If Not ADDIE, Then What with Michael Allen #astdtk13

These are my liveblogged notes from a concurrent session with Dr. Michael Allen.  I'm at the ASTD Tech Knowledge 2013 Conference kicking off today January 29, 2013 in San Jose, California.  Apologies for typos and incoherence.

Michael Allen CEO, Allen Interactions

ADDIE (Analysis, Design, Develop, Implement, Evaluate) – it just wasn’t good enough for him. He used to teach ADDIE with confidence. It’s hard to argue.  All of the pieces make sense and are defensible and naturally right.

But we’re pressed to produce a product that changes behavior and creates organizational impact – and do it on time and budget.  If we could do it better, faster, cheaper…

ADDIE’s origins – by the armed services when they needed a cookbook to create a lot of instruction fast by people without a lot of instructional knowledge. And it worked.

Over time, he has evolved ADDIE into Successive Approximation. (SAM)

We’re not after perfection, cuz you’ll never arrive there. Perfection is an impossible journey. But we can keep getting closer to the perfect solution.

Extreme programming, Agile, etc. is going on in other technical disciplines. They use the same principals of Successive Approximation.

Dr. Michael Allen’s Book: Leaving ADDIE for SAM (co-written with Richards Sites, Allen VP – he leads the Allen studio in Tampa)

What we’ll cover today:

• Why not ADDIE – too costly and not enough fun.
• Search for process must consider the desired perfect.
• ADDIE is too content-centric and not learner-centric.
• Agile – what are the bigger challenges and opportunities?
• SAM

If the model you uses gives you the quality products you want on time and on budget then stick with it.

Products need to meet expectations, achieves performance outcomes (it’s not about knowing), stays within budget, delivers on time, unites the team (builds enthusiasm and has everyone excited about the final project – especially if you’re doing it over and over. If it isn’t fun, then it’s really hard).

Agile Product Development

Manifesto (www.agilemanifesto.org):        

Continuous functionality (satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of software – every delivery is a usable product. Unlike in ADDIE where people look at a specification document but what they imagine is completely different. For each “sprint” you set required functionality that must be there, then target , future deliverables)

Changes welcome (Welcome changes, even late in development. At the end of the process you start asking yourself “is this what we meant to do?” – this stimulates late breaking ideas.)

Frequent deliveries (Work in two week sprints – deliver working software frequently. And you may throw out everything you did in those first few weeks. And that’s ok.  It turns the ADDIE question around from “what do we need” to “why wouldn’t this work?” We might find out in this process that we’re targeting the wrong audience.)

Buyer involvement (Business people and developers must work together DAILY throughout the project. “We’ll know it when we see it.” Agile is really good when the requirements change. Agile EXPECTS change. Nobody ever asks the senior leader to be involved – why not just ask? Allen tells the story of a project they did with Apple. They wanted him on the project – he said he’d only do it if the person who owned the project was also involved. This was the Chief Counsel. At Apple. So she was asked. And she participated and was fascinated by it.)

Minimum documentation (Keep the documentation as small as possible but as useful as needed.  Even storyboards have this problem. Think hard about what documentation is useful and needed.  Less is necessary when you keep putting product in front of the customer.)

Face to face communication (Written documentation is low on the communication totem pole of effectiveness. Face to face and a whiteboard is really effective. Open space with lots of white boards and in between.  People adapt to that and wear earphones.  We do have virtual teams but we mostly work together. Use Skype a LOT.)

Iterative and incremental (Keep doing things in small steps and build on top of them. If you mess up something in the sprint that was already built, then you have to fix it in that sprint. The product gets more and more complete.)

Breadth vs. depth (We go from one content area to the next and we avoid perfecting things. We do a once over – build the bottom layer of the cake. As we go into other content areas, we see ideas that would be useful in earlier areas. We want to discover those synergies. So then we build the next layer of the cake. This is hard for developers, because they like to perfect things as they go.)

Continuous testing

JIRA – Project Planning Ticketing tool (we use this at Kineo US) great for itemizing all the tasks that needs to be done in sprints.

