Three Predictions for Workplace Training - Post Corona Virus
Across the world, the universe of the “workplace” has suffered a stunning blow in the last few months and many industries and companies will come back as a contracted version of their former selves. One department that is likely to take a hit is training and professional development. Here are my predictions for what T+D will look like in the coming few years.
Note: This article was originally published by Training Industry Magazine.
Prediction #1 virtual training will really take off – for 2 reasons
As a consultant who specialized in designing and delivering virtual training for about 15 years, it always amazed me when I encountered a client to whom it was all new; but I had one or two clients such as this each year. There are two important reasons why I predict virtual training will become more in demand than ever going forward. (Note: Virtual training is conducted live, with other participants and a facilitator, as opposed to distance learning or e-learning, which is really self-study,)
First, now that many companies have made the switch to work-from-home (WFH) they realize it’s not as impossible as they feared. One of our clients is a call center who finally started work-from-home options due to the virus. A call center customer service rep is definitely not a role that requires sitting with others in a central location – but the client was simply resistant to the idea of WFH. Now that they realize people can work from home, it’s not such a hard sell to get them to accept people learning from home as well.
The second reason virtual training will take off is because it is so affordable. Post-corona virus, those companies that are still in business are going to have to use their resources wisely. During the Great Recession I managed a new-hire on-boarding process for a client for five years. We onboarded approximately 300 people, in 10-12 groups, throughout the year, all virtually. Virtual training is convenient, affordable, and logistically a lot simpler.
There are also a number of reasons why virtual learning is a preferable methodology for adult learners, such as spaced learning and built-in time for reflection – but that is fodder for another article.
Prediction #2 companies will realize the value and necessity of cross-training
When I first became a consultant in the early 1990’s, one of the first projects I worked on was a cross-training project for a manufacturing firm in which everyone on the manufacturing floor was “upskilled” (to upskill means to teach a current employee additional skills) to be able to backfill at least two other positions.
The curriculum was designed to require them to learn five new topics in total, but the remaining three topics were allowed to be knowledge-based (such as understanding more about procurement or finance) as opposed to skill-based. The objective of the training was to have each employee paying the company back in multiple ways. For example, a machinist who had additional training in finance was more likely to complete routine maintenance knowing that the cost of maintenance vs. repair was enormous.
I thought the “multiple skills” idea was quite brilliant and have been amazed, over the course of my career, by how few companies do it. What is more prevalent in training – especially in the last twenty years – is training for depth, not breadth. If someone enters a company in a finance role, more than likely all their company sponsored training will be focused solely on finance. They will never be exposed to marketing or HR or operations. Through training, companies have kept employees in silos and by doing so they have hobbled their agility. Companies will be forced to lay off their over-abundance of marketers (for example) while simultaneously hiring salespeople because not one of those marketers was cross trained in sales.
This shuffling of people like pieces on a chess board has all sorts of negative ramifications, such as recruiting costs and a loss of company history / knowledge; but again, that is fodder for a different article.
Prediction #3 – subject-matter-experts will be more in demand as trainers than ever before
Having been a consultant for nearly thirty years, I have seen this pendulum swing back and forth a few times. First there are fully staffed, centralized training departments who run training like its own business with marketing and sales, delivery of a product / service, and requests for feedback. Then an economic shakeup swings the pendulum to focus on what is truly needed for individuals to learn and that is the transfer of business-critical knowledge from those who have it to those who do not. This often means direct contact between subject matter experts (SMEs) and newbies, eliminating the “middle-man” of the training department.
Training and development has always been seen as a cost-center (which it is not) and is always one of the last functions to be brought back online after an economic downturn. But a lack of a training department doesn’t stop the need for training such as new-hire onboarding or skill-specific training. In the coming years, companies will redeploy resources and the training will more than likely be done by individuals who are subject matter experts.
While using SMEs as trainers is a great cost-saving tactic, it doesn’t result in the best training outcomes. SMEs aren’t knowledgeable about the best ways to transmit content to learners (hint: lectures are not the way), and they tend to start at a much higher-level of capability than their audience because they forget what it was like to be new and unskilled. They have the “curse of knowledge,” as this 2017 TICE article explains. The best way to utilize SMEs as trainers could be an article - or a book - all its own.
As business returns to “normal,” companies will be altered in many ways. Underlying those changes will be the need for cost-savings and efficiencies which can be achieved, in the realm of training and development, through virtual training, cross-training, and using subject-matter-experts as the deliverers of training. The next decade will see a “bold new future” for training and professional development; will your organization be ready to adapt?
