Design thinking is all the rage in the training industry lately, as it can help training managers improve learning solutions and make a greater impact. To learn more about how training managers can develop a design mindset — and leverage it for more effective and innovative training solutions — we spoke with Danny Seals, director of design and experience at GP Strategies.
Listen now to learn more on:
- Leveraging technology for improved learning experiences.
- How a design mindset can help learning leaders enhance their training initiatives.
- The benefits of curiosity and experimentation in training design and development.
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Additional Resources:
- Design Thinking Master Class
- Agile Certification for HR and L&D
- The Business of Learning, Episode 23: Managing the Learning Tech Stack
The transcript for this episode follows:
Speaker:
Welcome to The Business of Learning, the learning leader’s podcast from Training Industry.
Taryn Oesch DeLong:
Hello, and welcome to The Business of Learning. I’m Taryn Oesch DeLong, managing editor of digital content at Training Industry.
Sarah Gallo:
And I’m Sarah Gallo, an associate editor. Thanks for joining us today. This episode of The Business of Learning is sponsored by GP Strategies. GP Strategies enables people and organizations to perform at their highest potential, creating a world where business excellence makes possibilities achievable. Subscribe to the GP Strategies podcast, Performance Matters, where they interview industry experts and explore best practices, and share innovative insights on topics like the one we’ll discuss today.
Taryn Oesch DeLong:
Design thinking is all the rage in the training industry lately, and it helps [to] demonstrate that design as a mindset goes beyond creating content. It’s a way of thinking that training managers can use to improve their learning solutions and make an impact. To explore this idea further, we’re talking today with Danny Seals, director of design and experience at GP Strategies. Danny, thanks for joining us on The Business of Learning.
Danny Seals:
Hey Taryn. Hey Sarah. Thanks for having me on. It’s a pleasure to be here.
Sarah Gallo:
Alright. Well, let’s dive right in. First of all, Danny, why is it important for training managers to have an understanding of design principles?
Danny Seals:
It’s a great question. The best way I can break this down is, ultimately, when we design and when we look at things in life, we have principles, whether that be our own internal principles [or organizational principles]. Ultimately, design isn’t different. If we have a good design flow and rigor and a foundation of what these are, we can always, [maybe] not guarantee it, but we know that we’re all staying true to ourselves and how we design and look at problems. So, whether that be looking [at data], rather than making [something based on] a gut feeling. [With a design mindset], we make a data-informed decision whether [or not] we look at the experience and that’s just sometimes it’s about just looking at, actually, [the fact that] people always want innovation and sometimes innovation is just stripping right back and looking at things through a simple lens. So, having these good principles to stick to helps us design folks be consistent with how we look at problems.
Taryn Oesch DeLong:
Great. Danny, you write a lot, especially on your LinkedIn page, about transformational performance design. Can you tell us a little bit about what that term means? What do you mean when you talk about it?
Danny Seals:
Yeah, sure. So, transformational performance design is a human-centered approach. So, it brings in various design understandings and different mindsets. So [it’s] especially [useful] when we want to look at creating true, sustainable change. Whether that be from large organizational systems, right through to individuals and behaviors. Ultimately, it’s a way of doing, and it’s a way of designing. My team has a background in learning, ultimately. We also bring with us experience and understanding from other areas, such as behavioral science, research, innovation, [and] we even have people in there from engineering [backgrounds]. Bringing these different mindsets and applying them to our design disciplines and looking at things such as design thinking, and service design, and experience design [from these different perspectives], and applying all of them to solve a big business problem, is what transformational performance design is really [about]. This [includes projects ranging from] big, large challenges such as organizational culture and play experience, right through to onboarding, coaching or creating thriving communities in the workplace. So, we’re more focused on this workforce transformation [aspect] than others. And we look at it from a very different level. Sometimes people want to have a more efficient, more lean approach. Especially if you’re coming from a background where many, many years ago, you got forced into doing a learning [activity, and now we’re] moving more into the flow of work learning. So, sometimes it goes more down this performance support approach and, often, organizations want an understanding of, “How can we create true behavioral change?” And that’s where we’d pull on something like experience design to give them an experience that allows this change to start happening. So ultimately, it pulls from various different design [principles] and what it means is [that] we start looking at business problems not as a learning problem, but as a workforce problem, and then reverse-engineer backwards.
Sarah Gallo:
Very cool. And could you give us an example of a time when you’ve actually used transformational performance design in your role to address a specific need? What did that process look like?
