CHAPTER FOUR
Analyze What You Want the Audience to Do
A Talk With Randall
The next day, Dayna goes to Susan’s office for her meeting with Randall, the subject matter expert for compliance training. Dayna has brought a task list of performance objectives that she wants to verify with Randall. She also feels that there are some missing steps that the policy doesn’t address.
Susan escorts Dayna to a nearby cubicle. She waves at Randall. Randall takes off his earphones and raises his eyebrows. “Randall, I’d like for you to meet Dayna. She’s from learning and development.” Randall nods at Dayna. Dayna smiles. “Randall is in touch with the owners of all of the policies we’re training on, so he’s your point person.”
“Thanks, Susan,” says Dayna. Susan walks back to her office. Dayna turns to Randall. “Mind if I sit?”
“Nope.” Randall removes a stack of papers from the chair by his cubicle.
“Well, as Susan said, I’m the instructional designer for the compliance course.” Randall nods again. “I’d like to take a look at the performance objectives with you and see if we can identify gaps.” Randall looks at her but says nothing. Dayna tries again. “Susan mentioned some new privacy procedures? Maybe we can start there?”
“Sure,” says Randall.
“Um, maybe you could describe the new process of encrypting email,” suggests Dayna.
Randall inhales and glances at his screen. “Yep. When you send an email containing sensitive information, you need to encrypt it.”
Dayna waits for more information. Randall’s done. “Alright, what performance expectations do you … ” Dayna rephrases the question. “What are the steps for encrypting an email?”
Randall demonstrates on his computer how to encrypt the email while Dayna takes notes. “That seems fairly simple,” says Dayna. “Type the word encrypt in the subject line of the email and send it.” Randall shrugs and nods. “So, why do you think employees aren’t doing it?” asks Dayna.
“They are,” says Randall matter-of-factly.
“So … why do we need to train them?” asks Dayna. “What’s the problem?”
“Attachments,” Randall says. “The problem is really the attachments.”
“What’s wrong with the attachments?” she asks.
“They have confidential information in them,” says Randall.
“Right.” Dayna still doesn’t get it. “But isn’t that normal? Isn’t that part of what we do as a business?”
“Yeah.” Randall takes another deep breath. Dayna makes a mental note not to ask yes-or-no questions going forward. This time Randall offers more information. “But they’re hiding rows.”
“Rows?” asks Dayna. “So are we talking about a spreadsheet here?” Remembering her mental note about yes-or-no questions, she adds, “What file types are being sent as attachments?”
“Yeah, that’s it. Excel spreadsheets. They hide rows that have information that doesn’t belong to the person they’re sending it to. That’s an unauthorized disclosure,” explains Randall.
Dayna takes some notes and recaps, “So, the recipient gets access to sensitive information that they are unauthorized to see. Because the sender hid rows?”
“Sometimes a report will bring in more information than what’s needed … you know, more than the minimum necessary.” Randall turns to his computer and scrolls through his email.
Dayna is starting to understand. “OK, so when that happens, the employee is just hiding the rows with the extra information that the recipient shouldn’t see. But what they should do instead is … ”
“Delete the rows,” says Randall, still scrolling through his email.
“They should delete the rows,” Dayna says aloud as she writes it down. “Because the recipient could unhide the rows in the spreadsheet to view sensitive information they are not authorized to see. And that’s what you called more than the minimum necessary?”
“Mm-hm.”
“OK, what happens if they don’t do that?” asks Dayna.
Randall spins around toward Dayna and sits up in his chair. “Let me tell you. Privacy had this one case where the sensitive information of over 12,000 people was disclosed to an unauthorized party in one email. What a headache! Took us over a month to get all of that settled. If people only knew!”
Dayna leans back, surprised at Randall’s sudden animation. “If people only knew … ?”
Randall continues, “ …. how much time it takes for disclosure tracking and reporting and the time crunch! We’ve got to notify people that their information has been sent to the wrong person within 60 days!”
“Yeah, that sounds like a lot of work for one misstep,” Dayna empathizes. “This, uh, disclosure tracking. Is this something the employee is responsible for doing?”
“Maybe,” says Randall, suddenly sedate. He turns back to his email.
