Authenticity

The solution to your next, big challenge might not be found within your organization, but within your community.

That's where we learn how a mother creates a healthy menu on limited funds, or a farmer makes more efficient use of solar cells, or a teenager designs a better shoe...

Our challenge? Finding those people. Defining the actions that make them different. Sharing the learning. Measuring the impact.

The end of publishing?
( learning?... or other concern for next generation here:_____ )




Thanks for sharing this nifty palindrome, Will.

Leadership Lessons: Tips to remember when things go wrong

some thoughts on lessons I have learned, prompted by an article from Bnet.com

1. Relax, you can't control other people’s actions. Your job is to define a vision and expectations and provide the resources to help people achieve goals. Great leaders understand the rule of equifinality (multiple paths - including small failures - can lead to the desired outcome).
2. Empathize without blaming everyone involved: show empathy for those who got things wrong, those who suffered as a result, and for yourself; that’s a leadership quality.
3. Learn from the experience; share the lessons you learn from your failures. Solicit team input on what could have done to prevent it. Record the lessons: adjust policies, processes and procedures to reflect the learning.
4. Inspire confidence in your team by allowing these opportunities for them to succeed or fail on their own, and then help get them back on course. Re-energizing the team is your next step.

Social Learning: the human experience

I ran across this online and it immediately resonated with me: "An important facet of learning within a social context is social proof. Simply stated, when someone just like me does something, I’m more likely to try it myself."

The first person to deviate from the norm is a leader: someone doing something risky (yet positive) that eventually attracts another risk taker, then another, until ultimately many join in to create truly meaningful solutions or memorable experiences.

This You Tube clip illustrates the point. Watch what happens, and think about this in terms of a social learning process. Be patient. Reward your positive deviants. Some will follow right away, others will wait. Many will be inspired. Change happens.

source: www.positivedeviance.org

Attention Deficit Nation?

One more study that seems to suggest we have shifted from an experience economy (one that requires a certain degree of engagement to appreciate) to an attention economy (one that relies of increasing efforts to capture consumer attention for every engagement/experience).

Social learning (with leaders and followers) requires a significant amount of energy expended in an "attention attraction" function.

In this environment, there is growing evidence that workers do not actually manage the surplus of information (distractors). Instead of multi-tasking, they are responding to tasks with a focus deficit, or an increasing inability to focus on detailed topics or lengthy processes.

What does this mean for...Communication? Learning? Work? Relationships? There are certain to be pros/cons to all this. Here's the meat of this particular study. I'll keep chewing on this bone for a while.

According to a new study from Iowa State University, viewing television and playing video games each are associated with increased subsequent attention problems in childhood.

The study, published this week in the medical journal Pediatrics, examined 1,323 kids in "middle childhood" over a 13-month period.

Characters, Challenges and Cliff-hangers: What Toy Story 3 can teach us about learning

Did you see the movie? I double-dog dare you to tell everyone you did not get a lump in your throat as Andy prepared to leave home, or when the toys faced an uncertain future near the end. Those moments are examples of great storytelling.

Creative writing is a major part of great storytelling, like peas and carrots, hands and gloves. Think about the last training material you created.

Do you enjoy reading it? Did it tell a good story? Does it move you, or change the way you feel about a particular topic? Would you want to sit through it again – just for fun?

People respond to challenges with a combination of emotion, physical responses, and intellectual capacity. Yet most courses often only appeal to our cognitive, rational side. That’s a big mistake many corporations make. (shhh… “emotional” sounds so…“unprofessional"!)

Wrong! If you truly want to create more meaningful learning, you need to appeal to your audience’s fundamental humanity: their emotions.

By creating characters, challenges and cliff-hangers that spark a true emotional response, you keep them focused on opportunities coming from within the learning, and not the sports updates on their Blackberry.

Advertisers, movie producers, and great sales people learned years ago that the best way to engage the brain is through the heart. Ditto learning and employee development.

Engage your Customers Through Learning Moments

Very few customers walk into a grocery store prepared for class when they shop for cheese. Not many people look up “pest control” companies online expecting to learn about mice, when they need an exterminator. (Get it: mice, cheese?). But both of those scenarios is an opportunity for your team to engage customers in learning moments.

