When you’ve designed, developed and delivered technical training, you understand the complexities.
You must commit extra effort to ensure technical accuracy within an instructional flow that frequently follows a sequential, linear learning process.
But by focusing so much energy on capturing technical material in an instructionally sound framework, it’s easy to forget the entire training process is a HUMAN-CENTERED one.
This oversight is why some technical training becomes deeply internalized and implemented… while other equally sound training is barely remembered.
We pioneered a different approach to technically-focused training.
An approach that starts where solid content, training communication and participant engagement intersect.
Success starts with a promise
Decades of research have shown adults – even young adults – must know WHY they’re learning.
Without knowing the why, learners struggle to internalize and apply their new knowledge. Even when content is technically accurate and instructionally sound.
So how you communicate your training’s why drives how well learners internalize and apply your training. And communication success begins long before your training event.
It starts with how you share upcoming training opportunities… extends to how you describe each training event… and continues to post-event evaluations.
Without a connected, cohesive thread that clearly and continually conveys your training’s why, you can unknowingly create obstacles.
Obstacles that prevent learners from internalizing and applying your training.
A promise is no guarantee
Yet even when learners own their why and the content is solid, your training can still fall short.
Shortfalls often occur when a training event emphasizes information dissemination rather than application.
In such trainings, the majority of learners may pass a post-course assessment. But only a fraction will retain that training’s knowledge for a month. Even fewer will apply it.
And those numbers shrink further for technically-based content… because by definition, internalizing technical content is more challenging.
Worse still, an increasingly cultural diverse learner population has magnified these engagement challenges. And diversification has exploded as training virtualization decimates geographic borders.
Unfortunately, many organizations still cling to that information dissemination model.
The EASY button
We’ve seen this struggle up close – because we’ve helped clients like IBM, Ford, the U.S. government, Roche Pharmaceuticals and others overcome these obstacles.
When we’ve asked why conquering these challenges is so hard, almost unanimously they say, “Even in the best of times it’s hard to recruit, hire and retain a team with such a broad diversity of skills.
“And in more difficult times, the budget to do so disappears.”
That’s why we created IDT Group almost 20 years ago – to supplement clients’ internal capabilities so they could successfully make that shift.
Since then, we’ve shown how fusing communication and engagement with technically-focused instructional system design (ISD) can transform technical-training programs.
And recent trends have only reinforced our experience.
We’ve seen that the shift from in-person, instructor-led training (ILT) to virtualized delivery exposes communication and engagement weaknesses in existing training programs.
And that same shift magnifies the need for training to resonate with a culturally-diverse audience.
We encourage you to learn how our unique combination of skills and experience can help you. And discover more about our satisfied clients and their past projects.
Then when you’d like to discover how we can help you, contact us for your free, no-obligation consultation.