What Are We Waiting For?

To serve as a starting point, I sense we may be unsure of how to measure the value of informal learning. This is certainly something we have seen before, especially with newly emerging tools that have attracted so much attention as to create entire sub-industries around them, such as social media.

There are definitions to explain some of the buzzwords surrounding the changing face of learning and development, as an attempt to define the elements of the craft of informal learning. However I think the L&D department knows what these terms mean and how beneficial they can be to an organization. The problem is they are speaking a completely different language than executive management, including CLO’s that are often fixated on numbers. Implementing informal learning absolutely needs endorsement from the top.

A common misconception for learning specialist is their role in an informal learning environment. Some types of learning cannot be managed, and for good reason. Informal learning can to be facilitated and the environment changed to support self-directed learning. Although this can be challenging, learning specialist are to be translators or mediators for performance, similar to how the role of trainers have changed with the implementation of e-learning in an organization.

Insight from a project manager, specializing in e-learning, provides a clear account on the role of learning specialist and instructors in the new landscape of learning and development.

“Teaching and training is both a science and an art. As the science of how people learn progresses, teachers and instructors have to themselves learn and incorporate these elements to provide the most efficient learning experience.

There are opportunities for us to change prospective on how we use technology in instructing and learning. Instead of being considered as a replacement of face to face instruction, online content should be used to enrich the learning experience. For trainers and instructors, it's understanding that online resources do not necessarily mean less work, but a more effective way to work. Specifically, online resources and learning management systems allow more effective use of time in tracking and analyzing progress.  We have, and will continue to witness technological advancements. With these changes, so must our perception on how we view things evolve in order for us to grasp how we can truly make use of these new developments in an ever changing learning landscape.”

Eric Tang, Project Manager, Vretta

Setting the Gold Standard for Training

There is no surprise that more companies are chanting the benefits of change and are looking for the most effective and efficient way to do everything. Training employees has somehow taken the backseat of importance and HR departments are comfortable with pulling everyone into one room for a full day of training and getting the entire thing done as quickly and painlessly as possible. Much like many other things that have been done the same way for some time, no one asks for metric performance reviews for the effectiveness in those methods being used because, it has always been done that way. I can tell you hypothetically, finely tailored business simulations and e-learning courses can increase retention up to 35% in trainees. In other words, employees will understand and remember more from learning by a different method. This can directly improve ROI– finance guys, did you hear that? There is a world of performance measurements supporting the abilities of e-learning, all swirling around in a great pool of blogs and online articles, but no one seems to care. We’ll still do it the boring old way that we aren’t even sure works most effectively. Surely you must see something wrong with this picture. Once someone throws a percentage into the picture, the immediate follow up question is where did that metric come from? How does e-learning improve retention in employees?

It is first important to note that not all observed information or behaviours are effectively learned. After hearing something once, you may be able to recall it almost perfectly after 1 minute and just after 20 minutes with only 58% retention ability. With e-learning, material can be reviewed at any time and information can be digested at a rate appropriate for each trainee. The ability to store information is also an important part of the learning process. “Retention can be affected by a number of factors, but the ability to pull up information later and act on it is vital to observational learning” says Kendra Cherry, author of Everything Psychology Book. In the end, in order for any type of training to work, the trainee needs to be motivated to implement was has just been learned. The means used to accomplish this should be highly engaging, motivating and interactive. This is gold standard for training.

Genele Rose 

easel.ly

Happy Holidays!

Happy Holidays from Vretta to you and your family! What could be better than the gift of understanding? Vretta helps transform a student’s learning experience and teaches skills for life.

Face-to-Face Training vs. E-Learning

‘’Change’’ has become a mantra for literally every CEO who wants to leave a lasting impact in the way businesses have traditionally been run. This push towards transformational change within organizations, to evolve into industry leaders, has led to the constant need for employee training. From front-line sales and support to leadership teams in almost every vertical, organizations are looking to invest in their human capital.

Training may involve soft-skills, software, product knowledge, budgeting, etc. with the common objective of witnessing excellent return on investments made. With the constant need for sustainable and ongoing training, face-to-face training is becoming a bottleneck in this organizational change initiative. The table below produced by Vretta, a transformational learning company, enumerates the differences between face-to-face training and e-learning.

	Face-to-face Training	E-learning
Impact of learning materials	Mainly depends on the trainer.  Materials used are mostly animated PowerPoint presentations. Sometimes props are used.		With the advent of emerging technologies, materials can be tailored-made to provide high user engagement by using adaptive- and mastery- based learning methods.
Accessibility	Needs to be at a scheduled time and place. This calls for numerous localized training events making the training initiative expensive.		Self-paced learning. Learners can access the resources anywhere at any time.
Number of users	Limited number of users during any particular training session.		Unlimited number of users can access the system.
Scalability	Scaling is a challenge as trainers at different locations need to be trained to deliver the desired training experience.		The initial investment is in designing highly effective training modules that can be used for many years and that users can access from anywhere.
Trainer to student ratio	To get the most out of the trainer, classes contain as many users (generally 50 – 70) reducing the impact of the training.		1 : 1 through collaborative approaches.
Consistency of training	Largely depends on the trainer.		Consistent.
Interaction	Depending on the size of the class and the training style of the trainer. Collaborative training methods have been tried many times. However, ensuring that all trainers continue using these methods is a very challenging task.		Material can be created in such a way that users interact with the system all the time through engaging learning objects and mastery meters. Leaners cannot progress through the training session being passive learners. Constant activity through interactive assessment tools effectively built into the training material ensures high retention levels.
Employees buy-in	Employees are used to this training method and don’t require too much buy in.		For the success of this training, it is critical to get employees buy-in from the outset which will include endorsements from senior management.
ROI	Trainer’s fees are high. Additionally there are costs associated with booking rooms, employees working time, food, etc.  which reduce the ROI. Due to challenge of achieving a collaborative approach in the training, learners view these sessions as a “break from work” rather than a professional development program leading to reduced retention levels.		Inexpensive given that it is highly scalable and can be used over many years.  When the modules are carefully designed and the learning is mandated and tracked, this learning style has proven to significantly improve retention levels.