Dayna kicks herself for asking another yes-or-no question. “What should the employee do if they have done something like this—an unauthorized disclosure?
“They should contact the privacy office, I wouldn’t worry about putting all of the disclosure tracking stuff in training, just tell them to call the privacy office and they will take it from there.”
“But employees may be responsible for doing some of this disclosure tracking—I mean, what are their responsibilities?”
“First, let their supervisor know, then contact the privacy office. They will give further instructions. And yeah, sometimes the supervisor and the employee have to do some of the grunt work, and believe me, it’s not fun.”
“Thanks, Randall,” says Dayna, “That’s really helpful.” She jots a note on her audience profile: WIIFM—Save time! As she writes, she asks Randall, “If you could tell employees one thing about this issue, what would it be?”
“Use your head! Think before your send an email!”
“Good advice,” says Dayna. “OK, so it sounds like what the privacy office is asking them to do is check the spreadsheet for hidden rows, minimum necessary, and accuracy?”
“And the email address!” Randall puts his head in his hand, “You’d think people could remember who needed the information. I can’t tell you how many cases we’ve had where people encrypt everything and quality check the spreadsheet attachment but send it to the wrong person!”
“Wow, yeah.” Dayna takes some notes. “Is there any other reason why you think people are doing this?”
“None that I know,” says Randall, “Except maybe that they are slammed and just want to get it out the door.”
“Who?” asks Dayna.
“Well, 95 percent of the time it’s customer service,” explains Randall.
Dayna makes another note on her audience profile: customer service. “That’s interesting.” Dayna feels an urge to question further about this piece of information but isn’t sure what to ask. “What about the cybersecurity issue? The phishing email?”
Randall nods. “Yeah, it’s a problem.”
Dayna asks, “Why do you think people are still clicking on links that contain malware?”
Randall shakes his head, “I have no idea. Cybersecurity has sent out the policy, like, a hundred times!”
“Wait,” says Dayna. “So have employees ever received training on how to handle phishing emails?”
“Well, basically, it’s a PowerPoint with the policy on it and a quiz at the end,” he answers.
Dayna vaguely remembers taking that course. It was the text of the policy on the screen with an occasional unrelated stock photo. One of those “can’t-click-Next-until-the-narration-is-finished” courses. She pulls out the cybersecurity policy from her stack and holds it out to Randall. “But the policy doesn’t have anything in here about what to do with phishing emails. Or how to detect them. How are employees supposed to know what to do if the policy doesn’t tell them?”
Randall takes the policy and scans through it. Then he points to the page and says, “See, it’s right here.”
Dayna looks at where Randall is pointing and reads aloud, “Also, employees should always be vigilant to catch emails that carry malware or phishing attempts.” Dayna looks at Randall. She looks back at the page. “That’s it? This is all the guidance employees are receiving?”
“It’s common sense!” says Randall, a little defensively.
Dayna realizes that she could put minimal effort into making this course engaging and probably make Susan and cybersecurity pretty happy. Anything would be better than the death-by-narrated-text course they are used to. But then she thinks of every employee in the company enduring 30 minutes of nonsense and still leaving the course without knowing what to do. And there’s Susan’s request for a story. She can’t think about that right now. The very least she can do is train employees on what they can act on.
“Maybe it’s common sense,” says Dayna. “But it’s not common knowledge. I think with your help we can make detection and prevention steps a little clearer. Let’s review these performance objectives … ” She doesn’t want to use instructional design jargon with Randall. How can she describe it succinctly? Finally she says, “Let’s build an action list.”
Talk Straight
Though many instructional design certification programs have a deep focus on writing learning objectives, a highly academic approach does not always adequately prepare professionals and students to enter the warp-speed world of business. The theory is solid and mastering it is helpful, but when it comes down to communication with stakeholders, SMEs, and learners, it’s best to talk straight: “What actions need to be done to achieve the business outcome?” Dayna caught on to this by the end of her conversation with Randall.
You will find success in speaking the language of your subject matter experts and making it easy for them to speak yours. Calling the task list of performance objectives an action list is one of the ways you can bridge that gap. It keeps you and your subject matter experts focused on what’s most important: action! Check appendix 1 for an action list template in the Instructional Story Design Plan. Download an editable version of the action list template and an example of a completed action list at needastory.com/book-resources.
