It’s that time of year when most learning leaders tackle their strategic planning for the learning function.  The clients I work with tend to fall into one of two categories: they approach strategic planning with hope and excitement, or they are cautious about tackling what is perceived to be an overwhelming task.  In either case, my role is not to build the plan for them but rather to help them navigate the planning process, challenge their status quo, and support them as they make difficult tradeoff decisions.  Then, I cheer for them when they crystallize the plan.  While it is a mentally taxing facilitation session for me and them, it is one of the most rewarding!

As I reflect on the recent planning sessions working with clients, I wanted to share seven tips to consider as you embark on your strategic planning:

1. Involve Your Team: If your department is large enough to have directors and managers, include them.  Also include anyone on your team who has specific knowledge or responsibility that is important to have in the discussions.  Anyone invited to a working session needs to bring their A-game-- tell them that. I’d shy away from inviting your whole team unless it is small (five people or less).  The extended team should be involved but probably not at the beginning; while you don’t want to make decisions in a bubble, too many voices can make it difficult to create a good plan.  If you want a scan of the current state and what the team envisions for the future, send out a short survey to everyone and collate the results – it's a great way to start the live planning session.
2. Anchor to the Business Objectives: Whether it’s the entire organization or a single business unit you serve, find out the business objectives and strategic initiatives, then align to them.  Put them on a slide and refer to them as you go through the planning process to ensure that your plan not only supports the business but enables the business to achieve the results it has declared.
3. Ruthlessly Prioritize: This is a tough one and it is the time when I challenge clients the most.  Once priorities and tactics are identified, a prioritization activity should occur to determine which ones will be included in the plan.  This is tough, because we tend to think that everything is important.  It may very well be.  However, there’s a limit to our time, resources, and budget.  In many cases, learning teams are ‘building the plane while flying it’.  Ideally, your prioritization yields a mix of quick wins, near-term, and long-term tactics.  Reach out to me if you’d like a copy of our Prioritization Activity to use with your team; just be prepared to moderate with tough love!
4. Consider Learning Team Capabilities and Gaps to Address: As you identify priorities and tactics, think about the current capabilities of you and your team.  Does your team have what it will take to implement the plan?  If not, team capabilities must be part of your strategic plan.  For example, imagine that you desire better alignment to the business objectives, yet the training team has been acting as reactive “order takers” at your organization. To address this gap in communicating with business partners to understand needs, the team will need up-skilling in a capability: in this case, performance consulting.
5. Cut the Training Jargon: Ever see a business leader’s eyes glaze over when you start talking about personalized learner journeys, blended learning, or gamification?  While near and dear to us, you’ll want to minimize using terms like these, as the strategic plan should be understandable to anyone in the organization who reads it. 
6. Market Your Plan: Now that you’ve avoided the training jargon, prepare a focused and visually appealing “walk-around deck” so you can communicate your plan with your team, key stakeholders, and even your learners.  Take the time to proof the deck and consider graphic support needs.  Then, set up time to talk with everyone about it.  Make sure you think about any questions or objections that may arise and give thoughtful answers.
7. Create a Workable Plan: Sounds like common sense, right?  I’ve seen learning organizations stumble here.  They create a plan that is too complicated to execute, overfilled with tactics, or lacking in clear timelines.  Make sure to list out each tactic with a description, resources needed, a specific start and end date, and the people responsible for implementation.  A note about timelines: try to be more specific than “complete in Q4”.  It’s important to project the timing of your plan in detail, so you can overlay its different tactics and see where there may be too many things happening at once.  Remember, you are probably building that plane while you are flying it.
8. Consider the Culture: Is your organization an enterprising new startup? A large global biotech? Is the organization risk adverse or welcoming of new innovations?  Imagine the looks on the faces of the business as they hear about your plan.  The culture can serve as your guideposts for creating a realistic plan that everyone can rally around.

The learning function is often thought of as the opposite of strategic, and in fact, many elements of what we do are tactical.  A solid strategic plan can help you and your learning team incorporate strategy into your work and better serve as strategic business partners.  Now it’s time to tackle that plan; I’m cheering for you!

The post Seven tips to ensure your strategic planning is a success  appeared first on Bull City Blue.

When to consider preparing a business case?

There are a number of times when you should consider preparing a business case. Having a business case will help you hear the magic words “It’s approved!”. Here are several situations to consider a business case:

• You don’t have any resources
• You need more resources
• You identify a key organizational or performance need that would drive business outcomes if addressed
• The stakeholder expects it
• Presenting to senior leadership

Elements of a business case

Business cases can get pretty detailed and elaborate. The size and scope of the business case will depend on how large your learning initiative or project will be. 

There are three key elements of a great business case. 

• Background and Business Need - This is a really important element as it conveys the challenge or performance problem that your initiative will address. This may be the most difficult section to write, since it isn’t always easy to capture and articulate the need. However, this element is critical as it sets the stage for your solution. If your request gets shared with others in the organization, it should be clear for anyone reading it, why you want to implement your initiative. 
• Project Overview - As it states, this should include key elements:
  • Deliverables and Objectives
  • Timeline and Key Dates
  • Project Team
  • Estimated Cost
• The Impact and The Ask - This element outlines the importance of developing the proposed solution and highlights your ask(s) of the audience. To help demonstrate the importance of developing the proposed solution, it can be helpful to illustrate the consequences of not acting. When you do make your ask, be specific! What will you need from each stakeholder to make this successful? 

In summary, knowing how and when to make a business case will help you get your new learning initiative approved. In addition to following this structure, be sure to use supporting data to make your case bulletproof and it always helps to know your stakeholder(s). Being able to adjust to their personality and communication style will help your business case be better received.

