From Training to Learning - The Journey of a Thousand Miles

In the business world and specifically in the learning world, there has been a lot of discussion about training and learning and between creating a training culture versus nurturing a learning culture. And this discussion isn't new. 

A popular article by Eileen Garger, Goodbye Training, Hello Learning, was published in Workforce, November 1999, Vol. 78, No. 11, pp. 35-42. That was 20 years ago. 

In the article, Eileen says:

"Training as something provided for employees will be replaced by learning that employees initiate themselves. Training, when available, will be replaced by learning, when needed. Training for the masses will be replaced by highly customized, just-for-me learning." 

20 years later, how are we doing?

In the same article, Mark Laurin, director of global HR training and development for Rosemont, Illinois-based Galileo International cautions about technology and says:

“We have to think less like trainers and more like business professionals. We have to forget for a moment the high-tech gizmos, so that we can focus on the big picture. And the big picture is that performance problems aren't always solved by training. We must become fluent and comfortable with evaluating what we do, and recommend non-training solutions when appropriate.”

Have we made the move from training to performance? 

Brigitte Jordan, Ph.D. in his extremely insightful article,"From Training to Learning in the New Economy" writes: 

"Training has come under the gun because conventional training organizations regularly can't deliver the goods. Whatever learning needs to happen for getting work done at the front line -- on production floors, in sales, or in customer service -- often is not generated, or even recognized as needed, by the training organizations." 

He goes on to say:

"...the question is not how to make training more efficient but how to make learning more effective.”

If there was a quick way to highlight the difference between training and learning, I'd say this: training is not learning; learning is work and work is learning. 

I view the move from a training culture to a learning culture as a continuum - it may seem tedious and difficult but every step counts. 

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.
-Lao Tzu

The journey can be challenging as it involves letting go of control and moving from a centralized, hierarchical, traditional department to a distributed, personalized, 24x7 endeavor. Organizations and individuals who support a learning culture look at learning as a continuous process rather than an isolated event that happens in a training room, a course or a workshop. 

For true learning culture, organizations need to move away from encouraging efficiency and control and instead focus on enabling effectiveness and self-directed behaviours.

The question is, are you designing and delivering training but find that little or no learning is taking place? Do you feel trapped in the 'death valley' of workplace learning? Here are a few thoughts on how we can walk the road of learning, performance and change.

L&D As the Invisible Glue

I often think about what constitutes good design especially in embarrassing situations where I try to push a door open when I was actually supposed to pull it. Ironically, in some other situations, I don't think about design at all for example, when squeezing ketchup using the upside-down bottle; it seems so natural that I don't pause for a second! We tend to notice poor designs but more often than not, good designs are unnoticed because they are intuitive or invisible and although we experience them, we don't notice them.

In the early 1980s, Dieter Rams shared the 10 Principles of Good Design. The last principle of good design is, "Good design is as little design as possible." What this means is that good design doesn't need bells or whistles to draw attention to itself. It allows users to engage with the product or service easily and effectively without being a distraction.

How does this idea fit into the design of learning/training experiences?

An article by Josh Bersin in 2016, shared how the learning function has become invisible where, he discusses how "Invisible learning leaders focus more on curation and context, building an always-on learning environment, and becoming experts at embedding learning into work."

In the article,"The Invisible L&D", Dani Johnson defines this idea as “An L&D approach to developing the workforce by enabling and assisting learning throughout the organization, wherever and whenever it happens.”

In his post, Emmet Connolly, talks about different levels of invisible design. In his categorization of these levels, "Product invisibility is the most dramatic shift towards invisible design, where complete products or entire categories have moved from demanding notice to being automatic." Emmet talks about how "there are more and more products and services that strive to invisibly integrate themselves into our lives in a helpful, human-centered way."

Perhaps, as L&D, we need to strive for this highest level of invisibility where we act as the invisible glue that seamlessly integrates learning into the lives of those we serve. As this invisible glue, we need to:

• Provide the right environment for friction-free learning without being intrusive.
• Act as conduits that enable people to learn continuously. 
• Ensure that our design acts as the bridge that integrates learning and working. 
• Encourage and support natural learning processes and even when learning may appear to be messy, we make sure it is authentic, natural and intuitive. 
• Champion a continuous-learning culture and recognize all types of 'learning' including informal learning. 
• Help individuals learn how to learn and enable them to be more self-directed in their efforts.

While we may appear to be invisible as L&D, our work and how that positively impacts the life and work of those it serves must be very visible. 

