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This month’s Big Question on Learning Circuits Blog is

What questions should we be asking? 

In a former life I worked for a company whose business model was structured around a two-day workshop.  Although in the time since I’ve been there I have learned that a two-day workshop can usually be just a cog in a larger wheel (if it’s to be effective) that two-day workshop was excellent.

One of the most popular modules was one called ‘Effective Questions.’  In it, the facilitator had participants experience the difference between two different questions that could be asked in the same scenario (i.e. Why are we so behind schedule? vs. What can we do to get back to our projected timeline?)

An effective question can leave a person to stew on it for hours or days only to have an answer pop-in unexpectedly.  I feel this is what the learning and development field should strive for in their communication to business executives.

Some examples would be:

•  What knowledge, skills and attitudes are necessary to execute on your strategy? 
• How can we more effectively diversify your learning ‘portfoilio’ so that the maximum return is realized?
•  What are the various futures that may be in store for this organization?  What are the common denominators between those potential futures that we can align learning and development with now?
• How can your incentive programs be better aligned with the behaviors required for success?  What can learning and development then do to make it easier for people to receive those incentives?
• How can your current training expenditures be adjusted in order to maximize the net present value of these allocations?

I feel that learning and development needs to continue to show that we think like business executives in order to get the ear of business executives.  Through well targeted questions, executives will convince themselves of the value of their workforce having the skills, attitude and knowledge needed to succeed.  At that point, we in the learning and development field can banter as to the specific methodology to use - won’t that be a good problem to have?

I am part of the inaugural class of both the CLO Academy and the CLO Institute and am summarizing my experiences to date through a comparison and contrast of the two programs for anyone that is considering attending either or both.

As I’ve said before, kudos to the founding members of both for elevating the status and visibility of the Chief Learning Officer role in organizations.  I am of the opinion that we are amidst a transformation in the way that organizations can use learning and development to enhance the performance of their company.  This isn’t done by putting people through more content and more training sessions - it’s done by giving people access to the information they need to succeed or helping develop new skills or mindsets for success.  Chief Learning Officers are the people to make that happen.

I’ll start the review with a bit of background.  The CLO Institute was the first to market.  I received word of it in November of 2005 and attended classes in January of 2006.  I heard of the CLO Academy in May of 2006 and attended the first class in September of 2006.

The CLO Institute was started and is heavily led by Doug Harward - the founder of TrainingOutsourcing.com.  This is an important detail as some of the content is influenced and benefits from his expertise.  The CLO Academy was started by the team at MediaTec Publishing; also the creators of Chief Learning Officer Magazine. 

Format - How the two programs approach the development of learning leaders

• CLO Institute:  The CLO Institute has different Learning Programs for participants to choose from.  They include a Certified Chief Learning Officer (CCLO), a Certified Learning Strategist (CLS) and a Certified Learning Architect (CLA).  Participants take classes according to which Learning Program they select.  Once all classes for a Learning Program are completed, participants must do a real-world project in order to be certified.  Currently all classes are conducted face-to-face although they mentioned that on-line classes will be held in the future.
• CLO Academy:  The CLO Academy also has choices to make.  Theirs are Certification Tracks [cannot embed a direct link] and are called Learning Leadership, Learning Effectiveness and Learning Management.  The CLO Academy begins with a 2.5 day face-to-face session (called a Colloquium) regardless of which Track is selected and then all following Track-specific courses are conducted on-line through a partnership with Capella University.

Content and Style

• CLO Institute:  The CLO Institute classes were that…classes.  We were instructed from 9-5 and then went to our respective hotels to return the next day.  This is not all a complaint, though.  In an environment where people are hungry for the knowledge I don’t think presentations are all that bad.  The classes were small enough that we could ask questions at any point. The advantage of this format is that we received a lot of great information. The CLO Institute helps learning leaders view and analyze learning as an investment; this requires a good deal of foundational content for participants and that’s what they provided.  The CLO Institute is where I was began to apply concepts such as net present value (NPV) and economic value added (EVA) to learning expenditures.  The disadvantage of their format was the lack of informal networking and peer-to-peer collaboration.  To their credit, the CLO Institute has since set-up a place on their site as an on-line resource for the community of past participants.
• CLO Academy:  The CLO Academy Colloquium was a very different experience from the first classes of the CLO Institute.  We were borderline sequestered on the sprawling campus of the Conference Center in VA.  I ate all of my meals with participants and faculty and joined them for drinks and conversation in the late evening.  For the informal learning and relationships between peers and with faculty, the CLO Academy has it nailed. Most of the CLO Academy was in a ‘case-based’ environment.  This was a term I heard there which basically meant we had an in-depth interactive case study that we were put into that mimicked a real company.  As I put in an earlier post, the components of the case study need a little tweaking in order to be completely relevant for a learning executive.  Once these are made I’m sure it will be much more satisfying for participants.  The great part about the case study, though, was that our stellar faculty rotated among teams and gave some insight into their roles and specific methodolgy.  I did take away some nuggets from their informal talks that were not directly related to the case study.The CLO Academy also had three formal lectures from the faculty.  I had many ideas validated in the lectures but the agenda was so tight that we only had time for about two questions total following each of the structured presentations.  Some faculty were available during evening ‘fireside chats’ and meals which provided an opportunity to ask follow-up questions but I would have preferred more time with them in the front of the room for a Q/A. In terms of content and new ideas, I haven’t gotten much (yet) from the CLO Academy.  In their defense, though, the Colloquium was to establish the basics that will be built on by the on-line Capella courses (which for me begin in January due to my vacation).  According to the literature, the purpose of the Colloquium was to “provide a solid foundation for the shift from tactical to strategic thinking.”  I think that the CLO Academy is making a dangerous assumption that all participants are walking in as tactical thinkers.  At least that is how the messages were delivered to participants - that we would make this transition to being strategic thinkers.  Even if this is true for the majority of participants, I don’t know that people want to be told so outright because most people would probably like to think of themselves as strategic. 