The post How to Pitch Your Next Idea: The 3 Elements in a Business Case  appeared first on Bull City Blue.

Saying yes might "miss the mark" even when we're pleasing the stakeholder.

We need to know when to say no and when to say yes.

When to say no

Well, it’s easier said than done. Here are some times when a performance consultant says no:

• It’s not a training solution 
• Their plate is already full 
• The timeline is too short
• Resources aren’t there
• The need is actually different than what the stakeholder wanted

All of these situations, there’s a good reason to say no. Saying yes won’t give you the result your stakeholder is looking for. So even though saying “no” feels confrontational, it can actually be a key part of working as a team.

How to say no

It’s possible to say “no” without actually saying “no”! Here’s 4 ways to say “no” and scenarios when you could use them:

1. Scenario:  When you’re asked to do something with an exceptionally short deadline.
   Saying No: “Sounds like a really quick turnaround. Under normal circumstances, this would not be a problem. With this deadline, I’d like to explore other options that may meet the need.”
2. Scenario: When you’re asked in a meeting for an estimated timeframe for a complex project.
   Saying No:  I’d like to think about it so I can provide a more accurate estimate. Could you send me more information so I can review it carefully? Then I’ll be in a better position to discuss it with the team. 
3. Scenario: When people ask you to do something instead of the appropriate person
   Saying No: I think that Steve in HR would be more equipped to meet this need. Do you know Steve, or would you like me to connect you?
4. Scenario: When a business unit head asked you to tackle a new high priority project, but you are already working on another important initiative and can’t do both.
   Saying No: Wow, thank you for thinking of me! I am already working on another important project, but this sounds important too. Let me discuss with my leader and see how we can support. 

Performance consultants know when, and how, to say no. It is a differentiator between how order takers and performance consultants operate.

The post 4 Ways to Say No without Saying “No”! appeared first on Bull City Blue.

By Sue Iannone

A struggling L&D organization can exhibit a range of characteristics. Maybe its staff feel overworked and under-resourced. Perhaps it operates as a reactive organization instead of proactively pursuing strategic initiatives.

If this sounds familiar, it's time for a strategic reboot.

That's where our latest white paper comes into play. In Building an Organizational Strategy for L&D, we outline a four-phase process for articulating and achieving a guiding strategy that can radically improve your team's effectiveness.

To illustrate what that can look like in the real world, I'm sharing a few examples of recent projects Bull City Blue has tackled where we applied our org strategy process to challenges like product launches and gaps in training delivery:

Example #1 Needs Assessment for New Role - In anticipation of a specialty product launch, a biotechnology company opted to introduce a new Field Reimbursement Manager (FRM) role that would address access and reimbursement challenges. The organization needed to move quickly to define onboarding and foundational learning requirements. BCB partnered with commercial leadership and the L&D team to identify initial and ongoing learning needs, design the new hire curriculum, and facilitate the inaugural new hire training program.

Example #2 Competency Model Design – Soon after the launch of a specialty injectable product, this pharmaceutical company desired competency models for three of their customer-facing roles—sales representatives, virtual hybrid representatives, and field access managers.  The company’s goal was to clearly articulate performance expectations and give the learning organization and front-line managers the tools they needed to align the teams to them.  BCB partnered with key stakeholders to identify and map key behaviors and establish performance levels within each behavior—thus defining role-specific competency models.

Example #3 Strategic Planning - The L&D organization of a large pharmaceutical company was experiencing challenges when trying to meet the needs of its internal customers and key stakeholders.  These challenges included gaps in delivering effective training, curriculum design, resource management, and trainer capabilities.  BCB partnered with L&D leadership to define a new organizational strategy that prioritized critical needs, established a more effective organizational structure, and ultimately, transformed the learning function, making it more effective in supporting the business needs of the commercial organization.

To learn more about our process and recent work we've done, feel free to reach out or check our Org Strategy white paper.

The post Organizational Strategy in Practice appeared first on Bull City Blue.

By Carla Torgerson

Do you believe in unicorns?  It’s a safe bet that you don’t.  After all, unicorns are a myth, and everyone knows it.  But what about “learning styles,” the idea that each person is a certain kind of learner, and learns best when material is delivered to them in their own preferred style of learning?  The concept of learning styles has been around since the first half of the 20^th century.  It has had its ups and downs in terms of popularity, but it still hangs around despite the fact that the vast majority of scientific research on the topic has pretty soundly debunked it.

In this article, we’ll provide a quick overview of the learning styles concept.  We’ll also take a look at what can be useful—and harmful—about it.

The Learning Styles Concept

Over the years, different versions of the learning styles concept have been developed.  The one that has gotten most of the attention in recent decades is known as VARK, developed by researcher, Neil Fleming.  In short, it posits that each person can be grouped into one of four different types of learner:  Visual, Auditory, Reading, or Kinesthetic.

As you might expect, Visual learners supposedly learn best when information is presented to them visually, with heavy use of pictures, diagrams, demonstrations, etc.  Auditory learners supposedly learn best by using their ears.  Reading-oriented learners allegedly do better when they can read information.  And finally, kinesthetic learners supposedly like to get their hands on things, learning best when they can get physically involved by manipulating objects and so on.

According to this concept, instructional designers should develop programs that cater to each learner’s individual preferred style of learning, providing options that are matched to each style.  Doing this, the idea goes, will result in more effective instructional programs.  Unfortunately, the research does not support the idea that teaching in different ways for different people produces superior learning.

The Reality

Here’s the reality:  Assuming that we’re literate and that all of our 5 senses work correctly, we are all Visual, Auditory, Reading, and Kinesthetic learners.  Each of us has the capacity to learn in each of these ways.  While it’s true that some people have greater reading comprehension skills, or perhaps a preference for receiving information visually, these abilities and/or preferences do not represent different learning styles.