THE SAVVY START

Allen Interactions does a Savvy Start to kickoff meetings. They try for two days (could be 1-3 days depending on the project). Try to get offsite somewhere.  They spin through the SAM model as many times as they can in those two days. 1 ½ hour cycles to squeeze out all kinds of interesting information.

Ideally, the project owner (the Chief Counsel!) is in the room.

Quick initial evaluation:

• What do we think we know?
• Who are the learners
• What needs to change in their performance?
• What can they do now?
• Where do learners go for help now?
• What delivery means are available?
• What will define success?
• What is the budget? Schedule? Resources are available?
• Who is the key decision maker?

Try to get answers to these question before the meeting so you’re just validating them at the savvy start.

Get all the ideas out there as quickly as possible. And then mock up something as quickly as possible. Sketching is so important!

Sketching User Experiences, Bill Buxton

Sketching is not drawing – it’s about communicating ideas quickly and inexpensively. Sketching invites comments and suggestions. Easy to dispose of and nobody cares. Often the main content idea isn’t discovered until later in the process. 

Do a mock up – an iteration – and then ask “why wouldn’t this work?”

As a rule, throw out your first idea and then try something completely different.

People like their first ideas and feel wedded to it and proud of it. We need to let go of the first idea. Because almost every time, idea 2 is EVEN BETTER!

Three is the magic number of iterations. You get declining return. Two might be enough. Four might be needed.  But plan on three.

For iteration 3 you can borrow from the other two ideas.

Project planning comes AFTER the Savvy Start. Only then do we write a project plan and price it.

Agile based approaches can take a little longer than you expect.  To keep in time and budget you just stop doing iterations. 

Questions from the crowd:

How do you agree with client on contracting and scheduling?

Even with ADDIE there's a lot of strong customer education we have to do.  We have to show them that this is a different process. We have to walk them through it and say it's going to be different.  We do contracting just for the Savvy Start first.  And then they move into full budget.  Then they write up a plan and charge for that.  And the client could go build that themselves.

danah boyd ASTD Tech Knowledge Key Note #astdtk13

These are my liveblogged notes from ASTD Tech Knowledge 2013 Opening Keynote kicking off today January 29, 2013 in San Jose, California.  Apologies for typos and incoherence.

danah boyd

Microsoft Research

Networked Learned: How Tomorrow’s Workers Will Challenge Today’s Organizations

@zephoria

http://www.danah.org

Thinking through organizational change that matters.

She has been tudying teenagers for the last decade: from Friendster to Facebook to fragmented apps today of Instagram, Tumblr, etc…

Interested in the inflections where technology meets with society

What is the culture around the production of new technologies?

How technology sector has radically changed its way of working.

Transformation happening around the boundaries of organizations. We used to think of people working in contained organizations.

Young people are saying this makes no sense.  In a networked world why would you only talk to people in your org? Why not talk to everyone?

Young people assume information flows faster. Where you don’t keep secrets from people who can help you. This is confusing and counter to organizations.

Young people find ways of challenging the status quo of how boundaries work.

Technology Sector

In last 15 years, a shift in how programming happens and how it’s changed the industry.

Back in the day you read a book on programming and you followed the rules. And you slowly understood the code through simple implementation.

She studied computer science – where they had a formal planning process.  How will I use this code in the future? Compiling code took time – you made sure your code was perfect.  It was very formalistic.

About 10 years ago, the way people coded changed.  It didn’t take hours to compile. Young people were taking code from all over the place and shoved it together. And they didn’t know how it worked. Building collages of code.  Frankenmonsters of code.

This was alien to software engineering. This is not how you’re supposed to code.

Now you have ecosystems where people share code (GetHub) – the process of sharing has become part of the process of building.

Code is now a social, communal, collaborative process.  This practice of sharing has created reorgs in major start ups.

You will find co-working spaces – tons of people from competing companies sitting side by side and working together.  People who “shouldn’t” be talking together because they work for competing orgs…There are no cubes – open space to encourage conversation.

Companies do this because sharing knowledge builds up everyone. This is disruptive!

