The Future of Learning is Experiential

I recently participated in a 2-day corporate training event, delivered completely online, in Zoom, all delivered with talking heads and PowerPoints. The only reprieve from this marathon of maintaining undivided attention is an occasional, well-produced video. I don’t know about you, but as an educator and a learner, it’s time to catch up with the research on experiential learning.

It’s not enough that traditional learning approaches are as still being delivered for corporate training during and after the worst periods of the pandemic. With the forced move to digital delivery, millions of learners were subjected to more talking heads and slides ad infinitum leading to widespread exhaustion and subsequent disdain for this mode of learning.

An opportunity exists that needs immediate attention: The infusion of rapidly-developed, relevant, and customized experiential learning activities such as serious games, scenarios, and simulations. Why aren’t we retooling our corporate training centers, learning and development professionals, and the platforms they reside in with more scenario-based activities? Research proves that listening to someone speak, even with beautifully-produced slides, the retention of information is below 10%, while the use of experiential learning produces well above 70% retention.

More importantly, the opportunity also exists to address complex processes and issues that have eluded L&D departments forever with an approach that can unlock innovation and solutions.

Below is a list of examples of these hard-to-solve challenges from the corporate sector that traditional forms of training have a small chance of solving, many of which I have attempted to address through scenarios and serious games:

I need to hire people with experience. How can I hire a newly graduated person for a job that requires 5-10 years’ experience?

I need to reallocate resources (people) between projects. How can I rapidly bring new project team members up to speed?

I need to introduce a new work process (e.g. Agile). How can I rapidly give large numbers of people experience without disrupting their current work and without having them learn on the job which means make mistakes and have the first (or the first few) projects fail?

I need to reorg my company. How can I do that with minimal disruption?

I need to optimize my processes. How can I ensure that the newly proposed processes will deliver and not be disruptive?

The next generation of corporate learning needs to be experiential, both online and in-person. The immediate benefits to the learner will be greater retention of information; understanding of how a system works; what triggers the most positive impact; and more rapid adoption of processes, behaviors, and possibly even culture.

For the company, there is more rich data analytics showing learning leaders’ outcomes from training beyond Kirkpatrick level 1 and 2; new ways of doing labs that allows for interaction but more importantly, allows for continuous development and improvement of skills; and the concept of continuous improvement replacing best practices as a way of advancing in the organization.

Look for more detailed discussions and applications of experiential learning to come.