Considering the following fictional case study and the accompanying learner personas I craft an analysis of the learning knots and needs that should be addressed.
Case study:
In an effort to drive diversity, inclusion, and equity in its workplace, a local financial technology company has quarterly training sessions on cultural sensitivity and communication as part of their employee wellness programme. The sessions consist of a one-hour tutorial video on cultural sensitivity in the workplace, which staff are given one week to complete. Completing the quarterly training is a requirement for their quarterly performance evaluation.
After the last quarterly training session, a survey was conducted, and it was found that staff struggled to maintain focus as the tutorial video was too long and the presenter was not sufficiently engaging. It was also reported that, while staff generally understood the general value in cultural sensitivity, the relevance to their own workplace was not made clear. Since the main motivation to complete the training was around performance evaluation and the content was dull, the overall learning experience was described as ineffective.
You, the instructional designer, have been tasked with addressing these challenges by conducting a needs and task analysis for future training sessions.
The following learner personas have been drawn up to inform your analyses.
Thembi:
Thembi works in the company’s call centre. As she deals with both internal and external stakeholder communication, cultural sensitivity is a touchstone of her role. However, since she has much practical experience dealing with individuals of diverse cultures on a daily basis, she feels that the cultural sensitivity training is unnecessary because she knows all there is to know.
Thembi’s first language is isiXhosa, but she is proficient in English. Her highest level of qualification is the National Senior Certificate (matric). Thembi’s biggest pain point is lack of time. She often does not have extra capacity in her work day, so she completes the session on her mobile phone at home. This means that she has to use a large amount of her personal cellular data to stream the hour-long video from home rather than using the Wi-Fi at work.
Jahaan:
Jahaan is an analyst in the marketing department. She has recently approached her manager about wanting to move into a more senior role and has robust ideas for the team’s future. For this reason, she is particularly interested in the training in order to inform how best to manage and support a diverse team.
Jahaan’s first language is English and her highest level of qualification is a diploma in digital marketing. She finds the tutorial videos inaccessible as she is hard of hearing. She would usually rely on captions or a downloadable transcript, but neither have been made available.
Riaan:
Riaan is the manager of a team of junior accountants. With several years of accounting and finance experience under his belt, Riaan is well versed in the tricks of the trade and has a particular knack for client communications. Given his tenure, he was initially reluctant to engage with the quarterly trainings as he felt he had better things to do with his time.
Riaan’s first language is Afrikaans, but he is proficient in English. His highest level of qualification is a bachelor of commerce. In terms of pain points, in addition to lacking motivation, there are various buzzwords and jargon (e.g. assimilation, appropriation, and decoloniality) used in the video that Riaan is unfamiliar with.
Response:
Firstly, it needs to be noted that a single hour-long video is too long and lacks engagement. Instead, the video can be broken down (chunked) and scaffolded into more manageable segments that focus on specific learning objectives. These different video sections can then be interspersed with alternative content to help foster engagement and accommodate multiple learning styles. These alternative content sections can therefore be structured in such a way as to unravel the identified knots.
These identified knots can broadly be grouped as knots regarding Relatability and knots regarding Accessibility.
With regards to relatability, I have identified that, based on the provided learner personas, the content training may feel irrelevant or reiterative. Both Riaan and Thembi claim to have prior knowledge based on their skillsets and experience which renders the training superfluous. This leads to a lack of motivation to complete the training due to them finding it redundant.
To draw on this perceived prior knowledge the training material can be structured in a way where the learners can become active participants in the process. A scenario where the learner is responsible of arranging the information in the correct order with real time (automated) feedback on the correct sequence. This interaction can also be completed prior to the formal engagement with the content. In this way the learner is bringing their pre-existing knowledge to bare and could make them feel as if they are showcasing their capabilities instead of just passively receiving content. It also serves as testing the extent of their pre-existing knowledge and may highlight areas of shortcomings which would make the content more relevant.
A discussion board could also be a beneficial learning tool. Offering the students opportunities to engage in discussions surrounding specific topics will allow students such as Riaan and Thenbi an opportunity to showcase their knowledge and skills as well as mentor others, such as Jahaan who could benefit from gaining inputs on her ideas regarding her team's future.
Accessibility also presents some knots, both in terms of physiological accessibility as well as physical accessibility. Jahaan reported a physiological accessibility knot in that she is hard of hearing and finds the video inaccessible. Riaan, although having the practical experience to draw upon, finds the jargon unfamiliar and effectively renders the content of the video inaccessible. Thembi, on the other hand, reports physical knots in terms of time constraints forcing her to complete the training after hours without a stable internet connection and limited data. This leaves her physically unable to access the training.
Presenting the training in both video and written format would allow equal opportunity for visual, auditory and verbal learners to engage with the content. Presenting the content in text format would alleviate some of the data requirements as well. Providing optional downloadable transcripts would facilitate learners with hearing difficulties and alleviate concerns regarding connectivity as students can engage with the downloaded transcripts offline if need be. This can also be supplemented with a glossary explaining the keywords and concepts to familiarise learners with the jargon used in the training.
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