Rapid Performance Analysis

Rapid performance analysis, is there such a thing? In a discussion with a LinkedIn connection, the topic of a quicker way to complete an effective performance analysis came up. His company frowns on spending time up front completing an analysis and wants him to dive into course development to "Save Time." I understand the importance of producing a tangible instructional product quickly but I believe with a mindset like this you will spend more time creating solutions that are not effective or you end up wasting time doing re work after you come up with a great idea halfway through the project. After reading "Job Aids & Performance Support" by Allison Rosset, and "Analyzing Performance Problems" by Robert Mager and Peter Pipe, I am sold on the notion that a "course" is not always the answer and if a "course" is the answer it is crucial to conduct an analysis to produce an effective instructional product.

In the corporate world it is important to walk the fine line of producing a quality product and producing it quickly. So, how do we in the corporate training and development field balance conducting an effective performance analysis with the business need of producing it quickly? We hear so much about "Rapid Development" in the world of eLearning but we don't hear much about "Rapid Analysis." My favorite resource for helping work my way through a performance analysis quickly is Mager and Pipes "Quick Reference Checklist." I find the questions in the checklist help keep me focused on the important aspects of the analysis and make it easy to conduct an effective analysis quickly.

Below I listed out some of the key questions I ask myself when attempting to conduct an effective but rapid performance analysis. The questions I have listed out below is what I have boiled Mager and Pipes quick reference checklist down to after a few years of applying it in my instructional design work.

1. What is the problem and is it worth pursuing? In many cases it may be more expensive or anti productive to address the problem then it would be to leave well enough alone. You always want to be sure that you are going to get a justifiable return on your investment.
   
2. Is the performance problem a result of a skill deficiency, consequences, or the process? You would think this is such an obvious question to ask your self but all too often we assume that some kind of a course is the answer to the problem. I have found that in many situations that simplifying the process or providing consequences can have a much larger impact than any kind of instructional product. Is the workflow efficient? Is desired performance rewarding? Do they know when they are doing a good job? Are there any obstacles? Many of us are paid to turn out courses but you will prove greater value to the business by recommending the solution with the highest return on investment.
3. If your answer to the above question is skill deficiency, then how often do they need to perform the task? Is it just something that they need to do every once in a while? If so, maybe a job aid would be more effective then a course. Sometimes all that is needed is a simple set of instructions that are accessible just in time. A simple job aid can sometimes produce better results at a fraction of the cost.
4. Which solution yields the most value? By the time you answer the questions above you will have a good idea of what needs to be done to close the skill gap. At this point you need to decide which solution or blend of solutions is going to yield the most value to the organization. Not the solution with the most bells and whistles but the solution that is going to provide the most bang for the buck

Although not an exhaustive analysis I find the questions listed above get me off to a rapid start on instructional design projects. Please help me and my LinkedIn connection out by posting your rapid analysis tips in the comments section.

To Moodle or not to Moodle

To Moodle or not to Moodle, that is the question. I have come to a crossroads with a project that I have written about before. I am currently in the process of developing a series of eLearning courses that are part of a blended management training program. At this point, I have 3 of the 6 courses complete.

Here is where it get's interesting, an associate installed Moodle to start playing around. It's up and running, just needs to be used. So here's the decision, do I migrate from simply uploading these courses to MS Sharepoint like usual, or do we get crazy and try to implement these new courses on Moodle.

I am struggling with the decision of whether I want to make the leap to Moodle because I can't think of a good reason other than to try out Moodle. Here are some factors to consider; the majority of the courses require the learner to submit a project for completion. Only one course has a quiz. I have no experience with LMS's, but from what I understand the biggest benefit is tracking the results of quizzes etc. Is that a benefit to me if I only have one quiz? But then again, there are probably a lot of features that will help with logistical tasks.

I am going to have to invest some time in playing around with Moodle to see if it is worth changing what we are doing now. But will I really know until I try it out??

Cheat Sheets

I stumbled upon Tim’s Blog which is chock full of “One Page Guides” that are simple, one page job aids covering a variety of topics. Browsing through these one page guides reminded me that simpler is better most of the time. A well designed job aid such as the one page guides can be much more effective than a day long training course.

I routinely create PDF’s similar to the one page guides and make them available on the company intranet which works out great but after looking at the one page guides I know I can do better. By keeping the job aids down to one page and laying out the information in a more user friendly format I can get much better results. Keeping these principles in mind, I am going to start creating one page “Cheat Sheets,” rather than long documents covering everything under the sun regarding the topic.