Figure 4-1. Action List Template
Observable Action
Let’s work on identifying observable actions. Look at the following example of a training goal and its matching actions. Which ones rise to the top as something the learner would be able to do?
Goal of training: Increase sales numbers by 4 percent by end of Q3 by increasing the business acumen of sales associates to accurately and confidently explain product application to clients’ needs.
• Understand why clients need to know how products work.
• Show how the product may meet the client’s future need by comparing industry trends to the client’s situation.
• Avoid putting off client questions about how products work.
• Use the product sheet to show clients product features that will meet their needs.
• Explain how the client’s needs will be met by the product.
• Be aware of product applications.
• Share testimonials of how the product has worked for other clients in similar situations.
If you are struggling with this, think of the above list as actions you should be able to observe someone doing. Now, it should be clearer. You can’t watch someone understand or be aware. Both of these verbs must manifest themselves through an observable action. It doesn’t mean that learners don’t need to understand why clients need to know how products work, but this new knowledge must be acted upon. Those are the actions that need to be included on the action list. Be aware of is a commonly used objective. Awareness is a good thing for marketing and communications and can be coupled with training for a powerful experience, but instructional designers need to press beyond this and get to the actions learners will have to perform. Ask the subject matter expert, “If the sales associate understands and is aware of why clients need to know how a product works, what will they do to demonstrate that?”
This holds true even if you may be tasked with designing core values training. It is only logical, if respect is a core value, that the main action may be “Respect your co-workers.” But it can’t stop there. The same principle of observable action applies. If employees respect their co-workers, what will they do to demonstrate it? They may “Communicate with co-workers in a way that values their contributions” or even more specifically, “Stop typing, put away your phone, and give your undivided attention during conversations with co-workers.”
There’s another item on this list that should also be struck. It’s a non-action. Remember James’s joke in the last chapter about non-learning objectives? That’s exactly what avoid is telling us: something they shouldn’t do, rather than something they can do. If an action list contains words like avoid or do not or refrain from, there is either a positive action hidden somewhere in the negative, or it belongs in the content as part of the purpose, importance or benefits of the course.
In this case, the nonaction, “Avoid putting off client questions about how products work” could have a positive hidden in it, such as “Explain how the client’s needs will be met by the product,” but that’s already on this list. More likely, it would be more powerful to use this information not as a nonaction on the action list, but as part of the content describing the course’s importance, such as, “An important step in making the sale is answering clients’ questions regarding the application of the product to their needs. Avoiding this step is a mistake that will most likely end in losing the client.” Or, even better, imagine a story about a sales person who puts off questions from the client about how products work. Show the fallout of that action and you won’t even need to say anything about the importance. They will experience the importance for themselves through the story.
When you scan your initial action list, first look for ones that should be eliminated. Can I observe someone doing this? Is there a nonaction represented? When removing those items from the action list above, this is what’s left:
Goal of training: Increase sales numbers by 4 percent by end of Q3 by increasing the business acumen of sales associates to accurately and confidently explain product application to clients’ needs.
• Understand why clients need to know how products work.
• Show how the product may meet the client’s future need by comparing industry trends to the client’s situation.
• Avoid putting off client questions about how products work.
• Use the product sheet to show clients product features that will meet their needs.
• Explain how the client’s needs will be met by the product.
• Be aware of product applications.
• Share testimonials of how the product has worked for other clients in similar situations.
Organized Action
Using the pared down version of the sales action list as an example; there’s another step that needs to be taken to shape it into an action list with a logical sequence. Right now, the action list is flat. Nothing is more important than anything else. There is no obvious sequence of steps. To make this a more usable action list, let’s put the actions in a logical order.
First, take a look at the goal of training. What is the main action sales people will need to do? It’s the last phrase of the goal: “Explain product application to clients’ needs.” Is this represented in the action list? Yes, it’s part of all of the actions. The third action, “Explain how the client’s needs will be met by the product,” is almost identical to the goal of training, so let’s move that to the top as our main action. You may call it a terminal performance objective. Since all of the others are parts of this main action, indent them underneath. Now the list looks like this:
• Explain how the client’s needs will be met by the product.
