Making Compliance Training Interesting (Is It Possible?)

7:48PM Sep 13, 2024

Speakers:

Shannon Tipton

Jason

Renee

Andrea

Rachel

Allison

Peter

Terry

Carrie

William

Keywords:

compliance

training

year

chat

learning

work

safety

good

scenario

answer

person

courses

create

put

jason

subject matter experts

conversation

incorporating

program

read

And so, so I don't forget later. All right, birthdays. Oh, Monica, happy birthday to your daughter. How old? If you don't mind me asking, How old is she? Two soccer games and three volleyball games. Well, that's a busy day.

First time joining, but Oh, I'm glad that you like the updates. Thank you for that. Andrea, as I go through the chat here West Virginia, of course. Now I've got the John Denver song in my head. No, West Virginia, Colorado, Colorado, that's it. As you guys can tell I'm on a roll. So if you received my email yesterday and you read it, and great. Thank you for that, if you sent me an email in response, and thank you for that too. I appreciated all of that. And for those of you not in the know and you didn't receive Thank you, Peter country roads, that's exactly what I was thinking of I had, like, the the typo. Thank you, Thomas. I had the typo of the century. And of course, it always happens when as soon as you click the Send button on it, and then you notice it, because I send it to myself a couple of times for review, but at the very the last thing that I did, I looked at the subject line and I changed the subject line because I thought I was being clever. And then I clicked send. And then when I soon as I clicked send, I saw that typo, and I was like, Oh, this is going to be a good one. I look forward to responses here. Oh, Jason, do you have a playlist that you just shared with us?

No, that's the song.

That's the song. Okay, good. Earworm, awesome. All right, all right. Well, thank you everybody for joining me today, and welcome to all of you who are new to our learning rebels Coffee Chat. So this is the learning rebels Coffee Chat. I am Shannon Tipton, the owner of learning rebels and the proud moderator of this discussion. As most of you know, this coffee chat is all about you and the conversations around what our topic is going to be, we it's a it's learning rebels, right? We don't have a whole lot of rules to this. We, if you want to be on video, be on video. If you don't, don't, if you're not on video only because you're you're not happy with your background, or you're having a bad hair day or what have. You don't be concerned with that, because we are not concerned about that. We don't. We truly don't care. We just like to see your faces as we go on. But if you can't because you're surrounded by work, that's okay too. We also don't hold on ceremony. You don't have to stick to the chat if you want to open up your mic and contribute that way. We we'd love to hear your voices as well. So welcome everybody. And today's topic is about compliance training. How can we make it interesting for everyone, right, and not making, and I guess, a callback not making it the soul sucking experience that it has a tendency to be right when you think about compliance training, it's not our favorite thing to create. I know that because it typically is pretty rules based and we have to work within certain con, you know, a certain construct, but it's certainly not the most favorite thing for our people to participate in, because we've, you know, crammed a lot of legalese into it, because maybe, inherently, it might be a dry topic. So we have a lot of extra challenges, you know, that go with creating compliance training and what I'd like to hear from you, let's kick this off so you can go ahead and speak up or put it into the chat. What is the most what's the most difficult or the most challenging compliance training that you create? What gives you the most heartburn? Which type of compliance do?

Boring ones. Ryan, well, you know your boring might not be somebody else's boring. So which ones do you think are the most. Boring for you, the same annual policy. Oh yes, Rachel, thank you for that. I don't know why we have a tendency, or the business has a tendency to ask us to recreate training, some compliance training every single year, like on day 365 information is going to fall out of people's heads. So unless it's something that is regulated by the government, I don't know why they ask us to do it over and over again every year. I'm in banking, and the hardest one for me is the required compliance training for our board of directors. Even that sentence sounds terrible. Allison, do you want to expand what is that all about?

Most employees in the bank are pretty used to taking compliance training, whether they like it or not, like it's a fact of working in banking, but the board is removed enough from it. They're every year, they're like, Do we really have to sit through this again? So that makes it challenging, reminding them what their responsibilities as the board of a financial institution are and why they have to take compliance training.

Is it something that the the bank itself makes them do, or is it something that is mandated by the by a regulation?

It's a regulatory requirement, yeah, yeah. So we don't have any control over them having to do it,

yeah? And that's the hard part. Then it's, it's the mandatory around it that makes people go, Oh, I can't believe I have to do this again, right? And I see in the chat the read and agrees. I've never heard it put that way, but I like that. So Terry, talk to me about your read and agrees, what? What does that look like? What is it? What form and fashion does that take in your business? Well,

I don't want to take up your whole hour.