In fact, the most effective method for teaching new material doesn’t depend at all on the learners’ alleged individual learning styles.  It actually depends on the nature of the material being taught.  Furthermore, using a combination of methods is usually the best approach (Visual, Auditory, Reading, and Kinesthetic), even though one of those approaches might be dominant in any given case.

For example, if you want to teach someone the difference between classical music and hip-hop, you’d probably let them listen to multiple examples of each type of music.  You might also provide the learner with some reading materials and show the learner some pictures of famous classical and hip-hop artists.  However, auditory learning will factor most heavily in this situation.

In another example, training someone to service the brakes on a car might involve verbal instructions (auditory), the use of diagrams and demonstrations (visual), and written instructions (reading).  However, letting the person actually get their hands on the car will be the primary—and most impactful—approach.  In this case, the kinesthetic approach is where the magic happens.  We are all “kinesthetic learners” in this sort of situation. Of course, that approach is best when supplemented by all the other approaches too.

Key Takeaways for Learning and Development Pros

Given all this talk about learning styles, what are some key takeways for people who develop and deploy learning programs?  Here are a few that we think are useful:

1. People do not have preferred “learning styles” – Each person can learn in a number of different ways. People may have differing abilities or preferences, but no person is beholden to any single learning style.
2. It can be harmful to tell a person that he or she has a learning style – Telling someone that he or she is a “Visual Learner” (for example) might actually hold them back from a learning standpoint, as it can encourage them to pigeon-hole themselves and not take full advantage of their ability to learn in multiple ways. You never want to hear someone say: “I’ve been told I’m a Visual Learner, so I just don’t learn very well by reading things…”
3. The nature of the content will dictate the dominant approach – Per the examples above, the content itself—and not individual learning styles—will determine the best teaching or training methods.
4. Most learning programs should use a combination of instructional approaches – Even though a given topic might work best with a given instructional approach, a combination of approaches is almost always the way to go. Make full use of learners’ abilities to absorb content and skills visually, auditorially, via the written word, and kinesthetically (if possible).
5. To achieve a given learning or performance objective, one well-designed program is usually best for all learners – The idea that each learner requires a program customized to his or her “learning style” is just plain wrong. A well-designed program that uses a mix of approaches (with the content dictating the dominant one) is usually best for all learners.

So, that’s the story of learning styles.  It may be true that here are elements of the idea that can be useful.  On balance, though, we’d like to firmly enshrine the concept in the Book of Myths, right between elves and unicorns.

As a parting gift, we thought you might like this article on learning styles from The Onion.  Maybe you’re a nasal learner!  Until next time!

The post Learning Styles and Unicorns appeared first on Bull City Blue.

By Sue Iannone

“It’s like pulling teeth.”

“I’d rather stick a needle in my eye.”

“About as much fun as a box of razor blades.”

Those are all colorful expressions, for sure.  If you asked 10 people from biopharma L&D teams what they think about the Medical, Legal, and Regulatory (MLR) review process, you’d probably hear similar comments.  For marketers and L&D pros, the MLR review process can be seen as a real drag on progress—an obstacle to be overcome.  Well, the fact is the MLR review isn’t going away anytime soon, so it’s probably a good idea to make the best of it.  In this article, I want to help you do that.

Why the MLR Review is Important

Whenever L&D, Marketing, or some other team develops content or materials, those materials need to go through the MLR review process.  Typically, the MLR Review Team is responsible for conducting this process.  The review team members are most often people from—you guessed it—the Medical Affairs, Legal, and Regulatory departments.

Collectively, it’s their job to make sure that any piece of communications or training content developed by the company:

• Is medically accurate
• Complies with the applicable regulations
• Doesn’t communicate anything that will put the company, patients, healthcare providers, or others at risk (legal or otherwise)

When it comes to marketing materials, the need for some type of MLR review is readily apparent.  Customers and other stakeholders who are external to the company will see that content, so it’s important to make sure it passes muster.

MLR review is important for training content too.  Even though training programs are for internal use, they often train sales representatives and other externally-facing personnel how to communicate key messages.  So, a lot of internally-facing training content is ultimately externally-facing.

Why the MLR Review is “Hated”

“Hated” may be too strong a word, but many content developers really dislike it…a lot.  Why is this the case?  In my experience, it comes down to three reasons:

1. The Time – Simply put, it often takes too long. There are a number of factors that can delay content development.  However, the MLR review is one that’s always there, standing between a proposed piece of material and a finished project.  While the MLR review can take as little as a week, it can also take months if it involves a lot of feedback and results in an iterative process.  The time required depends on how busy the review team is and the type of feedback they provide.
2. The Changes – In many cases, content developers feel like MLR reviewers end up “sanitizing” the content so much, that it loses a lot of its meaning and impact. Once the lawyers get hold of something and scrub it of all potentially risky / controversial / borderline / “gray area” content, then—the concern goes—there might be nothing left!
3. The Reviewers - I hesitate to write this one because I don’t want to paint with too broad of a brush.  But, sometimes the review team members themselves can be less than amicable when dealing with the L&D and/or marketing personnel who create content.  This is certainly not always the case.  But it is in some situations.  It’s important to remember that most review team members basically do that “on the side,” in addition to their daily responsibilities.  They’re typically assigned MRL review duty and they can sometimes view it as a nuisance.  That can occasionally show through.  In other cases, reviewers can become defensive, as some have been “burned” in the past when working with content developers who try to force as much borderline material through as they possibly can.

