Faith in our People

I designed an online learning course template for an organization recently.  We went back and forth on the design several times and it seemed they were never quite happy.  I decided to model the template after their public website, this way I could be sure that all their branding would be 100 percent accurate. 

The feedback I received was that they thought the navigation structure may be too complicated for their employees.  I thought it interesting that the organization had faith in the general public to navigate their website, however they had little faith in their employees.  I see this all too often; we talk about adult learning and training, yet we have as much faith in our adults as we would small children.

Employee Newsletters: Informal Learning

Are you the Superintendent, Director, or Manager of a training department within a large organization?  Does your organization have a regular employee newsletter?  Do you contribute to the newsletter or oversee it in some way?  If you don't, you should and here is why:

Far more employees read company newsletters than interoffice memos or official emails.  It seems that like other periodicals like newspapers and magazines, employees want to be entertained and they see the company newsletter as recreational reading.  If you make regular contributions to the newsletter you can make an impact toward more informal learning. 

A Great Example of Informal Learning

I’ve talked about informal learning in the past, however I have stumbled across an example that training departments for larger organizations can take advantage of.  The concept is simply making available a program that you very likely already qualify for.  The cost is zero, and the effort on your part is minimal.

The program I speak about is the Microsoft Home Use Program (HUP).  Typically the IT department doesn’t promote the benefits of being a volume licenser from Microsoft, however buried inside the program benefits is the option of extending this license to employees through the program by providing Microsoft Office for around $10 USD each.

So how is this informal learning you may ask?  Well, it may very well be your responsibility to perform software training in your organization.  By offering Microsoft HUP to every employee who has a home PC for $10, a large percentage of employees will take advantage of it, they will use it during off-hours, they will gradually learn the new features, and how to do certain things with the software which they may apply back on the job.  Your investment in a little promotion of the program can pay off in the form of a more knowledgeable and skilled employee.

Ask your IT department if you qualify for the program.  It really is a win-win-win scenario.  Your organization wins by not having to build or purchase elaborate Microsoft training, you win because you have provided a training method, and of course the employee wins by getting really cheap software and upgraded skills.
To learn more, the program website is here.

Adobe Captivate

I was first introduced to Adobe Captivate when version two was still new.  Our instructional design team was switching from our previous authoring tool to Captivate while I was away conducting some classroom training out west.  Because of this I missed the training that our manager arranged for us.  I got back from the training and started to play around with the software.  It wasn’t quite as intuitive as PowerPoint, but close.  After a few days I found myself creating e-learning at a surprisingly quick rate.  As a team we relied heavily on Captivate for a year or two.  At which point we switched to another authoring tool to coincide with a new LMS launch.

Fast forward three or four years to today.  I have just opened up version five of Captivate which came as part of the Adobe E-Learning Suite I purchased a few months back.  It’s funny that the software is somewhat like riding a bike.  It’s been years but it’s all coming back to me.  There is very little that this software cannot do.  I’m so please to have my own copy of the Adobe E-Learning Suite.  It really has everything I could ever be asked to do as an Instructional Designer.

Malcolm S. Knowles

I have started to read Malcolm S. Knowles, "The Adult Learner" so that I have first hand knowledge of what Professor Knowles was trying to share with his audience.  I have heard much about his six principles of adult learning from other training I have taken.  Obviously there must be more to his concepts, as the book is over 260 pages in length. Many of the courses on adult learning and instructional design have referenced Malcolm S. Knowles and his principles of adult learning.  I wanted to get this first hand for a change and read from the author's pages instead of only finding his name in bibliographies.

I have found in the past that using my blog as a method for taking notes while studying in school to be very effective.  So far I have read the Introduction and have found the language a little challenging.  Perhaps taking notes on the subject may allow me to put his thoughts into my own words.  Of course I am primarily reading his work for myself and my own career as a training professional.  I am also a fan of sharing of knowledge; anyone reading this blog may benefit by what I learn as well.

Adobe eLearning Suite 2

I recently purchase the Adobe eLearning Suite 2 to not only keep up to date but to replace some earlier versions of software that was not compatible with my new laptop.  My new laptop uses Windows 7 which is a 64 bit operating system.  My copies of Acrobat, Captivate, and Dreamweaver were not compatible with this system so I was forced to make the jump to the latest versions of these.  By choosing the eLearning Suite I was also able to get the latest versions of Flash, Photoshop and few other lesser known applications from Adobe.

Normally this software would run about $1800; however I took advantage of an educational discount available to me as a student.  Earlier this year I had completed an adult training certification which entitled me to this discount.  I ended up paying only $600 for the suite.  This proved to be less than purchasing any two of the more known applications within the suite.  If you are taking even a single course at your local college you can take advantage of this offering.  The Adobe eLearning suite is extremely useful to anyone within the Instructional Design field.