Just, well, we're I work for a natural gas company. Very regulatory driven, compliance procedure driven. And so there's a certain number of courses, which I don't even like to call courses that they open up the procedure. They're supposed to read it, they close it. There could be a five question quiz. They answer each question until they get it right, and then they acknowledge that they understood it. So now the the great thing about this is I'm heading up a team right now. We're just kicking it off, and we're actually converting all of our read and agrees in our LMS system to actual e learning courses. So it's been a pet peeve of mine for about the last three years, and I think I've complained enough that finally we're going to do something about it. So well,

that's great. Well, so if you don't mind me asking, what's your vision? Then, for these courses,

we're, you know, we're going to work with the SMEs. We're going to our ideas to just add value, you know, not necessarily interactivity, or we want to make sure that they they are meeting what the procedure is, you know, one of the things that we struggle with is is, you know, we don't knowledge on them, but we're not focusing as much as we should on behavior change. And so that's something that that I'm kind of pushing in that area. So we're going to use all different types of modalities, from podcast to VR to AR, you know, that sort of thing. So we've got about 60 to start with. We're converting those from Captivate into storyline and rise and then after that, there's probably between 50 to 60 more. So wow, yeah, and it and then there's another group that's actually taking all of the courses and looking and seeing where they can be bundled, where they can create a single course with different sections. But long story short, last year, the last two years, we've been converting all of our courses into French, because Canadian Yes, yes. TC energy up in Calgary. So I work in West Virginia, myself and another developer, and so we had to undertake that over three or 400 courses. So that was really fun. So,

oh, that's a big project. That's a big project. And when we're working with large projects like that, it's, it's really easy to do, you know, just to like, oh, let's just get it done, right? And then, and then you get stuck, because all you've done is you've turned your read and agrees. You. Into the same thing, only in a course right where it's like now, all they have to do is just click the next button and that's and that's, you know, to your point, that's really not where the value is,

right, challenging the group that I work with to create some courses that are what I'm calling neck next plus buttons, meaning there's no next button in it. Anyway,

I like it. Thank you for sharing that with us. You're welcome. Thank you. I'll ask the group now, does that sound familiar to you what Terry was just talking about? Who would like to share next? I'd love to know. Okay, that sounds familiar to you guys, so how are you tackling this?

We were one step ahead of Terry. We didn't have the read and acknowledge. We had the listen and click of listen and click, listen and click, where you just listen to the guy talk, and then you hit next when he stopped talking, and then he listened and talk. And I actually walked past somebody's office and saw the lesson on their screen, and they were looking at their other screen answering emails. And I knew when the narrator would stop, because he turned, hit, click, hit next and went back. He was doing this the whole time, like, not, you know, multitasking. So we started incorporating story as much as we could of here's a new hire. And how do you explain this to a new hire? Our folks are used to having tailgate meetings every morning, so we turned all of them into tailgate meetings, where our characters would sit there and actually look like they're there and talk today we're going to talk about this and their health and safety. Person would talk about it.

I love that, because you're right, it's and I have a story like that as well. I was actually not at work. I was, I was in a bar, which, those of you who might know me might not be surprised by that piece of information. I was sitting in a bar, and I was, I was at a work thing, and there was a group of sales people who were going through some sort of training event who are gathered around me, and I did not tell them what I did for a living, because I just wanted to hear them talk. And it turned out that they each had this online compliance course that they were supposed to take, and one of them paid their kids to take it for them. And I'm like, Yeah, yep, that's where we are at. That's where we are at. You know, we want try to break away from that. And to Jason's point, I think one of the key things that we can do is make the characters look like them and make it sound like them, because a lot of times it's compliant. So we use a lot of legal words, but that's not how people talk, right? So if we can kind of mirror that, I think that's a great step forward. So Carrie, I saw your hand first.

Yeah, I joined a little late. I'm sorry. Yeah, I'm not sure about the other folks, but I'm coming into this, I think a little maybe a little different. I'm 28 year industry vet in chemical engineering, and I was basically asked by my company to lead a program around developing a more structured training program for our salaried folks, we have a very good program for our hourly folks that they go through that really gets them up to speed quickly on both the clients as well as the job specific aspects to get them up to speed and running, if you will, in their roles. For salaried folks, we haven't had that, and it has basically been each person basically weeding through whatever they had to to figure out all the different aspects they needed to learn. So I basically was asked to lead this program. I'm not a trainer by background, but I was asked to lead this program around, not just doing compliance, but teaching them the salary folks, the key things they need to understand and be competent in and have knowledge retention. So that includes a lot of our compliance stuff, so all of our PSM stuff, all of our environmental stuff, those are all components of this program, but we're trying to take it in a way that I heard a person a minute ago talk about, you know, they pulled something up on their computer and had to hit Next. A lot of our stuff is similar to that in our compliance, which we need to have for documentation and government alignment of. But we're the way we're taking our program is we're really incorporating much more active learning. We're trying to develop a learning culture here. And so our training modules, as we call them, are in person. It's in class. It's very interactive. There's Q and A the opposite way, meaning the instructors asking the students questions on so if this happens, what would that mean? Right? We we also have tours of different operational areas that they have to go out, learn more about those areas, fill out a documentation. Then in the next round of training, we do a teach back at the beginning of that training. For this, the students or the participants to teach back to the rest of the the rest of the folks in the room on an area that they're not familiar with, that they don't work in. So, for example, if I'm in in hazardous chemicals, I may be asked to give, give a teach back on an operational area in wastewater treatment. I'm not a wastewater treatment guy, and we're trying to do that really, to encourage them to learn and not to think that they just have to show up in two hours, they'll get a certificate that basically says they practice this class