Making the Best of the MLR Review Process

The things to remember are:

• You can’t change the process. The MLR review will be here until the sun explodes.
• Most likely, you can’t change the review team.

Given those truths, here are three suggestions for making the best of the MLR review process:

1. Adopt a positive attitude and mindset – It’s easy to adopt a negative mindset when it comes to the MLR review process. However, resist that temptation. Remember that both you and the reviewers want what’s best for the company.  You’re all on the same team.  Work to build a rapport with the review team members and develop long-term relationships.  Viewing your interactions with them as a joint venture—rather than an adversarial relationship—will make a difference.
2. Create forecasts for the review team – Some L&D teams develop forward-looking plans outlining the new programs and materials that will be coming to the review team. However, many don’t.  It’s definitely a good idea to create a plan and share it with the review team ahead of time.  They’ll appreciate the effort, it will give them advance notice, and it will help avoid surprises.  It will also be good for you, as the act of writing the plan will force you to think about timing, and to build in enough for the MLR process itself.  Develop the plan to look ahead as far as you realistically can.  For some, this may be a plan for the next POA meeting or quarter.  Other teams may be able to look ahead a full year.
3. Share concept previews – Generally, it’s best if you can sit down with the review team and share your ideas or concepts for a program up front. If needed, you can also involve your relevant vendor(s) in the meeting.  This approach enables the review team to give you some “pre-feedback” that you can use when you develop your material.  Doing this can definitely reduce review times—and the number of iterations—on the back-end.  It can also potentially save you dollars.  If you are working with a vendor that charges for numerous review rounds,  a concept review can help set you and the vendor off in the right direction and avoid extra rounds of MLR review.  It’s also a great way to further cement your relationships with review team members.

The ideas above should help improve the MLR review process for you.  However, they’re no guarantee.  Sometimes, the MLR review can be difficult and frustrating no matter what you do.  But, if you follow the suggestions above, it will make the process better and more productive over time.

What about you?  Do you have any ideas or suggestions for improving the MLR process?  If so, share them in the comments section or send me an e-mail at sue@bullcityblue.com!

The post Taking the Pain Out of the Medical, Legal, & Regulatory Review…Maybe appeared first on Bull City Blue.

By Carla Torgerson and Sue Iannone

As we’ve discussed in previous articles, microlearning techniques can be extremely useful for a range of training applications.  These include preparing learners for live training events, post-event reinforcement, stand-alone training programs, or performance support.

But, microlearning isn’t devoid of challenges.  The Association for Talent Development (ATD) did some research on the key barriers that prevent organizations from embracing microlearning.  In this article, we’ll look at four of the most common ones.  If a Learning and Development (L&D) team adopts microlearning approaches without a plan to deal with the issues below, then it will get push-back.  Furthermore, programs are more likely to fail, and people could easily get the impression that microlearning doesn’t work.  So, without further ado, let’s take a look at those common barriers.

Barrier 1 – Learners are not held accountable

Learning programs will have no impact if the intended learners don’t actually use them.  For learners, the top priority is doing their primary jobs.  Participating in learning programs will always take a back seat to that.  As a result, it can be tough to get learners to engage with informal or non-mandatory learning programs.

So, how to get around this barrier?  Well, the company could make it mandatory to participate and then track utilization.  That generally gets people moving.  There are, however, other ways to drive participation.

One way is to make the training as relevant as possible to the learner’s number one priority: His or her day-to-day job.  “Just in time” learning or workflow learning are prime examples of this.  Those types of learning resources are specifically designed to help the learner do a part of their job, right when they need it.

Other techniques for driving participation include:

• Enage with the learners’ managers so that they will help hold learners accountable (e.g., by asking learners questions about the program(s) in one-on-one meetings or staff meetings, etc.)
• Send e-mail reminders to learners about the program in question, using messaging that puts learners’ priorities first and makes it relevant to their jobs (i.e., “Got 5 minutes? Here are 5 tips to help make your next sales call a smashing success! Click here.”)
• Use incentives, like contests or drawings to drive participation (i.e., “Everyone who completes the module by next Friday gets entered to win a …!”)

Barrier 2 – Not easy enough for learners to access microlearning from anywhere

Microlearning must be easily accessible to learners when and where they need it.  If you want to deliver your microlearning solution to mobile devices and your LMS is not mobile-friendly, then you might need to find another means of delivering the program.

Don’t try to deliver a program using a platform that isn’t suited to it.  Find work-aounds if needed.  For example, could the content be e-mailed to learners?  Everyone has access to e-mail on their phones.  Alternatively, could a portal be created through which learners could access the material using mobile devices?  Or, for the case in question, is mobile absolutely necessary?  Could learners actually grasp the material just as effectively from their desks using the LMS?  If so, then resetting management expectations may be required.

Barrier 3 – Fitting microlearning into employees’ day

This barrier is very closely related to Barrier #1 above.  If the microlearning resource is viewed by learners as relevant and useful—and it serves their work priorities—then they’re more likely to make time for it.  The key is to design learning that actually helps learners do their jobs, and then communicate those benefits in ways that help the learners answer “What’s in it for me?”

Barrier 4 – Inability to tie learning to performance

We’ve heard this barrier before. The challenge of quantifying the links between learning and performance is not just related to microlearning.  It’s the primary challenge facing all of L&D in general.

But with microlearning it can actually be easier to measure the link between learning and performance than it is with longer-form approaches.  Changes in performance can be much more easily linked to a 5-minute, highly-focused microlearning module than to an hour-long e-course.  For example, if you measure an improvement in metrics related to X, and you had just delivered microlearning specific to X, then it’s easier to make the connection.

What’s Next?

Keep checking back with us for more articles on microlearning.  In our next installment, we’ll cover some key pitfalls to avoid when developing microlearning resources.