Danny Seals:
Yeah, sure. So, the client, I won’t be able to say due to [an] NDA. However, I will be able to tell you [a bit about] who it is. It’s a big insurance company and they came to us and wanted to [transform] this program that was in place, where throughout the program they take on 20 people a year. Don’t get me wrong, the program that they had in place was good. They shipped people off to San Francisco for two weeks, then they brought them back [and] then [they] shipped them over to Copenhagen for two weeks. So, all in all it was a great program and had the benefit of having a couple of holidays in there as well. But what the business really wanted was to have a more inclusive program rather than this really exclusive approach. And, obviously, they won’t be able to scale that [type of program in the future] given the fact it was two million pounds a year [to send] these 20 people off. So, they came to us and they said, “How can we change it? How can we create this program, which is really good? [How can we] create everything that was great about it from an experience point of view, and how can we scale it so that it becomes more inclusive?” So, the first thing we did is [get under the hood]. We had to look at the research. This is where it comes into one of our principles about being data informed. So, often you’ll see the client or the business will come to you with a problem. But usually it’s just a perceived problem. Often when you start digging in, you can start to get to the root of what is the real problem. So the first thing we did was lots of research, lots of ethnography, looking at journaling and we [also considered] audience insight and did lots of surveys [and captured] lots and lots of quantitative and qualitative data to capture that. So what we found out was [that] they loved this experience. But when you stripped it right back, what [they] enjoyed [the most] was the opportunity to be away with some of their work colleagues for two weeks in San Francisco or Copenhagen. And what they really, really loved about it was the network [they gained from the experience]. When you dug in, the stuff that they learned over [the course of] that program, they never really applied [on the job]. It was never really aligned to the business. I never really pulled out some of the business challenges and brought them to life. So when we looked at it, it was less about a learning problem, more about a work problem and a workforce transformation piece. So we did lots of research, as I mentioned earlier, and then we started work called deliberate and called co-designing. We started looking at, actually, what does a current experience look like? What do we want the new experience to look like? Again, at this point, we’re not looking at learning, we’re looking at the way, the macro-experience of that program. So, one of our key principles is co-development. You know, I can tell you, “You know what I think the problem is?”, but actually getting people who have been through that experience or getting people who haven’t had the experience to be part of what I’m looking to answer and share their experiences and start helping create this new solution was vital. So again, it always comes back down to that kind of co-development [and] co-design, [where] I’m working with the insight [of] what we’ve got … and if we [don’t have] that insight, we need to capture it; we need to get it. So it’s about bringing that to life. So once we did that, we then went through an iterative approach and we looked at, actually, if you look at it from a real top-level [approach], you’ve got the experience, the user journey, [or] what the person goes through. But actually, we went [to the] next level. We started using our design understanding and our experience to start to shape what the backstage interactions were and actually what needed to happen in order to make this program truly sustainable. You know, I’ve seen in the past with working at other companies where they create this great solution, but unless it’s micromanaged by every single individual, it falls over. So one of the things which we look at is actually, how can this be held up by itself? How [can we make it so it needs] less hands on it? And you know, it starts rolling itself and its consistently turning over. So, we do a lot of system thinking and service design to try and bring that to life. Ultimately, where we’re at now, and again, COVID came along so we had to adapt how we did this co-development, but now we’re using things such as Miro, kind of shaping that working co-development on a whiteboard and stuff like that to really bring it to life. We’re in the first iteration now. We’ve got insight rolling out in a moment’s notice. So come the end of September, we’re going to get lots of insight based on that first iteration. And then, ultimately, we’re going to go not back to the drawing board but look at what the insights tell us about the people who have gone through the experience. And then again, we’ll have an iterative approach on that. There’s lots and lots [going on]. It’s not necessarily a stop-start [process]. It tends to be lots of mini experiments if you like, and lots of iterations built on insight and data and not just on assumption. So, I think that may have gone around the houses to explain that to you, but hopefully that’s [explained it] a little bit.
Sarah Gallo:
Yeah. Thanks for breaking that down for us. Next off. Why would you say it’s important for learning leaders to ask the right questions when designing a new solution? How can they approach that process?
Danny Seals:
Oh, that’s a question. I think [asking] questions is a really interesting one for me, and the best way I can try and sum this up is that, ultimately, the people who are doing design should be a collector of questions. And that should be a thing that you’ve picked up. You know, sometimes I pick up questions I’ve heard on TV shows or picked up things based on what I’ve heard on radio. And it’s about creating this portfolio of questions to ask. So, we should be collecting questions anyway. Now that’s not to say every question needs to be super complex. I always try to revert back to being simple. Again, going back to one of our design disciplines and principles, which is actually to [try to keep it simple]. So what, when, where, who, how, where, that, there that’d be basic questions, what can really allow you to dig into what someone’s feeling, what someone’s thinking and how we can improve, how they navigate their work life. You know, you’ve got all the questions such as “tell me”; “explain to me”; “demonstrate”; which are all cool questions to ask and will all provide you insight. I think what we need to often be careful of is we don’t shy away from really digging into a question as well, because sometimes what you’ll find is when doing your design research often you’ll get this masking layer of an answer. And its only once you say why a couple of times, why is that? Or, “when was that?” You actually start to be able to pull out the root problem. For example, if I was to ask those on this podcast now; to “tell me how you make toast?”. We will all say we make toast differently. And if I was to ask you to draw and how you make toast, we will all draw it very differently. And that’s because we see the world in our own way. We look at simple things like processes of how to make toast. We all do it very differently. So, ultimately, we have to care about the people’s problem in order for them to care about our solution in the end.