Geeks are really social in term sof engaging in certain activities.  They don’t stay at organizations for that long. The average tenure in Silicon Valley is around 3 years. They switch jobs to learn new skills. Because they are highly social networked.

A lot of this is happening off hours – outside the core of the workforce. In NY there are “data drinks” – the social networks become the fabric of the tech industry.

Outside of tech sector, the idea of people moving from company to company, spending hours after hours to network, sharing code – is

Teenagers

How do they understand the world of public vs. private.

4chan (the underbelly of the Internet – not for work! A community that creates deeply problematic content – but also fun content. Started by a 15 year old boy).

In order to look at 4chan, you can only see what’s on the front page. Once they scroll off the front page, they disappear and are gone forever. He did this because he was in his bedroom and didn’t want his mom to know. It became part of the culture for 4chan. And this is where the meme started – lolcatz.    People repost, reown, modify.

Rickrolling started on 4chan – “I got rickrollled!”

A culture of pranking and punkstering.

Anonymous emerged out of 4chan in response to Scientology.

These people are trying to hack the ATTENTION ECONOMY. They mess with the flow of attention in society.  They play with the status quo and play with the boundaries of Internet culture.

Remix culture – let’s take Monty Python Holy Grail and mix it with Star Wars. Oblivious to copyright, but finding ways to engage and play online.

Teenagers on Twitter, Instagram, with millions of followers. They’ve created an ecosystem that exceeds the adults.

These teenagers live in a world where they are not let out of the house.  So young people are trying to find some place where they have control – where they have control in public.  Finding a space where they have some level of power.

They see the Internet as their own.

We see teenagers going public, but this doesn’t mean they’ve given up their privacy. Privacy is not control of information; it’s the ability to control a social situation. It requires understanding the social situation well enough to control it.

Ability to achieve privacy in these spaces.  They want to be in public, but to not always be public.

“Hiding in plain sight.” Teenagers know that they can’t control the access to the content, but they can control the access to meaning (by using in jokes) – danah shares a story of a teenager of Facebook (whose mom is also on FB and comments a lot in a lame, mom way). So instead of posting the sad song lyrics to show how sad she’s feeling, because she doesn’t want her mom to overreact she posts lyrics to Life of Brian “Always look on the bright side of life.” Her mom thinks she’s having a great day; her friends get the joke and send her txt messages.

So how do we think about the 21^st century?

Loose ties that get reinforced. People making sense of a networked public.  This is a radical shift.

15-20 years ago we organized by groups….now we’re organizing through networks. 

Success in today’s workforce is about being networked in a way that makes sense.  How do you build relationships that help you sustain the right kinds of connections?

In traditional higher-ed, the elite college in the US – not a place to learn skills. Professors give horrible lectures on esoteric subjects. They teach so they can do their research. Why people go to those institutions is really about social networking. Negotiating the dynamics of the dorm room – you start to build relationships that help sustain the elite connections of our country.

But this has gotten messier now with social media. Young people find their network of people like them even before they get on campus. So they’re rebuilding homogeny. This is dangerous as a long term practice.  We see people on social networks connected with people who are MOST LIKE THEM.

On LinkedIn you see this.  Google’s application form you fill out all the people you already know at Google.  They are asking “are you like us?”  Because they might stay longer with them, too.

People recommend people who are like them.

So we are reinforcing homogeneity.

We need to train people about thinking how DIVERSE their networks are.

Start up networks in the late 90s – they got to know each other but no reach beyond their world.

We see certain industries contract…how do you take your skills and apply them to a new sector, outside of your field?

As new educational technologies are coming into your landscape – MOOC, automated instruction.  Making learning more accessible to a larger group of people. But we lose the ability to build networks. When you’re learning together you’re building relationships.

As you build skills, how to you build social networks and relationships?

Kids who live at home in college – we’re losing the weaving of networks and connections.

When we see young people experiementing with networks – we want to encourage them.  Help people connect with networks. And yet young people are told not to meet strangers.

We need to meet people who are NOT LIKE YOU in order to build and learn.

Building out relationships through social networking is not just an HR issue – it’s connected to your ability to become a lifelong learner. Exposing people to other people who know what they don’t know.

