Online Learning Design - 10 Keys to Elevating Confidence & Performance in Your Business

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1 Know Your Goals & Objectives Key #2 for Elevating Confidence & Performance 10 Keys Online Learning Design Series 1

2 Table of Contents KEY #2 KNOW YOUR GOALS & OBJECTIVES ACTIONABLE OBJECTIVES ALIGNING LEARNER NEEDS THE OBJECTIVE-PERFORMANCE RELATIONSHIP... 8 Know Your Goals & Objectives Key #2 for Elevating Confidence & Performance Written by: Rich DiBenedetto The author has taken care in preparation of this White Paper, but makes no expressed or implied warranty of any kind and assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions. 1st printing June 2014 Copyright 2014 Rich DiBenedetto All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any means graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, Internet, or information storage and retrieval systems without the written permission of Rich DiBenedetto. 2

3 KEY #2 KNOW YOUR GOALS & OBJECTIVES In my military experience, I found people at all levels to be highly adept at complicating a training initiative by making contributions to my lesson plans. No matter how good their intentions, the end result typically muddied the overall learning objective. In their excitement to include additional content, they rarely understood how to communicate or write an effective learning objective. Instead, I ended up with a list of requests that were difficult to implement and impossible to measure. Chances are that at some point you ll be offered similar contributions to your training initiatives. Although you might eventually decide to include some of the suggested content into your instructional material, you ll need to make sure that you are clear on which ideas support your overall goals and objectives. To help you align the various objectives, I offer you five simple guidelines: 5 Guidelines to Align Goals: 1. Analyze Needs & Recommend Solutions 2. Deliver Training That Adds Value 3. Provide Tools That Ensure Self-Sufficiency 4. Invest In Technology & Instructional Design 5. Investigate & Resolve Challenges 3

4 1. ACTIONABLE OBJECTIVES With these guidelines as a starting point, the road to creating actionable objectives that support your goals is well paved. Now the aim is to figure out how to construct your learning objectives so that they are meaningful and measurable. It s one thing to say that you will transfer knowledge, impart skills, or change attitudes but it s another to be able to demonstrate it. The way to demonstrate comprehension and attainment of the objectives is by including essential elements that specify the condition, the behavior, and the criteria. Together, these elements help you to construct your individual learning objectives that produce results. Condition Behavior Criteria What will the learner be presented with as a reference tool or performance environment? What action do you expect the learner to perform in reaction to the condition? What result do you expect the learner to achieve? For example, let s say that your company provides facilities for truck drivers to park their rigs and store their cargo in sealed containers. One of the selling points would likely be that the facility has a high degree of security in order to protect the parked containers. If one of your goals is to identify the appropriate access control measures when using a secured parking facility, the logical breakdown for one objective could be: 4

5 Condition Behavior Criteria Using online resources and given a list of potential security guard practices, the learner will identify the acceptable standard for safeguarding cargo. Therefore, the learning objective is: Using online resources and given a list of potential security guard practices, the learner will identify the acceptable standard for safeguarding cargo. 5

6 3. ALIGNING LEARNER NEEDS Why would you need to provide hazardous material handling training to a segment of your workforce? Maybe it s because of government regulations that mandate periodic training. Maybe accidents are on the rise. Maybe a new chemical is going to be handled by some of your employees and you want to be proactive. Asking why might seem like a pretty basic question that can be answered quickly, but when you look a little deeper you might realize that you do not actually know the depth of training required for some segments of your target audience. Is the topic brand new to some, while currently in use by others? Has there been any training on the topic in the past, or is this a new initiative? Is the problem that the training solves an actual problem in all locations? Since your goal is to provide the right training to the right audience in order to elevate confidence and performance, answering these questions is a starting point for successfully tackling known issues. No one likes to have their time wasted and if your learning objectives are inconsistent or irrelevant, the learning experience will be devalued. No matter what the goals and objectives might be, there is one overriding factor that is of critical importance; the training message must be conveyed in a consistent manner for the entire target audience. 6

7 To align learner s needs, I use six principles that have helped me during different phases of the planning process. 6 Planning Principles: 1. Perform a Job Analysis 2. Identify the Desired Performance vs. Actual Current Performance 3. Conduct a Performance Gap Analysis 4. Identify the Drivers of Success 5. Establish the Desired End-State 6. Use Learning Measurement Tools 7

8 2. THE OBJECTIVE-PERFORMANCE RELATIONSHIP In 1928, as the Notre Dame football team was losing to Army at half-time, Knute Rockne gathered his team and concluded a motivating speech with go out there and win just one for the Gipper. He was actually setting his team up for failure. Although Knute provided a concrete objective (to win the game in memory of a famously known football alumnus), he did not provide the performance requirements for reaching that objective. Did his team need to change of their tactics? If so, was the team skilled enough to make the necessary changes? Was success going to be measured in more than a final score? What if they were desperate and cheated to win? Performance has no meaning unless you can clearly establish and communicate the requirements that will lead to attaining a goal. Investing the time to understanding the significance of each principle will help drive your analysis and lead to a realistic and appropriate course of action. The six planning principles provide a path for you to systematically and intelligently target true problem areas that are impeding confidence and performance. In the end, you will elevate confidence and performance by raising your sights toward higher goals that push the limits of possibility and set the bar high enough to reveal the full potential of your learners. 8

9 About Learn it Solutions Our team consists of professionals with diverse backgrounds and experiences. Our expertise is in learning design, multimedia production, and learning technologies. We incorporate these strengths into a process and product that is designed to produce an exceptional learning experience that elevate confidence, performance, and profits. We published this white paper to help anyone responsible for creating online training and education courses to better understand some of the critical factors necessary to end the epidemic of boring online courses. To find out more about creating engaging and dynamic online training and education courses, feel free to contact us at or info@learnitsolutions.com. Learn it Solutions 545 Washington Blvd., 22 nd Floor Jersey City, New Jersey Learn it Solutions is a business unit within the Verisk Claims & Crime Analytics family of companies. 9