IST 524. Week 4. Benefits of HTP. Response to Classmates Essay,
Re: Four Key Myths of Human Performance Technology: How to protect your organization.
Response written by Dana Payne - Monday, 21 September 2015, 8:35 PM
Zechariah,
The counterintuitive nature of the HPT myths you described in your article (regarding technology, job satisfaction, immediate feedback and subject matter experts) was compelling. In each case, the logical assumption is that if some is good, more is better. After reading your article on how to successfully scale “Myth Mountain,” this is clearly not the case.
Comments on your graphic and article layout:
I don’t know how to improve upon your graphic. It is hard to imagine a more effective use of a crisp, colorful graphic that metaphorically and literally illustrates your article’s overarching premise. Your use of font types and styles further contributes to the “eye candy” appeal of making me WANT to read your article. The layout of your article is organized and easy to follow.
Comments on the four major areas of your article:
Technology: Technology additions and/or upgrades must achieve “worthy” performance - defined as valued accomplishment derived from costly behavior - whose cost is considerably lower than the value of the accomplishment. One aspect of cost not directly mentioned in your article is the potential (initial) performance cost related to the learning curve for the organization in adapting to operations, maintenance and support of new technologies.
Job Satisfaction: Your recommendations for improving worker performance could be expanded to include non-instructional interventions (such as enhanced motivation, better equipment, more supportive organizational structures) targeted at concurrently enhancing job satisfaction.
Immediate Feedback: Your recommendations regarding immediate feedback could be expanded to emphasize the importance of the content (i.e. the qualitative and constructive nature) of feedback, in addition to determining when and how feedback will best be received.
Subject Matter Experts: Your premise regarding the potential pitfalls of relying upon Subject Matter Experts (SME) in defining performance steps are well developed. I am; however, “left hanging” in want of a solution for overcoming the noted limitations of the “unconscious competence” of SME.
Finally, your introduction and conclusion sections are well balanced and, like the entirety of your article, exceptionally well written.
Dana
Re: Week 4 Discussion Forum: Benefits of HPT
Response written by Dana Payne - Monday, 21 September 2015, 11:46 PM
Nancy,
It is easy to understand the areas readily identified for organizational performance improvement in the government agency cited for your HPT assignment:
●Reduce approval times for publication and documents.
●Process improvement for handling social media opportunities for outreach.
●Speed the process of informing Californians on health issues.
In your closing statement, you noted the performance technologist’s role as identifying the cause for gaps (that needed to be closed) to improve organizational performance by assisting in the selection of beneficial interventions. As potential up-and-coming Performance Technologist, how might we proceed from here?
From our week 4 course readings, the 5-point summary of Human Performance Improvement (HPI) seemed relevant to your narrative, especially the citation concerning the importance of Human Capital as “the driving force of the economy in most societies.”
Summary of Key Principles of HPI:
1.At its core, HPI has a relatively straightforward vision and mission: to achieve, through people, increasingly successful accomplishments that are valued by all stakeholders. As an HPI practitioner,first define valued accomplishments and the factors affecting the gap between desired and current states. Only when you have completed this should you begin the search for ways to close the gap.
2.A desired end for HPI is “worthy” performance—defined as valued accomplishment derived from costly behavior—whose cost is considerably lower than the value of the accomplishment. As an HPI practitioner, demonstrate concretely both the cost and value to the organization of your proposed interventions.
3.Human capital has been empirically shown to yield higher rates of return than physical capital. As an HPI practitioner, adopt as your overall goal the maximization of human capital achievements.
4.Simple solutions for closing human performance gaps are almost always ineffective. As an HPI practitioner, identify priority performance gaps (urgency, value, magnitude), analyze these systemically to uncover the range of factors affecting the gaps, and recommend integrated sets of suitable interventions to rapidly and effectively eliminate the gaps.
5.HPI bears similarities to other fields such as organizational development, human resource development, and organizational effectiveness. As an HPI practitioner, work in partnership with professionals from these related fields to increase your resources and obtain support for your HPI endeavors.
HPI – HPE – HPT?
When researching things a bit further, I found myself asking the question (once again)… “what is the difference between HPI and HPT? I came across the article “What is the difference between HPE, HPT and HPI and does it matter?”
Great – now are we not only dealing with learning the distinctions between HPT and HPI, there is yet another acronym “out there,” HPE, that also appears central for basic MIST concept understanding
Human Performance Engineering (HPE) as a systematic approach to solving complex problems experienced by individuals, teams or units.
HPE utilizes Human Performance Technology (HPT), which includes a rigorous analysis of current and desired levels of performance, to identify the causes for the performance gap, offers a wide range of interventions, guides the change management process, and provides evaluation and feedback on the results.
HPE uses HPT in one seamless process for integrating training and non-training solutions in order to develop and employ human resources wisely so that the actions result in Human Performance Improvement (HPI).
Some Editorial Comments:
Your opening sentence uses the term “return-in-investment.” Did you mean “return-on-investment?”
