by Jeanne Farrington, CPT, EdD

What does this mean for our everyday work? Where do you look? How much inquiry is enough? At what point should we, as practitioners, determine that there is enough positive or negative evidence to inform our recommendations for action? (Do I have to spend the rest of my life in the library?)

• Limit your research reviews to refereed journals. What this really means is, avoid taking too seriously articles that are just opinion pieces made up at the author’s keyboard. Insist on looking further than an author’s unchecked idea as a foundation for your recommendations to clients. Ask a reference librarian for help finding refereed journals if you’re not sure where to locate them.
• Look for the research leaders in a particular topic area. Search the abstracts and see which names appear over and over. Ask people in your network of associates for recommendations, too. Pick the top two or three and read what they have written.
• Look for current reviews of research or meta-analyses by respected authors in peer-reviewed journals. These are especially helpful because the authors look at many, many studies in the area in question, throw out the studies that are faulty, and then figure out what the preponderance of evidence shows. The rigorous journals’ peer-review processes help to keep authors’ individual biases in check.
• Sometimes peer-reviewed journals will devote an entire issue to a particular topic. They will invite the leaders in that area to write articles and there can be a lot of disagreement. These are great sources of information from different points of view. You can follow up by reading a few of the particularly salient references cited in these articles.
• Always look for opposing opinions. If one author says the earth is flat, look for evidence that the earth is some other shape. Then, consider what is behind the various authors’ conclusions: just a thought or belief, or do they have photos from outer space? Also, consider the motivation of the authors—do they collect big fees related to the Flat Earth Society, or do they seem to be free of ulterior motives?
• When you begin to find, during your search, redundant information from a variety of viewpoints in respected sources, you have probably made a reasonable effort.

Jeanne Farrington, EdD, CPT, is President of J. Farrington Consulting. She is a long-time ISPI member, a past member of the Board of Directors, and has contributed to publications and many conferences. Jeanne may be reached at jeanne@jfarrington.com.

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by Carol Haig, CPT and Roger Addison, EdD, CPT

This month we thought you might welcome a change of pace. Rather than presenting an interview, we are going to share an experience from ISPI’s 2004 Annual Conference in Tampa. At the conference, we gave a presentation called TrendSpotters: An HPT View. Its cornerstone was the TrendSpotters Menu that presents, in categories, the many trends our guests in this column have discussed. The purpose of the session was to explore trends that will impact our organizations and our HPT work in the near future.

The eight TrendSpotters Menu categories are: Customer Service, Economy, Human Performance, Interventions, Measurement & Results, Models & Tools, Performance Consulting, and Strategic Planning. From this foundation, we built the session around leveraging Menu information so attendees could identify and discuss trends of significance to them and their clients.

Table 1. TrendSpotters Menu

The benefits of this session included increased 1) knowledge of business trends, 2) ability to assess the effects of trends on their organizations, and 3) ability to use trend information to benefit clients.

In small teams, participants identified trends of consequence in their work. Then, they posted these trends in the categories identified in the TrendSpotters Menu and assessed the impact of each trend on three levels, as applicable: Individual HPT Practitioner, Organization/Industry, and the Field of Performance Improvement.

Next, the participants chose the single most critical trend for their individual work situation and listed both the opportunities and challenges the trend presented.

Finally, the group selected the most significant trends from those posted at each of the three levels. Below are the results.

Individual Practitioner Level
Trend #1: The enhanced integration of processes, workforce development groups, and product development provides a holistic picture of the target audience for all job roles supported.

Trend #2: Shared models that start with desired results and work backward mark the integration of training and work. The Certified Performance Technologist (CPT) Standards of Performance Technology and Code of Ethics provide a framework for these models.

Organization/Industry Level
Trend #3: Concurrent engineering, where a multi-disciplined approach to engineering projects and problem solving is used, helps link functional areas, eliminate duplication of work, and cut down silos.

Trend #4: Managing performance virtually for projects, consulting services, management of teams, and global mergers is becoming more prevalent in organizations.

Trend #5: Increasingly, organizations are taking a performance approach without retrofitting existing training functions, almost as if they are skipping the more typical “growing pains” we usually see.

Performance Improvement Field Level
Trend #6: The consultant as generalist is becoming a specialist who looks at the entire performance system and is supported by niche experts who can address specialties within that system.

Trend #7: There are many more HPT learning resources today than in the past.

