I was thinking about how much the industry has changed for those of us in the learning and performance (L&P) arena. Now I will tell you that I was able to get on the ground early and skip a lot of what this article is mostly about, but I feel that I should address it anyhow. So what do I mean by the title of this blog post? Well a few things…

One is that I see a parallel between the music industry and the L&P industry in that they both have had to grow up a little bit in terms of what they stand for. If we go back to 1999 when Britney Spears and N’Sync were all the rage we were so dazzled (some of us anyway) by how they were “performing” with all the lights and back up dancers we didn’t miss the most crucial piece: they weren’t actually singing.

During that time “trainers” were delivering mostly classroom instruction and printing lots of workbooks for our “trainees”. Most of them had a corporate account with Trainer’s Warehouse. They handed out the smile sheets at the end of the class. The best part? Just like when Britney hit us one more time, the training department was in awe and excitement when their attendance rate was greater than 50%.

While both of our industries were excelling at the time, I feel that now both of our industries have changed. As learning professionals we are moving in the direction of what real performance looks like and how we get our organizations there. We are designing for performance while keeping learning in mind. We are all becoming increasingly innovative in the discoveries and strides we are making to progress forward. We are rejecting the fakers like the smile sheet for a better outcome, better performance.

In the music industry the same thing is happening. Singers are being criticized for their use of autotune on their records and the fact that 80% of their live shows are lip synced. Now singers like Lady Gaga (personal bias) have arrived pushing what it means to be a performer. Singing live, carrying a message, and keeping fans engaged. Our equivalent of that is making the learning experience real and measuring performance all while providing them with the tools and information they need for success.

So the need for real performance in both industries is very much alive and is the new norm that is expected among “supporters”. What it ends up being is the proof that we are all the real deal in our respective professions.

I was always taught to know better regarding performance because I stayed current in the industry and applied it to everyday life. It’s interesting when you start working with people who are not there yet. I sometimes ask myself “Why are they doing it that way, don’t they know it’s outdated?” Then you have the people that know what they need to do but for some reason they don’t change their behavior…

I hope that this helps to elaborate on how far we have come in the L&P industry and shed some light on what we are now expected to be working towards for now and especially the future in our profession.

LEARNHAUS

Recently I had the opportunity to speak to a Fortune 500 company about their learning strategy. Like many companies, they adapted their strategy from an existing model and used it to fit their organization. One of those models was the 70-20-10 rule of thought. While I did like their use of the model I didn’t like the misconceptions the model gave.

It wasn’t the first I had heard of it, but the first time that I saw it being used in an actual organization. As I discovered more about it I realized that I liked the recognition of all the available learning means to a learner and not necessarily the model itself. I decided to do some more research about it just to back up my own opinion.

There is a whole backchannel of articles and information that I found on 70-20-10 from Guy Wallace that you might find insightful.

Basically what I found was that 70-20-10 is really a prescriptive remedy for managers to be developed into senior managers & executives. But I don’t see it useful for daily learning workflows. It really separates each modality into sections and pushes the use of staying in line with those numbers. I don’t think that you should follow this as a rule of thumb with today’s learning strategies. To conform to these numbers would be, in the words of Will Thalheimer, making it more bogus and dangerous.

Another interesting thing that I didn’t think of was the Amplifier Effect which says that formal training actually clarifies and boosts the 90% of informal training. Then I think of the role performance support plays in this. I think that it supports that boost and clarification to translate to actual use of the training on the job (formal training should also relate to the context of the job if you have designed it effectively, but that is another story). To me it seems that this is more of a reflective trend in learning versus the go-to model to follow. All three work together, it doesn’t make one more important than the other. Is it simply the state of learning or is it an actual validation?

I will end this post with a quote from Michael Stanford in his article, Curse of 70-20-10.

“70-20-10? How about 100. Every learning experience, whether it takes place in a structured setting or in the chaos of every day work, should apply a disciplined learning mindset to real-world challenges.”

I agree with this statement because now more than ever learning should be embedded into the context of the actual work that is being done. I also think that learning in an organization, as we know it is still evolving more and more each year as we are discovering new ways to make learning more nimble for the workforce.

LearnHaus