Right, exactly, exactly. And I love the idea of incorporating a teach back, you know, into some of the programs. And maybe there's something there. So when you think about the online versions as 99.9% of the compliance training is generally online, you know? So what? How can we incorporate those sorts of activities into the online spaces, right? Is it maybe the compliance training is presented through teams, right? And so then, that way, maybe you can have a robust conversation about whatever it is that you're trying to teach. So maybe there's an online component that could be incorporated in that I'm going to put a pin in my thoughts and hold on to Carrie, because I'm going to go over to Renee. And Renee, what's on your mind? So

I have a similar story to yours, in that this is years and years and years ago when the new feature was you could randomize the answers so that every person got a different list. Oh, right, right, right. So that used to be a new feature many years ago, and I had somebody come to me and say, I had to take the test six times before I realized that the answers were moving. And I'm like, hello, if you just read the questions the first time, you would have answered them correctly, because I know you know this stuff, but he was really keen that he had to take it six times, and he somebody given him the answers. And yeah, so

hilarious.

Yeah,

that is hilarious. Oh my gosh. So you left the feature on?

Yeah, I did. I wasn't even in charge of that training. He just I was a trainer, so he came. But I think you should leave that feature on, because they should be punished for cheating and taking it six times a certain reading, right, right, right.

That's hilarious, yeah, and that, I think again, that just goes to the point of, that's the expectation that a lot of our people have around compliance training. You know that it's just going to be that read this click, that read this click, that right? And they're not really grasping the point. And I saw this Heather. It was way back up. Here it is Heather. So this, this, if you want to come and share what you wrote in the chat about the story that when somebody starts with OSHA that one, because I think that's pretty powerful. So Heather Ross, that was yours. So do you want to talk a little bit more about the oh, you can't. Okay, so in, in Heather's chat, up, up a little bit. It says there's a story that when somebody starts with OSHA, they see a six foot tall stack of regulations, and are told that each of those rules is written in blood someone was hurt or killed, and that that is what required that a rule be written. So if we have to do compliance training, we should remind people that there's a reason that we do that. And yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I think that one of the keys here, when we think about, if we go back to Jason's point as well, about making the learning look like them, is many times we write compliance training from the company's point of view. So, you know, here's why the company is asking you to do this. You know, legal, this legal that, safety, this safety, that and we take that company perspective. But what if we shifted the perspective and said, We want you to take this training because we want you to go home at the end of the day, hard stop. We want you to go home. We want you to come home with all of your fingers and toes. We want you to come home living, you know, to enjoy that family barbecue over the weekend, right? And so maybe, if we shifted the perspective a little bit, maybe that might become more powerful. So I'm curious to hear from you, yeah, that shock factor, because you remember, I don't, I don't know. I'm, you know, I'm in that Boomer generation. I remember going through Driver's Ed training, and they made you go through, I don't know how many of you are with me, they went, they made you go through that Driver's Ed training where you were driving the simulation, but it was you actually hit somebody. There was a whole thing of that. I remember that in school, and that was really kind of that awakening, yeah, red asphalt. Thank you, Jason, that's exactly what it was. And, and that was just sort of like, oh, that, Oh crap. Moment of, yeah, this is serious. I'm driving not a car. I'm driving a killing machine, right? And so when you put about it like that, it makes might put safety into a different perspective, yeah. And so what I'd like to find out from you is how many of you are taking that perspective when it comes to your safety training or compliance training, and is that working for you. So Carrie, I don't know if that's a new hand or an old hand

I put in the chat, but that's a new that one of the new hand that was one of the things I didn't mention is what we're trying to do with most of the training we're providing, especially if it's around quality or around safety. We're trying to start those sessions out with the why the, why are you sitting here in this class right now? Because exactly what you guys were saying, right? We've had people lose fingers, or, you know, whatever it happens to be, so they understand this is not just a check a box type training, right?

