DSA's Award Winnning Custom Design—Defining Success
DSA has extensive experience in managing and developing complex projects from conceptualization through analysis, design/development, evaluation, production, and implementation. DSA is in its 29th year of creating great learning experiences. So, with that much experience under our belts, what are some of the factors we look at in defining a successful engagement?

• Did we meet the business/organizational need?
• Did we meet the individual needs of the learner?
• Were the learners motivated to use the training? Did they perceive the training as a great learning experience?
• Did we exceed the expectations of our immediate client? DSA always takes a value-add approach.
• Did we manage the change process with the client so the transfer occurred?
• Did we work in a cooperative way so that we were easy to do business with?
• Project management: Were we on time and within budget?
• Does the client prefer DSA for repeated engagements? Are we invited back?
• Did we understand and meet the client's definition of success?

We've provided a white paper HERE with the details on a very (award winning) successful engagement with Learning Tree International. Take a look at the strategic intitatives in your company, then call Darryl at 800-650-7465 (Free!) to see how DSA can match your definition of success.

In Company Workshops
Have a group? Let us come to you!
We offer a program of co-hosting and co-marketing our workshops if you have a very small group. The advantage: you will get your people trained at your site, and others benefit. Call Jane today at 800-650-7465 for details.

Upcoming DSA Events

Darryl Sink Speaks at Indiana University Summer Colloquium, coming July 10-11, at the main campus in Bloomington Indiana.
Registration information...

Meet Us in St. Louis for The E-Learning Design Workshop: Results Focused Pre-conference workshop
International Society for Performance Improvement Tuesday, September 22 to Wednesday,
September 23, 8:30am to 5:00pm.
Location and registration information.

Live and Online—The Instructional Developer Workshop
Begins: September 22, 2009
Darryl presents 4 (two hour) sessions starting on 11/22/2009, sponsored by Training Magazine. Registration and more information.

Online anytime: DSA's The Course Developer Workshop Online
Here's your chance to get work done while you learn. You'll get expert feedback from your facilitator, Dr. Paul Swan, a very experienced DSA instructional designer. Many of you have seen Dr. Swan speaking at conferences or presenting one of DSA's workshops.

Top Ten Tips

	Really Fast Storyboarding for E-Learning Projects
	Useful Instructional Methods
	What's The Meaning Of That Idea? Analyzing and Teaching Concepts
	Criterion-Referenced Checklists: The Workhorse of Evaluation
	Teaching Concepts: Combining Science and Creativity
	The Job Aid: A Reliable, CHEAPER Alternative
	Interview Analysis: Faster, Easier, More Accurate
	Writing Worthwhile Objectives
	Authentic Activities to Enhance Transfer of Skills, Part 2
	Objective-Based Tests: Better and Faster!

Today's Tip
From the Business Need to the Learning / Training Goal

When organizations decide they need training solutions, where do they start? The strongest starting point is understanding the business and individual needs that underlie the training initiative. This requires defining the business drivers for training program development and the organizational results needed or desired.

OK, that sounds good, so how do we get from the needs and desired results to the training program?

Answer:
We write training goals based directly on the business needs. We define training or course goals as:

Course or Training Goal:
A broad statement that describes the intended direction towards which you want the target audience to move. It specifies how the training will satisfy the identified business/organizational need. Take a look at the formula we use to write one.

1. Who?
   Name the target audience (e.g. Front Line Managers, Repair Technicians, Order Processors).

2. Towards what?
   Describe the intended direction in which the learners will move.

3. With what results?
   State what results will be met tied back to the business/organizational needs.

Here is a real example of a business need statement and its complimentary training goal.

Business Need: Order Fulfillment Example
Customer Sales Division and Telemarketing Division at Lone Star Enterprises decided to consolidate 11 order processing (OP) centers into 3 sites. Because management expected a limited number of experienced OP coordinators to transfer, the historical training strategy (on-the-job) was not feasible, so training became a critical success factor.

Course Goal
The goal for the Order Fulfillment (OF) Curriculum Project will prepare new OP staff so that they can process 80% of their orders independently and all of their orders accurately.

A key requirement of the project was that we start training in San Antonio within 6 months. The primary audience was all employees new to OP. A secondary audience was the experienced OP staff.

The goal is then a starting point to begin your Content/Task Analysis. By closely connecting training goals to business/ organizational needs and desired results you should realize benefits both from an instructional design point of view as well as the point of view aligning your training efforts to your business or organization needs.

Until next time,

Darryl
darryl@dsink.com

P.S. Would you like to see more examples? Email me at darryl@dsink.com with the subject line "More examples."

Article © 2009 Darryl L. Sink & Associates, Inc.