Eureka moment #1 - Job Aids are Very Important

In my first post-ASTD comments, I wrote about informal learning and patted myself on the back for a few right-track ideas. Here’s one of which I am particularly proud—

Weekly Workflows [edited to add link to past WWs - internal only link, login required - L.]

Who’d have thought? I like writing them, and have received positive feedback about them, but I never really thought of them as a key part of the overall training initiative. But as it turns out, job aids – the class of learning documents to which things like Weekly Workflows belongs – play an important role in informal learning, learning transfer, and post training support.

Definition: A job aid is an external resource designed to support a performer in a specific task by providing information or compensating for lapses in worker memory. (Job Aids Basics, ASTD Press. Read a sample in Google Books)

The good things about job aids:

• Targets a specific issue
• Focuses on performance
• Quick reminders
• Point of need guidance
• Low cost to prepare and distribute
• Minimize time away from the job/task

So the questions now are:

• How can these job aids be even better?
• What topics need to be covered?
• Where’s the fine line between enough and too much?
• Should hand outs from training sessions be comprised of jab aids, rather than less-than-informative PowerPoint slides?
• Is there a design or style that would be an improvement?
• What could I, and others at PLS, be doing to facilitate libraries in getting and/or creating these types of materials?
• How can we take tools that already have a solid foundation and take them up a notch?

I’m sure every single library has its own job aids – wouldn’t it be beneficial to share the wealth and increase the “knowledge pool”? (This comes from a book I scored from the Expo floor, and which may form the basis of my possible “Business Skills Self Help Book Club”… )