The post Barriers to Creating Effective Microlearning appeared first on Bull City Blue.

By Sue Iannone

Ah, the plan of action (POA) meeting.  It can be a fantastic tool for making sure the field teams are ready, willing, and able to get the message out.  Unfortunately, it can also be an exhausting and frustrating fire-drill—a mad dash to the finish—particularly for the Learning and Development (L&D) team.  It doesn’t have to be this way!

In parts I and II of this series, we described the need for a POA governance process and we outlined some best practices for POA planning.  In this third and final installment, we offer some tips for implementation success.

Stay Organized

Once your POA plan is in place, staying on top of all the moving parts leading up to the meeting can be a real challenge.  It’s imperative to use your POA plan to create an implementation checklist, covering all key tasks and deliverables that are due by meeting time (and even beyond).

Every POA is different.  However, there are plenty of common elements, and it’s possible to create a generalized POA implementation checklist.  So, that’s what we did.  You can find it here,

This general checklist can serve as a solid foundation for your own.  Feel free to modify it as needed to help manage your own POA implementation efforts.

Create the Right Training for the Right Purpose

The POA meeting is a large investment of time, energy, and dollars.  So, it’s important to maximize the return on that investment.  A big part of doing that is creating learning programs that are

1. Specifically focused on achieving business, behavioral, and learning objectives
2. Designed for maximum effectiveness

In a Part I, we discussed item 1 above.  So, let’s focus on item 2.  To help ensure that learning programs are as effective as they can be, it helps to think first of when they’ll be deployed:  Before, during, or after the POA meeting.  A good rule of thumb is to design learning experiences for these stages with the following goals in mind:

1. Before = Knowledge Acquisition
2. During = Knowledge / Skill Application
3. After = Performance Support

Before the POA Meeting

Learning should start during the weeks prior to the POA meeting.  During this time, learning activities should focus on providing learners with the foundational knowledge they’ll need to participate effectively in—and get the most out of—the POA meeting itself.

For example, assume that part of an upcoming POA meeting will center around some new studies that directly compare your company’s product to a competitor’s product.  Furthermore, let’s say that the study data was highly favorable to your product.  During the POA meeting, L&D wants to make sure field reps are well-prepared to communicate this data and some key messages derived from it.

You probably don’t want field reps learning about this data for the first time at the POA meeting.  It will be better to use that time for building their skills in message delivery regarding the new studies.  So, in the weeks leading up to the POA meeting, it would make sense to give them foundational knowledge about the studies and the data they contain.  Some tactics for doing this might include one or more of the following:

• Abbreviated pre-reading materials that highlight key findings from the studies
• A short knowledge assessment regarding the information contained in the pre-reading materials
• A microlearning emodule with interactive exercises or games to highlight key data points and reinforce key learnings
• An exercise in which learners should think of—and write down—some potential objections or questions that physicians might have regarding the studies

The main points are this:

1. You want participants to show up to the POA meeting primed, prepared, and ready to learn.
2. Save your live training time for knowledge or skills application, not knowledge transfer.

During the POA Meeting

The POA meeting is best used to help learners apply knowledge or skills.  Continuing with the example mentioned above, you might consider creating learning experiences like these:

• Training on a new visual aid that reps can use to communicate the study data and related messages, including role-play exercises in which they practice using the visual aid
• Objection-handling exercises, in which learners discuss potential objections, then formulate and practice responses

Don’t forget to make it fun and engaging!—themify it, gamify it, hold a competition, or infuse the training with whatever techniques are acceptable (both culturally and compliance-wise) in your organization.

After the POA Meeting

After the POA meeting, learners will return to the field and be expected to deploy their new knowledge and skills in customer interactions.  Post-meeting learning tools and experiences should help them do that.

During the weeks and months after the meeting, the L&D team should work to reinforce what the participants learned.  Some potential tactics might include:

• A quick reference job aid that contains key messages, data points, and/or key objections (along with potential responses)
• Feedback loops in which reps can share new questions or objections they hear in the field and formulate potential responses
• Coaching guides for sales managers to use when helping reps refine their skills

Don’t forget the post-POA meeting performance support!  Research tells us that participants lose most of what they learned at a live meeting if it is not reinforced.  It need not be complicated but it is necessary to drive retention.

Use Microlearning Techniques When It Makes Sense

As you know, “microlearning” refers to educational content that can be consumed quickly.   Microlearning techniques make sense in a lot of situations, particularly when you’re dealing with learners who are very busy, need to learn quickly, and must apply new knowledge and skills in the field, in real-time.

When it comes to POA meetings, you can use microlearning techniques at any point.  However, they are often most useful for the following purposes:

1. To prepare learners for the POA meeting
2. As follow-up support after the POA meeting

During the lead-up to the meeting, short pieces of easily-digested content can provide learners with a foundation of knowledge.  That way, they’ll get more out of the meeting itself.  For example, a short video clip on “What’s in it for me?” will help learners see the relevance of the training they’ll receive at the meeting and get them in the right mindset.  Short pre-reads or explainers can provide foundational knowledge.  The possibilities are numerous.

After the POA meeting, many L&D organizations fall short when it comes to performance support or post-event reinforcement.  It’s understandable.  L&D team members are likely to be exhausted after finishing the hectic POA process.

However, neglecting post-event training will hamper results and reduce the ROI of the overall process.  So, don’t ignore this aspect of POA meetings.  Microlearning techniques are well-suited to post-event reinforcement and performance support.  Easily-consumed job aids might provide performance support for field personnel.  Reminder e-mails, short self-reflection exercises, and other techniques can help keep learners on track once they’re back in the field.