Interview with Darlene Christopher, author
the-successful-virtual-classroom-book-cover
The Successful Virtual Classroom by Darlene Christopher
What motivated you to write this book?
I think that delivering training via virtual classrooms offers so much potential to organizations in terms of the ability to scale the delivery of training to dispersed audiences. The books I found on virtual classroom training focused on the "what" of virtual classroom training but I felt there was more to be explored in terms of the "how" so I decided to write about it.
I also included a chapter focused on delivering virtual training to global audiences since globalization is a growing trend affecting many organizations, yet little has been written about it.
If you could distill your message down to just one - what would it be?
Delivering training programs in a virtual classroom requires adjustments in two key areas in order to engage a live online audience: content and facilitation. Adjusting your content and facilitation techniques takes some time, but in return it saves travel time and cost for both the enterprise and learner.
How can trainers use this book to assist them in the work that they do?
The goal of this book is to provide facilitators and other training professionals with the tools and techniques to confidently design and facilitate engaging virtual programs. A supporting framework - the PREP model (plan, rehearse, execute, and post-session review) - is covered in detail.
The book is also filled with tools, checklists, and worksheets-as well as case studies from Oracle, UPS, and more. I aimed to make the book as practical as possible and I hope that training professionals will find the tips, sample exercises and icebreakers and real-world examples directly applicable to their work. 4
Darlene Christopher, Senior Knowledge & Learning Officer. World Bank
Why Utilize a Virtual Classroom?
Book Excerpt from "Tailored Learning":
The ability to interact with experts and peers in real time is a comfortable and familiar environment and eliminates the isolation that often comes with asynchronous technologies. Often a participant requires live interaction with an instructor or an expert, but that interaction does not need to be face-to-face.
For example, medical students observing surgery would, arguably, benefit from being physically in the operating room or a surgical observation area. However, those same participants do not need face-to-face interaction to ask post-operative questions of the surgeon. Questions can be asked and discussed among all of the participants via a virtual classroom. If a recording is made of the synchronous discussion, all the participants can go back and review the recording, at any time, to ensure that they understood the answers. One of the most common reasons for organizations to implement a virtual classroom is an audience that is dispersed across a large geographic area (oftentimes worldwide). Compared with traditional classroom delivery, the money saved in classroom costs, travel, and time away from work quickly becomes apparent. In addition, organizations may choose to deliver content that they never would have scheduled in a more traditional (classroom) setting. For example, an update to a computer system may only take one or two hours to teach, but an organization would rarely convene a training program for such a short period of time because it would be cost prohibitive. The virtual classroom makes this type of content easy to distribute.
As organizations become more global, and the need to collaborate across a distance is becoming more important, a virtual meeting place can help close the distance gap by providing a forum through which employees collaborate in real time.
Online learning is gaining in "popularity"
Interest in online learning is growing rapidly, while interest in traditional education is waning. From 2012 - 2013, distance education enrollment rose 1.8% compared with a drop of 4% in overall higher education enrollment according to the US Department of Education.
What does this mean for us? As trainers? It means our new hires are coming to us already equipped to be successful while learning virtually.
Online Collaboration MUST be Designed
One of the most wonderful things about the online classroom is the ability to bring learners together who may otherwise be geographically separated. If one individual in New York and one individual in Arizona need the same training, the virtual classroom not only allows them to partake in that training without travel, but also to take that training with fellow learners.
Too often, however, the virtual classroom is used in presentation-mode rather than in collaborative-mode.
All virtual classroom platforms pledge that their product enables your organization and your learners to work collaboratively. And it is true. All virtual classroom platforms allow for learners to interact verbally, via chat or instant messenger, through the use of feedback symbols or emoticons, and often through breakout rooms which enable smaller discussions and group activities to occur.
This doesn't just happen spontaneously, however. It is imperative that the training be designed to be collaborative.
One of the basic tenets of adult learning is that adults prefer to learn collaboratively; in other words adults prefer to learn with others. Therefore, it is imperative that the focus of the learning process is on the learners working together, discussing, questioning, problem solving, and in general, contributing to the learning process and the learning content.
As Instructional Designers, we must put quite a bit of thought into how we can ensure the learners work together to achieve the learning outcome, rather than sitting at their individual sites being passive recipients of a presentation.
The "Problem" With Virtual Learning
We recently read this blog post which really made our blood to boil!
In a nutshell, the writer, a college professor, finds himself stranded at the airport and decides his situation should not impede his regularly scheduled class. He can simply use the virtual technology his college supplies, to fulfill his teaching obligations.