Death by PowerPoint Isn't Always To Blame

Check out this presentation on PowerPoint.

YOU SUCK AT POWERPOINT!

View more presentations from @JESSEDEE.

How Many Pages is a Job Aid?

I feel that sometimes we attempt to make training more complicated than it has to be.  I recently was asked to develop training for using a closed circuit TV system.  The manufacturer’s user guide is a few hundred pages long.  I found out specifically what the end user needed to know to do their jobs.  Turns out they required only about five pieces of knowledge and skill.  I focused my training on those items and ended up with an eleven page document with a skills assessment check list at the end.  Very simple and it does what they asked this training to do.

Ironically the training department’s expectation was a “job aid”.  Many organizations think of job aids as “one pagers” or single page documents.  I think this is a misnomer about job aids; job aids are anything that helps a learner perform their job.  It could be a cheat sheet that sits on the top of their computer keyboard, a sign on the wall or like in this case a few pages about how to do a particular task.  I think we get stuck with expectations of our clients rather than building a training solution that is right for the training problem.  If a single page is all that is required; you are wasting the learner’s time to give them too much, if one page isn’t enough than more is required.  It really is that simple.

Don't Let It End This Way

Oh the corporate battles we as Instructional Designers have. In my first position as an Instructional Designer I thought this was a unique situation with the organization that I was apart of. Of course I didn’t know any better. Now that I have worked in more than one organization, I can tell you that this is a universal challenge.

What it comes down to is the fact that most people have a preconceived notion of what training is. While our industry has developed standards and expectations of training, the rest of the world is oblivious to these. In most cases, training is assumed to simply be a collection of information in some structure resembling a PowerPoint file. The assumption is that the more you put into this PowerPoint file the better and more complete the training will be. If one particular point is really important you should say it many times rephrased in different ways.

I’m sorry to say that this is still the expected norm out there in the corporate world. In fact I have colleagues who still think that this is primarily what we do (add style and appearance to other peoples content). There is more to it than that. It is up to each Instructional Designer out their in the world to educate our customers as to what value we bring to the table. Please don’t cave into the death by PowerPoint that so many are expecting. Ironically these are the same people who will blame you when the training that they had you passively design turns out to be ineffective.

The Search and Learn

Designing learning activities where the learners teach themselves are some of the easiest yet most effective training to design. These types of learning activities work best when the learners come to the table with some existing knowledge of the subject. This way less experienced learners can rely on the greater expertise of their partners. Another time when it's a great method for training is when there is an official document that the organization relies on such as a policy or procedures manual. This reference material can be distributed to the learners along with a set of instructions to guide the learners in their quest for knowledge; and some raw materials such as magic markers, white boards, or flip chart paper.

The parameters of the learning activity are simple. The learning activity is divided into three parts:

Part One:
Introduction and Instructions: You can call it a brain storming activity or a search and learn activity, or a knowledge hunt activity or whatever clever training exercise name you wish to dream up. I like Search and Learn myself but to each their own. Next you want to provide very clear instructions on how the activity will be performed. I personally like to assign roles within the smaller groups. For example one member of the group might be responsible for writing down what the group has learned, while another member might be responsible for presenting the material to the rest of the class, and so on. The key is getting everyone involved in some way. Rather than assigning these roles, allow the groups to democratically choose or elect one another for the roles. Typically people select roles they are strong at or enjoy doing.

Part Two:
Research: With the instructions at hand along with the reference material, allot a set number of minutes for the groups to conduct their research. Instruct your trainers to use this time to monitor the groups by walking around the classroom to offer advice or encouragement. They may also be required to put groups back on track if they end up misunderstanding the exercise.

Part three:
Presentation: Once the allotted time have been used up it's time for the groups to present their learning to the rest of the class. If each group has been responsible for the same research as other groups, take up the exercise in a round robin approach. This is where one idea is presented by one group; another idea is presented by the next group, and so on until all ideas have been exhausted. Alternatively if groups have been assigned unique research, each group can present all their content at once.

Personally I enjoy this type of design as you do not need to reinvent the wheel here. There are several advantages to you as a designer. First there is no need for updating the training each time the reference material is updated by the organization as the training does not contain the reference material itself. Another benefit to that same point is that you don't need to rewrite the reference material into a training format and have it signed off by subject matter experts. As long as the reference material provided remains accurate, your training will convey the right ideas to the group. Also this form of training breaks away from the passive methods such as lecturing. Learners learn best when they are engaged, talking with one another, sharing ideas and involved in some kind of activity.