by Guy W. Wallace, CPT

Goals of Empowerment
The overriding goal of the “empowerment” concept and practice is: Better business decisions—period!

Empowerment is not in vogue simply because it’s another motherhood issue. It’s not a component of management philosophy simply because it will make people feel better about themselves and will, therefore, make them work harder and be more productive for the business entity.

If management knew for a fact that poorer business decisions would be made as a tradeoff for an improvement in the workers’ self-esteem, does anyone pretend that he or she would continue to promote the employee empowerment concept? I think not.

In theory, by moving the decision-making authority closest to the true sources of knowledge about the problem and its potential solutions, better decisions will be made—better business decisions. But that is not always the case. Our results with empowerment often fall short of our goals.

Why? Partial Quality Management (PQM). It is similar to Total Quality Management (TQM), but partial, incomplete, and certainly not very effective.

Problems with Empowerment
Let’s look at a fictitious situation. A problem-solving team has a recommendation turned down by management after months of hard work and much internal wrangling with the data to determine the root cause of the problem and formulate a solution.

The empowered team spent months utilizing both work and personal time, enthusiastically battling their own biases and predispositions to arrive at an informed consensus. Using data and not opinions, they determined the most likely root causes and the most promising solution set to address the causes. They even calculated a probable return on the investment worthy of executive management’s attention and praise.

The empowered work team involved the engineers and the downstream operations organizations in an effort to ensure that all appropriate stakeholders were represented. Middle management sat patiently on the sidelines, ready to support but not disempower the team. It was as “blue sky” an occurrence as anyone on the team could have wildly envisioned. It seemed that the poster slogans were true. Quality was up to them. Empowerment was the path of the enlightened.

A presentation was painstakingly prepared by all team members. The presentation was practiced to perfection with much guidance and feedback provided by the empowered team members to each other using all the new interpersonal skills learned in the classroom. Cross-organizational bonds were formed that would transcend the heat of the future moments when the inevitable crises struck. The big day finally arrived.

Management’s response seemed unexplainably cool during the smooth presentation. The proposal for spending $350,000 in capital upgrades over a three-month period, for a calculated return of $3.5 million within 12 months, did not seem to excite the executive steering team. Management offered faint praise for a project and presentation that were obviously well done. Then they moved on to the next opportunity presentation.

The final word came down days later. No investment was to be made, and no further explanation was offered. The team was stunned.

What management knew, but couldn’t share, was proprietary information regarding the planned discontinuance of the existing product. New production capacity was being secretly geared up for a radically new replacement product. The new product was expected to take the market by storm and set the competition back three years. With the anticipated jump on the competition, the payback period was expected to be short, and the cash flow projections for four years out would allow for funding many more business opportunities. But, at that time, it was all a highly proprietary secret.

Management can’t share certain information it knew because it would not be consistent with their legal and fiduciary responsibility to the shareholders of the company. If they shared their strategic product plan with the workers, that would increase the chance of an information leak to the competition. If the competition got wind of the plans in the early developmental stages, all the advantages that could be gained by being first to the market with the new product would be lost. The investment payback period would be extended, and there could be a significant loss in the potential growth of shareholder value. Management cannot risk those results.

And, therefore, management risked upsetting the newly empowered employees and being the object of their wrath. Employees might reach the conclusion that management had again lied to and deceived them or that their management was incompetent or politically motivated. All their hard work, conflict resolution, and consensus building seemed for naught—a wasted effort, a frustrating experience. The employees have learned a lesson that they will remember. And when asked to approach another problem or opportunity, they will do so much less willingly and much less enthusiastically. Some may be so upset by the apparent deception they suffered that they will retaliate and try to sabotage future attempts to initiate improvements.

What are the typical misconceptions about empowerment? And what are the key concepts and precepts of empowerment? We’ll cover those in Part Two of Three in next month’s issue of PerformanceXpress.

Guy W. Wallace, CPT, and past President of ISPI, has been an external performance improvement consultant since 1982 and has served over 39 Fortune 500 firms. His specialty is performance-based Curriculum Architecture Design, having recently completed his 74^th CAD project. He may be reached via his website http://www.eppic.biz/.

Note: Modified from the original article printed in Pursuing Performance, Summer 2005 by EPPIC, Inc.

