Contributed by Devin Purcell • Technical Trainer
Editor’s note: In this new multi-part series, Devin Purcell will tackle the skills shortage that the fluid power industry is facing and offer creative solutions to address this challenge. Find an article about apprenticeships, Bloom’s Taxonomy and the importance of details, and step-by-step outlines.
If you have been following along over the past few months, you have walked alongside me as we have created a learning pathway —a pathway to expedite the transfer of knowledge from senior technicians to junior technicians. Creating learning objectives and outlining processes were only a few of the subjects we touched on. This article will be the final installment in the series, and we will discuss the concept of change.
As the title of this article states, change is good. Not all change is bad, and we need to remember this when your training program begins.
As we have discussed various subjects, I have included some different methods of learning, such as Bloom’s Taxonomy. This article is going to focus on a different learning method and an addition I have personally made to it, ADDIE. ADDIE is an acronym that stands for Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, and Evaluation. While all of these stages are important, I think there is a critical letter missing in ADDIE and I always include it — R.
R is for Revise and Refine, which should be done at the end any learning material creation.
Just like anything in business, you need to know what the ROI (return on investment) on your training program is. While ROI in numbers is easy to understand, ROI on learning can be harder to decipher.
Are you finding that your trainees are completing the program but lacking the skills you wanted them to acquire? This is the time to revise, refine, and make changes for the next person who goes through the program.
Any of the programs I have created in the past have never been perfect the first time they were run, and I apologize to anyone who attended those classes. They get better with time, much like a fine wine. This is why it is crucial to monitor the program’s results closely. This could be a one-on-one interview with the trainee and trainer after the program, or it could be a formalized test. Paper-based or practical, whatever works best for you.
With these results, you can then jump into the material and revise and refine. Perhaps you have learning objectives that do not meet your needs. Perhaps you’re missing material in the course that will help the trainee overcome the final learning hurdle. Or, maybe you are missing out on providing valuable practical training to complement the formal training. It is always essential to ensure that any book-based learning is complemented by practical, hands-on learning tasks.
It is important to note that for any of the learning objectives that you create, any processes that you outline, or any training methods that you implement in this process, you are not bound by an unwritten law to keep repeating the process over and over again. You can change it at any time.
The revision and refining step is never-ending. If you can imagine a program that runs for 10 years, numerous changes will occur during this time. Perhaps the diagnostic tools change due to different software, or new technologies are released that have never been seen before. Additionally, trainees’ learning habits may evolve, and old training methods may no longer be effective.
There are endless things that can change over the course of running a successful training program, and it is important that changes are made. This is how effective training programs continue to run year after year.
My mentality for providing great programs for trainees is the following: Make changes daily to the training material as it is delivered. Please do not wait until the program is over to change it all at one time. You will forget only to remember the next time you deliver the learning material. Instead, make the changes as soon as you notice something that should be removed or added, such as spelling corrections, timing adjustments, etc. A simple word document change here and there is much quicker than rewriting an entire document when the training is finished.
I hope you have all enjoyed this brief overview on how to create an effective training program and help combat the brain drain prevalent in all mechanical trades. It is ever so important to ensure that all the skills acquired by our senior technicians are passed down to the next generation.
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