I started teaching in late August of 2000. In those 19 years, I have studied many models of course design and teaching. A week ago, I took a day off to put together a visual of what I have learned and used. Look for new posts that will explain the mental model that I created.
I’m reading
the second edition of Marty Cagan’s Inspired: How to Create Tech Products
Customers Love. In chapter six, Cagan describes what he believes are the root
causes of failed product efforts. As I read the chapter, I could see parallels
to bad training programs and courses. Let’s work through the list:
Ideas – Ideas can come from
internal stakeholders or executives. Sometimes, ideas come from customers. Wherever
ideas come from, there usually is not a strategic vision or mission that can help
determine which ideas to implement. Even if there is a strategic
vision/mission, many organizations lack a way to assess the best ideas to
pursue.
“Biz
Case” – But, let’s say there is a way to determine objectively the best ideas to
pursue. The idea is suggested, and then the management wants to see a business
case. The purpose of the business case is to determine how much the design will
cost and how much money the idea will make. The problem is that it is too early
to decide on the costs or revenues. Other than past performance from similar
courses or programs, there is no data to justify the projections of the
business case.
Roadmap – After an
optimistic business case, marketing and sales hurry into listing features to
attract customers. Cagan writes that in the Roadmap Phase there are two
inconvenient truths. The first truth is that half of
the ideas will not work. The second truth is that it takes
several iterations for many of the features to
work.
Requirements – The Roadmap features
drive the requirements, and this is when the instructional design team is
brought in. Design decisions that should have been made by the instructional
design team at the beginning of the process are instead made halfway through
the process when the major feature decisions and business requirements have been
made.
Design,
Build, and Test – Assumptions made in the business case and the Roadmap have come back to haunt
the team. Customer feedback is giving mixed signals and the instructional
design team is most likely fighting with the marketing team. I can tell you
from experience that clashes between the marketing team and the instructional
design team are brutal and counterproductive.
Deploy – Now is the time
to deploy the training program and/or course(s). As a usual practice, the
evaluations are added on at the last minute and without much thought. Typically,
Kirkpatrick Levels One and Two which measure if the learner like the training
and if the learner believed they had learned anything. If you are lucky, there
may be an attempt at a Kirkpatrick Level Three which is
often a survey of the learner’s supervisor to see if the learner’s
behavior has changed.
The
above is why I moved from the standard Instructional System Design (ISD) to the Successive Approximation
Method (SAM). Like agile project management, SAM uses iterations to
prototype the programs and courses. Each iteration is checked against customer
demands and refined as the instructional design team gathers feedback. Having
built courses using traditional ISD, I much prefer SAM. I believe that you will
too once you have created a training program or course that meets the needs of
your learners.