After experiencing an unsuccessful "class," he wrote a lengthy diatribe about how virtual technology will never replace face-to-face teaching. Here are some things he failed to consider (and, quite frankly, most people who are new to virtual technology or use it occasionally, also fail to consider):
1. Choose the right technology for the job and be sure you know how to use it. We recently received a directive from a client telling us to not use the highlighter tool to highlight text on the slide because "it doesn't work, it scribbles all over the slide." In fact, the "breakdown" was with the Bamboo tablet in our office.
2. You cannot decide, on the spur of the moment, that you will teach using virtual technology. A delivery of this type must be planned for (see next article). The writer bemoans: Tonight was going to involve role playing, discussions, presentations, and even interactive trivia.
3. If you have a limiting belief that you can only "lecture" while using virtual teaching platforms, and that cannot be as successful as you would have been in the classroom - you will be correct. His sentiments exactly: Tonight I am subjecting my students to this hollowed-out lesson. I do so out of necessity. I know it is not the best experience for my students, or for myself..
The server and the virtual platform have little to do with one another other than being the "power cord;" would you say that your electric company was horrible if your lamp shorted out? We'd be frustrated too: I am now on my third attempt at uploading the lecture. During the two previous attempts a prompt came up, saying "server failure." The program crashed and nothing was recorded or could be recovered. An hour lecture up in smoke - three times over, but it has nothing to do with the virtual classroom.
Virtual classrooms ARE the training room of the future. We recognize that not everyone will be comfortable there, and that's ok (not everyone is comfortable standing in front of a room speaking, either); but don't blame the technology for a lack of forethought, planning, or skill on the part of the human.
Does Anyone Work “In the Office” Anymore?
The term "telecommuting" seems like such a quaint, 1990s anachronism, but the fact is worker mobility is playing an ever-increasing role in where and when people work. Today's workforce is more mobile and wired than ever before. How millennials commute to work is becoming less of an issue than where they decide to live.
A [US] Federal Highway Administration report noted that as of 2010, 26 percent of millennials - that's more than a quarter of our [workers] who fall into the age range of 17 to 32 - don't have a driver's license. It's also somewhat of a wakeup call that a Deloitte study notes that 46 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds would choose Internet access over owning a car.
Time for us to rethink: Who we are hiring, where they will work, and how will they be trained? Things that make you go: hmmmmm. No?
Note: This article based on a column by Rick Bell, Workforce Managing Editor.
Tips for online learning
A recent Edudemic article titled 20+ Tips from the Most Effective Online Teachers provides a wealth of good information, not only for those who are teaching online, but also for those organizations that are considering offering courses online. For all the business factors that make distance learning or virtual learning a plus - there are some weighty considerations as well.
We highly recommend reading the full article - it will really give you something to think about. If you don't have time - here are a few of the things we consider to be "gems" in the article:
What the students can teach each other is just as important as what the instructor teaches
Online does not mean easy
Online courses take much more time to develop and facilitate than classroom courses
Being an online educator is more a life style than an occupation
Be proactive about course management
Does Size Matter?
Very often, when organizations move to virtual training, they think that the constraints of travel and space (learning space) are removed and it is now possible for a larger audience to take part in the training offering.
Not true! Compare these two simple visuals:
A circular table of 8 where everyone can see each other, hear each other and be involved with one another in an engaging and collaborative way.
A town-hall meeting in which a lot of people are in attendance, but only a few get to take the floor.
If YOU wanted your opinion heard, or you wanted to come away from the meeting having developed a relationship with the others in attendance, which meeting would you want to attend?
The circular table of 8 is the visual we need to keep in mind when designing for virtual delivery of training. Our learners are already hobbled by the fact that they cannot make eye contact with one another or read one another’s body language; but they CAN make connections with each other when there is a smaller group involved.
The real benefit of virtual delivery is that you can deliver the same topic as many times as you like, at any time that you like. So you can run 3 sessions, of 8 learners, in one week. This allows for more interaction and engagement among the learners. When the facilitator asks a question, it is quite obvious if 8 people have answered or 3 people have answered. When you poll them for their opinion, there is actually time to hear why people chose the answer they did – and allow for comparing and contrasting results.
With larger groups, we might undertake the same activities, but they will simply be ‘watched’ by some in attendance – it is not possible to involve everyone, in every activity, to the degree that they feel they are contributing to the content.
Smaller groups enhance learning outcomes, and virtual learning deliveries allow us to economically utilize smaller groups.