As trainers, of either our customers or other staff, we often deal with dueling priorities.  Twice in the last month I’ve been confronted, as a trainer, with the tension between “Learn It Fast” and “Learn It Well.”  It’s a very stressful tension, and one that is not easily resolved by those of us who train, those who manage staff, and those who coordinate staff development and learning.

The “Learn It Fast” faction wants staff training and learning to not take very much time away from duties that they deem to be more important.  This faction wants learning to be instantaneous, efficient, and speedy.  They want learners to spend as little time as possible on staff training, period.  This faction tends to prefer webinars, online learning, and self-paced learning…which in and of itself is not a problem.  But when it’s the only learning that’s allowed, no matter what the topic, then we have a problem.  This faction tells instructors to cut a two hour class to 20 minutes, content be damned.  This faction tells training agencies that their staff can only spend 1 hour per week on a self-paced 4-week online learning class…and they still want to get the continuing education credits for it so they can tell their Commission or Board that they’re contributing to staff development.

The “Learn It Well” faction values the stick-to-it-ivness of training above all else.  They want learning to count, to stick.  This group allows for diverse training methods and media, as well as diverse training approaches.  They want to ensure that if they’re going to give staff time to go to training, that the time actually means something.  I’ve heard folks on this side of the line say “I’d rather give my staff 5 hours to go to a class and know that they’ll remember the content, than have them attend a 1/2 hour webinar that they can put on their performance review but which won’t help them in their jobs.”  This faction tends to like training evaluations, assessments before and after training series–all to make sure that the training is worthwhile and has the highest impact potential.  Those continuing education credits are like gold trophies to this group. Occasionally, this group values training almost too much, so much so that they over-complicate the process of training and creating training materials…thereby setting the barrier to entry so high that sometimes no training happens at all as a result.  Perhaps only face-to-face training is allowed, or online learning doesn’t “count” toward an employee’s development requirements.  Making things too long, too hard, can be problematic too.

There is a happy middle road–a common sense approach to training, the flexible “just get it done” approach.  Make what is useful to you, share it with others in a variety of ways depending on topic, don’t waste the learner’s time, and make sure you are always following best practices for learning and training.  That’s it.

To me, libraries (and anyone, really) should never, ever sacrifice quality and impact for ridiculous expediency.  Likewise, libraries shouldn’t over-complicate training to the point of never allowing the quick-and-dirty learning too.  As trainers, our primary duty is to our learners.  Just remember that, stick up for good training practices to those in charge, and you’ll at least know you’ve done your job.  And if you find yourself in the center of a battlefield of the “Learn It Fast” and “learn It Well” armies, hold up your white flag and scream for compromise.

Sarah Houghton-Jan