Photo by: Taruna Goel

References:

• The Learning Function Has Become Invisible
• Invisible L&D
• Invisible design: why less is more
• Bad Design vs. Good Design: 5 Examples We can Learn From

My Top 10 Learning Tools - 2019

It is that time of the year when Jane Hart (http://c4lpt.co.uk/) polls learning professionals around the world to weigh in on their top 10 learning tools. Here are my Top 10 Learning Tools for 2019 (in no particular order):

1. Google Search - If I have a question, Google always has an answer.
   
   
2. Twitter but more specifically Tweetdeck - This is the first social media app that I launch on my computer. I use it for both personal and professional learning and especially like the 'lists' feature to view and participate in a variety of 'streams of conversations'.
   
   
3. LinkedIn Articles - I have enjoyed cross posting my blog posts to LinkedIn and found a different type of audience. I have also noticed that people find it easier to comment on Linkedin posts rather than on blog posts and that creates an opportunity for conversations that are more meaningful.
   
   
4. Microsoft Word - I do all my professional work using Microsoft Word and can almost forget about this tool since it has become seamless with my work.
   
   
5. Dropbox - I rely on this tool for working in the cloud, collaborating with clients and teams, for synchronizing my work across various computers/laptops. I have recently started to use this tool to share documents and pictures with my family. Everyone seems to be on board!
   
   
6. Podcasts - I love all kinds of podcasts but have added several learning/training/human performance-related podcasts to my list in the past year. I like the flexibility of listening to podcasts while walking or taking the transit and it often sparks an idea or two for my own blog posts.
   
   
7. Meetup - I have been using this app increasingly over the last year and enjoy developing personal and professional relationships with people in my local community - within and outside my area of work.
   
   
8. Instagram - I use this tool for personal learning around my hobbies and interests including photography, makeup and cooking! I enjoy watching 'stories' and find it easier to respond to stories and make connections with people.
   
   
9. WhatsApp - This is my go-to tool to stay connected with my family but recently, I have joined both professional and personal neworking Whatsapp groups and have found it to be valuable to plan one-on-one meetings with interesting people that I discovered through the group chats.
   
   
10. Slack - In the past year, I found myself using Slack for personal learning. However, I found it challenging to keep up with too many Slack groups that are created post a meetup or a workshop or a course for a follow-up discussion but then no one ever posts anything! On the other extreme, in other Slack groups, members continue to post 'Fwds' and their professional bios for job prospecting. I can see the value of the tool so I am still trying to find my way through the world of Slack for personal learning.

Other notable mentions: 

Blogger - My blog resides in Blogger so it is a critical tool for me that offers me a platform to reflect and share. However, I tend to write long (aka reflective, thoughtful) posts and only post once a month so my frequency of using this tool is low.

YouTube - This is my 'how to' tool. I use it for microlearning when troubleshooting tasks both professional and personal and to learn more about product reviews mostly involving technology products such as laptops and iPhones! 

What are your Top 10 Tools for Learning? Please share them in the survey here. The Top Tools for Learning 2019 survey will close on Friday 13 September. Results will be released 8 am GMT, Wednesday 25 September 2019.

The What, How and Why of Multiple-Choice Assessment Questions

https://stocksnap.io/photo/YYH82Y0CS7

I am currently participating in a 3-Week Course by Patti Shank on how to "Write Learning Assessments" focusing on writing multiple choice questions (MCQs) that are valid and reliable. The course has a great group of people who have lots of insights to share! If you don't already know or follow Patti, you need to change that right now! She is a workplace-learning expert, instructional designer, researcher, and author who shares evidence-based practices that promote deeper learning. 

During Week 1 of the course, one of the things that came up in the group discussion was how to distinguish between lower-level assessment questions and higher-level assessment questions as they map to lower-level and higher-level cognitive skills.

Now, I have written my fair share of MCQs! In my current work, I lead and facilitate competence development projects, which includes designing competency-based assessment exams for trades/ apprenticeship programs. I work across many sectors and have developed assessment/certification exams for Power line Technicians, Residential Construction Workers, Shipbuilding Workers, Saw Filers, Hairstylists, Servers, etc. Currently, I am working on a Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) assessment pathway for Early Childhood Educators. Across all of these projects, I may have written well over 2000 provincial certification exam questions (summative assessments) and reviewed more than 10,000 questions written by technical writers.

A quick way that I use to distinguish between a lower-level and a higher-level assessment question is to look at whether it is a what, how or why question.

• A "what" question will typically ask to recall, identify, define, describe, etc. which are all lower-level learning objectives. It is important to note that "what" questions may be phrased as what, which of the following, when, how much, how frequently, who, where, etc. 
• A "how" question will tend to focus on step-by-step procedures or steps or phases in a process. For example, how will you do something, what will you do next, how will you apply a principle or a guideline, how will you calculate something, etc.
• A "why" question will focus on analyzing, problem-solving or troubleshooting-type objectives. For example, justify, compare and contrast, evaluate, categorize or rationalize, etc.

