An Interview with Harold Stolovitch and Erica Keeps
by George Hall
Harold Stolovitch and Erica Keeps share a common passion - developing people.
Their latest book, Telling Ain't Training, tackles the three universal
and persistent questions of the profession - how do learners learn, why
do learners learn, and how do you make sure learning sticks? The
authors describe the practices they have found most effective and offer
a universal model that can provide instructors with instantly
successful learning sessions. The book, published in 2002 with the
International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI), is ASTD's
best-selling publication to date.
George Hall (GH): What role should trainers play in the learning process?
Harold
Stolovitch (HS): Unfortunately, many trainers see themselves as "high
priests of content," and that their mission is to be sure that their
content is presented in a pure manner. This role is very different from
the role we advocate - the trainer as the learner's coach, the catalyst
for change within the learner. The key to training, developing, and
growing someone is not just an information transmission of accurate
content - that is insufficient. It is much more and much greater. The
key idea in our book is that you are transforming a person, and as a
result of the intervention you make, they no longer are who they were
before you started.
GH: How did the "high priest of content" role become so common?
HS:
It is based on the Master/Apprentice model. In other words, the belief
that people who know something are able to form those who do not know
something. In business and industry, trainers are often selected
because they are masters of a craft or content; they are experts. The
assumption is that if they know how to do it, they can train others to
become proficient. So, their respect and authority come from the
content, from what they know and know how to do. They focus on
transmitting this to novices.
This
sort of "transmitting" is simply insufficient. When you just provide
information, you lose the feedback loop. Transmitting is like a radio
play. Our hearing is very selective. We hear partially and learn
partially and often inaccurately. Our hearing is biased by our prior
knowledge. So, transmission ends up as a confused, one-way street. When
we assume the "high priest" of our content or work role, there is no
way we can know what, if anything, has been acquired and to what extent
it has been assimilated.
~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~
Learner Centered and Performance- Based
~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~
GH: What are the most important practices that empower the instructional process?
HS:
The most important practices can be summed up in two terms:
learner-centered and performance- based. What we do has to be focused on
and wrapped around the learner; otherwise it doesn't make any sense.
The fact that you gave the learner something has little value if they
can't do what is required with what you gave them. Performance- based
implies that they have to be able to do it and demonstrate that they
can do it. That's why our mantra for training is learner-centered and
performance- based.
Erica
Keeps (EK): In our research and practice, we have found much of the
training you see in organizations today is instructor-centered and
content-based. This type of training employs the "high priest" analogy
that Harold referred to earlier. We advocate a model that is really a
flip from the instructor being the center of the universe to the
learner being the center. We focus on "performance- based" as compared
to "what is the content."
GH: What beliefs or practices harm
the instructional process?
HS:
One counter-productive belief is "I told you, therefore you know." The
fact that I told you doesn't mean that you know; yet we often use this
with our children. The emphasis here is more on the stimulus rather
than the response. With many of the so-called "Professional Training
Courses," the emphasis is placed on the technique the instructor uses.
Techniques are supposed to "trigger" learning. A heavily
instructor-centered approach, however, places too much focus on what I,
as a trainer, should do rather than what the learner should do.
Telling
alone has never been satisfactory, unless you scream FIRE and point to
the door. In other words, learners will learn from anything if the
"heat" is great enough. There will always be a few avid learners - the
ones who sit at the front and take notes and are very excited. Avid
learners can learn despite the instructor. But under normal
circumstances, and particularly in a workplace setting where people who
do jobs have to train, it never makes sense just to pour content into
their heads.
EK:
Another counter-productive belief focuses attention on the somewhat
natural separation between the learner and the instructor instead of
focusing on the inter-relationships between the two. Oddly enough, many
people have been taught to present while standing in a 9-foot square
box, the instructor's area. Learners are taught to remain in their
area. There is almost a magic line that should not be crossed. We
believe that the "magic line" approach is counter-productive to the way
we want to engage our learners and have a continuing dialogue with
them.
HS: When I went to secondary school, for
example, I had Masters who wore black gowns and were on a stage. There
was a very great separation between the learner and the instructor.
When the Master stepped away from that "separate" role, interesting
things began to happen. For example, to excite us about Latin poetry,
our teacher said that if we translated all the poetry, he would let us
read "naughty" Latin poems. All of a sudden - we all wanted to read.
So, after this barrier was broken down, there was an initiation of real
dialogue - "Ooo, what does this mean?" "What does that mean?" We all
wanted to learn then. We drove the teacher.
~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~
Compensating for Learner Deficiencies
~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~
GH:
In your book, you mentioned, that "Three major factors influence how
much and how well we learn: ability, prior knowledge, and motivation.
How can trainers compensate for learner deficiencies in these areas?
EK:
Let's start with ability. We compensate for the lack of ability by
simplifying and then providing the opportunity to practice in a
supportive manner. We provide lots of feedback, give them
reinforcement, and where necessary, corrective feedback that gets them
back on track.
If
motivation is lacking, we add value to the learning task. In other
words, we build a positive environment that affects the mood; we
modulate confidence, making sure they understand the impact of what
they are learning, and the perceived value. We try to keep it at just
the right level - mood and confidence level. If people are
over-confident, negative things can happen: they can screen out or
tune out or think, "I've done that." In contrast, if learners are
under-confident, they may be too fearful or even freeze up.
