Liftology 11: How We Begin

Overall, a learning journey is composed of the event or events, and the LIFTs that extend the learning.  What’s required to get that right? It actually starts with a focus for everything that’s created, and then you need to know what to create as a foundation, and then how to build on that. We’ve been talking the basics, but let’s put the bigger picture together.

First, you need a specific learning goal to achieve, your learning (or, really, performance) objective. That is, what do people need to be able to do as a result of your learning intervention? Ideally, it’s something observable, and measurable. That is, you can have criteria that say whether someone’s achieved the necessary level or not. It can be as simple as “perform four transactions out of five without an error”, or as complex as “able create a clear and minimal report that successfully documents the situation, the alternatives, the criteria, and the resulting decision, with that decision being the best option”. A good model has three criteria: what folks have to do, in what context, and to what level. It’s that last that’s the ‘measurable’ bit. 

With that objective clear, then you want all your material to align closely to that objective. (Note, many learning journeys may have several learning objectives.) That includes the model, the examples, and the practices. The model, or models, should clearly indicate how the world works in this particular case. The examples should show the models applied to particular contexts. And the practices should ask the learners to apply the models to address problems in other contexts (again, the total context span across examples and practice determines the space of transfer, that is how well learners can apply the model to different situations including those not seen in the learning experience). 

What’s important to realize is that the first experience with the models, examples, and practice are best seen together to an initial level of capability. That level will likely fade unless reactivated, which LIFTs accomplish. However, you’ll new examples and new practices, at least, if not new models (and new models provide different ways or more complex nuances to address things). Also, to truly develop folks, you’ll want to move from reactivation to application, having learners start applying the models to real situations, and improving them over time as well. 

Ultimately, you want to take learners from where they are before they start to where you need them to be. Events, alone, are unlikely to do that. With a good foundation, however, and extending the learning, via LIFTs or otherwise, you’re far more likely to achieve your outcome, and be able to document the success. That’s what we’re about.