Learning Experience Design in NGOs “Part 2: From Learning to Performance”
Reminder:
The article you are about to read is the second part of a document which describes a Learning Experience Design project in an NGO in Nepal back in 2018. In this section “Part 2 — From Learning to Performance”, I cover the 2nd and 3rd prototypes, the learnings I had following each iteration, as well as the outcomes of the project.
If you haven’t yet read the first section of the article, I would suggest you click here “Part 1 — From Training to Learning” to get to know more about the research phase, problem definition and the design of prototype 1 before you continue reading.
1. “Learning within the Workflow” / Prototype 2
With the analytics, feedback and insights we managed to gather after week 1 prototype, we basically learned that people liked the idea of receiving relevant learning content directly into their emails in a weekly newsletter; however, we found some frictions within the organisational system when it came to when/how/where to access and consume this content and resources.
So before sending any more newsletters, or doing anything else to expose the team to new content and resources, we knew we needed to focus our next iteration efforts on finding a solution to solve this friction in the system.
How might we create the space for learning within the workflow?
1.1. My Learning Hour:
I strongly believe that learning should be part of your day to day job, and also that the closest you put the learning (training, support, tool, resource, etc.) to the workflow and tasks your employees are trying to do, you have a lot more possibilities to impact performance.
So, after getting buying and “green light” from the executive director of the NGO, and a quick briefing session with all the team, we launched “My Learning Hour”. The objective of this initiative was to offer (it was optional for them to do it) 1 hour to learn and develop during your work week.
Especially important at this point, was to make the team clear that this hour was free for them to use, that they didn’t have to ask for it to anyone, and also that they could learn whatever they wanted in that time. If they wanted to go through and review the learning newsletter and content that I was sending, that was ok. But if they wanted to do something else to help them develop, that was also fine.
The most important thing to achieve with “My Learning Hour” was for them to feel the following:
“Even if I am super busy at work, it is ok if I allocate some time each day/week for learning… its all part of doing my job better”.
1.2. Recognition:
The second element we thought it could help to create the space for learning within the workflow was the introduction of a “small nudge” to the design to foster role modelling and hopefully behavioural change.
Based on the insights we gathered from the research phase, we knew that the team valued very much the possibility of being recognised. However, this need was not always and consistently being fulfilled within the company as it was not always clear or defined why/when/how you would be eligible to receive a recognition.
Along with that specific insight about recognition, the analytics from newsletter 1 provided us with an important piece of information. We knew that one manager of the NGO had been the one consuming more content and resources than anyone else in the team the previous week.
What if we include some recognition within the newsletter?
The intention behind this initiative, which had a flavour of gamification embedded, was firstly to express our kudos and recognition to the people exhibiting behaviours we wanted to foster in this new learning culture. Secondly, we wanted to make learning “recognisable” and reinforce the message about learning being an integral and very important part of working at the organisation. And finally, for the other people who was not engaging yet with the newsletter and content, we wanted them to feel motivated to do it by seeing others getting some recognition (“If he/she is doing it, I can also do it”).
2. “From Learning to Performance” / Prototype 3
We were almost in the middle of the project plan and we were starting to see a slow increased engagement with the newsletter, specially on the number of people who was opening it and clicking on the content.
But as we all know, a design it’s never finished. So we continued to be close to the employees to understand their feedback about the prototypes, and we learned about a new opportunity we had to make our design more people centric and, specifically to help people where/when they needed it the most.
We learned that we needed to find ways to help them at the “point of need”; which is when they are at work “doing stuff” and “solving problems”.
Which was the friction now? Take a moment to reflect on the following scenario:
The upcoming annual performance review is coming in 2 weeks and an employee wants to prepare for it. She remembers that there is good content in some newsletters she received in the past, but she doesn’t know where they are.
The main insight we gathered here was that after they had received the newsletter in any given week from us, sometimes it will get a bit difficult for them (friction) to access the content again in a simple and quick way as it will get mixed up with other emails within their inbox, some other times they didn’t know if they saved it somewhere, or if they even deleted it.