Needless to say, there is more to mapping cognitive learning objective levels to appropriate learning assessment questions. But generally speaking, as we move from "what" to "how" to "why" questions, we are moving from assessing lower-level cognitive skills to higher-level cognitive skills.  

Planning for Transfer

Stocksnap

When I reflect about the goal of all learning and education, it is primarily to cause individual, organizational or community-level change. However, it is this aspect of planning for change using specific transfer plans where we often tend to fail in our role as program planners. I guess, the greatest disservice to planning programs is to plan and execute programs that stay on budget, meet all stakeholder requirements, are designed and delivered smoothly BUT fail to transfer any learning to the job. In that sense, I view planning for transfer as an integral responsibility of my role as a program planner.

As I reflect about my own work experience, I can differentiate the programs I have planned for folks in an IT organization trying to sell new software versus foremen at the waterfront working with containers and gantry cranes all day. There is so much that's different about the culture of selling in a global organization versus the culture of safety at the waterfront especially in a unionized environment. While my IT adult learners did short bursts of 'training' on their mobile phones, the foremen were coached and mentored one-on-one, in an intense program, on the dock. The transfer context of a sales pitch versus a ship to be loaded or unloaded on time is so strikingly different that program planning including evaluation and transfer approaches for the two cannot be the same.

For me, the key insight is to be aware of the learners' context because without it, there can be no learning or transfer. As a program planner, I tend to immerse myself in 'a day in the life' of my audience to make these key decisions. I like how Connie (@elearningcoach) describes the need for participating in such a discovery before the analysis. I love her concept of 'customer safaris' as a discovery tool and in my work at the waterfront, such a safari also includes climbing container vessels! I engage in needs analysis and participate in job work shadowing/observation to understand more about the audience. I continue to educate myself and my clients including key program sponsors and other stakeholders to systematically think about evaluation and transfer as key components of planning. All along the way, I ask myself two key questions:

• How will the participants apply what they are learning when they get back to their workplace?
• How will we know if we met the desired goals of individual learning leading to enhanced organizational performance?

Designing Blended Learning Experiences

If I'd ask you to select your preferred method of learning among all possible options, what is the first thing that comes to your mind? I bet you, classroom training isn't it! 

When it comes to designing learning experiences for others, as L&D we tend to ignore or not pay attention to how we like to learn ourselves. 

If given a choice, we don't always enjoy learning in only one way. We usually like to learn by exploring (reading, google search, YouTube videos), talking to others (asking questions), working with others (learning by observation), hands-on (by applying), by practicing (and making mistakes), etc. We certainly don't like to learn (and we don't learn) simply by sitting in a classroom with one-way information flow (or dump) from an instructor. But when it comes to designing learning experiences for others, I wonder why we don't design more blended experiences that are more natural. 

Blended learning is:

• Not a new thing. 
• Not a radical concept. 
• Not a new-age way of thinking about learning. 

As Elliott Masie puts it, “We are, as a species, blended learners.” 

Designing more blended experiences speaks to the diversity in the room because not everyone likes to or can learn in the same way. And I am not talking about the cliche of learning styles aka visual, auditory, reading/writing, kinesthetic styles. That is a myth. What is true is that: "Cognitive science has identified a number of methods to enhance knowledge acquisition, and these techniques have fairly universal benefit. Students are more successful when they experience the material in multiple modalities." https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-problem-with-learning-styles/

Blended learning experiences put the participants in control making them feel more engaged and responsible for their own learning. Designing blended learning experiences also means being respectful of adult learners and adult learning. It fosters the acknowledgment of the knowledge and experience that participants bring to the table by giving them the flexibility to choose how and what they'd like to learn. Based on my experience, the more autonomous and flexible the program, the more successful the learning experience and its application. Autonomy is also a critical success factor in promoting self-directed learning and helping people become continuous, lifelong learners. And that's a key skill that we desperately need for the future of work.

What is learning?

Source: https://stocksnap.io

A few months ago, as a part of a course that I was undertaking, the facilitator posed a simple question in the online discussion forum: What is learning? 
I have been working in the learning and performance industry for the last 20 years; surely, I can answer this question, I thought. But as I was formulating my answer, I realized how deceptively complex the question was. What does learning mean? generally? specifically? academically? theoretically? socially? personally?

When you think of learning, what comes to your mind?

Is it the formal education that happens in schools and universities?

Is it the structured activity that happens inside of training rooms?

Is it the informal process that happens at homes, workplaces and within the community?

Is it the unstructured activity that happens online in collaboration with others?

The fact is that this simple question has many layers. Learning is complicated and learning is messy.

An idea that adds to the challenge of defining learning is that learning is understood both as a process and a product. As a process, when I think of learning, I imagine several aspects such as if learning is driven by self or others, if the context is work or life, if it is an event or something ongoing, if it results in a change in behaviour or not, etc. When learning is treated like a product, I hear terms like classroom learning, online learning, elearning, digital learning, blended learning, social learning, mobile learning, micro learning, etc.

