We know that many trainers have to work with the tools that they are given, which often includes the platforms you are allowed to use to deliver virtual training. If you are a trainer who gets to train using Blackboard Collaborate Ultra Experience do a big happy dance!
Blackboard Collaborate Ultra Experience blew us away with its usability and features. So much so, that we’re adding it as a Soapbox compatible platform! Take a look at a few of the factors that make Blackboard Collaborate Ultra Experience live up to its name:
Jeni Johnson was perfectly ready, willing and able to volunteer her instructional design talents to create a training program (for free!) for staff and foster pet parents on how to best care for the animals… but nobody was interested in taking her up on her offer.
It turns out, people were just too busy to stop what they were doing to take an e-learning course about how to give a flea bath. At the end of the day, it wasn’t even a training course that was needed.
I had a chance to sit down and talk with Jeni about her approach to training design and when it might be appropriate to use something other than a formal course to help others get their jobs done better.
One of my first blog posts on Train Like A Champion began with the following:
“The conversations around the need for training can sometimes seem like they’re take out of a book a Mad Libs.” As part of that post, I shared the following Mad Lib-style activity, along with 7 questions you might want to ask to determine if training is the right solution:
The fact is that training can be one way to help people learn, but there are a lot of other ways that organizations can help their employees learn key knowledge and skills without the need for time-consuming formal training programs.
On Thursday, I wrote about a way that BINGO could be used as an engagement tool during learning programs (and shared this free, cool BINGO card generator).
As part of that post, I shared a downloadable BINGO card you can use to follow along with today’s podcast (or just skim the transcript below) and play along at home. The first five folks who send me a completed BINGO card, marking off the 5 concepts that Karl and I actually spoke about in the podcast, will earn themselves a $10 Starbucks card (my email address is brian@endurancelearning.com).
While “engagement” doesn’t necessarily equal “effective” when it comes to training design, lack of engagement most often results in ineffective training. Introducing games or game elements into a training program can be a very fruitful way to engage participants (if the games are designed well).
Next Tuesday, our Train Like You Listen podcast will feature gamification expert Karl Kapp who will be discussing the differences between games and gamification as well as offering some gamification examples and ideas, if introducing game elements into your training program is something you’re looking to do.
In honor of game play in a professional development context, the first five Train Like A Champion readers to come back on Tuesday, print out this BINGO card, mark off the concepts that Karl and I discuss during the podcast (hint: we will only discuss 5 of the 8 concepts on this card, so you’ll have to listen to the podcast and mark this BINGO card up!) and send it back to me (brian@endurancelearning.com) will receive a $10 Starbucks gift card.
In today’s blog post, we’ll be taking a look at how a simple game of BINGO can add a different kind of engagement to your training program.
We’ve been hearing so much about artificial intelligence (in the news and in movies) for years and we’ve heard some theories on how it might impact the learning and development world. This week on Train Like You Listen, Brian talks with Margie Meacham of learningtogo.info, who digs into the myths and realities of AI and begins to paint a picture of what the intersection between AI and learning might be.
In December, the Endurance Learning team shared one word around which they will focus in 2021 – a one-word resolution.
Resolutions, like any professional development goals, aren’t just something to set and forget. They take intention, action, reflection and effort in order to ensure they’re more than just a feel-good way to wrap up the year.
Anyone who has been tasked with building a training program has struggled with the question of “how long will this take?” I’m delighted to share my conversation with Robyn Defelice who has been studying this question. My conversation with Robyn digs into the value of these numbers and what they say (or don’t say) about the quality of training.
One minute my children were innocently watching The Backyardigans and Dora the Explorer, with imaginary quests and talking maps. They’ve traded such light and frivolous forms of entertainment (which also seemed to have a learning component subtly built in) for a more grown up world of anime. One of the shows that we all watch together is Naruto.
While the lessons being taught in shows like Naruto aren’t always as overtly pronounced as lessons from Dora and The Backyardigans, I think there is something powerful that draws tweens and teens into the world of anime, and I think there are lessons that instructional designers and learning program developers can (and should) adopt.
Like any other department in a company, Learning and Development teams have the biggest impact when their efforts are tightly aligned with the strategic goals of the organization. Gus Curran and Rachel Gathagu from Humentum and co-authors of a new ebook on organizational learning strategies (which is free and can be downloaded here) joined Brian to discuss their observations about how L&D teams can best contribute to the overall health and success of organizations. [Editor’s Note: Check out Successfully Working in a Remote Office with Gus Curran]