Delivered the right way, customer education won’t feel like education. It will feel more like a great interaction with a concerned, compassionate and committed team member. Learning can happen anytime–as part of an online information search or an in-store personal visit. Let’s see how you can add learning moments as part of your customer service philosophy. These opportunities motivate team members (they can make work feel a lot less like…work) and provide a great experience for customers.

1. Define Your Audience Needs

Cover the “how, when where, what and why” of learning. What do they want to know or need to know? (not: what do you want to tell!). Our best advice? Observe them, ask them.

Design your learning through questions like: “How much information do your customers already have?” “Is what they know usually correct or “urban myth?” Next, determine if they want an informal experience (your team just happens to engage them at the store…) or something more instructional, like a illustration explaining the habits of field mice and how to keep them out of the house? Answering these questions will determine whether you design team member prompts, a very basic class, or technical or in-depth instruction for budding experts.

2. Define Some Learning Objectives

What do customers need to know? What will customers be able to do (differently) after they engage in the learning moment? Example: buying cheese. A good learning objective might be: We want guests to be able to recognize, through sight and smell, the differences between hand-crafted cheese and factory-produced cheeses. This helps you create a more informed consumer, and allows your team to offer their expertise on a topic.

Two very important objectives for every customer learning moment: 1) Keep it light. You want these moments to be engaging and fun, not a return to calculus class. 2) Keep it real. You want customers to see how your team, and the value they offer through this interaction, is far superior to the competitor's.

3. Tell A Great Story

This is a great way to check your research and any assumptions. Jot down images or thoughts as to how the learning might occur. Invite your team members to design the story with you. You can envision this story being told: 1) by an associate in your store, 2) through an illustration on your website, 3) via an online learning module, 4) as part of an in-store video... there are many, many options. Worry about the story now, the delivery method in Step 4.

Draw the process on a napkin or tablet. Keep those learning objectives in mind as you or your team sketch the story. If the story you create doesn't address the learning objectives, that’s an indicator that you included some “nice to have” information versus the “need to know” content. You should probably leave any unrelated content on the napkin, or create a second course that focuses on another topic.

4. Engage Your Customer

Different people learn in different ways, so include actions and prompts that target the visual, auditory and kinesthetic (activity) learners. In an aisle or showroom, your team members can explain the differences between two cheeses (auditory), provide a handout (visual) and quickly let the customer compare the two by tasting (kinesthetic).

Need to squelch an urban myth by providing consistent, clear communication? You may find that an online interaction is the best way to get the right information out to customers quickly. Want more ways to engage customers in your store? You can help employees by providing them some quick coaching and prompts that help them tell the story, as they engage their customers through conversation.

5. Establish a Relationship

Don’t hit them over the head with a sale–that feels too much like a setup. Most customers don't respect that kind of entrapment. Remember, this type of learning moment–where your associate is positioning themselves as a trusted advisor–is a customer's first step toward a long-term relationship with your organization, not a quick-close sale.

In this situation, allow your customers some autonomy to call the next shot. Is this something they are passionate about, or are they just curious? Are there other topics they can explore? Are there additional opportunities (like a class or demonstration offered by your team) available to them? Would they like to bring in something they discovered online or recommend a similar product you should carry? Engage your customers - don't pressure them. And, if they really, really enjoy the topic, perhaps they might have a future working for your team...

The more you think about customer service as an education process, the more likely your team will begin to find meaning in their interactions, while uncovering previously hidden opportunities for additional sales and service. And don't forget, those materials you develop to educate customers can be repurposed as training tools for new staff, and vice versa.

The Learning Moment

Who hasn't taken a few hundred of classes, workshops, or training courses throughout their life? Comeon... make sure you include kindergarten!

Besides knowing that the wheels on the bus do indeed go 'round and 'round, you probably remember a thimble full of what your teachers actually taught in class. I feel lucky if I get through a day remembering the basics (the alphabet, up versus down, addition & subtraction…).

What do you remember from your four years in high school? Tick tock, tick tock… Hurts, doesn't it? Now try it again, this time thinking about the things you learned outside the curriculum… Meetings in the parking lots, dances, sports...the soul-bending sport of navigating teen angst. Makes a difference, right?

Unfortunately, many of us don't retain much more in the industry workshops or corporate courses we attend as adults. Sometimes, attendees don’t even remember what the course was about! So there is a big gap between what we learn in our seats and what we practice on the streets.

Think about your last corporate workshop or class. How much do you remember? Did you even want to take it? Would you take it again, just for fun? Did it change your life?