Our Thoughts
As we look back on this session and review the trends we have reported on, we see that there continues to be shared views, connections among personal experiences, and a strong interest in how best to harness trends information for daily use.

Session Participants
We very much appreciate the interest and energy of the colleagues who joined us in Tampa and contributed their insights to this session. Special thanks to: Jamie Barron, Capella University; Bob Carleton, The Vector Group; Kay Gallogly, Human Performance Strategies; Doris Greenwood and Barry Kneeland, Hewlett-Packard Co.; Laurie Wilson Ihry, Pearson Education; Jeff Loube, Odyssey Consulting Ltd.; Sammy McCubbins and Diane Stroud, State Farm Insurance; Julie Miller, Miller Training Development, Inc.; Sandra Mueller, Workplace Learning & Performance Improvement; Connie Swartz and Lori Turec, Creative Courseware, Inc.; John Swinney, Bandag, Inc.; Celia Szelwach, Creative Collaborations Consulting, Inc.; and Hugh Wetmore, Williams.

If you have any predictions about the future of HPT that you feel would be of interest to the PerformanceXpress readership, please contact Carol Haig, CPT, at carolhaig@earthlink.net or http://home.mindspring.com/~carolhaig or Roger Addison, EdD, CPT, at roger@ispi.org.

by Dennis J. Kravetz

Performance consultants are often faced with the task of measuring workforce job competencies. If the competence level of the workforce changes, this ought to be worth dollars to an organization. But exactly how much is the change worth? How do we calculate it? Typically, a specialized study is needed, such as a Level 4/Level 5 measure of training effectiveness. Is it not possible to set up an equation, and then plug numbers into it to calculate the dollar value of competence changes? Yes, as long as we want to make a couple of basic assumptions. This article will show how.

Competence measurements can be taken whenever a performance appraisal is done. It is common for organizations to track appraisal ratings on human resources’ software, so data is readily available for use. If a special competence measurement is needed, such as before and after a training class, the same metrics as used for appraisals can be used to get updates.

First, a couple of assumptions about the dollar value of human performance. The first assumption is that the dollar value of a job is worth the average salary being paid to the incumbents. This is certainly a safe assumption for organizations would scarcely want to argue that a job is worth less than the salary being paid to people.

However, total employee cost is more than salary. There are benefits such as vacation, health insurance, life insurance, college tuition, and bonuses. In addition, organizations incur other costs to keep someone on the payroll such as office space rental, furniture, cell phones, computers, software, and utility bills. A very conservative second assumption I will make is that keeping someone on the payroll is twice the individual’s salary. An employee earning $50,000 per year costs $100,000 per year to keep on the payroll when bonuses, benefits, and equipment and office costs are added in. So, a person with a $100,000 salary would cost $200,000 per year. The actual cost is likely more than this, but assuming twice the individual’s salary is a conservative estimation.

With these assumptions in mind, I can now introduce an equation for calculating the dollar value of competence change. This is as follows:

CL_T2 = the competence level at Time 2
CL_T1 = the competence level at Time 1

The total net gain can be calculated as follows:
Total Dollar Gain — Cost of the Program = Total Net Gain (ROI)

Let me provide a bit of explanation for the equation, then we will look at an example. We calculate the Total Employee Cost by multiplying the base salary by two. Next, we divide this number by the number of competencies to determine the dollar value of one competency.

As for the change in the competence level, the second part of the equation, we simply make measurements of competence for the group that we are studying at two points in time. Since our equation is based on the cost per competency, we must multiply this by however many competencies we are studying. If we were studying two competencies at once, we could calculate the change in competence levels for the two competencies considered together as a composite.

We may also want to know the effects over a few years, and for this reason, we need to multiply by however many years we are studying. Competency change lasts quite long, so looking out over a few years is very appropriate. Last, we need to multiply by however many employees we are studying since our equation looks at total costs per employee. Last, we subtract out any costs from the total gain which we calculate. This shows us the return on investment (ROI).

Consider an example. An organization has 30,000 employees, which is roughly the average of the 500 largest organizations in the United States. Assume that the organization works very hard at building competence at customer satisfaction with both internal and external customers. Assume building customer satisfaction is just one of 15 competencies that is needed by the entire workforce, that we want to know the value of change over five years, and that the competence improvement was 17% (3.00 to 3.50) due to training, culture change, and other initiatives. Also, assume that the initiative cost totals $10,000,000. What is the dollar value of this change? The results follow:

$250,050,000 – $10,000,000 = $240,050,000

The total value to the organization over five years is an astounding $250,050,000 before subtracting costs! If the initiative costs $10,000,000 for training, consultants, etc., the Total Net Gain is still $240,050,000. Not a bad investment! And, a gain of this magnitude is realistic if the training and other aspects of the initiative are on target. Knowing the potential gain could help senior managers determine the benefits of undertaking such an initiative.