Finally,
to compensate for the lack of prior knowledge, we can provide
prerequisite training, use meaningful analogies, and build in concrete
examples to which learners can easily relate. These ideas represent
just some of the many possibilities.
GH: How can trainers apply the learner-centered model you
recommend?
EK:
To adopt a learner-centered model, you need a continuous dialogue and
conversation with your learners. You begin by asking questions of the
learners and raising questions in them. Either draw on their needs or
create needs that they didn't even realize that they had. This
is part of establishing that "rationale" and the "readiness" to learn.
Next, you focus on meeting those needs. You provide a constant stream
of challenging activities, continually verify performance, and provide
feedback. Your measure of success is your learner's success. Success,
in this context, is not about you or a "magic" number of hours learners
spend in training.
HS:
I'm writing a chapter for a book, right now, in which we talk about
this very issue. In practice, companies establish training groups to
get people to be able to learn and perform. Once you have a training
group that has been around for a long time, however, its prime mission
becomes one of "survival." So, what they do is produce more training.
They "train" their management to accept this as their measure of
success: How many people did we train? How many hours?
GH: Are these types of trainers trapped by their own metrics? Is this a self-fulfilling prophecy?
HS:
Trapped, yes, and to a certain extent, they may like it that way. In
automotive dealerships, for example, you are often dealing with
anywhere from 75 to 400 percent annual turnover in salespeople. Such
high rates of turnover, however, create a wonderful "market" or demand
for training. Consequently, your job as trainer is now secure. What is
the incentive for "trainers" to solve the turn-over problem? You might
put yourself out of business.
EK:
This is the same industry that often measures what we do for them in
terms of the number of units we produce, because that's the only way
they know how to measure success. For example, you can build a job aid
that may only take up one page, but it replaces a technical manual that
might be 37 pages. However, when management looks at the two, it
appears as if you had accomplished more work with the longer one.
Management may reject the tool that will enable people to perform
effectively and efficiently and prefer a technical manual, which nobody
will ever read. It should be the other way around. It should be that
truly helpful things are brilliantly simple rather than weighty and
complex.
The "Universals" of Learning
GH: Can you describe the universal model in your book, which can be used to structure any learning session?
HS:
The five-step model comes out of research on learning. There is a lot
of research on learning but in our model, we have extracted what I call
the "universals. " They are simple. If learners know why they are
learning something, and that "why" rationale is credible and meaningful
and valued by them, then the probability of learning increases. If they
know "what" is required of them, the same is true. If learners have
opportunities to respond, to engage (particularly mentally) with the
learning content and to receive feedback (directly confirming or
correcting their responses and are rewarded for it), the probability of
learning will often be increased.
What is nice about this model is that it is
versatile - you can apply it to new situations or even "retrofit" it to
an existing course by breaking the existing course into viable chunks
or modules. For example, if an existing course or one of its modules is
missing a rationale, you provide it; an objective, you give it; if it
is missing the practice components or response opportunities, you add
it, etc. It is a universal model because you can use it with any type
or age of learner population, with any number of learners, with any
content, any context, and with any medium. It is absolutely applicable
to e-learning.
GH: The "guiding principles" of your
book include - (1) Start with the learner and never lose focus; (2)
Provide training sessions that are structured on learning research by
developing conversational dialogues, fun exercises, and challenges.
What inspired you to adopt these as your guiding principles?
HS:
We adopted these principles simply because they work. We are dedicated
to the principles derived from learning research rather than hype and
enthusiasm. You know all the hype and enthusiasm that there has been
over delivery methods, particularly with e-learning. Before e-learning,
video based training was all the rage. In reality, both of these
approaches do not necessarily lead trainers to focus squarely on the
learner. "Learner-centered and performance- based" is our guiding
mantra, regardless of delivery means. Many organizations are caught up
in the hype and enthusiasm, and it is our job to remain dedicated to
our guiding principles, to keep people focused on what the requirements
are, and to get the right results.
EK:
Exactly. Learning is an intelligent and enjoyable conversation using
the application of what we have presented in Telling Ain't Training. We
view training as being like an accordion - expand or contract the
application of various elements, depending on how much time you have,
the relative importance, the impact of what you are training people to
do, the size of your group, and a number of other variables.
For
example, a learner analysis may just consist of a phone call with a
couple of learners from your target population, or it could be a
comprehensive, across-the-board learner analysis. What is important is
that there are certain steps that we never skip. In other words, we are
bound and determined to uphold our process, our values, and our guiding
principles.
Harold D. Stolovitch is Professor
Emeritus of Instructional and Performance Technology at the Université
de Montréal and Clinical Professor of Human Performance at Work at the
University of Southern California. He has written almost 200 articles,
research reports, book chapters and books. Stolovitch is past president
of the International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI). Harold
D. Stolovitch and Erica J. Keeps are principals of HSA Learning and
Performance Solutions LLC. Keeps was a corporate training director for
two large American organizations and was a faculty member ofUniversity
of Michgan's Executive Education Center. Keeps and Stolovitch are
co-editors of the award-winning Handbook of Human Performance
Technology.
Interviewer
George Hall is an MBA graduate of the Marshall School of Business at
the University of Southern California. He teaches in the College of
Business Administration at the University of Central Florida and the
University of Phoenix. He can he reached at geohall@eudoramail. com.
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