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

If you have been spotting trends that may be of interest to the PerformanceXpress readership, contact Carol Haig, CPT, at carolhaig@earthlink.net or http://home.mindspring.com/~carolhaig or Roger Addison, CPT, EdD at roger@ispi.org.

Focus on what performers need to do to meet job performance requirements. There is no doubt that in a knowledge economy, the transfer of information and knowledge is critically important. However, knowledge for its own sake provides little business value. Learners must be able to use knowledge to perform their jobs. Therefore, the key is to assess learners’ ability to use newly acquired knowledge in the performance of job tasks, not to assess mastery of subject matter. Possessing knowledge is not the same as being able to apply it back on the job. In the business world, knowledge does not exist in a vacuum.

To be most effective, knowledge should be presented in the context of the job to be done, and should be assessed in terms of performance, not simply memory recall. There are four critical steps to effectively transferring knowledge in a way that ensures it can be used on the job:

• Define competent job performance
• Identify the elements of knowledge that are required for successful job performance
• Present the knowledge in the context of the tasks to be performed on the job, include practice in its application, and provide feedback on that practice
• Assess whether the knowledge can be applied to perform actual job tasks (not just whether it can be recalled)

Define Competent Job Performance
The first step is to define exactly what competent performance is. This enables the training to be built around performance objectives that describe

• what the learner must be able to do,
• the conditions under which the performance will occur (simulating the actual job performance as closely as possible), and
• the criteria (or standards) for competent performance (the level of performance that is expected).

Training should equip people to be fully competent, not minimally qualified.

Identify the Knowledge to be Included in the Training
One of the major reasons why much knowledge training is not very effective is that the training frequently includes knowledge that does not directly relate to job performance. Including the history of any field, or theory unattached to job requirements virtually guarantees the inclusion of irrelevant knowledge.

The first question should be, “What does someone need to be able to do?” rather than, “What does someone need to know?” Knowledge items should be described as actions or performances (for example, recall the types, or interpret a diagram) instead of as content (such as safety precautions, billing, welding, etc.). The training needs to provide the knowledge or skills to take the learners from where they are now to the point where they can practice the tasks they need to do on the job.

Present and Practice the Knowledge in the Context of Job Tasks
A common mistake in training design is to allocate hours, days, or even weeks providing knowledge, and then massing the practice at the end. Learners are not given the opportunity to do anything but take notes and discuss content for large blocks of time. This emphasis on content apart from application is not only inefficient, it also increases the likelihood that much of the newly-learned knowledge is forgotten before the opportunity for practice arrives.

A better approach is to integrate the knowledge content with the task performance by presenting information—factual knowledge, procedures, errors to watch for, etc.—needed to perform a single task or sub-task, immediately followed by practical application of that information. Practice should be designed to replicate or simulate exactly what the learner will be required to do on the job.

Assessment of Knowledge Application
Traditional written tests measure the acquisition of knowledge, but not the real-world application of that knowledge. The ultimate test must be whether the learner can perform as he or she will need to do on the job.

Therefore, the most useful and valid test is to match the requirements stated in the performance objective. Each learner should be asked to demonstrate competence in the performance called for in the objective. This performance-based approach to knowledge acquisition is far more useful and job-relevant.

Note: Reprinted with permission of CEP, The Center for Effective Performance. For more information, contact Paula Alsher at 770.458.4080 or palsher@cepworldwide.com.

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by Thiagi

At a recent chapter meeting, a member asked me the perpetual question, “Why do performance technologists use convoluted, jargon-filled language?” That started me thinking about my plain-English training when I was working on international technology transfer projects. One thing led to another, and I created an online game.

Remember the Telephone game that you played during your childhood? This online game called Yin-Yang is very similar, and it has an interesting twist. You get a message and, before you send it to the next person, you have to convert it from one mode to the other.

Here are the details:

1. Your first task is to figure out in which mode (HPT jargon or plain English) the message is written.
2. Your next step is to convert it into the other mode (plain English or HPT jargon) and type this converted message into a text box.
3. When done, you simply click “Send.”

Here’s example of a message that you might see:

Front-end analysis reveals that a majority of corporate employees suffer from a skill/knowledge deficit in the near-transfer requirements for the new software intervention. Our recommended solution to reduce the impact of this root cause is to incorporate an online EPSS in the application system.

You decide that this is in HPT jargon (smart of you!). Therefore, you convert it into this plain English version:

Provide Help screens to make the software program easy to use.