Plan for Contingencies

Perhaps I’m dating myself here, but fans of the 80’s television show, The A-Team, might remember Col. John “Hannibal” Smith’s catch-phrase:  “I love it when a plan comes together.”

Well, don’t we all?  But, plans rarely come together exactly as expected.  How many times have you planned an event (like a POA meeting), and had everything go exactly as expected?  That’s what I thought.

Chances are, something will go awry with any big event.  It won’t always be a major issue.  In fact, in most cases, unforeseen changes are minor.  But, you will need to plan for them, to the extent that you can.

Look for the elements in your POA plan that might be a bit “shaky.”  For example, maybe you’re doubtful that Marketing will get a certain piece of content finished and through Medical, Regulatory, and Legal review on time.

If your concerns come to pass, then it pays to have something in your “hip pocket” to replace that on the agenda.  Perhaps it’s some other meaningful training event…or a team-building exercise…or perhaps you just give them the time back.

In any case, think about those potential danger points, and have a “Plan B” if you need it.  I always like to say, “have a Plan A, a Plan B, and probably a Plan C.”  If you only have to use Plan A, then great!  If things fall apart, you’ll be grateful and less stressed if you have those B and C options ready to go.

What about you?  Do you have other best practices when it comes to POA implementation?  If so, let us hear about them in the comments.  Until next time!

The post Avoiding POA Chaos, Part III: Implementation Best Practices appeared first on Bull City Blue.

By Sue Iannone

Famous general and former President, Dwight D. Eisenhower once said, “In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.”  When it comes to life sciences plan of action (POA) meetings, I’d say I definitely agree with the second part of that statement.  Good planning is quite indispensable.

In part I of this series, we covered the need for a governance process to help ensure that POA meetings run smoothly and achieve business objectives.  Assuming you’re optimizing your POA process in a linear fashion, dealing with the general approach to planning comes right on the heels of establishing a governance process.  In this installment, we review some best practices for POA meeting planning.

Planning is Important but Easy to Overlook

Every POA cycle needs planning.  Unfortunately, this is where a lot of organizations fall short.  When you think about it, Marketing is busy creating tactics and building materials.  They’re not always thinking about “the meeting.”  L&D is usually busy with what seems like a million different projects, and it’s easy to lose focus on the next POA meeting.

However, that date is going to come and go regardless, so you’ve got to be ready for it.  In part I, we mentioned that preparing for a POA meeting is a lot like running a baton race.  Each “runner” (Marketing, Legal, L&D, whoever) must typically get their part done before handing it off to the next.  Delays at any point in the chain can cause problems.

L&D is usually the last runner in the baton race, so they often take the brunt of those problems.  This is why it’s very important that L&D spearhead efforts to ensure timely, effective planning for every POA cycle.

Some POA Planning Best Practices

As you work to develop and implement a strong process for planning POA meetings, here are a few tips to keep in mind.

1. Don’t delay getting started.

It should go without saying that you need to give yourself enough runway to get everything done.  Perhaps that’s 90 days, maybe it’s 120 days.  It’s definitely not 60 days, though I’ve seen that (and less) on multiple occasions.  In your specific company, you know how long it takes to get things through Medical, Regulatory, and Legal (MRL) review, so be sure to plan for it.  The exact amount of time needed will vary by company, but don’t forget to start with the end in mind, and then work your timelines backwards from there.

2. Do a Needs Assessment and know what you need to build.

It’s critical to work with your key stakeholders to perform a needs assessment up front.  This will help you define the business objectives, behavioral objectives, and the resultant learning objectives for the meeting.  That, in turn, will help determine what needs to be developed for the meeting.  It sounds like common sense to say it, but it’s best to approach a POA in the same way you’d approach developing any L&D curriculum.

The needs assessment and resulting training don’t need to be super-complicated. And, if you’ve adopted a strategic mindset towards POA and established governance, you certainly need not begin this from scratch.  By attending business reviews and other key stakeholder meetings, you may already have a good idea of the needs of the business.  If your organization has not taken a strategic approach to POAs, you can still move forward in an effective way.  What you need to build stems from the focus of the meeting.

What do we mean by this? If it’s a “POA-lite” situation, meaning if a meeting only needs to share a refresh of existing materials and/or only involves one business unit or product, then simple may be the best way to go.  In contrast, if a POA will encompass a new selling model, new data, a launch, multiple teams, and so on, then it’s going to get complicated.  That will also affect timelines, so it pays to conduct the needs assessment far enough in advance to allow for either type of scenario.

3. Line up your resources.

Once you know what you need to build for the meeting, you need to ask yourself a critical question:  Do we have the resources we need to do all this effectively?

If you do, then that’s great!  If not, then you may need to outsource some aspects of the work, and you’ll need to determine what those are.  Alternatively, you might be able to get other company personnel to help out.  For example, perhaps a Field Trainer or a District Manager could contribute as an “extra set of hands” as part of a special project.

Or, if funding is the issue, it may be necessary to ask Marketing to kick in some extra dollars to help get the job done.  The point is, you’ll need to systematically compare the resources you need with what you have, then determine the best way to plug any gaps.

4. Don’t wait on Marketing for final materials.

In general, it’s OK to start working on your training programs before Marketing has finalized the core materials.  Draft materials will typically suffice, at least at the outset.  This will help you get a head-start, or at least minimize the effects of any delays that Marketing or other stakeholders experience.  With only a few weeks left before a POA meeting, it’s much easier to tweak a strawman workshop that is “80% right”, than to wait to the last minute and build an entire workshop from scratch.  A solid and effective workshop, that is!