And I think to your point that, why that? What's, you know, that's what in it for me. And you know that I love the so what question? So it's not only what's in it for me, but it's after you take this class, people are going to go, yeah. So what you want to be able to answer that? So what question? And in your case, like you said, Carrie, it it's to keep people safe. But I also think when we're talking about that. Why statement? It's we need to be really clear that it's about the person first and the company second, right and and I think the more clear that we articulate that in both our live classes and online classes, I think that's a great place to start, what about the rest of you? What? What's What are you experiencing? How are you trying to connect those? What's in it? For me, dots.

I'll just add to some great information about the what's in it. For me, I think that's been really helpful. I created a saw safety course recently, and utilizing that approach of the stack of regulations written in blood, kind of implied, right, but also clear, very clear instructions. And goal for the course as well is something that I incorporated in the past, I had, I've, I've always tried to present the learning objectives, you know, kind of very clearly. But those can often get, I feel can be a little weighty at the beginning of the course, and not something that the learners are really connecting with. So I've tried incorporating instead of goal and a set of instructions at the beginning. I like it.

Yeah, I like that. I like that answer a lot. It's or that approach a lot rather, yeah, nobody cares about the learning objectives except for us. I mean, if we're honest about it. Nobody, nobody cares. And so why don't we just instead of saying, by the end of this course, you will learn the regulations behind you know, not blow drying your hair in the shower. Why? Why put that there instead just say, today we're going to help you not to electrocute yourself and let. Let it live like that, you know? And then the if you have to put formal objectives somewhere, put them in the handout or whatever sort of downloadable that might be going with the program. Yeah? Exactly. Renee, yeah. Use objectives to design the course and not be part of your course. I have said that for what feels like decades now, it's the objectives are the good three part learning objective helps us design a course. It doesn't really help people learn. And so if we tackle it from a human perspective, then we're good, yeah. What else we got in the chat? What else you guys have to say? What? What else are you doing? So let's talk about methods. Now, let's get into that conversation. What are some of the things that we can do differently? You know, Peter, I'm

gonna lower my hand first. Yeah. A bunch of years ago, I started off in the ropes course business, and we were scattered all over the country, building and running corporate programs, and our manager had a simple rule, nobody will be in trouble for making a mistake if you share it. So we can all learn. And over the course of several years, we gained quite a body of knowledge. And all that information would come into me, I'd consolidate it and send it back out so everybody was learning from a few mistakes that a few people made. And I tried to get that kind of a process back into my last company, but the safety people were not instructors, no, l, D background, so they would prefer to actually turn a PowerPoint stack into a video and then do a voiceover, much to Heather's background. It was just, it was murder. You could not sit through it. So it was, it was, it was a great way to get get knowledge from the field. And we did that around quality of, you know, the process too. So we were working on safety compliance policies, and then so we were actually, I guess, getting ahead of it, rather than reacting to something once it happened, it was mostly focused around near misses.

Yeah, I think that's worthy of a conversation. We'll put a little pin in that. We'll talk about methods first, and then we'll talk about, well, how do we get buying in, right? Because that's the to Peter's point. That's a lot of times. That's key, especially if you're dealing with, God love them. You know, HR, HR, legal, safety, risk management. You know where they they really don't have a lot of background in what we do, and all they care about is getting the information out there, right? But let's continue to talk about methods here, just for a second. And so Heather, Heather, I like what you put there in the chat, because that's kind of, it's kind of scavenger hunt, like, you know, here's a task. Here are the things now, complete, you know, complete the question, or complete the task after you're done. And I like that. And so that's just a little bit up the the chat stream there. If you guys want to find it, it's a little bit of a long answer, so I won't read it, but it's but in general, it's about, here's the documents, find the information, do the math, and now I'm going to show you where you missed where you missed it. And that sort of training could be done online. You don't need a moderator for that. But if you think about cybersecurity training on AI literacy or media literacy or phishing, right? So a lot of times you can do that, where you're asking people to hunt and search for pieces of information that may or may not be correct, right? So we kind of this gamified approach. So I think that's that's a great way to build interest and to still keep within the parameters of what it is we need to accomplish with the compliance but make it more interesting for people. Yeah. So what other methods are you guys using, or would like to use in your compliance training? Yeah?

What ideas do you have that might make it more fun and interesting for people?

