Does Technology Help or Hinder Learning?

With the sudden prevalence of remote working, there have naturally been some anxieties around how people will maintain their productivity, quality, motivation or… all of the above! However, an often-overlooked concern that many have is whether technology is going to help with, hinder or even replace job roles.

I can assure you technology is here to help, but with a caveat; it needs to be researched, designed and implemented with a solution in mind.

This sounds like common sense but think back to those meetings we’ve all had where we are encouraged to use a particular platform. There will be justifications such as “it will help us communicate”, or “this way we can keep tabs on progress”. But what is the problem it solves?

Has communication been lacking or is it that somebody likes the look of Slack? Is using Trello going to help project manage or is the entire approach the organisation uses when project managing wrong? It's these instances that mean a lot of people are unenthusiastic about the implementation of new digital experiences.

Good implementation of a digital experience comes from;

• the discovery of a problem
• discussion with those involved/affected by the problem
• identification of how the solution will resolve

Only then should the journey begin to develop the solution.

As a Digital Experiences Consultant with Ember Learning, I tap into my and my colleagues' many years of experience in Learning & Development and focus on the recipients of the digital solutions we create. This may mean you’d expect me to extol the virtues of digital but that isn’t the case. What I am here to do is shine a light on the reasons why many ‘solutions’ don’t solve the issues they are intended to and, in many cases, only provide fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) in the minds of those who use them.

Often, when we are brought into a company as an external consultant, we are met with one of two scenarios;

·        The client has implemented digital experiences badly

·        The client has not implemented digital experiences at all 

So, let's have a look at a scenario where the client has digital implementation, but it isn’t working as intended i.e. it has been done badly. As touched upon above it could be because the ‘solution’ that has been put into place is not fit for purpose. Usually, because they have not worked backwards from the problem and instead used a platform or approach that does not link directly with an issue. This obviously isn’t the only reason implementation fails but it is a reason we come across often.

However, another cause of digital experiences failing to succeed can be from a culture of resistance to them. The FUD Factor so to speak! This is what bridges a lot of clients from instances where implementation has taken place to some extent across to those organisations where no digital experiences have been embedded and any training that does take place is delivered in the traditional face to face setting.

Digital experiences can be a complete unknown to organisations and/or users in the context of learning. This can be rectified by changing the culture around these solutions with effective onboarding to fully explain what they are, what they do and what they help with. This is just like any onboarding process, it is present to help the person new to the environment understand and appreciate the values, aims and objectives they can expect to be provided.

The unknown can also come from how the solution is functioning. This is something that can be overlooked in the rush to get learning out to the audience particularly if going straight to roll-out with no iterative reviews 🤐.

The checklist is done before the files are uploaded to the LMS/LXP or whatever platform is being used…

• A problem has been identified ✅

Subsequently, a digital experience is created including:

• Introduction ✅
• Objectives ✅
• Clear information ✅
• Said information split into chapters/modules ✅
• Formative assessments ✅
• Summative assessment ✅
• Revisiting of objectives ✅
• Results fed back into the reporting system ✅
• Analytics fed into GA/Intercom etc ✅

That’s great! 

So, if all of these requirements have been met, the digital content has been reviewed and the information is providing a solution to a specific problem; how can it be that it still isn’t working?

Many clients will initially think it is because their employees aren’t engaged in their own development; others may think it’s because they need to send more reminders; while there may be organisations who stop here and think they’ve done all they can 😱.

As humans, we are always striving to quell our curiosity and gather more information, we don’t give up on things for no reason. So, if somebody has taken the time to log in to new content and attempt to complete it there must be a reason for them not getting to the end – especially if we have met the above checklist...

Think about how the content could still give the user FUD.

• They already know they don’t know everything on the course a lot of the time so fear shouldn’t be an overwhelming factor.
• When we embark on something new there is always an element of uncertainty so again this is to be expected.
• The same goes for doubt - if anything they are trying to quell theirs.

This is odd…

But it can so often be all of these things due to the fact the experience itself is not appealing. Do you ever go to a website and can’t find what you are looking for instantly? Me too. And I bet you do the same thing I do when this happens; you leave that site and try another. There’s no shame in that after all the landing page of a website is it’s ‘shop window’. If it doesn’t do what it should and entice you to participate then it is failing. The same applies to digital learning experiences.

The experience a user has when using learning content has to be instinctive but at the same time not a simple exercise of click through to the end and having a go at the knowledge check – let’s be honest we’ve all done this! It also needs to be familiar, that is why organisations without the capabilities to provide digital experiences - as few as 1 in 10 according to some sources - will often go back to tried and tested face to face or paper-based training – they feel comfortable with it. But do their employees?

There has been a consistent trend of so-called ‘Non-Internet Users’ falling with this group now standing at 5.3 million adults in the UK compared to 10.2 million less than ten years ago*. This number is still far too high but it is a positive trend and one that indicates organisations that aren't utilising digital are increasingly missing out on opportunities to upskill their employees in a way that appeals to them.

If we take this further, with such a high number of adults familiar with the internet they will also be familiar with the interfaces of websites and the way they work, the user experience (UX), whether they know they are or not. Here at Ember Learning, we are constantly keeping abreast not only of the latest trends in Learning and Development in respect of new technologies and approaches such as Virtual Reality, Learning Retention Tools such as Errol, gamification and Virtual Classroom approaches to name a few; but also trends in graphic design, web design, UX, the list goes on.

Users make so many micro-interactions with apps and web pages that they don’t even think about what they are doing most of the time – it ‘just happens’ and before they know it they are where they need to be – this comes from a blend of beautifully intuitive experiences (or if you like journeys), and the visual familiarity they have with what is before them. We’d all love our employees to do this with the training, learning and development opportunities we provide but without designing this familiarity into digital experiences the journeys they are provided with will feel unnatural in comparison to these everyday interactions.

It is this level of detail that Ember Learning provides our clients thanks to the many years of experience in training, learning and development, alongside developing digital experiences and solutions that means their employees are engaged and delighted with the new materials they have access to. Thanks to this we can replace the fear, uncertainty and doubt with familiarity, excitement and success!

Here's a little example for you. Above we have a selection of buttons which we see a lot, they contrast with the background, they have a clue as to what you will get if you click but what compels you to click through other than curiosity? You might do so once, maybe twice but eventually you'll tire of the uncertainty and doubt of what should be investigated, why and also whether you have already been there. Now look below, we have an idle state which evolves when the cursor hovers, a visual clue that demonstrates the button is being successfully interacted with, and confirmation when you come back to the page that you've already been there! It's simple but the frustration of this not being place will cause users to give up sooner rather than later.

Next time you are on a site think how you know where to go, where to click, what makes it easy to navigate and why you choose to return to that site so often. I promise it is because of the details above! Most importantly use this knowledge to drive solutions to genuine problems and embrace the challenge, without that genuine problem you have no opportunity to provide a meaningful and effective solution!

*Source: Office for National Statistics - Internet Users, Labour Force Survey (LFS)