For any last-minute requests or changes, have a contingency plan (which might include saying “no” if the request is unreasonable, unrealistic, or “nice to have”).  L&D professionals who oblige these last-minute changes run the risk of having poorly executed solutions and are ultimately seen as order-takers versus strategic partners.

5. Scale best practices beyond a single POA event.

It’s best to deploy best practices across POAs in general, and not treat every POA as a unique, siloed event.  Once you have determined your POA planning process, and the best practices that go along with it, be sure to document and institutionalize them as the way to approach all POA planning efforts.  Given the transitory nature of many personnel in the L&D department, you will want to make sure that your best practices outlive any single meeting…and the tenure of any single team member.

What’s Next?

So, we’ve covered best practices for POA governance and for POA planning.  In the next installment, the “rubber will meet the road” and we’ll look at best practices for POA execution.

The post Avoiding POA Chaos, Part II: Planning Best Practices appeared first on Bull City Blue.

By Sue Iannone

According to Dictionary.com, “chaos” is defined as “a state of utter confusion or disorder; a total lack of organization or order.” Any L&D professional who’s been involved in planning a pharmaceutical company Plan of Action (POA) meeting knows about chaos first-hand.  In fairness, “chaos” is probably too strong a term for describing the POA experience.  But, most L&D people will agree that it’s not entirely inappropriate, either.  When I reflect on my collective POA experiences during my 27-year career, I have memories of both extremes—the awesome POA successes, and the POA disasters I’d like to forget.

In this 3-part series, we’ll explore a framework for taking the chaos out of POA planning and implementation.  We’ll cover ideas and best practices related to

1. POA Governance Process
2. Planning Best Practices
3. Execution Best Practices

Today, we’ll outline the overall challenge and cover POA governance.

The Problem with POA Meetings

Pharmaceutical companies typically hold POA meetings once or twice per year.  They offer the best opportunities for Marketing and company leaders to get face-time with the field selling teams.  They’re the primary vehicle for rolling out new strategies, messages, data, selling tools, and training programs to the field forces.

They’re also extremely expensive.  Time out of the field is costly in two ways.  First, there are the direct operational costs such as airfare, hotel bills, food costs, entertainment expenses, and so on.  Then, there are the less-obvious indirect costs of the customer-facing teams not being in front of their customers selling, educating, or solving reimbursement problems.  Both types of costs are significant to the organization.  As such, it’s clear that a company needs to realize the maximum return from those significant investments.

Unfortunately, the ROI of POAs often suffers due to poor planning and governance.  The worst of the challenge often falls on L&D.

Think about this:  For a typical POA meeting, the L&D team is often tasked with developing training around new messages, selling tools, or any other tactics critical to brand or portfolio strategy.  However, L&D can’t develop that training until Marketing (or whoever) develops the core materials.  Marketing will often experience delays (it happens to the best of us) and create core materials much later than originally intended.  Add to that the need to clear Medical, Regulatory, and Legal (MRL) review, and the delays are compounded.

Because non-L&D people often underestimate the time and effort required to create good training, L&D is often left having to scramble at the last minute to get things done.  Too many times, L&D comes in “just under the wire.”

This is akin to a baton race.  The way to win is to ensure that your team’s runner is ready, launches off the blocks at the right time, holds on tight to the baton, and delivers a smooth handoff to the next runner.  If all goes well, the team wins the race.  If the first runner gets a slow start, drops the baton, or if any runners on the team stumble, the team loses valuable time and puts winning  (or placing) at risk.

L&D is often the last runner on the last leg of the baton race.  Time lost by any of the other runners can negatively impact training effectiveness.  This can harm business results, as well as L&D team morale.  It doesn’t have to be this way!  In fact, the L&D team can set in motion changes that can dramatically improve the whole POA process.

Good Governance is Critical

In our experience, the state of affairs described above is worse in companies that don’t have a good POA governance process.  A good governance process helps ensure that all stakeholder groups are on the same page, understand what’s expected of them and when, and have established processes for conflict resolution.  These stakeholders usually include:

• Marketing
• Sales
• Market Access
• Sales Operations
• Medical Affairs
• Legal / Regulatory
• L&D
• Meeting Planning

L&D typically doesn’t have the authority to establish and “enforce” a POA governance process, but it can act as the catalyst in helping to establish one.  Below are a few pointers in making that happen.  L&D should do these things as a dedicated initiative, not just in advance of a specific POA meeting.  Fixing a “broken” process deserves some dedicated time and attention:

1. Speak with Individual Stakeholders – L&D should sit down individually with the leaders of key stakeholder groups. Call on them to learn what they want to accomplish via POA meetings in general and ask them to define success from their point of view. Get their input on how the POA planning process could go more smoothly.
2. Establish a Governance Committee – L&D can advocate for the idea of a POA Governance Committee. This would be a group of senior leaders from the stakeholder groups listed earlier.  The committee is not supposed to get “down in the weeds.”  However, it will need to help determine the overall business objectives for individual POA meetings, set guiding principles for POA planning, establish dispute resolution processes, designate people to serve on the POA team (below), and so on.
3. Establish a POA Team – This team will include “doers” who get into the details. For any given POA meeting, this cross-functional team must outline the POA plan:  Objectives, deliverables, responsible/accountable personnel, deadlines, and so on.  A RACI matrix is often used for capturing all this.

A strong governance process is critical for aligning expectations and resources.  Basically, it helps get everyone pulling in the same direction at the same time.  In the next installment, we’ll cover some best practices for POA planning.

The post Avoiding POA Chaos, Part I appeared first on Bull City Blue.

By Carla Torgerson and Sue Iannone

In previous blogs, we’ve discussed how microlearning can be used to prepare learners for learning events, and as follow-up after learning events.  In this article, we’ll consider how microlearning can be used as stand-alone training.