Grow your networks to expose you to possibilities.

How to help people build skills and make connections?

We may need disruption to help grow things (e.g., outsiders coming into your organization).

How do we prepare learners for the skills of the future, but also how do we prepare them to engage with the ecosystem?

Questions from the crowd

Mobility – teenagers have very little control over their time.  Mobile phones don’t give them mobility (because their lives are so scheduled), but it provides interstitial connection. Provides social grooming – they’re saying nothing, but maintaining a meaningful relationship because they can’t be together (“hi. What are you doing.” “nothing” etc.)  Kids aren’t allowed to run around time anymore.  You’re reliant on your parents to drive you around. Even if you’re allowed out, your friends probably aren’t. So teenagers are more organized around PCs or mobile phones. 

Go through your Twitter list and see who you’re following. And then go out there and find someone who is radically different than you. Make sure your network on twitter is full of different voices. It shapes how we think, keep it broad.  

Diversity within workforces – more diverse teams outperform less diverse teams.  More diverse teams perceive themselves to be underperforming homogenous teams. AND they perceive themselves to be less happy.  So how do you explode out diversity, even when it makes you uncomfortable.

Strategies to help your employees move beyond their network? (The woman who asks this question works in tech sector and says her org hires people from same colleges/universities – so her challenge is to help them broaden their network).  Idea: Here are a list of people on Twitter to follow that are ALL different.

Coding Freedom http://www.amazon.com/Coding-Freedom-Ethics-Aesthetics-Hacking/dp/0691144613 – a book about the hyperindividualistic culture of programmers and open source software – the tension.

How do we incentivize people collectively vs. individualization?

Can you get a team to buy in to be collectively evaluated?

Tired old elearning? Want some ideas? Free Webinar!

Join me this Tuesday, January 22 at 1:00 eastern for a free webinar hosted by Training Industry and Brainshark.  I'll share some tips and strategies for spicing up your eLearning designs - simple tips for better writing and more thoughtful interaction that don't have to blow your budget.

Yawn Proof Your eLearning without Busting the Bank

Hope to see you there!

One Learning Designer's Look Back at 2012

So we've wrapped up 2012 with a few ribbons and bows and have sent it on its way.  It was a big year.

Some of my professional and personal highlights from 2012 (not that you asked):

Growing Kineo US

Our Kineo US team has continued to grow and flourish.  While I still work out of my home office in the Boston area, our office in downtown Chicago now boasts a full host of project managers, instructional designers, ace graphic artists, top notch developers, our Totara LMS support team, as well as marketing and support personnel.  It's an exciting journey and I'm proud to be part of the Kineo family.

So what did I learn from all that? Well, keep on keeping on.  Virtual working is great, but it's also really wonderful to hang out in the office with my team mates.

Clients & Project Work

Of course, none of that growth is possible without our growing and amazing client list.  I've had the opportunity to work on a huge range of projects this year, from virtual classrooms to leadership academies.

And what could have been a boring course on information security won a Brandon Hall Gold Award for Compliance Training. Just a little proud of our team!

So what did I learn from all that? Well, that learning and development always provides something new to learn. New technologies, new approaches.  There's really no getting static in this field unless you just stop trying.

Conferences

Going to industry conferences is where it's at as far as I'm concerned.  I love connecting and learning and breathing learning stuff with really smart people.  This year was no let down.

The year started off with me wrapping up my stint as the planning committee chairperson for ASTD TechKnowledge 12.  I was this close to doing onstage karaoke in front of the entire TK crowd -- it's hard not to let Vegas get into your soul. You can see the proof here.

In March, I ran a pre-conference session at the eLearning Guild's Learning Solutions called The Accidental Instructional Designer.  Loved, loved, loved that.  So much, in fact, that I'll be doing it again this March!

I helped facilitate two ASTD Learn Now Conferences -- one in April and the other in July -- where we focused on real application of social, mobile, and performance support.  Working closely with Justin Brusino, Bob Mosher, Conrad Gottfredson and Chad Udell -- amazing!

