Rapid Learning Cafe

The Rapid Learning Cafe is a site for managers, HR leaders, sales executives and training professionals who seek tools and strategies to better train and develop their people. The RLC editorial team puts special emphasis on the latest research on training and workplace learning – and what top learning organizations are doing to stay ahead of the curve. Key topics covered include e-learning, training transfer, assessment, trainee motivation, course development and delivery, and follow-up.

Training Follow Up: THE Essential Factor in Training Transfer

March 17, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

That managers are ONLY people who can ensure that training transfer sticks. Follow up is THE factor that determines training transfer. The biggest challenge organizations face is getting managers to do it.

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The Research: Why Training Transfer is So Low

March 5, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

Dozens of studies in the past 40 years have tried to figure out how to improve training transfer. I've read many of them and there's one thing they all agree on: People retain only 10% to 20% of what they learn. The question academics all try to answer is: How can organizations vastly improve that number?

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Interval Reinforcement -- Following Up on Training

February 21, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

Learn why 80 percent of what an employee learns in training is abandoned almost immediately after the training event.

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Training Transfer: Kirkpatrick Says It's All About Managers

February 16, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

Training expert Bob Pike recently conducted a revealing interview with Donald Kirkpatrick, the man who created the model for “Training Evaluation” and for years ran ASTD. If you know Kirkpatrick, skip this paragraph, but if you don’t, here in a nutshell is why he’s been such a key player in training over the past half

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Are Your Managers Plugged In to Best Practices in Your Industry?

February 10, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

At a meeting of my executive forum yesterday, one CEO talked about how she ensures that her management team stays sharp: She requires all bosses to join a peer group or industry association. It’s actually written in their contract. They don’t get their annual bonuses if they can’t show active participation. I like this idea.

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To Improve Training Retention, Capitalize on Metacognitive Learning Skills

February 3, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

Metacognition sounds complicated and academic, but it's not. Anyone who's taught others knows that some people learn better than others. And intelligence doesn't always explain the difference. Most good learners couldn't possibly explain how they do it, but they've figured out "how to learn." They've acquired a set of skills that learning experts call "metacognition" (which literally means "beyond knowledge").

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Why Training Dollars Go Down the Drain

February 3, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

Training doesn't stick. In 1885 a German psychologist named Hermann Ebbinghaus conducted a study showing that 30 days after a training event people retain just 20% of what they learned. Since the 1970s dozens of academic researchers have confirmed Ebbinhaus' findings and conducted studies to determine how to achieve better knowledge retention after training events.

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How Shared Vocabulary Can Improve Training Transfer

February 3, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

One of the goals of any training effort should be to create shared vocabulary. That is, words and phrases that capture key concepts that drive performance in an organization. They become a sort of shorthand, or code, that help train new employees and reinforce the right behaviors with veterans. The greatest example I've ever heard is President Clinton's 1992 campaign slogan, "It's the economy, stupid."

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An interview with Stephen Meyer, RLI's CEO and Director of Learning & Development

January 25, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

Adults want to consume learning in small chunks. One of our customers calls it “snack-sized” learning. I’m sure this was true 20 years ago as well, but today it’s even more so. We’ve all been trained by Google to expect instant solutions in the moment of need. We’re all multi-taskers. We all have to some degree what I call “occupational A.D.D.” When modern adults engage in a learning event, they want it to give them what a successful Google provides – EXACTLY what they’re looking for. And they want it FAST!

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interval reinforcement

Relapse Prevention - How to Make Training Stick

January 22, 2010 by Stephen J. Meyer

The term Relapse Prevention banishes all illusions about training "stickiness." When you’re trying to rehabilitate a drug abuser, you have no illusions that the treatment will stick without post-treatment. In fact, many would argue that what happens after treatment is MORE important than the treatment itself. But in the workplace for some reason we assume that you can teach people something in training and expect it to stick. That's totally false, but we tend to believe it. This explains why we spend 10% of our time and effort preparing for training, 85% on the training event itself, and just 5% on follow up. If the substance abuse relapse metaphor can help us dispel the illusion that training will stick without follow-up, we’ll be more likely to do what it takes to ensure people retain what they learned.

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