The Nine Too-Often-Neglected Principles of e-Learning Design

Yes, nine. I realize ten would have been a rounder, more traditional number, but that didn’t worry Gagné with his Events of Instruction, now did it? (See Sidebar 1 for a summary of Gagné’s Events.) And perhaps there’s even a cosmic connection there, since a good third of his Events of Instruction seem to have fallen into the realm of neglect as well (with the notable exception, of course, of the revered Event #2, which is devoutly observed in every e-Learning course via the ceremonial listing of the never-to-be-read course objectives by no later than screen 3). But let’s save that soapbox for another article.

The truth is that every time I tried to think of a tenth principle to round out my list, it seemed either too painfully obvious or not quite neglected enough to be grouped with the other stepchildren, so nine it remains. And I wish I could say that my motives for sharing them were more altruistic, but in reality, since I will likely be reviewing e-Learning courses for many years to come, I’m primarily hoping to make my own life a little more bearable! So without further ado, here are the nine principles.

Principle 1: Interactive or hyperactive?

We all know that, in a self-paced, asynchronous course, learning occurs as a result of the interactions embedded within the training. But somewhere in the evolutionary timeline of online learning, someone mixed up “meaningful interactivity” with “frequent hyperactivity” and the number of links per page became one of the standard units of measure for instructional quality. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1 Example of “hyperactivity” in a course. Rolling over each photo brings up a new text paragraph. While this may be an effective information design technique, it should not be confused as instructional interaction, since it does not activate any type of cognitive process within the learner.

Beware — you may even be an unwitting hyper activist yourself! For instance, do any of these sound familiar?

“This page could use a little interaction. Let’s stick in a hyperlink that brings up some pop-up text!”

“That module summary is a bit static. I know — let’s add a bunch of different URLs that they can link to!”

“We need to get the user a little more involved. Let’s break that page up into four little pages so they’re forced to click Next a few times!”

If these statements bear an uncomfortable resemblance to your own thought processes, there may nonetheless still be hope for you. But I would recommend you keep reading.

Principle 2: Trans-media operations: Day surgery or intensive reconstruction?

So you already have an online reference guide in place containing everything your employees will ever need to know on Topic X?! Then with a simple nip here (i.e., listing of the learning objectives for each unit) and a small tuck there (i.e., the addition of a multiple-choice quiz), you’ve successfully changed your boring reference manual into a bona fide e-Learning intervention! (See Figure 2.) So why all the fuss from custom developers like myself about taking several weeks to design and program an effective course? We are all after your money, no doubt.

Figure 2 In this exercise, pharmaceutical sales reps are faced with several scenarios in which they must respond to some tough physician questions about their product. At any time during the exercise, they are able to pull up the product “fact book” (see highlighted icon at lower left) to research the answers they need.

But if I wasn’t just after your money and if I really was interested in helping you meet your business objectives, I might possibly make the argument that retention and transfer of your content would be more readily achieved via an experiential learning course than via a reference manual with instructional appendages. I might even have the effrontery to say that reference materials and courses have different roles — that the purpose of the former is to provide critical knowledge at the point of need, while the purpose of the latter is to provide the experiences that teach learners how to apply that knowledge to their real life tasks.

So can these two separate media peacefully coexist? Yes — and in a symbiotic relationship, no less! If you find it difficult to cram all of your content into your e-Learning course without creating an inordinate amount of pages or pop-up text boxes, then don’t! Create instead a course that consists largely of exercises — scenarios, simulations, games, what have you — that require the learners to analyze and apply the content. And if they don’t yet know the content? Then guide them to find it — in context and at the point of need! That’s right — provide them with links to the appropriate points in your reference material right from the course itself! (Those don’t count as the types of links that we condemned in Principle 1, by the way, just in case you were wondering.)

That’s unorthodox, you say? Well, just wait till you get to Principle #5. But first, my tirade on subject-matter experts.

Principle 3: Why SMEs must never be allowed to take over the world

I actually have many friends who are SMEs. But these are primarily the ones who have attained inner peace with respect to their destined role and no longer try to run amok designing courses and writing assessments.

But can SMEs never aspire to become instructional designers themselves, you ask? After all, isn’t that the heart of every rapid development tool’s marketing message?

There are, admittedly, a few documented instances of SMEs who successfully transformed themselves into instructional designers ... but only after undergoing a dramatic spiritual conversion in which their long-held traditions of knowledge based instruction gave way to the enlightened path of performance-based learning. Researchers verified the transformation in each case by comparing several of the subjects’ post-conversion questions with those commonly overheard in their pre-enlightenment phase. See Table 1 below for the results of the comparison.

But alas, the large majority of the world’s SMEs continue to define content in terms of all the topics that learners might ever need to know, with the result being courses that focus on the inhalation and regurgitation of work-related facts and concepts. It is therefore still up to the instructional designer to lead the minds of these well-meaning but misguided souls to ponder the higher question of what changes must take place in the learners’ actions, attitudes, and capabilities in order to achieve measurable performance improvements, and to then translate this information into potent, relevant learning experiences.

Principle 4: The glamorous world of hi-fi design

And just how do you go about making an e-Learning experience that is both potent and relevant? By creating activities that approximate the real-world tasks as closely as possible in an online environment (within the parameters of the allotted budget and timeline), of course. (See Figure 3.) In other words, the learning activities that are most effective at achieving transfer are those with the highest level of fidelity — hence, the value of “hi-fi” design.

Figure 3 Example of hi-fi design: This game mimics the real-life adventures and pitfalls of the pharmaceutical sales rep. The goal: To get face time with the influential physician. How? Get gradually referred to the top by first meeting with and impressing the lower level MD’s. Performance in a given scenario can lead to an upward referral, a lateral referral, or no referral at all! Expertise is measured both in terms of potential revenue generated and the amount of time it takes to reach the goal.

I nearly cut this principle from the list, as it teeters precariously on the brink of the painfully obvious, but the frequency with which it is overlooked in practice convinced me to leave it in.

Consider a product knowledge course designed to ensure that salespeople know all the ins and outs of a new product line. The most common method I have seen for providing practice on this type of content is a list of standard multiple-choice or true/false questions regarding the features and benefits of each product. Or occasionally (Hold on to your seats!) a drag-and-drop matching exercise in which learners match a feature to its corresponding product! These activities are undoubtedly the diabolical work of the more sinister class of SMEs discussed in the previous principle, as these individuals thrive on knowledge regurgitation: “I name a product — you rattle off its features and benefits.”

Now I could actually live with this type of lo-fi exercise were it simply a knowledge check leading up to a culminating performance activity, but all too often it is the culminating activity. Don’t let the appellation fool you. The true objective of a product “knowledge” course for salespeople is actually performance — improved sales performance, to be exact. Then why wouldn’t the culminating activity take place in a sales setting? With fictitious but realistic customers who must be asked relevant probing questions in order to uncover their needs, which should in turn trigger in the salesperson’s mind a specific set of benefits that address those needs, which can in turn be associated with their corresponding product features? And then why not have the customer pose a challenge or concern which requires the salesperson to not only understand the relevant features and benefits but also to explain them in such a way that the customer is likely to appreciate them, too?

Get the picture? Those are precisely the types of real-life situations in which the salespeople will have to apply their new knowledge in order to make the sale. I would venture to argue that they will rarely have a customer approach them and ask, “And by the way, could you recite to me all the features of the XBJ2000, along with the corresponding benefits of each?” So why content ourselves with asking them to do nothing more than that in the training?

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