About The Book

You probably spend more time than you might find productive seated on an airplane. Maybe you’re on one right now.

Can you imagine getting on a plane with an untrained pilot at the controls and wondering if he or she will safely transport you to your destination? Of course not. Yet, as a company leader, you’re unclear on the actual skills and knowledge of your workforce and whether they are providing a competitive advantage? Well, join the crowd. Most executives have no idea how training can be used to provide the same benefits as sales and marketing. But, you’re in luck. This book will detail precisely why your training is not eliciting measurable business results and how you can begin to use learning as a true competitive advantage.

Now obviously you’re quick to see that the effectiveness of pilot training matters, but your plane is not suffering equipment failure, you’re not at risk of crashing, so what does pilot training have to do with you? More importantly, what does it have to do with your company and your employees? The truth is that there’s a great deal your company could learn from how pilots are trained. The root of pilot training is learner-focused, interactive, hands-on, problem solving oriented, and asks that the pilot apply what he or she has learned. Several aspects of this approach to pilot instruction are elemental parts of S4 NetQuest’s scientifically developed and results-proven instructional design methodology known as M-Pact Learning. M-Pact Learning is the key to designing, developing, and implementing learning that provides your organization with a true competitive advantage.

M-Pact Learning: the New Competitive Advantage will not only demonstrate the ins and outs of a number of transformational corporate success stories, it will illuminate the rigorously researched and carefully developed learning approaches that have created such success.

As an intern in United Airline’s 767 fleet, I had the opportunity to see what state-of-the-art training is all about. With United, my learning included the best-in-class instructors and the use of sophisticated flight simulators that allowed every imaginable variety of scenarios a pilot could encounter, from engine failures and smoke in the cockpit to thunderstorm penetration and instrument malfunctions. From the simulator, I graduated to actual flight checks in the airliner that exposed me to all types of critical events and often to emergency situations. I was constantly evaluated and always debriefed in ways that had direct repercussions on the stages of my training and determined when I required remediation of knowledge or skills I had not yet mastered. Such sophisticated mechanisms will not surprise you in this environment, for airline pilots, like surgeons, are considered the best-trained professionals in their industries.

If you went right now and polled your own employees, I doubt that many would rate their training as engaging, rigorous, or highly effective. For most, often for trainees and trainers alike, job-required education is viewed as a necessary evil. Yet your guts tell you that good training matters a great deal. You probably have no instruments in place that allow you measure how it impacts your bottom line, and, as a company leader, most likely you’re largely unclear on the actual skills and knowledge of your workforce and whether they are providing a competitive advantage. If so, you’re certainly not alone. Most executives have no idea how training can be used to provide the same effects as sales and marketing. Because of this, most likely training in your company hasn’t changed much over many decades. The company may have moved some of its training onto the web or added tablets or remote instructors to the mix, but the presence of technology should not be confused with quality teaching or carefully designed instruction. Our experience at S4 NetQuest suggests that most training still relies heavily on traditional methodologies. These traditional methodologies include:

• Lectured-based classrooms taught by subject matter experts
• Emphasis on the teacher rather than the learner
• Learning as a singular event rather than a continuous process
• Online “page-turners” where learners rush through slides to quickly complete a test
• Assessments that test rote memorization of facts rather than the ability to apply specific skills and knowledge in authentic situations

These methods will never provide measurable business results or a competitive advantage. But they are what most companies continue to use because they have no idea how to design, develop, or implement truly innovative, highly effective learning solutions.

In Chapter 1, we’ll dig deep into why traditional training methods don’t work and begin to demonstrate why the M-Pact Learning approach S4 NetQuest has developed has proven so effective.

Most traditional training is designed and developed by such subject matter experts, not by instructional designers, so there is little or no knowledge of innovative, highly effective instructional design methodologies. This becomes even more pronounced when SMEs are required to develop more advanced learning assets such as structured field experiences and performance support applications. And, as noted earlier, most traditional training is built on outdated teaching methods that are neither engaging nor effective, with heavy reliance on lecture, PowerPoint presentations, and self-guided reading (if reading alone worked, we wouldn’t need training in the first place). Whenever training does not utilize the principles of M-Pact Learning, the learner cannot see the application or value of what is being taught and will have extreme difficulty applying that learning. SMEs do possess vital subject information, which is critical to developing learning objectives and identifying the skills and knowledge essential to high-level performance. Many SMEs can be trained to deliver various components of the learning solution. But these abilities alone don’t make them adept at designing a comprehensive learning solution.

As a career-long designer of highly effective learning solutions, it pains me to realize these learners in traditional training environments will never provide their organizations with a competitive advantage. The M-Pact Learning methodology, when correctly employed, will ensure measurable business results.