After sending your converted message, you can see all the earlier versions of the message.

Click here if you’d like to play this online game. If you suffer from a lack of skills or knowledge in this area, learn how to write plain English from the European Commission’s Translation Service “Fight the FOG” campaign and download a PDF of their booklet. These skills will be especially helpful for making effective conference presentations to our increasingly international audience.

by Andrea Moore, CPT, ISPI Director

For those of you who attended ISPI’s 2005 Annual International Performance Improvement Conference in Vancouver, you most likely recognize the slogan CPC—Ask Me! For everyone else, let me clue you in to a very important organization within ISPI. The Chapter Partnership Committee, or CPC, comprises chapter leaders who are interested in collaboratively fostering Human Performance Technology (HPT) in local chapters. The CPC even has a dedicated section of the ISPI website.

The CPC has been a busy group this past year and will continue creating products and services that we all can use. In January, they started their newsletter initiative, which follows the PerformanceXpress model. The CPC would like local chapters to submit articles from their local newsletters so they can be posted on the website—a great way to follow the status of different chapters.

And speaking of the goings-on in chapters, the CPC conducts the Chapter Health Survey at the beginning of each calendar year. By surveying chapters on membership, programs, and workshops, the CPC can determine which chapters are conducting chapter business in new, innovative, and productive ways. This is a tremendous resource of knowledge for those chapters who are in the “forming” stage.

Perhaps the biggest achievement of the past year is the CPT Mentoring Program, created by the New Mexico chapter. It’s been such a success that the remainder of this article will focus on its progress to date, current status, and the future plans for the program. In recent PX issues, there were two articles focusing on how the mentoring program was created and implemented within the New Mexico chapter, and on the early progress of the program. The Vancouver conference was the CPT Mentoring Program’s “coming out” event. The program’s creators, Stacy Rafter and Jean Strosinski, put together two conference sessions that were well attended and well received. Because of the interest from other chapters, Stacy and Jean worked to develop pilot program guidelines so these chapters could begin the pilot program.

The Montreal and the Heartland chapters decided to participate in the first round of the pilot program. Since then, Stacy and Jean have held ongoing conference calls to monitor progress, share success stories, and talk over lessons learned. The plan is to continue these calls throughout the year and to conduct a session at ISPI’s 2006 Annual International Performance Improvement Conference in Dallas, Texas, for updates and further information sharing.

So, what does the future hold for the CPT Mentoring Program? The sky is the limit to what this program can do. Clearly, finding more pilot participants is the first order of business. It behooves us all to get the CPT message out, not only across the United States but internationally as well. And what better way than getting experienced HPT practitioners paired with those aspiring to be experienced HPT practitioners?

The CPT Mentoring Program can also benefit newly forming chapters. Typically, new chapters do not have large memberships. Jean envisions that senior ISPI CPTs could help new chapter members in their quest to become CPTs. The New Mexico pilot has been equally successful in virtual teams and face-to-face teams, proven by one mentor-protégé team located across the country. Just think about how partnerships between U.S. chapters and international chapters could work using virtual mentoring teams. Maybe the Barcelona, Spain, chapter has several CPTs who are paired with the newly forming western Utah chapter. The CPT Mentoring Program could provide the bridge between U.S. chapters and their international counterparts, which would be a highly valuable benefit for all involved.

As you would expect, the New Mexico chapter had goals to achieve:

• Actively support the ISPI CPT initiative
• Strengthen the professional development efforts of New Mexico ISPI members
• Share the process and lessons learned with other ISPI chapters
• Establish a support mechanism for chapters ready to pilot their own mentoring program

On all accounts, the New Mexico team has been successful in meeting each of these goals.

As you can see, the CPC does exceptional work. These people are volunteers who genuinely care about the profession and about their colleagues in the profession. While the cast of characters may change from year to year, there is always a strong dedication no matter who is driving the boat. So, CPC—Ask Me? Sure, you can ask me, but why not ask a current CPC member? Better yet, get involved and find out for yourself!

Just imagine. We are seated in a circle on the floor with our legs crossed. Our eyes are closed and we are relaxed. The light is dim. We repeat over and over again “learner-centered, performance-based, learner-centered, performance-based…” Why this mantra? Because these two terms are the keys to transforming learners. Let’s examine each of them individually.