Key Benefits

Of course, using microlearning as stand-alone training can provide all the core benefits of elearning.  For example, microlearning is:

1. Asynchronous, meaning that learners can access it any any time. There’s no need to get everyone together at the same time.
2. Self-paced, enabling each learner to progress at a rate that personally works best.
3. Accessible any place, through a mobile device or computer.

But, microlearning provides added benefits.  It also:

1. Maximizes flexibility and minimizes disruption to each learner’s work day.
2. Increases retention. Think about this question - Which is more effective at driving up retention: A one-and-done hour-long training session or a series of five- to eight-minute mini-modules delivered once per week for 5 weeks?  In many cases, it’s the latter.

Example

Here’s a brief example to illustrate how you can use microlearning as stand-alone training, and get a better result than using traditional approaches.  Imagine that a training leader needs to get a large number of call center workers “up to speed” on a new product or service offering.

Traditionally, this might require scheduling a training session that all call center employees would have to attend.  Call center workers need to be covering the phones, so it would be impossible to get all workers at the same training session simultaneously.  So, the training leader would need to schedule several alternative time slots, for which call center workers could register.  This would enable everyone to cycle through the one- or two-hour session while still maintaining at least partial call coverage during session times.

Needless to say, that approach would be disruptive to the workers and to customer service.  In addition, the “one-and-done” nature of the training is less conducive to learning and retention.

Now, let’s consider a different approach…one that uses microlearning.  The training leader could divide the content into 4 or 5 “bite-sized chunks,” each of which could stand on its own.  Then, the training leader could create a series of brief “mini-modules” that call center employees could go through at their own pace.

Each module would cover a discreet topic related to the new product or service.  For example:

• Overview, defining the new offering, the target customers, and why it’s important
• Features and benefits
• How to engage potential customers
• Questions customers frequently ask

Learners are much more likely to retain information that is given to them in pieces over a period of time, rather than all at once.  Sure, those call center employees still need to be scheduled off the phones to take this training, but it’s far easier to schedule a 10 minute “learning break” than it is to find 1-2 hours when half the agents can be taken off the phones to attend a session together. That makes this approach far less disruptive to the business’s normal operations.

What’s Coming Next?

In our next installment, we’ll identify the top barriers to using microlearning effectively.

The post Using Microlearning for Stand-Alone Training appeared first on Bull City Blue.

By Carla Torgerson and Sue Iannone

In the last installment, we explored how to use microlearning techniques to prepare learners for live training events.  But what about after the event?  Can microlearning techniques help learners retain what they learned, as well as perform better in their jobs?  Yes, they can.  Here’s how.

Why Reinforce Learning After Live Events?

Most L&D professionals know about the “Forgetting Curve” – an estimate of how quickly people forget content learned in a formal learning environment. While we can debate how quickly people forget new information, one thing is clear: Learners do have a tendency to forget recently-learned information pretty rapidly.  That’s why it’s important to reinforce learning in the days, weeks, and even months following a live training event.

We typically reinforce learning for two key reasons:

1. Increase retention of key concepts
2. Make it easier for learners to apply what they are learning to the job (i.e., performance support)

Why Microlearning for Post-Event Reinforcement?

Microlearning is great for post-event reinforcement because it meshes so nicely with the reality that most learners face – that they don’t have a lot of time for long-form reinforcement activities.  They can much more easily fit short, “bite-sized” learning activities into their work day.

In addition, some types of reinforcement are meant to be used just-in-time, as learners perform job-related tasks.  “How-to” resources for using a piece of software or operating a piece of equipment are great examples.  These resources must quickly hone in on the task at hand, and enable learners to use them in real time. To be most useful, they must focus on what the learner needs at that moment and nothing more.

Examples

Here are a few examples of microlearning tools and techniques that you can use after an event to reinforce learning and/or to be used as performance support. We’re confident you can come up with many more ideas:

1. E-Mail Campaign – You use e-mail to deliver short pieces of information to learners over time, reviewing and reinforcing key things they learned in the training. It’s important to focus on the most relevant information and determine the optimal cadence.
2. Pulsed Knowledge Questions – The idea is to ask the learner a series of multiple choice questions over time. This technique adds reinforcement which leads to retention. It can also push learners to more thoughtfully engage with the information.  High relevance and proper cadence are also important for this technique.
3. Wallet Cards – Reference cards and similar tools are great for reinforcing key points. They can also be used for performance support, if the content is a checklist or other job aid.
4. Infographics / Job Aids – Infographics can be highly useful, whether static (printed or electronic) or interactive. If an employee posts one of these things on his or her bulletin board and refers to it regularly, you know it’s making a difference for him/her.  A good example of a job aid might be an objection handler:  A tool that outlines common objections a sales rep might experience, as well as the proper responses.  It’s important to note that an infographic is not a discrete item on this list, as you could incorporate an infographic into a wallet card, detail aid, etc.
5. Detail Aids – Sales reps often use printed or interactive detail aids to communicate with potential customers. These resources can really help sales reps structure narratives, recall key facts and messages, and communicate more effectively.
6. Video Clips – “How-to” video clips can be very useful, particularly for performance support. Remember the example we gave earlier about using a piece of software or operating a piece of equipment?
7. How-To-Guides – Short “how-to” guides can really help people get a task done quickly and accurately. Think of the Quick-Start Guide that came with your last laptop computer, DVD player, or other electronic gadget.

How about you?  What other microlearning tools and techniques have you used for post-event reinforcement or performance support?

What’s Coming Next?

In our next installment, we’ll explore how you can use microlearning techniques for stand-alone training.

The post Using Microlearning for Post-Event Reinforcement and Performance Support appeared first on Bull City Blue.