The tool presented here will enable performance consultants to directly and easily calculate the dollar gain from competence change. No specialized studies are needed. We merely get our data from regular performance appraisals done on competencies, and we update this data as necessary. Each manager can have such an equation on his/her personal “dashboard” to see the dollar impact of competence change throughout the year. Competencies change due to mundane things like retirements and new hires being added to staff as well as major initiatives. Managers and performance consultants should make such metrics and the equations a part of their daily work life.

Note: This article is an excerpt from Dennis’ recently released book Measuring Human Capital: Converting Workplace Behavior into Dollars published by KA Publishing.

Dennis Kravetz is president of Kravetz Associates, a national consulting firm based in Mesa, Arizona that specializes in human capital consultation. He has authored five books and more than 30 articles on management and human resources, and has won three national awards for innovations in the field. Dennis’ clients have included roughly half of the largest 500 companies in America as well as a number of government agencies. Dennis has a BS in Psychology from Purdue, and MS and PhD degrees in industrial psychology from the University of Illinois. He may be reached at dennis@kravetz.com.

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by Sivasailam “Thiagi” Thiagarajan, PhD, CPT

Last month, I conducted a contest that required people to define performance-based instructional systems design in exactly 16 words. We received an impressive number of entries, including several from the same contestants. Here are the results:

Tools to create—and know we’ve created—environments where learners don’t just know, they can do.

The delicate process of choosing the best way to help your lover push the right buttons.

There once was a trainer who wrote and wrote and joy! somebody actually used it once!

Systematic process utilized to arrange the instrumental [graphic showing a set of steps] in learning results-oriented behaviors that produce desired outcomes.

• A method of designing training based on organizational needs and training people to meet those needs. —Daniel C. Roberts
• A repeatable method for structuring training in which participants demonstrate that they can perform a task. —Fran Durkee
• A systems approach to designing instruction, focusing on developing knowledge and abilities required to perform tasks. —N.F. Wheeler
• A training intervention to get a person or a group to behave in an effective way. —Jill Hughes
• Creating materials, programs, or interventions to improve job performance rather than create a well-rounded individual. —Kim Andrews
• Gets the right training to the right person at the right time for the right performance. —Lee Davis Saxton
• How To Do It: Break tasks down. Teach the parts. Practice the tasks. Measure task performance. Revise until methods work. —Patty Newbold
• ID: systemic approach to close the gap between ideal performance managers want and today’s performance. —Lisa Owens
• Ideologies guiding organizations on how to create a climate of teaching that is based on performance. —Tamra Thoreson
• ISD is when the course works. Performance-Based ISD is when the course made a difference. —Fritz Randall
• It is a functional design and execution of Instructional products and systems resulting in performance proficiency. —Amy von Stritzky
• Just-in-time development of experiences and concepts that are intentionally arranged in order to bring about learning. —Teri Holloway
• People learning to do what needs to be done better than they have done it before. —Rob Stevens
• Performance Based Instructional System Design is a process blueprint for training development focusing on task requirements —Pat Mullins
• Performance-based instructional systems design combines organizational and task assessment to create measurable and effective learning experiences. —Jan Watrous-McCabe
• Process of creating a learning intervention to fill the gap between actual performance and pre-established competence. —Alvaro Estrado
• The different ways people help each other figure out the best way to get something done. —Peter Gray
• The systematic creation of learning solutions that directly improves the performance of learners with gay abandon. —Terri Spafford
• To design training such that delivery is in a form matching the required performance base application. —Michael D. Salazar

