Great Work: Bringing a Leadership Vision to Life

Earlier this year, AllenComm teamed up with employee recognition leader O. C. Tanner to enhance the company’s leadership training. O. C. Tanner already has a leadership-oriented book called Great Work: How to Make a Difference People Love. The company wanted some complementary training to go with the book’s content.

This was a challenge for AllenComm. After all, how do you create leadership training for a company that is an expert in leadership training? To make the most of both companies’ expertise, close collaboration was required. Of the collaboration between AllenComm and O.C. Tanner, the project manager Gina Anderson says that the teams worked “very closely with the O.C. Tanner team to turn their high-level design concepts into well-crafted, intuitive, and engaging learning experiences that are realistic and non-contrived.” Gina also notes that providing “real-life and business results that have a lasting effect on the learners” was one of the top priorities for the training.

To that end, the project leaders chose to use three methodologies for O. C. Tanner’s custom corporate training: gamification, interactivity, and microlearning.

Going with Gamification

Besides being more engaging than a simple presentation, in many cases gamification offers more effective learning. You may “…be more likely to remember a solution you discovered on your own rather than the one that someone with superior knowledge simply told you…” writes training expert Cathy Moore on her blog.

O.C. Tanner’s training includes seven gamification modules that allow the learner to make decisions in a variety of business scenarios. Instead of being force-fed information, learners discover what’s effective on their own through trial and error. They see clearly how they can make their work even better. Most importantly, they’re able to practice using the real-world skills O. C. Tanner teaches so that they’re ready when similar situations arise in their own lives.

Immersion through Interactivity

In today’s world of training, interactivity is a must. “Interactivity software integrated with serious game-design thinking doesn’t just present learning content. It immerses learners in the content and gives them control over the learning process. As a result, learning experiences become more vivid, stories more powerful, and questions more provocative,” notes Training Industry.

Every page in the seven O. C. Tanner leadership training modules requires some type of learner interaction, whether it’s scrolling down to view more information or driving a car across a road covered with business-process pitfalls. And the gamification elements throughout the modules serve as a double whammy—they’re not just gamification; they’re also interactivity. They keep the learners engaged as they process the leadership training.

Mastery by Microlearning

Microlearning is designed to be quick and easy. In the words of eLearning Mind, “When learners are self-motivated and already have a solid understanding of material, microlearning can be a quick, effective way to brush up, hit home, and teach important concepts in a bite-sized way.”

That’s what makes microlearning so great for O. C. Tanner: learners should already have a basic understanding of the leadership concepts from reading Great Work: How to Make a Difference People Love. They need only a refresher to bring what they learned to life, so each piece of microlearning takes just a few minutes to complete. This is especially important since O. C. Tanner works with a variety of industries, and the learners taking the modules may not have much down time.

Outcome

“We wanted learners to walk away feeling the training was absolutely worth their time and has valuable, retainable information they can use over and over…” says Gina. The AllenComm and O. C. Tanner teams also wanted learners to “really feel passionate about the recognition solutions that motivate and support learners’ performance.”

Did it work? Of course it did! O. C. Tanner’s leadership training, with its gamification, interactivity, and microlearning, garnered a Horizon Interactive Award and two gold Brandon Hall awards. Together, and by combining their strengths and using the right methodologies, AllenComm and O. C. Tanner really accomplished some great work!

Looking to create your own great work through customized training for your organization? Reach out to us. We’d love to help you design a corporate training solution that gets results.