At DevLearn in November, I had a great time with my session: Putting the Design Back in Instructional Design. This session had me out of my comfort zone -- I was reading and researching it for the six months leading up to it.  How's that for some informal learning with a clear goal in mind?

So what did I learn from all this conference speaking? Well, that yes, I can talk in front of 1,200 people and somehow pull it off without looking or sounding like a complete idiot.  That I need to slow down more when I talk and let people absorb it a bit (thanks to Lance Dublin for that feedback!) 

Writing 

I appeared in actual paper print this year for my first time with an article published in ASTD's T&D Magazine. As much online blogging and writing as I've done in the past 7 years, it was still a thrill to see my words in an actual magazine.

Not only that, but I got interviewed for an article on training that appeared in Delta Sky Magazine.  You know, an inflight magazine that you randomly read while enroute from O'Hare to SFO or something. Weird, right? In print and in the air! (This is where people can start making jokes about the mile high club or something).

My article, The Accidental Instructional Designer, appeared on the Learning Solutions site in January.  OK -- it's not a paper magazine, but I think it's one of the best industry news sources out there so I was thrilled just the same.

My blog has suffered a bit this year as my writing has ended up elsewhere.  But be sure to check out Kineo Top Tips to which I'm a regular contributor.

So what did I learn from all that? Well, that people actually like to read what I write. And that I really love it.  And that I just need to keep on writing...I've got quite a few unfinished articles and ideas floating around that I need to pull together and get out there.  It's like giving birth sometimes.  And also like releasing an idea into the wild.

Getting Sporty

I used to be a competitive swimmer, so getting back in the water to race brings back strange feelings for me.

This July, I swam the swimming leg of a sprint triathlon in my now hometown of Littleton, MA.  Of all the relay swimmers, I was the first one out of the water and my team finished fifth.  Pretty cool if I do say so myself.  And apparently I am saying that myself.  This inspired me to start running in earnest and a few days later I started a couch to 10k running program. I've got my mind thinking about doing the entire triathlon this July...

So what did I learn from all that? Well, exercise really does make me feel better. And that sometimes you can just decide to do it--and then you go ahead and do it.

City & Guilds

Big news for those of us who proudly fly the Kineo banner! We're now thrilled to be a part of City & Guilds, a UK force for 130 years with a focus on vocational training and support for employers all over the globe.  As part of City & Guilds, our goal: "to become the global workplace learning company." You can read more about our acquisitions on our website.

So what did I learn from all that? This one is still new so haven't had much time to absorb.  But I think it's that exciting alliances can come from unexpected places!

So what's up for 2013?
Well, there's that triathlon that I may have just publicly committed myself to...

I'll be speaking at loads of conferences, with ASTD TK 13, Learning Solutions, and ASTD ICE coming ahead in the nearer future.

Hoping to write more, more, more.

Hoping to push myself more, more, more.

And -- to slow down a bit too and be more mindful....(check out my Learning Resolution on the Open Sesame blog.)

Thanks for being with me in 2012 and looking forward to more more more in 2013!

DevLearn Conference Video: Putting Design Back into ID

At DevLearn this year, the eLearning Guild taped a number of sessions and has made them available to members.

I was honored to have my session recorded: Putting "Design" back into Instructional Design.  eLearning Guild members can access the video archive on the eLearning Guild's website:

The eLearning Guild: Putting "Design" back into Instructional Design

If you do take the time to watch the video, I'd love constructive feedback and ideas for how I can improve this session for the future!

Thanks for watching :)

Joe Sabia – opening keynote at Brainshark #sharkmeet12

Joe Sabia – opening keynote at Brainshark #sharkmeet12

Video maker

TED Talk

http://joesabia.co

Joe follows viral culture.

What could be transferred to business communications? From the world of viral video?

Think about a presentation you’ve given in the past month.  Based on the principles Joe is going to talk about, how might you integrate those principles?

CDZA – creating videos for this music channel.

Keeping people on the edge of their seats…don’t reveal it all at once.