Learner-centered
Imagine that you are an accountant and have been asked to run a training session next week for a group of technical and professional personnel recently promoted to managers. Your mandate is to teach cash flow management to these nonfinancial managers. What will you do to prepare? Be honest and check off which of the following two scenarios more closely describes actions you would take.

A.

Gather materials on cash flow management. Examine documents for key concepts and terms. Create an outline of the content in logical sequence so that you ensure you hit all the fundamentals. Study up and rehearse so that you appear credible and can answer any content questions the learners raise. Put together information and exercises that clarify what cash flow is and how it works. Verify that all of your content is accurate and state-of-the-art.

B.

Gather information on the prospective learners’ jobs with respect to cash flow. Gather information on the learners’ backgrounds and experiences concerning cash flow management. Investigate to identify problems new managers encounter and create with respect to cash flow. Gather a list of organizational expectations of these newly appointed managers concerning cash flow management. Create realistic scenarios and tools to help the learners acquire expected competencies. Create a list of benefits to them and to the organization when they manage cash flow well.

From experience, we have found that the overwhelming majority of people, when placed in this position, opt for A. They go for the content. The more appropriate answer, however, is B. Focus on the learners with their needs, concerns, desires, fears, frustrations, and characteristics. Option A leads to telling and transmission. The emphasis is on the instructor. Option B leads to training and transformation. The focus is on the learner.

Performance-based
If you examine most course notes, either those of the trainer/instructor or of the participants, you likely will find them filled with information—lots of content. There is an impression that more is better. How often does one hear trainers complain, “I didn’t have enough time to cover the content”?

Here’s a simple choice for you. You have a group of technicians who have to learn about a totally new approach to diagnosing a problem. Check off your response below. Do you want them to:

A.   Know about the new approach?

B.   Do the job correctly?

Harold D. Stolovitch and Erica J. Keeps are the principals of HSA LEARNING & PERFORMANCE SOLUTIONS LLC, an international consulting firm that specializes in the application of instructional technology and human performance technology to business, industry, government, and the military. Stolovitch and Keeps are co-authors of the best-selling, award-winning books Telling Ain’t Training and Training Ain’t Performance. They are also co-authors of the Wiley/Pfeiffer Learning & Performance Toolkit Series as well as co-editors of the award-winning Handbook of Human Performance Technology. Their most recent book, Beyond Telling Ain’t Training Fieldbook, was released in May 2005. Stolovitch and Keeps may be reached at info@hsa-lps.com. For more information on their books or workshops, visit their website at www.hsa-lps.com.

The International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI) annually recognizes people, products, innovations, and organizations that represent excellence in the field of instructional and Human Performance Technology (HPT). Submissions receiving the “stamp of approval” in this criterion-based awards program receive acknowledgment and recognition by their peers throughout the year and at a special awards presentation held during ISPI’s Annual International Performance Improvement Conference in Dallas, Texas, in 2006. Click here for more information and to submit your 2006 entry application. Entry deadline is October 14, 2005.

While Human Performance Technology (HPT) old-timers will no doubt recognize this story, it bears repeating for the sake of newcomers. What I believe is the most fundamental feature differentiating HPT from other performance development methodologies is its focus on accomplishments and not merely on behavior. Let’s briefly explore the origins of this important HPT feature and summarize its implications.

In his pioneering book Human Competence (1978, 1996), Tom Gilbert criticized what he called “the cult of behavior” and pointed out that it’s the accomplishments (or job outputs) of people that are valuable, not the behavior that produces them. In fact, he observed, behavior is costly and efforts to improve the worth of any performance intervention should aim to optimize the quantity and quality of valuable accomplishments while minimizing the cost of the behavior needed to produce them. While this statement might not seem earthshaking, once stated so clearly, it goes against the common unstated and usually unquestioned assumption that the focus of Human Resources professionals and managers should be on teaching and supporting desirable behavior. In fact, this simple insight laid the foundation for a new approach to optimizing human performance quantity and quality that many among us still fail to grasp.

Too often our training and development colleagues focus on behavior itself, seemingly for its own sake (e.g., “communication skills”). In contrast, HPT pioneers such as Joe Harless emphasize the importance of identifying and measuring the valuable accomplishments that contribute to business results, and then focusing like a laser beam only on the behavior that the most productive (exemplary) performers use to produce those accomplishments. We identify exemplary performers by measuring the quantity and quality of their accomplishments, and we seek to emulate their behavior because it produces those accomplishments cost-effectively. This insight about the importance of accomplishments paradoxically emerged (at least in part) from laboratory research conducted by behavior scientists.