Furthermore, learning tends to be implicit but the output of learning may be explicit. But even when the output may indicate a change in behaviour, attitude or skills, one can't be certain that these changes happened because of or only due to learning.

Finally, each learning theory including behaviourism, cognitivism and constructivism has its own set of assumptions about learning which makes defining learning even more challenging. Perhaps this is why most textbooks and papers hesitate from defining learning and rather describe the subtexts around learning or discuss the 'types of learning'.

In all of this I have realized that instead of focusing on trying to come up with a universally acceptable definition of learning, the goal should be to develop a shared understanding of what learning means to each of us within our current contexts. 

In my work context and for me personally, learning is an active process and is situated within a real-life context. It leverages the prior knowledge and experience of people and engages them in cognitive, constructive and reflective activities. Learning may happen at an individual level but may also be collaborative and social. And it is definitely not a single, isolated event but more like an ongoing, continuous process. 

Perhaps the best way for me to summarize what learning means to me is how Bransford, Brown, and Cocking (2000) highlight that "Learning involves ongoing, active processes of inquiry, engagement and participation in the world around us."

What is your personal take on learning? What does learning mean to you?

If you need some ideas, here is a curation of 10 Definitions of Learning by Connie Malamed @elearningcoach

Cathedral Thinking - Designing for the Next Century

“Though there are many instances to which Cathedral Thinking can be applied, they all require the same foundation: a far-reaching vision, a well thought-out blueprint, and a shared commitment to long-term implementation.” 

~Rick Antonson

Cathedral thinking dates back to the medieval times when architects were tasked with building cathedrals none of which would be completed in their own lifetime. The challenge they faced was how to use long-term thinking and engage with others such that there was a strong commitment to the shared vision. Although the idea of cathedral thinking originally came from architecture, it has been applied to different fields including corporate visions and individual road maps. 

I came across the concept of cathedral thinking back in 2014 through Jory C. Faibish. In his talk recorded at an event in 2014, he shares the importance of cathedral thinking, leadership and strategic innovation. In this video, he mentions how cathedral thinking involves enrolling other people into your vision, to truly think beyond your own lifetime and detach one's self from the final results. He shares a few historical examples and leaves us with a key question, 'How do I communicate something that is bigger and beyond me and make other people participate in that vision?' He says the first thing it takes is 'getting out of our own way and imagine something big.'

Rick Antonson, an author and former President and CEO of Tourism Vancouver, spoke about cathedral thinking in a TEDx event in Vancouver. In Rick's words, cathedral thinking “is about keeping the present generation tethered to the future.”

Cathedral thinking involves taking a leap and imagining the bigger picture and realizing that while it may seem that you are a small part, you play an important role in how that bigger picture will eventually emerge. It means realizing that your decisions today will lead to consequences in the future that you may or may not live to see but others will. 

Needless to say, the concept of cathedral thinking has been applied to many fields including space exploration, design and development of cities, visions for big organizations, tackling climate change and conservation of plants, animals and other resources, etc.; basically anything that requires long-range thinking and being okay with always thinking about and continuing to invest time and money in 'unfinished work'. I'd also connect the philosophy of 'slow' with the idea of cathedral thinking. In some ways, both the concepts focus on the idea of finding the right pace to do things and focusing on quality over quantity. But I will save those ramblings and reflections for another blog post. 

I think the concept has a key role to play in how we design for learning especially considering the future of work and the future of learning including multi generational learning in the context of Artificial Intelligence, machine learning and other adaptive learning technologies. 

With the cathedral thinking mindset, there are many questions that I am pondering about:

• Do we really know where we are going or are we only fixated on getting somewhere faster?
• Are we thinking of learning innovation in the truly long term or are we being driven by agility and short-term gains? 
• Are we finding the time to slow down and reflect on our decisions or are we focused on being hyper-active, always on, always doing? 
• What are the decisions that we make today about learning and technologies (such as using AI and machine learning) that will have consequences down the road? Not just thinking about 10, 15, 20 years ahead but thinking at least seven generations ahead. Do we have that kind of vision for learning?
• Are our learning visions truly embracing the shifts that are happening and will continue to happen long after we are gone?
• How can we use cathedral thinking to envision modern learning interventions that are more diverse, inclusive and ethical?
• What active steps can we take today that speak to that shared vision for the future? 

As a learning professional, I obviously focused the cathedral thinking lens on design for learning. But I do realize that there is scope and a good need to apply cathedral thinking to every aspect of my life. Reflecting about the cathedral thinking mindset reminds me of my role in making the design for the next century come into fruition and how powerful my actions of today are towards building a better future for someone else tomorrow.

"You can't build a long term future on short term thinking."- Billy Cox