Show how the product may meet the client’s future need by comparing industry trends to the client’s situation.
Use the product sheet to show clients product features that will meet their needs.
Share testimonials of how the product has worked for other clients in similar situations.
After showing this to the subject matter expert, they might agree that all the steps are represented, but in the wrong order. They want sales associates to first use the product sheet to show clients product features that will meet their needs, and they want to bring in testimonials earlier in the process (because success stories are also powerful). Showing how the product may meet the client’s future needs by comparing industry trends to the client’s situation is last and optional, if the first two steps haven’t worked. You modify the action list:
• Explain how the client’s needs will be met by the product, using these three steps:
Use the product sheet to show clients product features that will meet their needs.
Share testimonials of how the product has worked for other clients in similar situations.
Show how the product may meet the client’s future need by comparing industry trends to the client’s situation (if steps 1 and 2 haven’t convinced the client).
Now the action list makes a lot of sense. If sales people do steps 1-3, they will accomplish the main action above it. It’s easy to digest at a glance and sales associates will be able to use this process on the job. Look back to the first list. It contained all of the right things, plus some extras, but it wasn’t organized in a way that was easy to grasp. Though you will have to ask more questions about the sub-actions for steps 1-3, you have a solid framework for designing the instruction and the story.
You might be wondering, Don’t subject matter experts already know these steps? Shouldn’t they be able to just hand you a list of steps? On rare occasion, subject matter experts will have an organized sequence of actions they expect learners to take, but more often, you will help them discover their own process.
Dayna’s Action List
Let’s refer back to Dayna’s conversation with Randall. Before that conversation, Dayna’s action list for the privacy training looked like this (Figure 4-2).
Figure 4-2. Dayna’s Pre-SME Action List for Privacy
Even before she goes into the conversation, she’s already thinking about how to get past awareness. She wants to identify the actions employees need to take. You read about her conversation regarding the action list for encrypting emails. Before reading on, go back to the conversation and jot down the actions that employees should do for the privacy action list. Did you come up with something that looked like this?
Figure 4-3. Dayna’s Post-SME Action List for Privacy
Note that Dayna picked up from Randall that the bigger problem was not encryption but hiding rows on spreadsheets instead of deleting them. Most likely, you will walk away from stakeholder conversations with a list that looks similarly unorganized. That’s OK. You’ve got all of the information you need. Now take a stab at organizing this list in a logical sequence. Does anything need to be eliminated or re-written? Cross it out or rewrite it. Can you place these actions in a hierarchy that makes sense? In what order should they be listed? Number them in a logical sequence. After you’ve done these things, come back to see how Dayna organized her list.
Figure 4-4. Dayna’s Revised, Organized Action List
Dayna’s first pass at organizing the action list is good. This list contains some common red flags, though. Let’s refine the action list even more.
Read through Dayna’s final action list in Figure 4-6. Are the actions observable? For the most part, yes. Though you couldn’t necessarily observe someone verifying an email address outright, the action is written as strong as it can be. Are they organized logically? Notice that everything under number 1 relates to sending email securely and everything under number 2 relates to reporting. And, at a glance, one can easily identify the two main actions that will help mitigate risk concerning privacy: Send emails securely and report unauthorized disclosures.
Action lists help stakeholders confirm their own process and make it easier for them to spot if something is out of place or missing.
Figure 4-5. Action List Red Flags
Figure 4-6. Dayna’s Final Action List
As you compile and organize the actions for your action list, items like Dayna’s listed below may end up on yours:
• Understand the importance to protect our clients’ trust in the company.
• Comply with company policies regarding the protection of our information.
• Reduce time spent on restoring affected systems.
While not observable actions, they are important and should be recorded, but not on the action list. They represent another kind of content that will prove useful, especially for your story. It’s called PIBS, which stands for purpose, importance, benefits and similar to:
• Purpose: The stakeholder will help define the purpose of the instruction. Usually the purpose statement is woven into the course’s description or pre-course communications.
