Am sitting here attending the ILTA ECM peer group's webinar entitled Introduction to Search Technology. Admittedly, not the most engaging topic, even for a semi-geek. Yet, I am mostly engaged and have only checked my e-mail a couple of times in the last hour. ;-)
Why is that? The speakers have pretty pictures and engaging, effective diagrams in their presentation. They truly get the concept that a picture is worth a thousand words! Unfortunately, we trainer types tend to get all wrapped up in our words and covering the material sometimes, and we forget that engaging the audience is equally, if not more, important in the learning process.
The other thing that we get caught up in is the fact that we work for law firms and think we must be serious all the time. Really?!? Last time I checked, lawyers (and their staff) like to have fun too. There are times when we must be serious, but most people enjoy well-placed levity and creativity. It's especially appreciated when tackling a somewhat boring subject like, oh say, how to use software. :-)
The most well-received training resource that I have created was a short e-learning piece to explain Office's new XML files formats. It had an X Files theme that even included Bill Gates as an alien. I didn't ask for approval first. I created it and figured the worst that could happen would be that my time spent was wasted. Ehh...what's a couple hours time spent to test some boundaries? I let IT management see it, sent the link to the entire firm, and waited (a bit anxiously) to see what happened. They loved it! I got tons of positive comments from attorneys. While that isn't necessarily a gauge of the effectiveness of the information in the module, I know that more of them stuck around until the end, because they were entertained, which is half the battle with learning. Again, a dry subject that held their attention. It can be done! We just have to crawl out of our boxes and find the creative soul that's hiding out from that uber-serious partner down the hall. Make him laugh. He'll appreciate you for it.
Hats off to Matt Coatney at WilmerHale and Richard Change from ii3 for a great presentation! The webinar recording and slides should be posted within 24-48 hours on the ILTA site under Recordings. You should check them out, especially the Pac Man slide. It's what finally prompted me to compose this blog entry. I challenge you to watch it and think of something you're working on that could be approached more creatively.