Rachel, one thing, so I work in government, and so we have a lot of regulatory and a. Accreditation and different things like that. So things such as basics like fire safety and you know, what to do in a shooter attack, or, I mean, just very like wide variety. And then HR topics like attendance. One thing that I am thinking about for next year, because we have to do those annual topics the same things every single year is using scenarios. So we already launched our annual training for this year, but for next year, I'm looking to see how I can make the scenarios, because the staff, like someone posted in the chat, was that the new staff don't know this, but the existing staff, they already know where the fire compartments are. They already know where the fire extinguishers are. So what do I have to tell them again and again and again? And so I want to look at, I've only been here for less than a year, but I want to look at next year to say, how can I make it a scenario where it's now, if they pick the wrong answer, it takes them down one path. If they pick the right answer, it takes them down the right path. So it's more of a branched scenario where they get to choose where they go, but it's in the end, it still has to give them the content and give them like, Hey, you picked the wrong path, not tell them it's the wrong path, but they end up picking the wrong path, and now, hey, this is how we get back to the right path. Yeah, not sure exactly how I'm going to do it, but that's my my intention for next year's annual training. Yeah,

I think that's a great idea. Does anybody have any anyone doing anything like that that would like to contribute to what Rachel just said? I

because as you guys search for your unmutes or your hands or what have you, it's, I like this a lot, Rachel, I'll tell you why. Because, first off, let me, let me jump on to something that you said, where you said, Well, we won't tell them that it was the wrong path. I kind of disagree, and you guys might have something to say about that, but I kind of disagree. I think for compliance, we need to tell them it's the wrong path. So at the end of the day, sorry, you died. You fell off the roof because your strap wasn't on appropriately. Now you're dead, you know, I don't see anything wrong with that. And I don't see anything wrong with telling people, well, you didn't, you know, you didn't do this part correctly. And here's the consequence of it, you were now, you've been sued. Now you're getting fitted for an orange jumpsuit. You know, I don't see anything wrong with that. We can do that in, maybe in a light hearted kind of way, but still let them know that there are consequences to the wrong answers or to the no undecided, right? So in a branching scenario, scenario usually have the yes answer, the no answer and the neutral answer. So there's, there are consequences to the neutral and the no as well as consequences, good consequences for the Yes. But I think to let them know that they are definitely headed down the right path or wrong path is important.

So, so Shannon, this is Andrea. Can you all hear Can you hear me? I can Okay, so I've been playing around with this. I'm going to be getting into compliance training, but I love scenarios. But the other thing I've been playing with our AI avatars, who will come up with the scenario, right? And so you can do this in rise or storyline, but I have a, you know, an AI avatar talk about the scenario, then I have those tabs in rise, I don't know if anybody's familiar, and each tab has an answer, right? Somebody responding, and then the person you put, like a little thing, and you say, hey, which answer do you think is right? I'm being very simplistic here, right? And then after that, they click, and they can see which answer is right, and get the context and learn more. But I'm I'm thinking of doing something engaging with AI avatars. I know I can build scenario blocks in in storyline which are kind of cool, but I thought if they hear somebody talking people like short videos. So I'm trying to keep things very short and sweet. I don't know what you all think about that, but that's something I'm playing with. I use Synthesia, but there's also some other great ones out there. I'm going to pronounce this wrong. Colossian, but that's a lot less expensive, but those things kind of I thought maybe that would help. What do you guys think?

What do you guys think? Who would like to absolutely go ahead. Jason,

yeah, yeah, and you said it. Andrea, short, if it's a repeat course that they have take every year the first time they take it, however long it takes to get through the material, to get it to them. But if they have to take something annually, make that second third time shorter. Yeah, and use those scenarios, like, like Shannon said the Yes, neutral and no, and they pick the wrong thing, okay, but neutral maybe they get a little bit more of the lesson. But using, you know, an AI thing, or an animated character from beyond anything that keeps them focused on it. But short is the key for getting these repeat courses, unless there is a time component that is required,

right? Right? Unless there is a time component gonna I, and I would look at the regulation too. Because some of these regulations, it doesn't necessarily mean that they have to sit through a course. It means that they have to get the information. So there might be a test out component here.

Yeah, that's the other option too.

Yeah. So if they pass the test, they can electronically sign whatever it is that they need to electronically sign, and off they go, you know. So, so we can be, and that would be, to Jason's point, that would be only for the people who have already taken the initial right. So if this is your second year on the job and you've already taken the, you know, sexual harassment one before, then sign on this, take your test. Go. Have a great day. So I think that's a that's an option too,

unless you're in California and that second, right? The investment requires three hours, eight hours,

three out who made that law at Connecticut

safer? Connecticut?

Yeah, it's long, it's hard. And I heard somebody say they paid a kid to take it. I'm like, Hmm, no, I know that's wrong, but I thought, wow, that's, that's an interesting thing.

That's that that's a salesperson for you always trying to find the way. You know, you know, in the

last company I worked for, I was in charge of of finding the compliance course that we were going to inflict on everybody every year. And we that's how it felt anyway, we we did not have a test, because my compliance person said that if you have a test and you don't require 100% then people are going to say, Well, why didn't you, when they if you get audited, they'll ask, why didn't you require everybody to get 100% why? And it just brings up more questions than answers, and it's actually better not to test them if you get audited. So great,

great idea. So then what's the suggestion, just that they sign off on it?