• Reducing language and distance barriers: The first bilingual and virtual chapter of ISPI, the Performance Improvement Global Network, offers ISPI articles and materials in English and Spanish, which allows many members to publish and exchange ideas in their original language and stay up-to-date on ISPI events all over the world. With more than 1,200 members from 25 countries, the virtual chapter gives members outside the United States who cannot afford to travel the opportunity to participate in an extended professional community.
• Interacting regionally: ISPI’s non-U.S. conferences provide unique opportunities for exchange and networking between professionals from different countries at regional and international levels. They are also an excellent opportunity to explore models and ideas developed in different academic and cultural backgrounds that not only expand our perspective, but our ability to participate in international projects.
• Translating and exchanging HPT and PI materials: I recently attended the ISPI Europe Conference, and in a climate of camaraderie and hospitality, my colleagues presented a wealth of interesting international HPT materials and tools translated into English. Europeans have a tradition of systemic thinking, humanistic approaches, and different social sciences background and models that provide a new dimension to the performance improvement practice. The July 2005 issue of Performance Improvement journal will be a special issue based on this conference. In addition, bilingual members have translated HPT Institute materials into Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German, and similar efforts should be encouraged in the opposite direction in order to offer U.S. practitioners access to the ideas of Eliot Jacques (Canada), Fons Trompenaars (Netherlands), Julian Birkinshaw (England), Xue Li (China), S.K Battacharya (India), and other European and Asian experts.
• Internationalizing our standards and committees: ISPI currently has 68 non-U.S. CPTs, and 35 more are being considered—a 50% increase in one year. In the near future, non-U.S. performance experts may play a larger role in non-U.S. certification because they are uniquely qualified to judge the application of standards in the cultural contexts.
• Internationalizing our HPT faculties: ISPI’s HPT Institutes have been extremely successful in disseminating our technology and approaches. The team-based format is especially attractive for international participants because it gives them the opportunity to successfully participate in multi-national teams using HPT models and concepts as a common language. Recently, in another significant step toward internationalization, the HPT Institutes’ faculty was expanded and enriched with the participation of non-U.S. professionals who bring new perspectives to our field.

ISPI’s Annual International Performance Improvement Conference is always about professional learning and growth; expanding the breadth and depth of what we know, how we do what we do, and the impact we have on work, education, and the international community. And, this year’s roster of pre-conference workshops delivers on both the breadth and depth commitments—breadth of topics and depth of both presenters and the insight they deliver.

With nearly 30 topics to choose from, this year’s line-up of pre-conference workshops is bound to have just what you’re looking for! The list includes some long-running favorites like Robert Brinkerhoff and Dennis Dressler’s, Connecting HPI to Business Goals and Metrics, and Roger Kaufman’s, Needs Assessment: What it is—How to get it done. Partnership is the theme in James Tamm’s Building Collaborative Partnerships and Thiagi’s workshops Faster, Cheaper, Better: Alternative Approaches to Instructional Design and The Four-Door Model: A Faster, Cheaper, and Better Approach to e-Learning Design. Bill Coscarelli, Sharon Shrock, and Patricia Eyres’ Constructing Level Two Evaluation and Certification Systems: Technical and Legal Guidelines also returns to the line-up. If you want to focus on our training roots, Carl Binder will help you in Building Fluent Performance, and just to make sure we don’t forget what counts—Bill Lee, will present on Evaluation.

This year’s list includes some new additions like Ray Svenson’s Business-Driven Strategic Planning for Learning and Development, Richard Gerson’s Winning the Inner Game of HPT, and Holly Burkett’s Using Action Plans to Manage, Measure, and Align Performance with Desired Results just to name a few. Regardless of what you’re looking for, we have it!

Remember, ISPI pre-conference workshops come in all sizes to fit your needs and schedule (half-, one-, and two-days), on Monday, April 11 and Tuesday, April 12. So, if you’re looking to gain a depth of knowledge from an established expert or a rising star, sign up for one these exciting learning experiences. Click here for the complete workshop descriptions, and register today!

• Separate change initiatives run independently from one another, often prompting in-fighting among the various camps. For example, the Six Sigma and Lean Enterprise experts battle over projects and resources.
• The CIP is not aligned to the strategic plan; therefore, the change initiatives in process are not relevant to the company’s strategic action plans.
• Employees complain that they want to be involved in strategy deployment and improvement initiatives, but because they do not understand the strategy, they do not feel like they are a part of the plans for change.
• People complain that the CEO is not supportive of their initiatives.
• Individuals are trained in the change tools, but meet with resistance in implementation, because they cannot overcome other people’s fear of change.

Randy K. Kesterson is the Founding Director of the Society for Leadership of Change (SLC), a non-profit professional membership society, which seeks to increase the value of leaders of change within organizations. The SLC brings leaders at all levels within organizations together, as well as with the recognized experts in the area of change leadership, in order to appreciate the intricacies of the strategic plan, the available change tools, and the people skills necessary for linking the two into a strong continuous improvement plan. Randy may be reached at kestersonrk@theSLC.org.