How might we support people at the point of need so they can access relevant content and resources 365/24/7 (and not just when we plan to send it to them)?
We were getting to the final part of the project and we needed to make the most of the little time we had on our hands. So we decided that the best option we had was “not to reinvent the wheel”, but to reuse and repurpose some of the content and resources we have been sending them within the newsletters.
The best option we had was “not to reinvent the wheel”, but to re-use and re-purpose
To start moving forward with this idea, and to get tangible as fast as we could, we built a very simple website with a “free drag and drop” tool called Weebly that I had used a few times in my previous experience.
In here, we tagged and organised all the videos, articles and resources we had already curated, created and shared (Push) to them about performance conversations or feedback, but now using a different channel for them to access it (Pull) whenever was good for them.
Looking backwards, the end of the 3rd week I think it was a bit of a tipping point in the project, as we took again some strong steps away from traditional classroom training and towards a modern learning culture. Employees had at their disposal a channel to Push (Newsletter) content to them, as well as a first (very draft) prototype that could allow them to Pull (Website) content whenever they need it.
3. Outcomes & Impact
Based on all prototypes and iterations, we finally managed to send a 4th and 5th newsletter to the team; and in despite that it might be too early to say if we managed to achieve a long lasting cultural change or if the annual performance reviews are now being handled in a more structured and relevant way, below you will find some initial insights that I started to see before I finished my project in Nepal:
- Learning Culture Transformation: This was the main objective of the LXD project in Nepal. The team was exposed, explored and and gave its first steps towards a modern learning culture, doing away with classroom training and scheduled programmes. This included digital learning tools, a blended strategy mixing push and pull elements, curation and creation of content, and a variety of channels for them to “consume” learning content and resources in new ways.
- Behavioural Change: By introducing a weekly newsletter notification directly into the team’s inbox, we started to make it easier to create a habit of learning. Engagement increased and we managed to moved from 42% open rate on week 1 to 81% in week 5. By sending these emails notifications periodically, we manage to get in front of the team to share suggested learning and resources, which helped to reinforce the message that learning is an inherent and essential part of their day to day job, and not something that should only be done outside working hours.
- Ownership: With the introduction of initiatives such as “My Learning Hour” to create some space for learning, and also the “Online Platform” for them to Pull content, people started to realise that they didn’t have to wait for the company to provide them with training and learning opportunities. The team got curious about the possibilities of owning and driving their own personal and professional development.
Bonus: “People Topics Support — Helping you with those moments of truth”
As you can see from the image above, by the end of the project, this was not only about supporting the team to upskill on effective performance conversations and feedback. But we made the most from everything we learnt from prototypes and iterations with our users, as well as from the (free) digital channel available to us (Weebly), to provide them with more resources, templates and content to support them on “all human resources things” at the NGO.
From recruitment templates, to onboarding checklist, feedback conversations or leader toolkits. The idea of setting up this “online one stop shop” for people topics and content, was intended to help people to access and prepare more effectively and confidently those “moments of truth” within their employee life cycle at the company; as well as providing the next HR Advisor at the NGO something to build on to.
All these additional content and resources were not created from scratch or in a rush at the end of my project. But all the opposite, as they were all used by me, as HR Advisor, at some point during my 3 months project in Nepal. I knew that people was onboard with this new way of accessing content and learning, and I made the most of that opportunity. So the only thing that I had to do was to select the most important ones, format them a bit, and organise them within the online platform.
In summary, by solving real problems, focusing on frictions, running experiments and learning from iterations, we ended up with a design solution that was scaled based on its results and adoption, rather than focusing on learning completion or on how many people attended a classroom training. We designed and implemented the whole learning experience with no budget or external consultants to facilitate training, by maximising free online tools and content.
Do you want to get to know more about other initiatives People Centric Design we also implemented in this NGO in Nepal? Click below to learn more about each specific initiative:
From Physical to Digital: Improving an NGOs communication and feedback experiences
