Thanks to Steve Simmons for the inspiration here. Steve was explaining part of the theory behind Where There’s a Will There’s an A. (I've heard the concept before, but have NOT studied this material, so this is not intended as a summary)
There are two concepts that would seem to apply in all training, but especially technical training.
1. Attention span is a bit like a bell curve, and for most of us it tapers off pretty quickly. (Maybe this is just another part of ADD) However, if we switch to another subject, the curve restarts, so by dealing with a lot of short subjects, we're likely to learn more than spending an extended time on a single subject.
2. When we receive teaching on a particular subject, we’re more inclined to remember the first thing said and the last. What’s in the middle becomes brain mush quickly.
If you put these two ideas together, it would seem the best training would be based on many short segments, covering different topics, with each segment consisting of a great intro, a little bit of detail, then a great summary. There's some indication that even if we rotate through a small number of subjects, the short segments still work.
Five minutes may not be the magic length, but it sure makes sense to NOT spend all day on a single topic (as with my earlier post on Conventional Training).
Can we recreate training to be lots of short segments? That offers the potential of higher retention, as well as an opportunity for the attendees to not have to be away from the job for as long. Can we do this? I’m willing to try!