• Advocates (by invitation)
• Clarifying the HPT Value
• Proposition: Presidential Initiative Task Force (Members only)
• CPT Forum (Members only)
• HPT Forum (Members only)
• International Forum (Members only)
• Member Forum (Members only)
• Research Forum (Public)
• The Goal of “Communicating About HPT” (Members only)

The ISPI Web Communities are your opportunity to communicate with fellow performance improvement professionals from around the world. Get answers to questions. Learn a new technique. Help others with questions by sharing your knowledge. To become an active participant, click here.

Maybe it’s happened already, maybe it hasn’t, but if so, the people have spoken. The November 2004 Presidential election in the United States has captivated audiences around the world. Regardless of your particular political persuasion, ideally what the process displays is democracy at work, where political power emerges from and for the people. HPT also is powered by and for people. The theme for this month’s column is People Power. We will explore sites that reveal unique ways that HPT has energized and enlightened people engaged in the process through the government, the military, the public health arena, and the environment. Please, feed the hamsters.

Quick recap: Every month, three sites, one theme. While far from comprehensive, hopefully these sites will spark readers to look further and expand views about HPT. Please keep in mind that any listing is for informational purposes only and does not indicate an endorsement either by the International Society for Performance Improvement or me.

These are the general categories I use for the sites featured:

1. E-Klatch: Links to professional associations, research, and resources that can help refine and expand our views of HPT through connections with other professionals and current trends
2. HPT@work: Links to job listings, career development, volunteer opportunities, and other resources for applying your individual skills
3. I-Candy: Links to sites that are thought provoking, enjoyable, and refreshing to help manage the stresses and identify new ideas for HPT

E-Klatch
The power of a people is sometimes measured via military resourcefulness. A great example is the U.S. Navy’s Human Performance Center (HPC SPIDER). This site incorporates a highly detailed introduction to HPT, specific examples of HPT best practices/lessons learned in governmental/non-governmental settings, and many valuable links (yes, including to ISPI). Settle in for some “deep-C” (for “Computer”) exploration as this site provides detailed information on technologies, management, and R&D. HPC SPIDER is the U.S. Navy’s “premier online resource for human performance and training technology for lifelong learning.”

HPT@work
HPT in public health is one arena where performance improvement can positively impact people...from educational campaigns to life-saving interventions. For a comprehensive and conversational overview of resources from public health of value to HPT, visit the website of Betty C. Jung who describes herself as: “…a public health professional with a background in nursing, did a short stint in child welfare, love quality assurance and quality improvement stuff.” As if she knew ISPIers would be visiting, the site outlines as a goal “To meet the Evaluation Criteria set by the Health Summit Working Group for Quality Health Information on the Internet and adhere to the Stanford Guidelines for Web Credibility.” The excellent listing of the Site Search Engine and Site Index includes many valuable links, including a Needs Assessment Matrix, the World Wide Evaluation Gateway, an essay on performance indicators in organizations in Australia, an AmeriCorps Performance Measurement Toolkit, and a performance measures database from the National Quality Measures Clearinghouse. This website can serve as an inspiration for all performance technologists to create research-based, informative sites geared to educating practitioners and the general public, complete with links to websites for kids.

Special, cool, international public health note: Speaking of global measures of improving people’s lives, during a recent visit to the Seattle (Washington, U.S.A.) Art Museum’s fascinating exhibit on Spain in the Age of Exploration, 1492-1819, I-Spy learned that Spain launched the first global public health campaign in 1803 when physicians were sent to the New World to vaccinate thousands against smallpox. For an interesting article on this Royal Philanthropic Vaccination Expedition, read Karen Shashock’s essay, A public health odyssey brought back to light: The story of the world’s first mass vaccination project.

