Today I got together via phone with one of our subject matter experts (SMEs) regarding some safety training. Just to give you some information, the training is simply a step-by-step guide on what to do when certain things happen. For example, what is a front line supervisor supposed to do when someone gets injured or there is a forklift accident. It’s called “What to Do…When…” and he informed me that he did not want to have any audio or voice over. The presentation already has absolutely NO graphics. This is still one of the strangest requests I have ever seen or heard. I, personally, have great apprehension of putting anything on the LMS without any sound. I already have a difficult time being limited to no video (bandwidth issues). Honestly, I hate to have my name attached to any training development that I believe is not effective, which I believe training with no audio will be. However, I know it is not about me, yet it is also not about the SME either. Instead it is about the learner, the student, the field person.

I understand the apprehension to have audio and voice over simply because of the time and effort it takes. No one wants to writes scripts. No one wants to wait another week. No one wants their material changed or adapted. On the other hand, I cannot understand why anyone would want an eLearning course, SCORM course for that matter, and not have any audio (or video for that matter!). That’s the purpose of SCORM, to create a learning environment that closely mimics a classroom setting that is reusable and repeatable without any further explanation (I haven’t had any formal education nor have I done any reading in this area [SCORM], so I could be missing something here). Any and all eLearning and instructional design principles scream against not using any sound, or multimedia (it’s death by PowerPoint). eLearning professionals are already up in arms with the need to push learning 2.0, mobile learning, and virtual learning, which we haven’t even come close to considering (nor is our system capable of handling such things without some upgrades). Even Adobe, the creator of many multimedia applications, writes that there are things that need to be discussed via audio and not text. However, if we really don’t want to use audio for whatever reason, because frankly, sometimes audio is not useful (for it would be naive to think that it is always useful), then we need to ask ourselves, is the LMS the proper means? Is this training not more effective in another venue? Why not just send them an email or a document or create a wiki (which I believe the current training is fit for)? But if we continue down the eLearning road, let’s consider a few more questions. Would any of us take a class or a training willingly that the teacher didn’t speak (not considering sign language of course) and all we had was the PowerPoint? How many of us like to listen to someone speak that simply read their sermon or speech (esp. as compared to a speaker who deviates from the script or a speaker who doesn’t read)? [Yes I know some people read their scripts really well, but not the majority of business people do, and in my experience, esp. SMEs.] Does everyone learn the same way (only through reading with some very limited visual support)?

And if I may, safety training is already considered extremely boring before we even begin. It’s got that reputation for a reason. All we are doing is encouraging people to skim and just complete the training. Or as I have seen field operatives, they skim to the test, try it and if they fail go back and only read pertinent information as it regards the test. People are not learning anything. They are just jumping through a hoop. Are Behaviors and actions changing due to the training? Do we really think or expect that people will memorize all the information from the safety training?There is a lot of material there (35+ slides breaking every PowerPoint rule known, font size range=12-24). Or will people most likely have to do something else like call someone (like you) or have it all written down and refer to it as things happen? I know when I was in the field, many managers didn’t memorize anything unless they had to as a requirement from their service center manager (and even then they only memorized it half way and learned who really knew the information as a go to person/contact, which usually meant me).

The safety manager noted that people will be there to support and train people in the field, and that’s great! However, while this may be true, how do we know that everyone is getting the same support? How do we know that everyone is having the stuff that is left out or left for confusion explained to them? Why not take a little bit of extra time on the front end to write scripts and make the learning object impactful? It is logical that training that engages the three learning styles (Audio, Visual, and Kinesthetic/Active) will be much more effective than training that only hits at one learning style (which is what “What to do…When” does). Second to that, if there are people in the field then why not just hand them a manual or a document and explain it to them (but I will get back to this)? In short, why is this training being put on the LMS? What are we trying to accomplish? Do we just want to say that everyone was trained? Or do we want to make an impact with the training?

What would you add?