Yeah, they basically, the way we did it is that they took it. They had to prove that they took it. And honestly, it was the honor system. It wasn't like there was some torture device or anything, but so they could have paid their kid to take it, but they had to at least prove to the LMS that somebody took it. Okay,

yeah, and I think that that's the issue with compliance, right? It's really understanding what goes with it. And like I said in the blog post, it's about reading the regulation, reading the requirements yourself. Because, you know, like I said, there's I have yet to read a requirement that said you must make this as boring as possible. That's never been part of the reg for the compliance yet. That's what we managed to do. So what does the reg actually say? You know? So that's part of your conversation, I think, with the subject matter expert, or with, you know, HR legal risk, is understanding, let's get together, because a lot of times I found in organizations that I've worked with and for in the past is that they want this compliance training completed, created according to a reg that's from 1990 and the laws have changed and the rules have changed. We don't have to do it like this anymore, but nobody has really gone back and looked at what is required. So that could be a homework assignment for some of you, if you really haven't looked at what's the actual requirement, and then you can have a real conversation with the subject matter expert behind that, right? Yeah, yeah. New York had some required training that said that you had to use their materials. I've seen that before, and in that case, you know, what can you do? You know, maybe you try to divvy it up. And, as Jason said, you put it into smaller bites and tried to make it a little bit more interesting. But you know, in some cases, truly, your hands are tied. In

those cases, you put that disclaimer at the beginning as. Following material is required by the state of New York,

right? So you aren't taking blame for it, right? Yes, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Okay. So now let's talk about we've got some methods here doing things like those scavenger hunts like Heather suggested creating the branching scenarios. I really think between those two, those are the best things that you can do, because it's getting people involved. And a lot of times with compliance training, it's about resourcing. Where can they find? X, y, z, where is it located? Like, where is the fire extinguisher located? Or, where is this document located? So sometimes a scavenger hunt, type of thing you know, can happen. So one of your questions, maybe on your E learning is, you know, where did you find it? Go find it. Where's it at? And then where's it at becomes the answer to the question. And you can do this as well through some simple so thinking about how to use a fire extinguisher in a company that I worked with in the past, we built an augmented reality, little short little one about how to use the fire extinguisher, you know. So it was attached to a QR code. They scanned the QR code, they saw how to do it. They could do it themselves. Was kind of interactive, and boom, you're done. And it was super simple to put together, and kind of interesting, because it had a little bit of a wow factor to it, because people hadn't seen that before, but not really expensive either, you know. So I think what we're thinking about here is some really interesting not I will say it's new. Simulation based training is not a new thing, but how we apply it here can be different, new and refreshing to the people within the organization. Right? Sherry, as part of our compliance training, we had to show the driver how to use the handbook to look up Right exactly? So you show them how to use the resources, or where those resources are completely different than how to drive a truck. They already know that. So what gets to the heart of it? So we did a safety course where we took pictures at our locations, thank you. And they had to click on the hotspot to point out what needed to be fixed. Something else, right? It's not a name and shame. I totally agree with that. Something else, it might be. You might build a gallery. And I used to do this for orientation, but now that I'm thinking about it, it might be able to be done for compliance as well. And what we did was we said, for the orientation part, it was, here's the company's mission, vision and value statement. Now go out and take pictures of all of the things that reflect the safety and not safety, but the mission, vision and values, and upload those pictures here. So maybe something like that could be done from a compliance perspective. It might be take pictures of everything that shows that we are a safety oriented culture, you know. So maybe something like that might be different and interesting, and has them looking at things in a different way. I don't know. Maybe that being said, I would love to get your opinions on how do you work with your subject matter experts? So you have that subject matter experts, some of them are flexible and adaptable. Others are locked into a certain perspective. How do you work with them in order to try to get the best information out to the people? What's your experiences? What are your experiences?

I ask a lot of why questions. Why does this person need to know this? Why would an office based person need to know about Ladder Safety?

And then, you know, okay, well, we have step stools in the office. Okay, then we'll talk about that for the office people, we don't need to talk about the giant, you know, extension ladders.

Also ask them what they want them to do at the end of the training.

Yes. What's the do? Right? What's the do? Don't climb up on the shelves. Use the step ladder,

right, which is hard for something like sexual harassment prevention, because you don't want them to do something which is so it's trickier.

Mm, hmm, yeah, it is. That behavior. Change is always going to be a trickier wicket to tackle, but I think this is where your simulation or your logic based, or your decision tree type of training comes in. You know, did you say this? Don't say that. Did you act this way? Well, don't you know. So there's a whole decision tree that happens there that could be incorporated into a training program. What else do those conversations? How else do those conversations happen? What are we? How are we managing the relationship?