I-Candy
Controversy rages this political season regarding the relationship between people, performance, power, and petroleum. So, how could people get performance to happen using alternative fuel sources rather than gasoline? Crank up your solar panels and wind turbines to get energy for a visit to “The Cutting Edge of Low Technology” at OtherPower.com. Owned by ForceField, a home-based business with staff located in the remote mountains west of Fort Collins, Colorado, this site offers “a huge free resource for alternative energy enthusiasts and experimentors. Build your own low-rpm permanent-magnet alternators, battery chargers, anemometers, windmills, hydro turbines, and more.” With advice on a wide variety of energy options for life “off the grid” (we cybernauts, though appreciative, still shudder at the thought!)—including efficient lighting and solar panels, OtherPower.com is a great introduction to challenging our assumptions about how we as people can get energy that helps sustain the environment. For the performance technologists in the room, we suggest this approach to HPT—Hamster Powered Technology—complete with performance measurement via an attached computer to support gathering wH/hM—watt-hours-per-hamster-mile! Special thanks to I-Spy’s good friend, fellow web-gawker geek and programmer impresario Andy Craze for the reference to this site.

Until next time, remember the wise and respectful engagement of people using their power to improve performance sustains democracy, fosters social well-being, inspires innovation, and unleashes organizational excellence.

When he is not Internet trawling for ISPI, Todd Packer can be found improving business, non-profit, and individual performance through research, training, and innovation coaching as Principal Consultant of Todd Packer and Associates based in Shaker Heights, Ohio. He may be reached at tp@toddpacker.com.

by Carl Binder, PhD, CPT

On Sunday, October 10, 2004, Ogden R. Lindsley, a giant in the fields of behavior research, measurement, and performance technology, died of bile duct cancer at the Kansas University Medical Center with his wife, Nancy, at his side. Four days before, Og sent a gracious and inspiring farewell message to his students and colleagues. In response, he received a stream of emails from around the world with love and appreciation from old friends, as well as from parents, students, and professionals whom he had never met yet whose lives he had profoundly improved with Precision Teaching and Standard Celeration Charting.

Lindsley’s life was extraordinarily full and productive. At 20, he left Brown University to enlist in the Army Air Corps, serving as an engineer-gunner on B-24 bombers. Shot down over Yugoslavia, he spent nine months as a POW, and then escaped. He later told colorful tales of tricking the Nazi soldiers and making friends with the local populace on forced marches between prison camps. He also recounted his personal pledge that if he were allowed to escape, he would devote half of his life to helping the world and the other half to having fun—reasoning that his fallen comrades would have insisted on the latter. His career, in fact, was marked by enthusiasm, inexhaustible energy, continuous curiosity and discovery, plus lots of fun. Cartoons, songs, and funny stories occupied an important part of his professional repertoire, along with enormous amounts of charted data.

Ogden returned from the war in 1945 to complete Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in experimental psychology and histochemistry at Brown University, and a Doctorate with B.F. Skinner at Harvard. With Skinner, he founded and directed the Behavior Research Laboratory at Harvard Medical School, where from 1953 to 1965 he conducted extensive behavior research with human subjects, coined the term “behavior therapy,” and demonstrated that principles of learning discovered in Skinner’s animal operant conditioning labs applied with equal power and precision to humans. During that period, he published dozens of scientific articles reporting groundbreaking research in psychiatry, advertising, behavioral pharmacology, geriatrics, social psychology, and education. Most of his early publications are as relevant today as when they were published, and well worth the effort to request via interlibrary loan. He received the Hofheimer Research Prize from the American Psychiatric Association in 1962 for his study of psychotic behavior.

Measurement was at the core of his contributions. At an early stage, Lindsley committed his scientific career to Skinner’s supremely sensitive measure of behavior (or accomplishments), count/time (rate or frequency). He learned from Skinner’s cumulative recording methodology the power of standard graphic display for communicating and analyzing measures over time, applying that principle to develop his own standard charting tools.

In 1965, he decided to “parachute behind enemy lines” by moving from Harvard Medical School to special education at the University of Kansas Medical Center. He hoped to effect radical change in classroom education by replacing percent correct with count per minute measures and graphic displays of data for decision-making by teachers and students. He began a new career in teacher training and field-based educational research that ultimately had an enormous impact on thousands of teachers and hundreds of thousands of students.

When he first worked with educators, teaching them principles of behavior and requiring them to measure behavior frequencies in their classrooms, Lindsley discovered that the idiosyncratic stretch-to-fill graphs they used to share data slowed down communication. To remedy this problem, he prototyped a “standard” chart initially using semi-logarithmic engineering graph paper covering a range of behavior frequencies from one per day (.000695 per minute) to 1,000 per minute up the left axis; and spanning 20 calendar weeks (140 days) across the bottom. This tool enabled teachers to share and receive feedback about classroom measurement and teaching projects in about one tenth the time it took with traditional graphs.

