You might have faced this situation before: you’re writing or designing a course, and the subject-matter experts (SMEs) keep wanting to include every single bit of information they have. That is, everything they THINK the students need to know. SMEs know a lot (that’s why they are Subject Matter Experts), and they often want to include all of that wonderful knowledge in the course. But adult learning in a professional environment isn’t about KNOWING, it’s about DOING (or not doing) something with that knowledge.
The Instructional Designer’s Job
Our job is to make sure learners get exactly the information they need to meet desired performance and business results. That means including what they need and, just as importantly, leaving out what they don’t need.
It’s our responsibility to make sure we aren’t wasting their attention and time with extraneous information. Truly unnecessary information is easy to cut. What’s far more dangerous is the “nice-to-know” information—the information that’s somewhat related and mildly interesting, but not necessary for achieving the performance or business results. It can sneak in if we aren’t diligent, and if a stakeholder or SME is adamant that it be included, it can be very difficult to negotiate out.
Get your SMEs thinking about how learners will USE the information.
For starters, here are some questions to help your SMEs focus on what really matters:
- Can you give me an example of when this would come up on the job?
- Describe a situation in which this would help them [insert business result or performance goal here].
- Would there ever be a situation in which they’d need to rely on this information?
- What would happen if someone DIDN’T learn this information?
These questions are extremely valuable. They can shift the focus from information to performance and help surface what’s most relevant. BUT, don’t get smug! SMEs often have a trump card they use when they can’t really answer these questions, but still want to include the seemingly excess information:
“Well, the students just need to be aware of it.”
So what do you do with THAT!?
Think of it like going shopping. The salesperson asks if they can help you with anything. You say, “I’m just looking.” And sometimes you are just looking. But often, you just say that as a way to deflect the question. And it usually works—the salesperson leaves you alone.
Well, we need to make sure that we don’t let “they just need to be aware of it” stop us from doing our jobs. Here’s the bottom line: in workplace learning, no one needs to know anything unless that knowledge can help them do their jobs better. Swap out “know” with “be aware of,” and the same thing holds true. No one needs to be aware of anything unless that awareness might help them do their jobs better. So make that the new direction of your questioning. Note the subtle, but important adjustments to the previous questions:
- Can you give me an example of when this awareness would come up on the job?
- Describe a situation in which this awareness would help them [insert business result or performance goal here].
- Would there ever be a situation in which they’d need to rely on this awareness?
- What would happen if someone WASN’T aware of this information?
One of two things is likely to happen.
- You and the SMEs will come to the conclusion that the learner doesn’t really need the information, and you can leave the information out.
- You and the SMEs will come to the conclusion that the learner really does need this information. At that point, you’ll have better context to present the information to learners in a way that helps them understand how they’ll use it.
In either case, the result is relevant and practical training that helps the learner actually DO something differently. Which is, after all, the whole point!
In workplace learning, no one needs to “be aware” of anything unless that awareness helps them do their jobs better.
These are just some of the ways Artisan Learning’s Instructional Designers maximize valuable SME knowledge while advocating for learners. The balance is critical and results in best-in-class custom-designed learning. It’s core to our curriculum design approach and essential to our collaborative process with all our clients. Here are samples of how that played out for some of our clients. We’d love to to do the same for you!