Conditioning the “Front End” of the Rat
Ogden Lindsley, a giant in both basic and applied behavior science, a student of B.F. Skinner, and a professional colleague and long-time friend of Tom Gilbert, enjoyed talking about the insight represented by his friend’s focus on accomplishments. He pointed out that when laboratory behavior scientists delivered food to increase the lever-pressing behavior of rats, they were actually teaching the “front end” of the rat rather than a specific form of behavior. He reasoned that it was not the precise form of lever-pressing that the food reinforced. Rather, in the laboratory apparatus, it was actually the closing of a microswitch connected to the rat lever that produced the food. In other words, it was the closed switch (an accomplishment) not the behavior, per se, that was most important. And if you watched very closely, you noticed that different rats closed the switch using different forms of behavior. Even the same rat in the course of an extended laboratory session might use different variations of behavior at different times to produce the switch closure. Sometimes the front paws pressed the lever and sometimes the nose. Sometimes the rat used one paw, sometimes both, and sometimes the rat simply rested its whole upper body weight on the lever to produce the switch closure. But all successful forms of behavior produced the switch closure.

The Benefits of an Accomplishment-based Approach
One of the most important things we can communicate to our colleagues and protégés in HPT is to focus first on valuable accomplishments and only then on the behavior (tasks, tactics, procedures, decisions) that produces them. As Gilbert stressed incessantly, one of the best ways to improve cost-effectiveness in any performance improvement intervention is to “clip” back to the behavior actually required to produce desired accomplishments—to focus on “need to know” versus “nice to know.” And to identify the behavior and behavior influences that optimize accomplishments.

This simple insight about the value of the switch-closure and not the lever-press can help us save clients enormous amounts of money while improving overall ROI for performance improvement interventions.

References
Bjork, D.W. (1997). B.F. Skinner: A life. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Gilbert, T.F. (1978, 1996). Human competence: Engineering worthy performance. Silver Spring, MD: International Society for Performance Improvement.

Harless, J. (1998). The Eden conspiracy: Educating for accomplished citizenship. Newnan, GA: Guild V Publications.

For several years, ISPI members have asked for a series of workshops for the performance professional. In response, the Society is offering the first two workshops in this series, both in Washington, DC. On October 25-26, Geary Rummler, CPT, PhD, will present a workshop based on his best-selling book, Serious Performance Consulting; and on October 27-28, Judy Hale, CPT, PhD, will present a workshop focused on implementation and going beyond the rollout of an initiative.

Geary’s workshop, Introduction to Serious Performance Consulting, moves beyond job-level performance improvement toward process- and organization-level performance improvement. His focus is identifying the factors impacting individual and organizational results, and his Anatomy of Performance gives us the framework to view the organization. Geary sees great similarities between the diagnostic work of a physician and that of a performance consultant. The following job aid from the Performance Design Lab gives us a unique look at the comparison.

Organizations invest billions on initiatives intended to improve productivity. Unfortunately, after the initial launch there is little evidence of change. In her workshop, Implementation: Assuring the Adoption, Judy will focus on implementation and going beyond the rollout of an initiative. She will show participants how to increase the odds that new behaviors, technologies, standards, values, and desired results are fully adopted by the organization. Judy identifies the following barriers to a successful implementation:

• Lack of business need
• Failure to assess feasibility
• Failure to identify and continuously enroll stakeholders
• Failure to confirm infrastructure and management systems supporting it
• Failure to measure and report regularly

These workshops are sure to be a highlight to this season’s professional development. For more information about the Workshops for the Performance Professional series and to register, click here.

Autumn brings many changes in our lives. Kids, and many adults, return to school as the leaves on trees transform their colors. Performance technologists manage change continuously in our work, and this month we will find some websites to help. I hope you find these resources useful, and your feedback is greatly appreciated. Any listing is for informational purposes only, and does not indicate an endorsement either by myself or the International Society for Performance Improvement.

Human Performance Technology (HPT) assumes that people can facilitate successful change in their work environments. In recent years, researchers and the popular media have examined change management to provide organizations with valuable tools for success. This month we examine some resources that can help link performance technology to change management. Polish your numismatics.