Life's short. Training is boring, learning is fun. With a creative approach we can make learning part of every job - removing the boredom and inserting opportunities for challenging, yet engaging learning moments. Let's take this whole education thing up a notch. I'd like to start by recommending three basic ideas:

The Voice of the Customer in every course.
Why not? Social media has opened the door. Learning that includes the customer allows employees to measure their success at innovation and delivery. And, by visibly including the customer you create an open space that encourages more effective dialog and actions...

Experiential Learning over Firehose Learning
I bet flying a space shuttle is a heck of a lot more exciting than reading about it. Ditto healthcare, pest control, auto sales... Make sure your courses include student application–opportunities to practice, fail and succeed–even if learning is delivered over the web.

Moment-based Learning Design should include emotional content
Users make major purchase decisions based on their gut instinct. Your learning needs to generate a range of emotional responses like: nervous, anxious, concerned, happy, delighted, ecstatic and more. "Real" learning means allowing employees to feel the same emotional reactions a customer might experience during the very same interaction.

I think these are three good steps to make sure you content is memorable, meaningful and measurable when it comes to improving individual performance.

5 Quick Ways to Ruin
the Learning Experience

I confess. I'm feeling a little snarky today.

I was reading an article about one organization's challenges and thought I would lay them out as "what not to do" guide. Evidently, this company had not analyzed its behavior to see what you and I might clearly see, patterns of behavior that belong on the "don't" list...

1. Close Your Eyes! Facts can be ugly things. Hide from the research and unvarnished truth by taking comfort in the kind of pseudo-truthiness found in internal research and staged interviews.
   
   
2. Fudge a Little! Transparency is for losers. Let your marketing team ignore the facts as they create materials. Why not invite your legal team to lead the organization?
   
   
3. Obfuscate! Confuse your customers by creating a social media forum that has no relationship to the real service experience. Better yet, invite feedback and then hide any unpleasant opinions. Don’t forget to kill the messenger with a dull user survey.
   
   
4. Waffle! Why take a stand? Commit minimal resources to any new service, process or loyalty program, only to drop it months later as you accuse some manager of random incompetence.
   
   
5. Duck and Cover! Pull a “turtle” when challenges seem too difficult. Simply go back to doing things the way they have always been done. It feels so much safer to hide behind statistics.
   

Hopefully you won't run into this group. They seem programmed to demoralize their employees while they bumble up the customer experience!

Why The Moments Matter

I primarily teach and present workshops to corporate audiences. A lot of people immediately understand why great interactions matter, especially in an era when customers can share their experience almost as it happens. Your customers make decisions based on their emotional responses to your brand, your service, your team. Period.

Regardless, I still get the pinstripe suit reaction that goes something like this:

"Great story, Russ, but why should I care about the moment? Worrying about how customers feel takes our eyes off important work or distracts us from business at hand."

True... it might distract people briefly from a mountain of to-do's on a desk, but it helps them re-focus on the real reasons customers arrive, leave and do or don't come back (or post nasty comments online). When I spend time with an organization, I try to listen to what others are saying about their people. I try to find specific ways a better experience (training, new-hire orientation, leadership development, sales process, etc) can benefit their organization.

For those who remain unconvinced, here are three top reasons why great experiences or "moments" are valuable for any organization:

Reason 1: Return on Investment

People like to go places, buy things and participate in activities based on great experiences. Like most ROI calculations, three primary measures of a user experience are made in quantifiable measures: productivity per employee, costs, and sales (revenue). You can reap a major benefit from the right training, better leadership and enhancing sales and service experiences.

Reason 2: Active Community Development

Online communities and social media tools are changing the way we learn, share and measure our experiences. A store manager tells of being negatively reviewed on Yelp when he asked a college student dressed only in pajamas and no shoes to return with shoes on. Even though she wasn't a customer, she posted a review complaining of rudeness. His real customers jumped online and contradicted her statements. Their better experiences give them better material to share with others.

Reason #3: A More Highly Engaged Workforce

The wall between work and life is dissolving. As it does, people don’t just want a job, they want a more satisfying work+life experience that makes a difference for them, their families and their customers. By focusing employees on how they can create better customer experiences, you offer them a way to engage their personality in daily activities. It's a more fulfilling and fun way to work. Are you that kind of employer or organization? If not, watch out. You may lose some critical high-potential talent.