How to Familiarize Yourself with Any Training Topic
A Template for Learning Content Discovery
TLRD: To familiarize yourself with new training topics, leverage the power of structured questioning. Access the template here.
Imagine you’re a learning designer starting a new project. You’ve already engaged with the client to identify performance gaps and desired outcomes. Now, you’re faced with the challenge of structuring the subject matter into a cohesive course, but the content is completely foreign to you, and you only have one hour with a subject matter expert (SME). Where do you even begin? It’s a familiar scenario for many learning designers, and it’s easy to feel overwhelmed.
The key skill here is the art of questioning. Many of us are familiar with the 5W + 1H framework: Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How. This approach is invaluable for quickly grasping the basic contours of a subject.
But learning design is more than informing and presenting facts. It’s about transformation, making sure that learners can apply the knowledge in a real-world context. This requires a deeper exploration into the sequencing and scaffolding of content, as well as the behaviors required to fill the performance gap.
Furthermore, asking SMEs about the required behaviors or skills to achieve a certain outcome often leads to vague responses. It feels too abstract. Instead, I ask about real-life examples and the steps people used to overcome obstacles. I can deduce the required behaviors and skills from that information.
Template
To go about the content discovery in a structured way, I developed the following template¹:
- Definition: What is the definition of this concept?
- Problem/ opportunity: What is the problem or opportunity this concept helps address?
- Audience: Who are the key people affected by this problem or opportunity?
- How-to: Step-by-step, what strategy/ practice/ tactics can people use to address this problem or opportunity?
- Example: What’s an example of this in the real world?
- Tips: What is a best practice or common pitfall?
- Depth: What course / book / case study / expert do you recommend I follow up with?
- Insights: If you want learners to remember one thing, what is it?
After gathering the information, I proceed to design a real-world project or worksheet — some kind of hands-on assessment that will tell me whether learners have achieved the intended learning outcome. In subsequent discussions with the client or SME, I often pose questions like, “walk me through what people do, say, think in order to successfully complete this task” or “what distinguishes a proficient performer from someone who might struggle with this project?” This feedback sharpens my focus on the essential skills and behaviors the learners must exhibit for successful completion.
Example
Adjust the questions above to your subject domain. For example, imagine you’re designing an online course on running business experiments:
- Definition: What is the definition of a business experiment? What is NOT a business experiment?
- Problem/ Opportunity: What problems do business experiments help overcome? What performance gap or KPI does it address?
- Audience: Why is it important to them? What are some common objections you hear? What’s enabling/ stopping them from doing the right thing?
- How-to: Step-by-step, what is the process for designing business experiments? What is the connection between these elements? How do you know that you’re ok to move from one stage to the next? Who is involved at each stage?
- Example: What is an example of business testing in the real world? What strategy/ practice did the company use? What went well? Didn’t go well? Does this apply to orgs in other sectors as well? If so, does it play out differently?
- Tips: What are the characteristics of a great business experiment? What are common pitfalls? As a rule of thumb, what should be done first?
- Depth: Are there any existing frameworks or principles this is related to? What thought leaders do you recommend I follow?
- Insights: What are 2–3 key learnings you want people to remember?
I use these questions to structure conversations with subject matter experts or to organize my thinking as I read up on a new topic.
There is remarkable power in a well-phrased question. It can instantly unlock better answers and open up new paths to explore. Think of these questions as a starting point. Each one can trigger more questions that take you down new paths.
[1] Inspired by What Smart Students Know by Adam Robinson.
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