While using the chart for classroom practice and research, Lindsley and his students discovered that behavior multiplies, it does not add. That is, when graphed on the standard chart, which allows accurate projection of straight-line trends instead of curves, frequencies of behavior and accomplishments (along with many other natural phenomena) exhibit patterns of proportional rather than additive change. (For example, some behavior doubles rather than adding a fixed amount every week.) The power and sensitivity of Lindsley’s charting methodology is so great that if there were a Nobel Prize for behavior measurement, some colleagues believe he should have received it.

From the chart he discovered and quantified celeration (ACceleration or DEceleration), a direct measure of learning for individuals, organizations, or systems quantified as a multiplying or dividing change in frequency over time (e.g., x 1.5 per week), and graphically displayed as a standard angle on the celeration chart. From the late 1960s on, his students and colleagues demonstrated enormous improvements in learning effectiveness with Precision Teaching and Precise Behavior Management, using the standard celeration chart to make educational and management decisions.

Emboldened by these discoveries and frustrated by the inability of teachers to change systems in which they served, Lindsley switched in 1971 to educational administration at Kansas University. He supervised 34 doctoral theses over the course of his tenure, training those who would become educational leaders to use behavior science principles and standard celeration charting in day-to-day educational and organizational management and decision-making. Extending use of the chart to count-per-week, count-per-month, and count-per-year applications, his students monitored such macro phenomena as organizational change, stock market activity, world health and economic trends, improving analysis and decision-making in every application they tried.

The Standard Celeration Society emerged during the early 1990s to support this work, and charting practitioners have become more and more visible in organizations such as ISPI and the International Association for Behavior Analysis. Many of Lindsley’s protégés became impatient with resistance to radical improvement and, with Lindsley’s encouragement, formed private-sector schools, learning centers, and consulting firms to make their methods available directly to consumers.

Lindsley’s unique qualities were a combination of scientific rigor and unwavering commitment to effecting positive change in the world. We have lost a creative scientific genius, but his legacy is a powerful set of measurement and performance improvement tools that have just begun to have their multiplicative effect.

The International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI) is seeking an ISPI member who has the flexibility to take on the commitment and responsibilities of Editor for Performance Improvement (PI).

We’re looking for a member who can demonstrate an extensive knowledge of human performance technology (HPT), has a professional HPT network, and possesses an editorial review ability. The Editor will be responsible for acquiring, reviewing, and selecting manuscripts and will contribute suggestions and ideas toward the editorial direction. The Editor will work with authors and potential authors to maintain the highest standard of editorial content and will work directly with ISPI’s Senior Director of Publications, who is responsible for all production and distribution. The Editor reports to the Executive Director, who serves as Publisher of Performance Improvement. The position requires a two-year commitment, commencing in April 2005. The Editor will receive $10,000 a year as compensation for the invested time and effort.

PI is published 10 times a year and is distributed to more than 5,000 members, subscribers, and institutions. For an application and instructions, or for questions regarding the position or the application process, please contact April Davis, ISPI Senior Director of Publications, by phone: 301.587.8570 x112; by fax: 301.587.8573; or by email, april@ispi.org.

Are you working to improve workplace performance? Then, ISPI membership is your key to professional development through education, certification, networking, and professional affinity programs.

If you are already a member, we thank you for your support. If you have been considering membership or are about to renew, there is no better time to join ISPI. To apply for membership or renew, visit www.ispi.org, or simply click here.

ISPI is looking for Human Performance Technology (HPT) articles (approximately 500 words and not previously published) for PerformanceXpress that bridge the gap from research to practice (please, no product or service promotion is permitted). Below are a few examples of the article formats that can be used:

• Short “I wish I had thought of that” Articles
• Practical Application Articles
• The Application of HPT
• Success Stories

In addition to the article, please include a short bio (2-3 lines) and a contact email address. All submissions should be sent to april@ispi.org. Each article will be reviewed by one of ISPI’s on-staff HPT experts, and the author will be contacted if it is accepted for publication. If you have any further questions, please contact april@ispi.org.

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PerformanceXpress is an ISPI member benefit designed to build community, stimulate discussion, and keep you informed of the Society’s activities and events. This newsletter is published monthly and will be emailed to you at the beginning of each month.

If you have any questions or comments, please contact April Davis, ISPI’s Senior Director of Publications, at april@ispi.org.

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