Jon joined Dashe and Thomson in 2003 as Director of Consulting, and assumed the role of President in 2005. Prior to joining Dashe & Thomson, Jon was co-founder and Vice President of Yatra Corp, a technology company subsequently acquired by Dublin-based Datalex Communications. Before that, Jon spent 10 years at Carlson Companies in a variety of roles including Director of Business Process Integration, E-Commerce VP with Carlson Hospitality Worldwide, and Director of Marketing Communications for Carlson Wagonlit Travel. He has degrees in Journalism and Organizational Development/ Communications from the University of St. Thomas. Jon serves on the Board of Directors for Hammer Residences, a Minneapolis-based nonprofit organization that provides housing and services for people with disabilities.
Inc. Magazine recently published its annual list of the 5,000 fastest growing companies in the U.S.
The list ranks companies by revenue growth over three years between 2004 to 2007. Dashe & Thomson grew 154% during the period.
In 2001, Dashe & Thomson created and delivered its first Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) training program. Shortly after that, we formed a partnership with Enovia/MatrixOne software to act as their preferred U.S. custom training provider.
We are proud to be exclusive training sponsor at Enovia’s global PLM conference in Orlando this May.
As our customers can attest, working on a large-scale PLM implementation can be challenging. We’re looking forward to seeing many of them in a bit more relaxed state than usual.
Robert Cenek at The Cenek Report points out some enduring wisdom from OD guru Roger Harris.
An organization development intervention should occur at a level no deeper than that required to produce enduring solutions to the problems at hand; and
The intervention should be at a level no deeper than that at which the energy and resources of the client can be committed to problem solving and to change.
The quotes are from an article, Choosing the Depth of Organizational Intervention, written by Harris in 1970, but no less true 38 years later.
Bill Brantley points out recent research in which respondents identify their preferred learning methods. Conspicuously absent among the top 5 most preferred learning methods: E-Learning. Brantley summarizes:
For soft skills, the top five methods were:
1. On-the-job training
2. One-on-one coaching
3. Peer interaction and feedback
4. Discussion groups
5. Live classroom instructionFor hard skills:
1. On-the-job training
2. Workbooks and manuals
3. Books and reading
4. One-on-one coaching
5. Live classroom instruction
The research appeared in Retiring the Generation Gap by Jennifer Deal.
For younger workers, the #2 slot on the ‘hard skills’ list is hard for me to believe: workbooks and manuals? Guess I’ll have to read the book to get the whole story.
Cammy Bean has been doing some interesting surveys on her blog, Learning Visions. Most recently, she posted a survey asking instructional designers to tell about their educational background. The results: Liberal Arts across the board.
What struck me is how many different majors showed up. Definitely a diverse lot.
The always impressive Cathy Moore provides a great list of eLearning samples over at the Making Change blog.
This page alone would be a great starting point for anyone interested in eLearning. Actually, if you were an eLearning expert and just got back from a 90-day safari, you’d find things you’d never seen before.
Be careful, though; many of these pieces are dangerously engaging. Especially these paper-based videos from Common Craft. I’ve been telling everybody I know about these.
Bob Sutton, at Work Matters, outlines a strategy for encouraging innovation. The most notable aspect: awarding kill fees for bad projects.
Sutton cites evidence showing that creative geniuses are notorious for leaving long strings of failures in their wakes. However, their failure rates (their batting averages, if you will), are no higher than yours or mine.
[There is] little evidence that creative geniuses have a higher success rate than their more ordinary counterparts; they just take more swings at the ball … The most creative people — and companies — don’t have lower failure rates, they fail faster and cheaper, and perhaps learn more from their setbacks, than their competitors.
One barrier to the (ultimately effective practice) of failing quickly, is the “escalating commitment to a failing course of action.” We’ve all seen this: companies become so heavily invested in a project that killing it begins to seem impossible - even if they know that it might be the right thing to do.