Joe starts off and shows us two videos on detecting extra solar planets.  Two methods:

Take 1 – talking head,  dull voice over. But more information. If you watched it 10-12 times you might get more out of it.  Facts, but dense.  Dry and boring.

Take 2 – exciting visuals, more memorable. Made reference to pop culture to pull people in. But all over the place and distracting.

 Neither really very effective.

Two questions any presenter must ask:

How do you present info in a way people will learn?

How do you present info in a way people will pay attention?

How do you present info in a way people will learn?

1. Brevity
2. Clarity (no confusing graphs!)
3. Relevant aesthetics – no pictures of hotdogs and bunnies!

So how do we get people to pay attention?

Joe looks at videos and internet culture. What compels us to send the video around of the cat falling into the fish tank?

Right now, SO much content out there. So what do we share and why?

Benefits of connectivity

Unprecedented access to info

Global connectedness

Work from anywhere!

But there’s a darkside…

Makes it so damn hard to pay attention to anything.

Easy to be addicted to all the stuff that's out there.

Joe shows an Excel spreadsheet that looks like Facebook – so you can use this at work and no one will know!

Attention is a valued commodity.  Keep in mind that people probably have 15 tabs open on their browser and that Facebook Excel page…

Use creativity to stand out and capture that attention!

Six things that might be interesting…to apply to presentation world? Not trips or tricks, but perspectives in grabbing attention.

 1. Dessert and vegetables

The Huffington Post – it’s reliable. Huge headline, big photos. Serious politics up tight. But then you go down and there’s John Hamm without a shirt. The mullet approach to news – business up front, party at the bottom. Get your veggies at top ad your dessert at the bottom. We all love dessert.

Sitting in class (veggies) vs. recess (dessert).

Barry Schwartz – great with the dessert and veggies.

Dessert is a moment of escapism. Makes the veggies more memorable.

As long as dessert is on the table – doesn’t matter if in beginning, middle or end.

2. Cultural references as dessert

The power of cultural references

Cultural love – analogizes information, baked-in familiarity. Shows you have a pulse on culture.

Obviously, challenges to do this in culture world.  But how can you connect back to cultural references?

3.  Interactivity

“tone of voice is personality expressed through words”

tests, evals, url slides, polls.

“Liking” on Facebook – you’re showing the world your view and doing marketing for another organization.

How do you get people to interact without clicking their mouse? But get them to move their body behind the computer screen?

Skittles Lick the Rainbow video.  Touch the space. Touch the screen.  Get your hand licked by a cat. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnwEntgHyFI

Passive isn’t as good as active.

4.  Your Space as a Playground

Think outside of the walls of your classroom.  (shares a video of a classroom teacher who has a ppt on screen that “comes alive”).

In a presentation world, your confined to a box.  Your PPT box.  Don’t see it as a box, see it as a universe.

Choose your own adventure – an interactive Facebook experience.  In the first comment for a photo, you click a link to go off…

5.  Unscientific Research

“What happens when you put an android, winpho7, iphon 4 – what grills faster?” (youtube video) – cooked three phones on a  grill.  Over 1 million views.

Apply human, unscientific views - -ask people – raise hands.

Information for a captive audience.

Offers convincing, offbeat evidence.

Shows passion.

6. Power of Surprises

Your world may not allow for a lot of this absurdity.  There is a time and a place for fun. 

Replace the word fun with the word surprise.

Tania Luna – her company is called “Surprise Industries” – she consults with corporates. Give people the unexpected.  Stand out from everyone else.

In primates, surprise intensifies emotion by 300-400%.

That element of surprise makes us talk about it and share it.

Surprises can be a lifestyle.

Joe likes to pay for things with $2 bills.

Surprises make everything better.

How does this work with presentations?

Make a pact – put one surprise in your presentation. (But don’t give anyone a heart attack or completely inappropriate – know the boundaries).

Look at the presentations that people are doing that you want more of.  Think of your own ways to do these things.  Be inspired by what other people are doing “good artists borrow; great artists steal.” ~Picasso

When it comes to presentation making – be the 1%--stand out from what everyone else is doing.  Don’t let the corporate world corporatize you out of your creativity.