By ERNIE TURNER 

WHAT makes learning last? Over the last few years, I've had a
number of conversations with clients and colleagues about this
question when discussing leadership and team development.

We are all interested in understanding what we can do to support
individuals to go from awareness to sustainable changed
behaviour.

Some of the specific skills include: coaching direct reports and
peers; having difficult conversations; providing timely
feedback; influencing; communicating clearly; creating a
participatory environment; running effective meetings; creating
an inspiring, achievable and shared vision; critical thinking;
making effective decisions; contracting roles and
responsibilities; making meaning from, and learning from,
experiences; developing realistic and powerful plans that are
implemented; delegating with authority and clarity; sharing
leadership; etc.

We all agreed that traditional classroom training programmes
produce limited results when developing leaders and teams. We
quickly came to the conclusion that most companies spend a small
fortune on training programmes in these areas that do not
deliver the sustainable change required or desired.

So our next question was, "Why do traditional training
programmes not deliver sustainable change in these areas?"

We came up with a number of reasons that can be grouped into
three implicit yet misleading myths:

Myth 1: Teaching equals learning. Many traditional training
programmes are still subject-focused and expert-driven. They
revolve around what the teacher (professor or consultant) knows
to be "the truth" about whatever the topic is; the teacher
lectures, occasionally asks rhetorical questions, shows slide
after slide and basically "PowerPoints" most of the "trainees"
to daydream or disengage.

This kind of experience is like drinking out of a fire hydrant
with little time allowed for swallowing (reflecting).

This learning philosophy is based upon the faulty notion that
most students are primarily interested in what the experts have
to say.

Bernice McCarthy has developed a fairly simple yet validated
learning framework, 4MAT, based upon the work of David Kolb. She
has identified four basic learning styles and the questions they
prefer to ask.

Type 1 Learners are more interested in the question "Why"; they
want to understand the purpose, outcomes, rationale and reason
for taking the time now to learn whatever it is.

Type 2 Learners are more interested in the "What" question; they
want to know what the experts think, their theories and what the
textbooks say.

Type 3 Learners are more interested in the "How" question;
they're interested in the steps, tools, techniques and processes
that make something work.

And Type 4 Learners are more interested in the "So what"
question; they're pragmatic and interested in application and
adaptation.

If it's true that traditional training programmes focus more on
Type 2 Learners, they lose the attention and engagement of the
"Why", "How" and "So What" Learners - roughly three quarters of
us.

Myth 2: Relevance can wait until application. All too often, the
teacher is more concerned with the lesson and correct answers
than the learner and his/her questions and experiences.

The heavy reliance upon case studies and simulations often
precludes the opportunity to explore the current challenges and
questions faced by most learners. Very little time is devoted to
reflection and dialogue.

Because the teacher "has the answers", there's really no need
for the "students" to explore their own experiences, exchange
their insights, make their own meaning and identify and explore
those emerging questions that are important to them.

A number of years ago, I facilitated a five-day leadership
development programme for superintendents and headmasters from
international schools around the world. I told them in advance
that the only "experts" in this programme would be themselves
and the curriculum would be driven by their questions.

On Monday morning, within a couple of hours we created our
agenda for the week by identifying those questions that they
wanted to explore in the area of leadership.

The question-owner became the session leader; for each session
they captured the essence of the dialogue and the result was a
book on leadership created by them - a chapter for each day.

We had a number of reflection and dialogue sessions sprinkled
throughout the five days to dive deeper into emerging questions
coming out of each session. The unanimous evaluation was that
this was the best leadership development programme they had ever
participated in.

The reason was simple - it was driven by their questions and
their experiences; the programme was theirs.

Myth 3: Once you've seen it, you can do it. The "If you can see,
you can do" approach to training is based on the premise that if
someone is exposed to a new way of thinking, automatically he
will behave differently.

We know this doesn't work and yet we continually run into
training programmes that operate this way.

In sports, music, theatre and space exploration we know that
practice is required and although it may not make perfect, it
certainly leads us in that direction.

The faulty logic we often hear is that since "time is money", we
can't afford to take highly paid professionals away from work
for very long periods of time.

So what happens is that we try to do more with less and
sacrifice transfer and transformation - two key outcomes.

If we can't afford to invest in the time it takes for
individuals and teams to go through the learning cycle, then
we're really throwing money away.

Only when new behaviours become second nature will learning last
and be sustained. And only then will the real value of learning
be realised. As the old adage goes, "You get what you pay for."


This is the first of a two-part article. Part 2 will look at the
learning principles that support learning that lasts. It was
published in: "The LIM Newsletter", October 2004.

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