Merck pharmaceutical has gone so far as to institute “Kill fees, [which] pay out serious dollars to scientists who pull the plug on failing projects.”
Ultimately, Sutton puts forth my favorite line: “reward success and failure, punish inaction.”
Reminds me of another favorite quote: “I’d rather get fired for something I did, than something I didn’t do.”
It’s doesn’t surprise me any more when “project success” checklists fail to include change management, training, and documentation. So, when they make even the bottom of the list, it feels like cause for celebration. Michael Krigsman at the Project Failure blog puts forth 6 tips to reduce IT project failures. Last, but not least, among them:
6. Change management, documentation, and training are important. To be successful, users must understand the project’s goals, status, and impact on their jobs. Many projects pay too little attention to training and documentation, especially when the project starts to run over-budget. This oversight reduces productivity and can negatively impact the project ROI. In extreme cases, users simply don’t use the new software, bringing the effective ROI to zero.
So, the last few words in the last paragraph tell us about something that can “bring the effective ROI to zero.” If that’s the case, why is it so often at the bottom of the list? Or, as Michael states, ignored once the project starts to run over-budget?
One hypothesis I have: Project success for the software team isn’t measured on user adoption - or ROI of any kind. Instead, they’re measured on functioning screens and transactions. It’s up to the business to actually use the stuff.
Reminds me of a health club membership; just spending a lot of money on it doesn’t make you lose weight — you have to actually use it.
A couple weeks ago I pointed out how we’re seeing more companies than ever - especially very large ones - rely heavily on Electronic Performance Support Systems (EPSS) as a complement to structured learning.
The idea is that employees want to learn only the information they need to perform a given task — and no more.
And, they want the information at the time the task must be performed — and no sooner.
Shortly after that post, Brent pointed out an article
in which Charles Jennings, global head of learning for Reuters, talks about a much-needed shift in training:
“Too many learning professionals are obsessed with transferring information into employees’ heads, even though they know that the amount of information is growing very quickly and that the nature of that information is changing.
“These changes mean that knowledge workers actually need less knowledge to do their jobs … Formal training is less effective as the amount of information increases and its shelf life becomes shorter.”
The article goes on to discuss the virtues of EPSS systems and how they enable real-time support. Reuters uses SupportPoint as a context-sensitive help system. We’ve been helping companies build content for these kinds of systems for over a decade, but it seems like we do it more every year.
So it’s good to know we’re not alone in advocating heavy use of EPSS systems which, according to Jennings:
Allow us to employ what I call ‘just in case’ learning. That means that the information is there in case you need it. A simple transfer of knowledge is no longer appropriate. We need to know less and learn more.”
Well said. In fact, Jennings’ term Just in Case learning is a bit less cumbersome than my term, At the Time learning - but the intended meaning is the same.
The photo above is from the excellent discussion thread at Tufte.com.
Dozens of big companies have started running “serious play” workshops, in which participants construct Lego models to represent business challenges or opportunities. From an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution the other day, “Lego Facilitator” Lewis Pinault says:
“We use Lego as a tool that enhances psychological flow. Lego takes people out of their usual comfort zones.”
Psychological flow: good. Lego-free workshop: bad.
Seriously though, it does make sense. Any activity that results in participants setting aside their conscious egos seems likely to produce more creative ideas more quickly.
Another Lego Facilitator, Robert Rasmussen, says the program is effective because it results in 100 percent participation from 100 percent of the group 100 percent of the time.
In general, Rasmussen said Lego is rare in that it functions as a universal language understood by people regardless of their age, race, gender, or culture.
Again, sounds like a cool idea, but I didn’t think it was new. In fact, during the 10 years or so that I worked for a big company, I attended three or four training events in which Legos played a prominent role.
Today, Lego facilitators like Pinault help clients in two-day training sessions at a cost of $7,000.
I guess it was only a matter of time before some consultants got hold of a Good Idea and turned it into a Good and Billable Idea.
Photo from Digger Digger Dogstar.