 Faculty

• CLO Institute:  The CLO Institute went for variety.  They want to expand the view of learning professionals to include CFOs, COOs, etc. so they brought that expertise into the classroom.  Our presenter for “Level 6: Beyond ROI” was a financial consultant that happened to know about learning expenditures.  She was on a mission to teach us to speak to CFOs and I appreciated that perspective.
• CLO Academy:  The CLO Academy went for star-power.  If you want to interact with and hear from some of the top CLOs and learning executives in the field, this is the place for you.  I had one-on-one conversations with learning executives from Microsoft, General Mills, IBM, EDS, EMC, Delta and Defense Acquisition University.

All in all, I felt that both programs were well worth my time and money.  They were both very different and each had their unique advantages.  I hope that the above review helps anyone trying to determine which to attend.  Please write with any specific questions if you’re still struggling with your decision or are just curious.

A dollar today is worth more than a dollar tomorrow.

This is the basic underpinning to the concept of Net Present Value (NPV) in finance.  Given the option, businesses are going to want their money in their own hands until the last possible second.  The more time a company can hold on to their money, the more of a return the money can generate for the company. 

This is the reason for some magazines offering subcriptions that steadily reduce as the years go on if you pay for them today.  They want that money now!  Even if it’s less than the full subscription you would have paid in three years, they would rather have it today to improve cashflow, invest, etc.

We discussed NPV in the Level 6: Beyond ROI class while I was at the CLO Institute in January.  Ever since then I’ve been playing with the idea of NPV and how it relates to methods of learning that don’t fall under the category of ‘traditional.’ 

I decided to write after reading the July edition of Education Signals.  One section of the report was about the ’Top 20 Companies in the Training Outsourcing Industry’ that is compiled by TrainingOutsourcing.com.  In it, the authors share the following data points:

“The largest percentage of revenue from the leading players came from content development (35%) and training delivery (30%) services.”

Content design/development obviously comes at or near the beginning of a training outsourcing initiative.  That means that over 1/3 of the money of contracts is in the hands of the training supplier soon after the project begins.    

If I were in a position to be hiring a training outsourcing firm, I would look for a deal where the fees weren’t so front-loaded.  I would want to keep my money as long as I could and let it make more money for me. 

Enter informal learning (i.e. communities of practice, blogs, wikis, podcasts, etc.).  As illustrated in this post from Jay Cross, and as others have been preaching, much of learning doesn’t come from ‘content.’  It comes through the informal and unscheduled channels of an organization.

Informal learning may have an additional advantage.  Since there isn’t near the level of design/development required for informal methods as there is for more formal events such as workshops and e-learning modules, a company that was buying these services from an outsourcing company would pay less up front.  This allows them to keep their money longer and let it make more money for them.

Although I’ve only cited one report that I’m basing this post on, I came from the instructional design world.  We charged crazy fees (usually way more than 35% of the total contract) for design/development at my old firm and that was the first thing the client paid for.  I also realize that there is a need for some structured content in a company’s learning and development plans - I just think it should be provided in minimal chunks.

I’m suggesting services that would be a double win for companies purchasing training outsourcing.  With more informal elements in the mix to create a more diverse learning portfolio the client would not only receive more effective learning and development, they would pay less up front and get to make money from the money that they would have spent on instructional design and development fees.

Note:  I’m consciously not addressing the area where training outsourcing firms make the second most amount of money - the 30% from delivery of training services.  Informal learning, by nature, requires less delivery than its traditional counterpart.  For this post, though, I wanted to emphasize the benefits of not paying design/development fees up front.