The Art of Creating High Impact Learning Content

2020 has been the year of digital disruption and the power of digital content and learning has been more than evident. Due to the impact of the pandemic our ways of working have changed and so have our ways of learning. We have seen a complete transition from in person training to all aspects of learning being managed virtually.

What becomes crucial for making any learning intervention effective is the content, as it is the content that is experienced by the audience. It is what adds value to any learning intervention. It is one of the factors that differentiates mediocre sessions from wow sessions.

But what really goes behind creating a high impact learning experience.

When I think about it, it all begins with asking the right questions to understand the learning outcome. Then applying them at different stages to conceptualize an engaging program which achieves the desired results. Let us divide this journey into key elements and look at how we can make our learning intervention stand out and truly make a difference.

1.      Assignment Brief – The starting point of the journey is understanding the essence of the assignment - from the Outcome (the objective to be achieved) to the People (the learners), the Timelines (duration of the program), the Infrastructure (the platform for delivery) and the Budget of the training (cost involved). Ask relevant questions which give clarity on these aspects giving us the ground to start the content curation. It is critical to get the answer to the questions- what behavior change do we want to achieve at the end of the session? Or what insights do we want to generate from this session? And so on?

2.      Contextualize learning objectives - Before putting the content together, it is imperative to understand and evaluate the learning objectives or the outcome of the training. At the same time take cue on the culture, the values being driven in the organization. These factors will provide us with the blueprints for the learning content and give the program its basic flavor, make it more relevant and relatable to the audience.

3.      Aligning the needs to the learners – with what learners want - Spending some time on doing a cohort analysis goes a long way. Make sure that the learning content curation strategy includes the actual needs of the intended audience. Understand the demographics of the participants in terms of count, their gender, age, experience, role etc. Find out what their goals are and what they want to achieve; then choose the best curation strategy to complement those. Ask questions like - How can the sessions be made relevant to their individual needs? This will help us assess the learner’s knowledge and most importantly their appetite for what information they can take and how.

4.      Bringing it all together - Now is the time to put all pieces of information together and create the content. As we do so, it is important that you have answers to the below questions:

•  What do learners need to know to meet the learning objective?
•  What skills do learners need to perform the learning objective?
•  What are the activities (breakout room activities, games, brain storming, case studies etc) that can help learners understand the content? How can we contextualize them appropriately?
• What are the most common mistakes learners make (related to the topic)?
•  What are the most common questions that learners can ask (related to the topic)?
• What is the information that is considered “mandatory”?
• How will you assess the learners’ knowledge?
• How can we ensure that ;earners remain engaged throughout the session?

Answering these questions will ensure that the structure and flow of the content falls in place and meets the assignment brief.

5.      Creating room for Authentic Conversations and Reflection - Once the content is ready, comes the most important part. Ensuring a sense of engagement and interest that learners feel during the learning experience is essential.

• Using the right blend of tools – Structure it with a story, an anecdote, a real life example they can relate to- examples to create that all-important emotional connection, incorporate live examples from the industry. Given the virtual scenario we might want to look at breaking it down into bite sized modules also.
• Contextualization – Take specific anecdotal evidence/situations from the organization which can be integrated in the content through activities and customized case studies which will cater to exclusively meeting the learning objectives and are in sync with the culture of the organization.
• Offering follow-up tips and information – Sharing e-books, pre-reads, action-learning assignments, newsletters etc before and after the training will help reinforce the skills your learners have gained from the program and decrease the possibility of that knowledge getting lost. Hence, we should ensure these elements are integrated and taken care of during content curation.

At the end of the day, all learning content curation efforts still boil down to one category of people –which is the learners. The success of any training content creation strategy is largely dependent on what learners can get from it. A strategy that helps learners fulfill their learning needs, attain their goals, and assist them on what they want to achieve are good indicators of a program’s success.

We at Marching Sheep follow the same approach, thoughtfully curating content of our sessions and always ensuring delivery of high-impact programs for our clients. We do not offer off the shelf programs. Instead, what makes us excel is the quality of our content which is experiential and reflective in nature. The customized content of our sessions designed basis client needs, based on thorough diagnostics, enables participants to reflect, evaluate their thoughts, beliefs and behaviors in the right direction. Given the virtual setting we operate in, our recent programs on Psychological Safety and Emotional Resilience have been specifically designed to build behavioral capabilities in the workforce and make a difference to the society at large. As we step into 2021, success of businesses will hinge on building leadership and managerial capabilities in building high performance inclusive teams while continuing remote or hybrid way of working, and we believe that following a structured approach to learning interventions will ensure effective use of resources.