whitelaw Consulting and Research Inc – Project – Research Report titled Study of Risk Management: Government Impacts on Agriculture in Canada .

 Duties and responsibilities

The following is a synopsis of the Skills and Knowledge used or developed during this project.

 People Skills

Worked with business partners, a husband and wife team, but maintained a distance for any of their personal conflicts

Communicated effectively with the upper echelon of government such as deputy ministers and equally as well with farmers.  

Research and Report Writing Skills

Internet and library research on key report topics such as farm insurance programs

Note taking and transcribing

Wrote specific sections for the report

Proofed to ensure one “voice” in the report instead of three

Edited all electronic document changes

Survey Preparation and analysis skills

Researched current methodology on surveys.

Selected an email/mail format and determined the questions

Created the layout and formatted the survey

Wrote, as part of two person team, proofed and edited the questions to ensure clarity and eliminate ambiguities

Established the criteria for analysis of the 250 surveys, created the matrix and entered the survey results

Provided numerical analysis and assisted with the summative descriptive analysis  

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 Interviewing Skills

Prepared questions for the face-to-face and telephone interviews. Questions varied depending on whether the interviewee was a farmer, government agricultural person or representative of an agricultural group

Completed telephone and face-to-face interviews. This included note taking, transcribing and summative evaluation of information provided.

Conducted face-to-face interviews in my home province, Saskatchewan, either at the bureaucrat’s office or in the farmer's kitchen.

Established and maintained time schedule of meetings sand avoided overlap of commitments.

 Project Management Skills

Goals set via brainstorming sessions and objectives determined based on goals.

Established the milestone dates

Monitored status

Advised team when they were falling behind and assisted them with getting back on schedule

 Teaching Skills

Taught WordPerfect manuscript skills such as headers, footers, and table of contents, page numbering and indices.

Taught basic accounting principles and the applications QuickBooks and Excel report generating features

 Technology Skills

Designed page layout for document text and PowerPoint presentations

Edited all documents and maintained backups

Entered and tracked quarterly contract income and expenses for the project in QuickBooks (accounting application).

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Last modified: Thursday August 30, 2007.