You Get What You Pay For: Why Companies Should Invest in Learning Solutions

Engagement is linked to real performance goals and is exactly why companies should invest in learning solutions for their employees.

Linear Learning

Read, click, scroll describes linear courses with plain click and read functionality providing little to no engagement. This is a common trap trainers fall into because the focus is solely to share information and it may be hard to move past this to consider the benefits of interactivity.

PowerPoint Authoring Tools

Then there is PowerPoint slides with audio voice over which can be said to bring a few new dimensions to learning solutions. This is usually slightly more expensive than a read, click, scroll solution but certainly scalable. The marketplace is flooded with authoring tool products and they can be found in many company learning and development departments as the sole learning solution for employees. There are user interactivity features that are adapted to improve engagement and are attractive because this solution is achievable by an in-house trainer or L&D professional.

Creating Engagement

There are three elements of interactivity that can be used as building blocks for engagement; click, hover and drag. While this is more on the design side of creating learning solutions, it is important to notice how infrequent these core elements are used. Even more relevant to how design affects interactivity, which then affects performance goals, is the use of custom learning solutions to achieve the best results through careful tailoring to the needs of the user and company.

There is a difference between the option to choose Button A, or Button B to take the user to the next part of the course, and putting the learner in control so they can choose how they would like to go through the learning experience. This requires a much deeper understanding of how design and interactivity in combination will enable the user to be more engaged and retain more content. Adaptive methodology is a key element to providing engagement and requires implementing algorithms and computer-based pedagogical agents. The presentation of educational material is adapted according to students' learning needs, as indicated by their responses to questions and tasks. An adaptive layout has its merits because it can be a more pragmatic solution that is cheaper to implement and easier to test.

Keep in mind; if it’s only an information-based course, then it may be easier to do a simple linear standard e-learning course than waste the learner’s time navigating an interactive module.

In custom e-learning solutions, real world simulations have strong potential to break down learning barriers that compromise achieving performance goals. Learners can interact with the content and make real-world decisions that optimize the learning experience to specific needs.  The content, design, user interactivity and overall experience can be tailored to achieve the most engagement from learners and solicit the best performance results through custom e-learning solutions. Read, click, scroll and PowerPoint authoring tools cannot facilitate the same learning experience and cannot be expected to return the same results as engaging customized learning solutions.

Genele Rose

E-Learning: A Means to an End

E-Learning is a means to an end. This may be a strange topic to discuss considering many of us are heavily involved in the E-Learning market, and for many of us it being our sole profession and source of sustainability. Clive Sheperd shed a light on what exactly that phrase means. It is easy to get caught up in the means we use to achieve our goal, the latest device, platform, or company birth in the e-learning space but we are to be wary of not becoming occupied with these things and to focus on the true purpose. Are we making our game simulations so visually focused that we lose the objective and only entice users to be excited and have fun rather than learn?

Now that we have pioneered several technological methodologies of delivering learning material, we must focus on the user and their performance.  Businesses are allocating budgets to learning and development to see an increase in efficiency, not merely more e-learning courses. Executives are not concerned with how learning is delivered; they want to know how it is going to impact the business.

The functionality of learning solutions should complement the content and focus largely on user needs and employ a blended-mastery approach to implementing the material. What we need are learning resources that can cater to a variety of needs and provide a plethora of information based on demographics such as career industry and location. Specialized content that is specific to an individual within the scope of their company’s objective is an area for opportunity that has yet to be fully explored. For instance, a new Sales Manager at an environmental manufacturing firm in Toronto has just been hired and is going through training using an e-learning course with simulations that make the training engaging. Great! What could be even better is if there were push notifications that suggested workshops in the Toronto area that focused on motivating and empowering employees as well as a recommendation to a LinkedIn group or blog that united similar people in the industry of environmental products. All of this information could still be transmitted through an internal LMS, for example, but now the focus is on the learner and how to increase their performance.

Here’s a question to consider: are e-learning courses a formal or informal method of learning? Naturally, a large part of learning occurs outside of formal structures and this sort of learning can be made accessible through e-learning resources. Learners need a holistic learning environment combining online courses, webinars, face-to-face instruction with forums, assuming roles in practice and user – generated content platforms.

If learners can make a self-assessment based on their level of confidence with a small qualitative portion to make comments on any areas of special interest, learners can skip to areas of need, providing a more blended, personalized approach to learning which ultimately saves time.  There is certainly much more to consider in stressing the importance of learning rather than e-learning than has been discussed, but it is important that we begin to refocus our energies on the learning objectives and in what ways we assess it.

People can pass tests or choose the right multiple choice answers through the process of elimination but the value in a learning experience comes from the change in behaviour, and that is what should be measured. Understanding that e-learning is a means to an end will prompt us to change the way we deliver learning material and how we assess learning overall.

Genele Rose