So I'm coming into a team that was mostly all in person, and actually it is almost all in person. So I'm new to the or me coming here is new to them for e learning and doing e learning modules and courses. So I'm really just trying to show them the benefits of why e learning can work, but also taking their PowerPoints and looking at it and saying, Okay, how can we take this? And, like everyone has said here before, too, what does it mean for the learner, and how can we, instead of just death by PowerPoint, as someone has said before, too, what does it mean to the person? How can we make it more scenario based, or, you know, getting examples from, you know, the smear, the whoever's actually doing the job. So whether it's someone, you know, the actual employees that are already out there, and getting examples from them, and actual real life scenarios and real life situations, and bringing that into the training and saying, Okay, what would you do in this situation? Let's talk about why this is not the best, you know, path to take, and that's like in the live classes that we've been talking about it. Because, again, we do mostly live classes here, not in very few e learning classes.

I think that's a I think that's a great idea. I'm going to put it pin in my comments, because I'm going to go to William real quick.

You're still on mute. There you go. Oh, your mic is on mute.

Okay, now, now, it should be good, right? Okay,

there you go.

I've had success in the past, like working one on one with the SME, kind of throughout the development and, like, one time we even kind of sat down together and, like, worked on the multiple choice questions together, because they had sort of given me their idea of what the multiple choice questions should be. But they're very like, kind of abstract. So I was sort of showing them, you know, how they can, you know, create a character that is in this situation, and then the choices are like, what they would actually do, and not like, Oh, I know that this is the policy or whatever. And so I think that that was helpful for sort of showing the value of that kind of approach. And also, you know, getting, I got the information I needed, which was, well, if they do this action, what will the consequences be? Because I don't know that, but they know that. So I found that to be very helpful.

I agree, and I think it's, it goes too. So, William, I don't know what your thoughts are, so how, how is it that you built your relationship with the subject matter experts when having those conversations?

Yeah, so I, I mean, I sort of made it, you know, acknowledge that they're helpful, right? And like that, they're being, you know, trying to be proactive in, like, giving me this, this content, but then explaining, well, you know, if we wanted this to be more effective, we can, you know, basically, like, let's try this approach and see how it goes, right? And because they're a little resistant at first, like, Oh, this is taking so much time just to design one question. And I said, Yeah, it does take a little more time, but you're going to get the results you want, which is that they're actually going to remember, right? So we had this scenario about, you know, a person in a call center environment, and one of the choices was, send the person on the phone to the in person office to do the form. And that was the wrong answer, right? Because it the call center person could have done it. So I said, well, they won't remember the whatever that this is the policy, but they will remember that this character sent the other character to the office unnecessarily, and then got, you know, pissed off. So that's kind of the value, right, right? Remember this little stupid story about about the person who sent the client to the off to the office. So that's kind of how I how I sold it. Yeah,