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
One focus of managing change is corporate renewal in the face of bankruptcy and financial crises. The Turnaround Management Association (TMA), with 34 chapters around the world and 7,000 members, provides information and resources to assist professionals with companies striving to restructure to maintain profitability. Their comprehensive site includes links to submission guidelines for The Journal of Corporate Renewal, a trend survey of “most troubled/most improved” industries, a detailed Code of Ethics, information on certification from the Association of Certified Turnaround Professionals, a limited job bank, and more. The TMA annual conference is October 18-21, 2005, in Chicago, Illinois. One HPT connection: “Step 2” of their stages of turnaround focuses on “Analyzing the situation.”

HPT@work
Ready to try some change management? How about a simulation for starters? Faculty at INSEAD’s Centre for Advanced Learning Technologies (CALT) in France provide a wide-ranging list of research and other resources of value to PTs. Check out their information on simulation, which includes links to two change management simulation games—the EIS simulation (where you can learn about “Chocolate and Change”) and The Innovation Diffusion Game. The vast resources available through CALT also include extensive resources on Organizational Behaviour, which also include several topics under “Change Management.” You can find out more about partnering with CALT on research projects. Hurry, the next deadline for the European Commission 6^th Framework programme, Call 5 is September 21, 2005!

I-Candy
What’s more rare than a problem-free change management process? How about a 1787 Brasher Doubloon with the hallmark on the eagle’s breast, not on the wing? Last sold at auction in 1981 for $625,000—if you have some spare change perhaps you can one day also purchase this “ultimate spotlight in all of numismatics." (Numismatics is “the study or collection of money, coins, and often medals,” according to Dictionary.com.) You can view other rare and international coins at http://coin-gallery.com/coins.htm. One HPT connection from this site’s links: Common sense, research data, and a focus on profitability demonstrate the value of the penny, according to Americans for Common Cents.

Until next month, cherish your valuable change. See you in October!

I-Spy continues to advocate for an official day, week, or month to honor HPT and our excellent profession. Please send your suggestions to tp@toddpacker.com, and we’ll share some ideas in a future column.

When he is not Internet trawling for ISPI, Todd Packer can be found improving business, non-profit, government, and individual performance through research, training, and innovation coaching as principal consultant of Todd Packer and Associates, LLC, based in Shaker Heights, Ohio. For sample articles on performance innovation and additional information, please visit www.toddpacker.com. Todd may be reached at tp@toddpacker.com.

by Judith A. Theobald, CPT, David B. Schultz, CPT, and William H. Taylor, CPT

The mission of Ford Motor Company Education, Training, and Development (ET&D) is to provide employees and suppliers with performance-based learning solutions that are innovative, cost-effective, and of the highest quality. In the past, ET&D leveraged an internal team of Instructional Systems Design (ISD) professionals to develop custom learning solutions for functional organizations within the company. In 2002, business factors required a decisive move to a new development model, with learning solution design and development outsourced to external vendors.

While outsourced to recognized industry leaders, the initial experience with external design and development projects fell short of company expectations. Vendor deliverables consistently exhibited significant quality concerns; resulting rework extended project timelines and often exceeded established budgets. The ISD manager formed an internal process improvement team composed of ET&D professionals to resolve this concern.

The team established an analysis plan and identified significant performance gaps that resulted in a failure to design best-in-class learning solutions. “Unclear expectations” was determined to be at the root of causal factors leading to the performance gap. Multiple approaches (e.g., EPSS, training, testing, and certification) to the performance problem were considered. The team determined that development and distribution of a comprehensive set of specifications could improve quality while reducing errors and rework by clearly defining expectations and improving process consistency.

The Web-Based Training Development Specification document was developed and implemented in January 2003 and is now positioned as a core component of the ET&D integrated instructional design model. Intended for use by internal and external training professionals, this performance aid describes corporate expectations and the process utilized for custom learning solution development, supporting project completion.

The performance aid was a critical enabler in the shift from the internal development team to an outsourced model. The benefits attained by closing the performance gap are of mutual benefit and include measurable improvements in instructional integrity, quality, and alignment with expectations, while reducing rework and cost.

