Welcome to our Microcertificate in Practical Wisdom!
The Ancient Greeks often wrote about Phronesis in their reflections. It is a word used to refer to a type of wisdom relevant to practical action. They noted that in order to live virtuously, we require not only ethereal intelligence but practical wisdom which helps provide balance in every action of our daily lives.
This is how Aristotle explained the concept in his Nicomachean Ethics, “Practical wisdom is a true characteristic that is bound up with action, accompanied by reason, and concerned with things good and bad for a human being.”
We know that it is challenging to bring about change while maintaining balance in everyday life. That’s why innovators, movers, and shakers need extra help to continue their own journey of self-development. This is why we have designed a special certificate program to help you to keep building the skills you need to live a more fulfilling and pleasant life.
Change starts with transforming yourself. This is a program to facilitate your own personal transformation accompanied by the balance that only Practical Wisdom can provide. With this single purchase, you will be able to take a special selection of microcourses that include key soft skills you need in every area of your life – from your student experience, to work, to your relationships with friends and family.
Our Practical Wisdom series combines the best of corporate training principles with a twist of humor and wisdom to help you apply these skills in your life. Each microcourse has downloadable PDFs of exercises you can use personally, and with your teams at school or work to help implement new strategies and new behaviors that will benefit all.
Upon completion, you will be issued a Microcertificate that you can share with peers and colleagues, and post on your social media profiles. If you have any questions about the series, please let us know. Below please find a description of each microcourse included in this Microcertificate program.
Emotional Intelligence Basics
Emotional Intelligence is defined as a set of competencies demonstrating the ability one has to recognize his or her behaviors, moods, and impulses, and to manage them best according to the situation. This microcourse will give you the tools you need to be emotionally intelligent in your workplace. An employee with high emotional intelligence can manage his or her own impulses, communicate with others effectively, manage change well, solve problems, and use humor to build rapport in tense situations. These employees also have empathy, remain optimistic even in the face of adversity, and are gifted at educating and persuading in a sales situation and resolving customer complaints in a customer service role.
Creative Problem Solving Basics
In the past few decades, psychologists and business people alike have discovered that successful problem solvers tend to use the same type of processes to identify and implement the solutions to their problems. This process works for any kind of problem, large or small. This microcourse will give learners an overview of the entire creative problem-solving process, as well as key problem-solving tools that you can use every day in both your personal and professional lives. We address topics such as understanding problems and the creative problem-solving process, identifying types of information to gather and key questions to ask in problem-solving, the importance of defining a problem correctly, and the use of different problem definition tools.
Creating High Performance Teams Basics
The term “high-performance teams” has become a frequently used buzzword. It is easy to talk about high-performance teams, but what are they, how are they formed, and what benefits do they provide? The material in this microcourse will help you find the answer to these questions and develop your own high-performance teams.
Mindfulness Basics
Mindfulness is a term that is frequently used but rarely defined. Practicing true mindfulness encourages living in the present while it addresses the danger of distorted thinking. Staying in tune both mentally and emotionally holistically improves your perspective. Mindfulness is not the same thing as meditation, although meditation is often used to help bolster mindfulness practice. Like most competencies, you will have to consistently practice in order to truly experience the power of mindfulness, but once you become accustomed to it you will find your life changing in a myriad of ways. With our Mindfulness Basics microcourse, you will begin to identify your own patterns of thinking. As you learn to practice mindfulness, you will cultivate positive emotions that will have a dramatic effect on your personal and professional life.
Improving Self-Awareness Basics
A vital way of becoming more effective in both business and life is by becoming more self-aware. If you can become aware of your self – your strengths and your weaknesses – then, you can become aware of the effects you create. Only once you know how you affect others can you know how to change your behaviors, or even whether you should. Implementing the guidelines in this microcourse is the first step in a continual process of deepening your awareness of your self and the effects you create. Becoming aware of who you are and how you act can only lead to greater rewards in both your professional and personal life.
Self-Leadership Basics
As we grow, we learn to become leaders. Being a leader is natural for some, and learned for others. No matter how we have become a leader, it is important to remember we must lead ourselves before we lead others. True effectiveness comes from embodying the leadership competencies you would like to see in others in yourself. Leading by example and modeling good behaviors is the key to creating a strong team. Take the time to motivate yourself and realize that you can do it!
Personal Productivity Basics
Most people find that they wish they had more time in a day. This microcourse will show participants how to organize their lives and find those hidden moments. Participants will learn how to establish routines, set goals, create an efficient environment, and use time-honored planning and organizational tools to maximize their personal productivity.
Developing Creativity Basics
Creativity and innovation will improve your chances of success in business and in life. Fortunately, there are steps that can be taken to inspire you and develop your creative mindset. By changing the way that you think and overcoming your fear of risk, you will improve your creativity and change your life. Implementing the guidelines in this module is the first step to forever changing your creative process.
Facilitation Skills Basics
Facilitation is often referred to as the new cornerstone of management philosophy. It focuses less on running more traditional “dictatorial style” staff meetings, and focuses more on on dialogue, and creating a sense of fairness and an easier decision-making process. Creating a comfortable environment through better facilitation will give your meeting participants a much better experience, and will increase your productivity. The Facilitation Skills microcourse can help any organization make better decisions. You will develop an understanding of what facilitation is all about, as well as receive some tools you can use to facilitate small meetings. This strong understanding of how a facilitator can operate effectively, while offering key assistance at crucial decision-making points, will have you well on the road to becoming a great facilitator!
Our shopping cart is simple and easy to understand. If you do not have a user account, you will be able to create one upon purchase. Save your username and password as you will need it to login to access course materials later. For more detailed, step-by-step instructions you can review our tutorial How to Purchase a Course. Again, if you experience any issues, please email our Registrar at registrar@ubiquityuniversity.org.
Information about how we process refund or cancellation requests can be found here: Refund and Cancellation Policy.
To Receive Certificate:
Upon completion of the microcourses, you will be issued a Microcertificate that you can share with peers and colleagues, and post on your social media profiles. Once you have completed the courses and are ready for us to review and issue the certificate, please notify us using the chat button on the lower left-hand corner of the page. We will verify that lessons and quizzes have been completed and will send your certificate to you. The assignments are for your personal use and do not need to be submitted for grading unless you want academic credit for them. Good luck!
Microcourse Contact Information:
Microcourses are completely on-demand for your convenience. If you have questions or require additional assistance, you may click the “Chat” button on the lower, left-hand side of the screen, and submit your question. Our help desk will respond as soon as possible. Please do not email faculty directly with any technology or registration issues.
Single microcourses do not qualify for academic credit. However, enrolled students can add three microcourses together, purchase a Microcourse Credit Conversion option, pay the difference between the cost of the microcourses and a regular trimester course at their degree level and submit your reflection journals and a Final Creative Assignment for grading. If you complete all 9 microcourses in this series, you could earn 9 academic credits if you are enrolled in a degree program. For assistance with this, please email our Registrar at registrar@ubiquityuniversity.org.