exactly. And I think that goes very well with what Rachel was just. Saying, if we the more that we can weave those sorts of stories in from the actual people or or as close to the actual people, you know, then I think that's, that's wonderful. And so if it's if you can do subject matter expert interviews, or, you know, people with boots on the ground, type of interviews. Then, one, I think it kills two birds with one stone, so to speak, it's you're really getting a good story. And two, you're building up that relationship that says, I really want to listen and I really want to understand what the pain point is, if you will, behind this compliance training, right? And it is about making it realistic and short. Why couldn't we put together a kind of like a trailer, if you will? So if you think about it, you know, movies put out these video clips right about what the movie is going to be about. So couldn't we? Couldn't we create, like a sizzle reel, if you will, or a trailer behind here's what we're doing for this particular stream of compliance, safety and so now, here's here's some videos, here's some interviews, here's something that's really interesting to kind of pique your interest and curiosity about what you may be learning about what So what other techniques do you have to help with your subject matter experts to get them on board with you? Because that's usually the roadblock. Like William said, it's like, I would love to do all this scenario based stuff, but I really wanted out yesterday, and I really only wanted on a PowerPoint deck uploaded to whatever tool you're using. So how do you handle those conversations? One of the shifts that I've made kind of recently, is asking the question about what makes it hard. So instead of assuming that somebody doesn't have the knowledge, what gets in the way if I know, especially when it's compliance, things that we have to do repeatedly, okay, I might know it, but what makes me still not follow the rule in the first moment? And so it's trying to get them to see that. So if we use Ladder Safety, okay? Well, because the short ladder was here, not the long extension ladder, or, you know, so it's like tailor your training or the information that you're providing to solve what makes it hard to do. Yes, yes. And it's that gap analysis, right? Let's, let's, let's go formal. We're all led people here. So if you think about what's the gap analysis, and the gap analysis means, here's the current state, here's the future state. Why is it that it's not happening, right? So the current state is we people need to be people should be using a ladder. That's the current state. The future state is they need to be using a ladder 100% of the time. So why is it that those two points are not connecting? What's happening in the middle? And I think that's a really important question that we haven't talked about yet this hour. So thank you, Brandy for bringing that up. It's you know, so helping the subject matter experts understand, or helping us to understand, what is the barrier to success. And in and as in your example, Brandy, it might be something super simple, or maybe that was Jason, something super simple, the right tool is not available at the right time. So do you have a little hook on the wall where the little step stool can sit? Is there a home for the step stool, or does it always constantly get moved around? And if it's always constantly moved around, if you're like me, I'm going to step on something else to reach whatever it is I want. So I love that answer. I think that's great. The more that we can think about it from that perspective, the better off we are. Yeah, the yeah link it to a business matrix. But again, let's not focus on the business matrix, because sometimes the business matrix is, well, we want long term disability to go down, or those costs to go down. That's the business matrix. And the people on the other end of the on learning program don't care about that particular business matrix, you know, so they may care about whether or not they're hurt and have to stay in a hospital for two weeks. That's the matrix that matters to them. But when we are talking with our subject matter experts, then that business matrix does become important. So. And it's about tackling it from both ends. Yeah? As I go back, I'm sorry, I'm going back up through the chat to see if there's anything, anything I'm missing here. Nope, but we are, as I'm noticing now, almost at the top of the hour. Yeah, right. EPA fines don't matter to the people in the office who don't have to pay the fine, right? But, but it does matter to the subject matter expert. So now we've got to marry that together and to somebody else's point. I saw it in the chat here, to somebody else's point. It might be because the subject matter expert doesn't realize what you can do. So they've only experienced maybe what the other person used to do, or the history of what online learning looks like in the organization. So they're only used to that click Next button that's the only thing they know is the only thing they've seen. And so maybe if we take some real time to say, what is it that you want to achieve? If we can achieve this through this, creating moments of engagement and interest and learning stickiness, be like that car salesman, right? If you could do this, would that matter to you over here, and if they say yes, then it's like, all right, maybe we could try a couple of these things, yeah, and having a prototype would be helpful. I agree with that. Yeah. This is where I an event, right? Working for a company owned Yes, yeah, when you work for an employee owned company, those business matrix matter to everybody, right? Okay, so we are at the top of the hour, and as usual, this has been an excellent conversation. A couple of things for me to point out to you all is that the next Coffee Chat, which I'm putting in the chat right now is what I call an off week chat. So for those of you who are new, we do these chats every other Friday. Typically the next chat would be not next Friday, but the Friday after however, Shannon is going to Mexico and won't be here in two weeks. I can't believe it, I'm actually taking a vacation, so that means then that the chat is going to happen the following Friday, which falls on an off week. So I just wanted you all to be aware of that, and that coffee chat is going to be a lot of you do leadership development programs, sales programs, customer service programs, and you incorporate reading into it, like a book or articles or things like that. And sometimes people read it, sometimes they don't. Sometimes you turn it into a book club and you don't have success. So what I want to talk about is, how can we make things like book clubs or reading assignments, that sort of thing? How can we make them more successful? How can we make them work in our benefit? Because there's a lot of good stuff out there, so how can we get how can we make that happen. How can we reimagine what the book club, the corporate book club, might look like? So that's what we are going to be talking about in three weeks. So thank you everybody for joining me today. Now here's my question for you. We got fall coming up, so what's the tradition for you? Right about this time of year, what's your fall tradition? Is it finding the Halloween stuff, buying your first pumpkin latte at Starbucks. What is the tradition for you? The Pumpkin Patch hunting game? Is that anything like you know the movie. So what are you doing with things where you're playing a game of hunting? Peter? Okay, all right. So we're that. There we go. So we need to warn the deer out there that Peter is coming, picking out pumpkins at the patch, hoodies and bonfires. Yes, it is that time of year. Football. That's me. Anybody see the dolphins game last night? What was up with that? Dolphins? Not looking good, but my 40 Niners on Sunday or on Monday? Yes, looking good against those jets. Apple picking. Yes, absolutely,

absolutely, I love all of that Oktoberfest. Oh yes, it is that time of year for Oktoberfest. And I used to live in Southern California, and there was a big Oktoberfest up in. In Big Bear Mountain. We used to go to that every year, and it was a wonderful experience. I miss it. That's one thing I do miss about Southern Cal where I used to live, so I need to find a really good Oktoberfest out here. I'm sure there's plenty. Okay. Well, thank you everybody for joining. I appreciated the conversation as always, was engaging, and hopefully you found it useful to you know, transform your compliance based training. And also, thank you once again for having a sense of humor about my latest newsletter. I do appreciate all of the comments about what fetishes that I get from you guys. Thank you so much. When you confuse soul, S O, U, L with soul, S O, L, E, I guess you're asking for it. Thank you. Now. Everybody have a great weekend, and I look forward to seeing you on October the fourth for our next Coffee Chat. You.