Your learners are on their marks and ready to race through the Learner's Journey. From the starting line to the finish, you need them to carry the baton from awareness down the track to application, but there's one slight problem. While your learners are all lined up at a starting line, they're not starting from the exact same point. Some learners are ready to run the race and cross the finish line with ease, while other learners need a bit of guidance. And then there are the few who don't even realize they are in a race at all.
So, how do you create a learning strategy that caters to all learners, regardless of their starting point?
Cold Turkey Copycats
It's undeniable: We love a good learning theory--especially one that translates into practice. At ELX, one of our foundational scientific models is the Transtheoretical Model by Prochaska and DiClimente (1983).
Basically, our friends P & D went on a quest to understand how people quit smoking cold turkey. The ultimate goal was to see how treatment centers could replicate the best practices of those who independently quit smoking and turn them into generalized programs to help others.
Prochaska and DiClimente studied over 800 subjects. They uncovered that regardless of how excellent a treatment center's best practices, activities, and content were, no behaviors would change if the patient wasn't ready to make the change.
You see, the treatment centers were making a common mistake that we often see in Instructional Design; they assumed that just because patients enrolled in their treatment program, it meant patients were ready to make the changes necessary for their success. This mistake is similar to rolling out mandatory training to employees and assuming they are ready to change their behavior because they accepted the calendar invite.
The Five Stages of Change
After their study, P & D discovered that people go through five stages of change as they move from one behavior and mindset into another. Let's take a moment to break down each stage and how you build a learning strategy around them.
The Five Stages of Change
Precontemplation
Contemplation
Action
Maintenance
Relapse
Precontemplation
During the precontemplation stage, your learner is underperforming, and they don't even realize it's a problem. Maybe they are answering the phone with the incorrect greeting or forgetting to mention the newest promotion when they speak to customers.
Regardless of the behavior, if they aren't aware that what they are doing is problematic, they certainly don't have plans to change it. Learners may even feel a little defensive if you tell them their way of doing things is wrong.
As you build out your learning strategy, be sensitive to the learners at this stage and use empathy to understand their perspectives while tapping into positive reinforcement and motivation to help them understand why best practices are best practices.
Elevate your learning experience with:
Empathy training for managers to help them meet learners where they are
Research what could motivate employees to change this behavior and how to positively reinforce best practices.
Host round tables with employees to hear their perspectives and understand their unique starting points.
Contemplation
When you contemplate something, you are in a state of weighing the pros and cons. For learners in this stage of change, it's essential to continue raising their awareness of the benefits of applying best practices and the potential consequences if they don't.
In your learning strategy, design a training environment that allows learners to see what happens when they do or do not apply best practices. Keep your feedback transparent and your education frequent.
Elevate your learning experience with:
A learning game that leverages Procedural Rhetoric
Newsletters that explain the benefits of best practices
A script for managers to use in team meetings and one-on-ones
Action
Congratulations! Your learners have reached the Take Action milestone. They're following your advice, applying best practices, and thinking, "Yea, that training team is really on to something."
So, keep the momentum going with positive and social reinforcement by identifying superstars who act as internal influencers that get their peers pumped up to make the change themselves.
Elevate your learning experience with:
Intentional callouts of excellent performers during all-team calls
An internal influencers program
Highlights of superstar employees on each of your newsletters
Maintenance
While it's incredible that your employees are starting to take action, it's not enough. They must maintain this behavior through thick and thin, even when it may not be the most convenient.
Plug content into your learning strategy that helps learners cope with temptation and teaches them how to bounce back if they misstep.
Elevate your learning experience with:
One pagers and charts that are easily referenceable
Just-in-time learning that easily supports employees during the workflow
Continuous conversations about the best practices in company podcasts, newsletters, and all-team meetings, like townhalls
Relapse
Unfortunately, learners can relapse to the undesired behavior and may or may not have the intention to begin applying best practices again. The relapse stage is the perfect time for a heart-to-heart and some self-reflection to get your learner back on board.
As you finish up your learning strategy, consider ways to discuss the benefits of the best practices and how they help the learner, their peers, and the organization as a whole. Build out activities that support self-reflection and partner with managers to continually monitor their performance and success.
Elevate your learning experience with:
Self-reflection surveys
Scripts for managers to share with underperformers
A mini-course that reintroduces the best practices to the learner in the context of relapsing and getting back on track
Performance management is no easy task when you're responsible for the learning, development, and performance of dozens (or hundreds) of employees. While learners may start at different places on their learning journey, you can use the five stages of the Transtheoretical Model to support them at every stage of change. What are your thoughts on the Transtheoretical Method? Connect with us on LinkedIn to join the conversation.
Reference:
Prochaska, J. O., & DiClemente, C. C. (1983). Stages and processes of self-change of smoking: Toward an integrative model of change. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 51(3), 390–395. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-006x.51.3.390
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