Here are a couple of my favorite one page guides from Tim’s Blog:
Online Video Editing
Introducing Wikis

Proving ROI in Training

The company I work for has a tight grip on the training budget this year and if I want to make eLearning a priority in future budgets I need to make the ROI on eLearning obvious. As you may have seen in the previous post, I am attempting to do this by replacing some content that is currently delivered through instructor led training. By doing that I could easily point to the salary of the trainer and the cost of paying our employees to leave the store and sit through training. This would result in a large amount of money that I could point to as ROI and hopefully this would cause some alarms to go off among the VP’s.

I brought this idea to my supervisor and he likes it but he’s steering me in a different direction. He would like me to create some kind of tool or eLearning course that will help our sales staff with product knowledge because this is a current focus of the training dept. I am happy that he would like to use eLearning for this but it will not be easy to make ROI blaringly obvious in this situation. Because we are not currently spending anything on this training it’s hard to say how much we are saving by delivering it through eLearning. If we already had an instructor led course that covered this subject it would be easy to calculate the cost of the ILT versus the cost of the eLearning version.

Where there’s a will there is a way! I came up with a couple of ideas of how I can prove ROI on this project:

1. At completion of the project, I need to show how much I improved product knowledge and somehow try and correlate that to a dollar amount if possible. I can see how much product knowledge has improved by developing a baseline of product knowledge at the beginning of the project then compare that to the level of product knowledge at the end of the project. I will develop this baseline of knowledge by conducting some kind of assessment at the beginning and end of the project then compare the results to see how much their knowledge has improved. The assessments will also make it easy for me to see what areas of product knowledge they need more help in. Once I know how much knowledge has improved I need to correlate that to some kind of dollar amount or value. That’s where I’m stuck.


2. Another way to prove the value of eLearning with this project would be to calculate how much this would cost if we did it through instructor led training then compare that to the cost of eLearning. I’m sure the cost of eLearning would pale in comparison to rolling out an instructor led course. The only problem with this is that ILT may not even have been a consideration for this.

I think it would be best to go with both of these solutions so I can point to all of the positive way’s that eLearning has affected our financial situation. The more pros I have to point to, the better.

One small step for eLearning, a giant leap for the company

Now that I am on a shoestring budget I have been making more of an effort to find low cost solutions to implementing eLearning. In my research I came across a website called Quia that I think will be a perfect fit for helping us get our feet wet in eLearning. It’s no high powered LMS, but it will let us create all kinds of assessments and track the scores. In addition to assessments, it also has an interface for creating fun games and activities. I think that by using Quia assessments and games along with power point shows, reading assignments, and conference calls we can construct a low cost distance education course. This may seem like a small step for eLearning, but it is a giant leap for my company : )

Here comes the tricky part. I need to find a subject to cover and preferably it is a subject that is currently being covered in an instructor led course. Ideally, I would like to take a portion of the content of an instructor led course and convert that to eLearning so that I can reduce the amount of days/hours required to complete the class. If I can point to a dollar amount that I saved by converting this material to eLearning I am more likely to turn some heads and get more leeway in the budget. By doing something simple that has a positive ROI I can begin to win the VP’s over and make eLearning a priority in next year’s budget.

So that’s the plan! Create an eLearning course that will replace a portion of an instructor led course and make the ROI blaringly obvious.

Opportunities for Performance Support – Allison Rossett

Another DevLearn workshop I got a lot out of was “Opportunities for Performance Support” with Allison Rossett. I was excited to meet Allison because she is a professor in the educational technology program at San Diego State. I am starting the Ed Tech program in January and can’t wait to get started.

This workshop was right up my alley because it covered what I do at work every day. I love creating job aids because they allow me to make a bigger difference across the organization. If I teach a class I am only reaching a handful of people but by creating a job aid I can reach every person in the organization.

This workshop helped me develop a new way of looking at training initiatives. I think sometimes I have a tendency to assume some kind of training course is the best way of handling the issue and this workshop helped me realize that this is not true. In many cases if not most, a job aid or tool can be more effective than investing in ILT or eLearning. I learned to always ask myself “Do they already know how to perform this task?” If they do already know how to do it, will throwing more training at them help? By providing a job aid that makes the task simpler for them you can have much better results than investing in training and more training. By making more of a focused effort to look for “Opportunities for Performance Support,” I can make more of a difference in my organization with less effort and time.

Allison has written several books on the subject and I look forward to reading them. First on my list is Job Aids & Performance Support which seems to be a more updated version of her earlier book First things fast.