By reducing dependence on memory and providing clear direction, the specifications assist in the development of insightfully designed, best-in-class, learning solutions that are defect free, delivered on time, and within budget. Based on a detailed comparison of four similar projects, the Ford Motor Company has benefited from a 32% reduction in development cost per training hour, while supplier partners have reduced rework and increased the quality of the learning solutions.

Distributed to ET&D partners, the performance aid provides an opportunity to share experience and best practices with colleagues in the performance improvement community. ET&D was pleased to find that ISPI selected the resource as an Outstanding Performance Aid in the 2005 Awards of Excellence program.

To further enhance the value of the award and to ensure greater exposure of the program throughout the Society’s membership and the profession, the International Society for Performance Improvement asked the 2005 Awards of Excellence recipients to contribute an article to PerformanceXpress highlighting their projects.

These are extreme times for our organizations. And, extreme times call for extreme learning!

The pace of business, the scale of our organizations, the continued warfare for talent, the deluge of information, the pressure of increased compliance, and the uncertainty of world events and economies translates into extreme pressure for learning and performance professionals.

Extreme learning is a conversation about learning strategies that are one standard deviation from today’s comfort zone. Extreme learning involves changing the form factor, content creation, coaching roles, collaboration styles, and timing of our performance improvement efforts. Imagine a new hire spending six hours gaming with real and avatar-based colleagues to gain a sense of the culture of the organization. Or, perhaps doing that during the original job interview. Imagine a coach connected to the mobile phone of a worker, engaging in several micro-level interventions during the day. Imagine an organization sending out an RSS feed (Rich Site Summary, an XML format for syndicating web content) every time an aspect of a worker’s job was impacted by a new regulation, and that feed showed up on a graphical dashboard on their computer! Extreme learning challenges us to think differently about content, consulting, assessment, collaboration, and engagement.

For those involved in learning efforts, here are the key questions that we are posing about extreme learning:

• Velocity: How do we increase the speed of development, delivery, and time to competency or compliance?
• Scalability: How do we deliver learning resources across the entire organization (globe) and massively increase availability?
• Intensity: How do we increase the intensity of the learner’s experience—making it more useful, engaging, transformational, and seamless—in the classroom and online?
• Personalization: How do we move toward a more personalized and useful set of content and context for each learner, without breaking our budget?
• Integration: How do we integrate learning into the daily work of the organization and integrate learning systems into the organization’s technology and systems?
• Effectiveness: At the end of the day, all that we do in the world of learning must be effective, for the learner and for the organization!

A similar set of questions can be raised for each of the dimensions of Human Performance Technology (HPT). How do we create greater velocity, scalability, intensity, personalization, integration, and effectiveness in our HPT efforts?

These issues will be addressed head-on at The MASIE Center’s new upcoming event, Learning 2005, which is co-hosted by ISPI, October 30 through November 2. Global leaders in the learning and performance world, including Malcolm Gladwell (author of Blink and The Tipping Point), Steve Johnson (author of Everything Bad is Good for You), Marshall Goldsmith, Frances Hesselbein, Bob Pike, Wayne Hodgins, and Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, will join me in a series of dialogues about the future state of learning and performance. There will also be a special workshop presented by ISPI on HPT. For more information, click here.

On a sunny day in July, San Francisco/Bay Area ISPI members attended the “Annual” Oyster Barbeque at Stinson Beach. For the last 20+ years (more or less) this group has gathered to renew old acquaintances and establish new friends within the ISPI network. Roger Chevalier acted as the oyster czar, traveling hours to obtain a sufficient number of oysters to feed the more than 40 ISPI members and their families. Past presidents Margo Murray and Roger Addison got to the beach in the early morning to reserve space. The two most recent Thomas F. Gilbert Professional Achievement Award recipients Bill Daniels and Don Tosti were on hand to help with the grilling and eating duties.

To submit your testimonial, send an email to membership@ispi.org and include your full name, title, company, city, and state. If you’d like to include a photo of yourself, please attach a color photo to the email (preferably JPG format). Your testimonial and photo will be posted on the ISPI website. For more information or questions, contact Francis George at 301.587.8570, ext. 110.

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 e-mail 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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Feel free to forward ISPI’s PerformanceXpress newsletter to your colleagues or anyone you think may benefit from the information. If you are reading someone else’s PerformanceXpress, send your complete contact information to april@ispi.org, and you will be added to the PerformanceXpress emailing list.

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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Phone: 301.587.8570
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