The Learner’s Perspective

I spent today as a student in a training program. It’s been a while since I’ve been on this end of the stick. Much of the day was put your mind in neutral and go with the flow. The demonstration & performance piece was very good – here’s how to do it, and now you do it. Could have had better feedback though.

This day as a learner reinforced what I know as a performance technologist. Training without clear performance objectives, that are relevant to each learner, is useless. Also; anything is better than death by PowerPoint (bulleted lists of the instructor’s notes). For many people it was a day outside the office. For me it was the loss of a day’s revenue, or even worse, an opportunity cost. When your own money is on the line, you become a more discerning buyer. This is the future of training – be relevant or be gone.