You lead off with benefits of HPE/HPI and ended your opening paragraph acknowledging you found it refreshing that HPT relies on much more than training to close the desired performance gap. Like you, I find this refreshing as well.
Your next two paragraphs introduced your organization and clearly identified three specific areas for organizational performance improvement while simultaneously incorporating comments pertaining to the likely relevance of HPE/HPI in each of these areas.
Your closing paragraph concisely amplified your previous comments related to attaining HPE/HPI intervention to achieve organizational performance improvements “as an urgent need as this is truly a matter of life and death or health or disease.”
Overall - your narrative is clear, logically organized, easy to follow and compellingly concluded.
Dana
Sum of ratings: 3 (1)
Show parent | Reply
Re: Week 4 Discussion Forum: Benefits of HPT
Article written by Nancy Palate - Sunday, 20 September 2015, 8:04 PM
Human Performance Technology (HPT) also called Human Performance Improvement (HPI) offers many benefits to organizations, with return-in-investment in learning and performance being the main one. After all, human capital is the driving force of the economy of most societies. However, there are other benefits implicit in HPT and not as obvious: it is systemic and systematic, empirical and flexible enough to allow for any particular delivery and any audience or any topic needed. At its core, HPT seeks to close the gap between the desired work performance and the actual state of workforce performance, acknowledging that training is not always the answer to close this gap (which I found refreshing).
I work for a pretty big government agency with five centers, divided into many divisions, branches, and programs which total more than 200 programs. It is, like many other government agencies, a bureaucratic agency full of bureaucratic processes. Human performance technologists could help to change some of the processes we follow and that are obviously not working, such as the approval time for publications and documents. I see room for improvement in this area that affects us all because it delays our work and decreases morale. It ultimately affects the public because information takes a very long time to become public.
Another area where Human performance technologists could help to change is the process we have for handling social media opportunities for outreach. With the growing need to outreach the public through this means, the challenges employees face is that clearance and approval are handled by our office of public affairs which are few and may be disconnected from the community need, lacking the perspective and sense of urgency.
I see human performance technologists identifying the cause for the gap and helping us to select the intervention that makes the most sense to help us to speed the process of informing Californians on health issues. It may sound alarming but I could sell this to upper management as an urgent need as this is truly a matter of life and death or health and disease.
Reiser, R. A. & Dempsey, J. V. (eds.) (2012). Trends and issues in instructional design and technology, 3rd. ed. Boston: Pearson.
Written by Dana Payne (my own)
The Benefits of HPT on the Global Newspaper Industry
HPT takes into consideration the cost of any intervention to improve human performance. HPT views costs as investments that must yield returns valued by the investing organization.
The benefits of Human Performance Technology (HPT) can be exemplified by the “Maestro Concept,” something I first learned of while working as an intern for the “Californian Newspaper” in Salinas, CA.
Leland Ryan created the “Maestro Concept” in 1990. Mr. Ryan’s concept was made a sensation in journalism at the American Society of News Editors in April 1993. The “Maestro Concept” is a term used today, in journalism World-Wide, to encourage everyone on the journalistic team to “think like a reader.” Articles need to be written with the reader in mind. Readers today are busy, they have less time to read and comprehension can be compromised. The use of photographs and graphics need to be eye catching but most importantly, informative.
By employing the “Maestro Concept,” reporters, copy editors, and layout artists organize themselves and work together on every article to improve time management as well as increasing quality while reducing costs by the reduction of waste.
From everything I have read, it appears Mr. Ryan evolved his concept from a systemic approach to performance analysis and change, just as a Human Performance Technologist is defined in our lecture notes from this week’s readings. By definition, the Human Performance Technologist that considers investments for solving human performance problems in terms of payback periods, costs and benefits, and return on investment is likely to find organizational decision makers more open to the interventions that are proposed.
Some twenty plus years later, the apparent global adoption of Mr. Ryan’s “Maestro Concept” is a notable example of significant positive impact of HPT on organizations when the Human Performance Technologist “gets it right.
Reiser, Robert V.; Dempsey, John V. (2011-03-14). Trends and Issues in Instructional Design and Technology (3rd Edition) (Page 136). Pearson HE, Inc.. Kindle Edition
The following response written by Nancy Palate.
Re: Week 4 Discussion Forum: Benefits of HPT
by Nancy Palate - Monday, 21 September 2015, 10:19 PM
“Dana, thank you for describing how the "maestro concept" was used in journalism. I wish more journalists and communicators in general used that concept. Do they enjoy the quality of the stories they produce or the type of entertainment that modern media is producing? There is this dilemma that we crave the type of media we have, thus we have it made for us, or that we get fed this media so we learn to crave it. It is kind of like the "who was first, the chicken or the egg?" question. What I like about the maestro concept you mention (which by the way is not mentioned in the textbook as such but it is mentioned) is that a HP technologists can best design a strategy if he/she has looked at the problem from the performer's perspective. I liked the example of the employees using the products their company sold at their homes. I think it is not until we take that view that not just the problem becomes apparent but the solutions.
Do you think that journalists and communicators who use the maestro concept are more pleased with their work?”