NexLearn Simpact May '08

May 2008 Edition

This month we tackle a couple of HOW questions with respect to getting maximum ROI from your training effort. As we discussed last month, we know that alignment of corporate strategy and the initiatives that are designed to implement strategy is the first step in determining what training effort is required. Once you have a clear and consistent picture of corporate strategy, the rest is easy!

Not so easy you say?

Well, it is if you can take a few very specific steps with others in the organization to describe and catalog what strategy-enabling initiatives you will be supporting from a training perspective and how you will render that support. Let’s look at the principles you must follow to make sure training is aligned with strategy:

Make sure you fully understand the current business strategy and that your understanding is consistent with all other department heads who will be responsible for various strategy-enabling initiatives.
Ensure that training is focused on specific implementation of initiatives designed to enable access to strategic goals. Training does not create strategy, but must support full enablement, deep understanding, and skill-based action by all students involved in implementation of the strategy-enabling initiatives.
Make sure the base portfolio of training and development is aware and reflective of the overall business strategy. In other words, the base processes must continue to support and reinforce any newly implemented initiatives. On-boarding, base training, product knowledge, customer service, and specialized knowledge—all must have ongoing and continuous skill reinforcement supporting strategic imperatives.

Once you have mastered the principles of well-aligned training and development, you are ready to take some specific action to ensure that you are training the right people on the right things. This should put you in perfect alignment with business strategy in the appropriate business context. If you look at Exhibit 1, you will note that there are many states possible for your company’s business strategy. Starting on the left, you may find very specific, clear, and well-communicated strategic targets or you may find vague, unclear, poorly understood targets.

You could also find them in between in various ways. You could find that some of the strategies are specific and some vague. The important thing is for you to bring the correct training and development remedy to bear on each strategic initiative. Moving farther left on Exhibit 1, you will see that to align your effort with strategy, you must respond to specific, clear, and well-communicated strategies with pinpoint implementations. More vague strategies demand focus on business process training recognizing critical gaps in perfect performance of process. Even more vague strategies demand a focus on general operating competencies. Refer to the information in Exhibit 1 as you check your strategic alignment.

The matrix in Exhibit 2 is a good way to diagram and begin to understand the correlation between business overall strategy and specific implementation initiatives required of training and development. Creating this document is critical for a couple of reasons: first, to make sure that you know what is really required of you by the organization’s strategy, and second to ensure the training and development department has agreement among all of the stakeholders and actors in the implementation of the strategic initiatives. If you are able to articulate your plan to respond to all of the training and development challenges posed by complete implementation of business strategy, you will be well ahead of the crowd.

Once this process is complete, you are ready to determine the ROI on training. We will discuss some specifics with respect to calculating ROI on training and development in our next issue. Until then, make sure you are aligned with the business strategy!

BlogBites
The social activity of summer extends to the virtual world in this month’s BlogBites. The featured blogs for May offer ideas about including social networks in your learning solution, developing a collaborative environment, and allowing a blended audience of experts and novices to learn together and help inform each other.

http://elearningtech.blogspot.com/
Tony Karrer enumerates the rules of using social networking tools to create meaningful learning interactions. He takes a look at the quality and types of participation you can expect when using a collaborative environment in e-Learning and explores how sharing via blog can promote community learning.

http://www.elearningpost.com/
Lance A. Bettencourt and Anthony W. Ulwick suggest creating a customer-centered innovation map for determining where an organization could benefit most from learning. By mapping out the task a student will be trying to accomplish and the steps the student must take to accomplish that task, you can better determine what learning to offer to students.

http://www.elearnspace.org/blog/
The post “Digital Montessori for Big Kids” examines the value of creating participatory games that mingle experts with novices. Author George Siemens postulates that giving experts and novices a chance to participate in a game together creates a venue for sharing experiences and transferring knowledge.

If you have a great blog (or know of one) that you want to share, send us the link. We just might include it in a future Simpact edition. Send the link to our Expert.

Podcast

Listen to this month’s discussion about the latest issues regarding e-Learning and immersive learning simulations.

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May Survey

Do you use ROI as a basis for determining when to develop e-Learning courses?

Yes

Sometimes

Last Month’s Survey Results

How often does your organization demonstrate ROI of e-Learning courses?

Every project

Monthly

Annually

Never

Ask the Expert

Question:
We’re preparing to develop some e-Learning courses, but we’re not sure how to create content to meet the learning goals. How do you do it?

Answer:
During the Planning process, NexLearn instructional designers perform a Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA). Members of the NexLearn instructional design team have been conducting CTAs for over 14 years in conjunction with custom development of story-based learning. The first step in any development process should always be to perform a CTA. You must have an inventory of skills that are to be taught, and you must test the quality and sufficiency of the skill set to ensure complete treatment of the subject matter in the courseware. Once we gather the necessary information from subject matter experts, we are then able to synthesize teaching goals, and from there, learning objectives. Most often, our approach is a form of Applied Cognitive Task Analysis (ACTA). For many story-based learning scenarios in which we are teaching some form of soft skill or combination of hard and soft skills, this method provides the flexibility necessary to adequately define the domain.

Have a question about e-Learning or Simulation-based Learning? Send it to our Expert.

NexLearn SimWriter 2.0 Captures Brandon Hall Silver Award. Contact us today to experience the best simulation authoring tool available! Information at NexLearn

Pack and Send

The Pack and Send option in SimWriter allows developers to email their simulation to others for review. The .zip file includes all image, sound, and movie files necessary to work with the simulation in SimWriter.

NexLearn and SimWriter in the News

Read the HR Management article detailing how NexLearn and UBS collaborated to create an engaging 60-module blended learning solution featuring Immersive Learning Simulations.
Read the article here.