• Importance: The importance is derived from the purpose. Think of the purpose as the surface-level “why” (to comply with laws, to build an effective team, or to implement a new system) and the importance as the second-level “why” (because we want to keep our clients, because employees on effective teams are more efficient, because the new system will help streamline our processes). Expressing the importance in the story in instruction helps motivate employees to take action.
• Benefits: The results of adopting the new behaviors should have an outcome that positively impacts the company, the team, and the individual. There may be more benefits for her to discover. In the story, since characters are in conflict with the actions from the action list, they will naturally reap consequences that are in conflict with the benefits. Benefits also help with motivation.
• Similar to: This is particularly helpful when the content is somewhat foreign to the learner and they need something familiar to explain the unfamiliar. When your story solution is a metaphor, go to your similar to for inspiration.
There is a PIBS for each item on the action list, but that can get a little overwhelming. PIBS for Dayna’s cybersecurity and privacy course may look similar to this:
• Purpose: To comply with company policies regarding the protection of our clients’ information.
• Importance: Because we want our clients to keep trusting us with their information and do business with us.
• Benefits: Our company’s brand reputation increases and reduce time spent on restoring affected systems. Individuals benefit from encrypting emails successfully by saving them time on the back end, when they might have to spend hours assisting with disclosure tracking.
• Similar to: The trust you place in a credit card company to guard your information.
Training and Stories Are All About Action
Dayna has extracted, from her conversation with Randall, the things that employees should be able to do. She’s placed them in a logical order. She will need to go back to Randall to confirm with him that the action list is accurate and complete and that there is nothing extraneous on it.
The action list is essential for instruction and for storytelling. Learner actions must align with the business outcome, which is why they must be observable. Could you take a video of someone doing it? Great! You’ve got an observable action that you can teach.
This is also important for storytelling, because stories are all about observable action. Earlier in the book, you were asked to imagine your training story as a staged play. Go through your action list and imagine yourself as a director telling the actor to do the things on that list. “Bonnie, I’d like you to cross stage left and be aware of product applications.” Sounds ridiculous, right? But if you told Bonnie to cross stage left and use the product sheet to show the client product features that will meet their needs, she can actually do something. There’s even a prop she can use to do it!
Characters do things, and in Story Design, they are doing things that conflict with the action list. Get the action list right and the conflict of your story will be spot on.
The End of Analysis
You leave the Discover phase with two things in hand: an audience profile and an action list. Along the way, you’ve made note of case studies and other possible stories. You’ve also got a handle on the training’s purpose, importance, benefits, and similarities (PIBS). Now it’s time to turn to the Design phase. We’ll leave instructional design for now and focus exclusively on designing the story, but we’ll come back to it in the Deliver phase of the book, where we’ll explore the application of storytelling to training delivery.
PRACTICE STORY DESIGN:
Structure an Action List
You gather all of the notes from your conversations with Dr. Kobal and his staff and make a list of the actions that will need to be taken in order for Well Adjusted Chiropractic to retain its customers and staff members.
All of these actions funnel up to the main objective of building strong client loyalty. You’ve divided your list into three main categories that focus on communication as a foundation of trust building: manager-to-staff communication, staff-to-client communication, and staff-to-staff communication. Dr. Kobal is coaching Carrie on how to communicate with the staff more effectively. For the most part, the staff is cordial to clients when speaking to them directly. You decide to focus training on the last category: staff-to-staff communication.
First, narrow this list down to observable actions. You may need to convert some of them into strong positive actions. Then organize them in a logical sequence. It may not be chronological, but put them in an order that makes sense. Try to narrow the actions down to one main action and four sub-actions that are written as statements directly to the learner. After you’ve completed the exercise, you can compare your answers to the completed Instructional Story Design Plan in appendix 3.
• Respect other staff members as you want to be respected in the presence of clients.
• Don’t talk about personal issues in front of the client.
• Understand the importance of respectful communication.
• Don’t withhold information; let staff members in other areas know about important information concerning clients.
• Be aware of clients in the room when speaking to fellow staff members; keep their personal information private.
• Explain the difference between respectful and disrespectful communication.
• Openly communicate with your fellow-staff members.
Write your revised action list below: