The term Performance
Support has become almost synonymous with mobile learning—note that I said
learning, not training. The approach is to use mobile devices as add-ons to
existing training—the well beloved Just-In-Time or Job Aid content. Existing
training has related content made available on mobile devices, so that students
can have a quick refresher when the need arises. One of the beauties of mobile
performance support content is that you can use is as a supplement to all types
of formal and informal training; classroom, virtual learning, elearning or
mlearning.
Performance support is not a cheap alternative to other
training; it is an addition to complement training, so such an implementation should cost more than just
delivering the existing training. If you choose this route, you need to analyse
the cost-benefits to ensure that you are not just paying twice to achieve the
same learning outcomes.
That said, performance support materials on smartphone or
tablet devices is a major benefit of the mlearning experience. Fewer of us
expect to remember all the answers to our business questions than was the case
even 30 years ago. Robert Kelley, in a Carnegie-Mellon University, on-going
study with knowledge workers, referenced across the Internet (http://clomedia.com/articles/view/the_new_knowledge_worker_enabling_the_next_generation/print:1),
found that while respondents to the question, “What percentage of the knowledge
you need to do your job is stored in your mind?” in 1986 was 75%. By 2006 this
had dwindled to 9%. This may reflect a more complex working environment, but it
is also an indication that workers use offline devices rather than memory to
store information.
An important point in the move towards performance support
is that this information does not replace training. The whole point of
performance support materials is that they are aide memoires for information that has already been covered. Do not
fall into the trap of replacing solid educational training with a host of PDFs
than no one is going to read. For example, a performance support component in a
hospital environment may list the core steps in a patient care protocol. This
is extremely useful for a nurse or doctor working in a busy environment, but it
does not explain the rationale for the procedure. This base knowledge, perhaps
the microbiology that underlies infection control procedures, cannot be
regarded as a supporting function; such in-depth topics are covered in
training, whether classroom-, elearning- or mlearning-based.
This has become something of a problem for the whole
mlearning performance support discussion. Some organisations simply republish
all of their internal documents in PDFs such that they can be read on a
smartphone. I worked with a company that had a stunningly attractive UI for
their performance support information—no names, no pack-drill. The front page
was an exercise in style, clarity and brevity; it was engaging! However, when
you made a topic selection you were then presented with a list of PDFs, some of
which ran to 60 pages. Some analysis of usage showed that while the home page
was very popular, the subsequent pages were a complete turn-off for users.
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