Change & New Learning

Every organizational change requires new learning. New learning can come through a variety of means: traditional training, computer-aided training, self-directed learning, and one-on-one coaching.

Most people think of new learning in the form of a traditional, instructor-led workshop. This traditional instructor-led training design is appropriate when there are large numbers of trainees, a need for declarative knowledge, and a small amount of training time. Obviously, we have other choices of methods for acquiring new knowledge. The key to successfully implementing and sustaining organizational change is to choose the appropriate method for acquiring the necessary new knowledge.

In every organizational change there is a need to acquire some (often a lot) of declarative knowledge. Declarative knowledge involves facts and figures—the basic building blocks of higher levels of knowledge.

If large numbers of stakeholders need to acquire declarative knowledge, an instructor-led workshop is typically appropriate. Simply getting all the stakeholders in a room and providing the instructor with all the resources necessary to facilitate the learning of the required declarative knowledge is a wise investment of time and money.

When instructor-led workshops are impractical or inappropriate, it may benefit the organization to create and support other methods of learning: computer-aided training, self-directed learning, or one-on-one coaching.

Computer-aided training (CAT) has become very sophisticated. CAT can provide not only declarative knowledge but skills training in a self-paced format. This approach can facilitate the learning for a wide variety of stakeholders with different levels of knowledge and different learning speeds.

Self-directed learning (SDL) is not necessarily the same thing as CAT. SDL may not involve any computer technology at all. SDL involves providing stakeholders with books, manuals, workbooks, audios, and/or videos. Like Cat, SDL provides a self-paced format. But, before using SDL, I recommend the use of the Guglielmino Self-Directed Learning Readiness Scale (Guglielmino, 1978, 1997). Obviously, not all organizational stakeholders are “ready” for SDL (Beitler, 2005, Chapter 4).

One-on-one coaching is often appropriate after the trainee has acquired the basic declarative knowledge. Coaching can be provided on the job by a supervisor, peer, or vendor. This form of on-the-job training (OJT) has the advantage of high “transferability.” Transferability is always a training concern. A lot of classroom-type training does not “transfer” well back to the real-world job. The transfer concern is eliminated in OJT.

To read more about this and related organizational change and learning issues, purchase a copy of my book, “Strategic Organizational Change,” on my website www.mikebeitler.com. Please feel free to send me your questions, comments, and suggestions for future articles anytime.