Taryn Oesch DeLong:
That’s a great point. I actually participated in an initiative a couple of years ago to basically create a big map of systems and processes for helping people with disabilities get employment. And in that process, we used a lot of these principles that you’re talking about. One of the activities that we did was seemingly irrelevant to me, but it was to draw something basic like making toast. And it was amazing to see the different answers and the different ways that people drew that.
Danny Seals:
Yeah, and I think that sometimes we miss that with research, especially when we’re doing qualitative and quantitative research. Often, we always try to do the research very generally, and we very rarely miss the extremes of our research. So, going back to your example of that turning light you know, people who’ve got learning difficulties, so for me, I have Dyslexia Dyspraxia. So obviously how I see the world and how I navigate things such as reading and writing is very different [for me versus the] general population is. And often you can get a lot more of insight from them on the extreme ends of that spectrum, so that sounds really interesting what you were working on there a few years back. Sounds really exciting.
Taryn Oesch DeLong:
Yeah. That’s a great point. Thanks for sharing. So how can training professionals create a better learning experience particularly when it comes to technology? That’s obviously especially relevant this year and we’re relying so much on technology at work, but also in learning.
Danny Seals:
So, I think it’s an interesting one. When we look at the technology within learning, within HR, within talent, often, sometimes I look at the technology and I go, “Who designed this technology? Who has come up with it?” because it doesn’t match our consumer grade lives. For example, whether we use Facebook or Instagram or TikTok or whichever social media platform we’re using right now in our daily lives, no one’s really ever taught you how to use that platform. You’ve managed to pick it up and make heads or tails and understand how it works and start to use it really successfully. So, in our consumer grade lives, our technology expectations and experiences are very different to our professional ones. So, what we have to do is we always have to kind of strip it back and ask ourselves actually, “how can we make our professional technology much about our consumer lives?” Only then will we start to be able to design really good tech. When you look at what tech is, whether it be learning experience platforms or whatever comes next, it tends to be a large percentage of that product, which is very similar to a product next to it. And often, maybe one product is focused on [certain] communities while the other one is focused on personalized learning content. So actually, it’s the very tiny things that make it stand out against everything else. But often I asked myself, actually, I wonder if someone ever created a platform and [had] gone to the user and said, “if I were to ask you to build this platform, what would that look like?” Sometimes I think [that] when we look at technology and the experience they give us, it’s always built on someone’s assumption of what people want rather than asking them, actually, what would that look like? If I were to ask you to create, I don’t know, a learning community right now on a platform, what would that look like? Tell me, you tell me what that would look like and how that would work. And instead, we just kind of sprint at something without really taking into account our learner, our people. So when it comes to creating a better learning experience, I will always try to find the tech that matches our consumer grade lives, where there’s less of learning curve to go through, and I’ll always look at it and go, “Actually, do we need learning tech for this? Or is there tech that’s already out there that we can use? What we can bend to our will to make it work, or is it something we can borrow from [a different technology’s design]?” So I’ll always try and look at actually, rather than buying lots and lots of new tech, [I’ll consider] if there’s tech that already exists, and how far can we stretch that first before we bring in any new tech, because I think there’s a risk that we want this one-stop-shop where everything happens and often that one-stop-shop doesn’t exist. We end up being more of a Jack of all trades. So sometimes it’s about understanding, actually, if this is working over here [and] how we can make that work with this rather than ripping it all out and putting in just one tech platform. So again, when it comes to that learning experience, ask your people what it is they want; where is it going to help them? What’s keeping them up at night? What’s the thing that’s driving their frustrations as soon as they come into work. Let’s look at how we can use tech to do [help them solve these challenges] rather than making an assumption [about what they want or need].
Taryn Oesch DeLong:
So then, assuming that the training manager has done kind of that due diligence and talked to their people and they are on the market for a new learning technology, what other things should they be looking for to make sure that they’re picking the right platform for their learners?
Danny Seals:
Yeah, so I think ultimately our design flow is very, very simple. It’s human-centric and experience focused, [and is] enabled by tech. If you’ve if you’ve managed to kind of understand what tech you want, that actually becomes your enabler. Now we need to reverse back and go, okay, what does that experience look like? And then we reverse engineer it back and go, actually, what is it that we’re trying to fix? But what we really want to try and do is think, okay, will this fix my problem right now? But will it [also] continue to develop my business? Often, we’ve seen people buy tech for the problem they are facing right now [and] not [for] any [potential] problems down the line. So, if you can gain more data to [make] informed decisions, that’s always a big win. And if you can work with [others] to give you more data-led information, that is a win, too. We don’t need to be the gatekeepers of all this knowledge. We just need to create something where there can be peer-to-peer learning, where people can have conversations and really strip it back to ask yourself, “What is it again?” It’s going back to [basic] principles [of design], really. What is it we want our people to do both now and tomorrow? So, GP strategies is a great example of this. We’re not in any kind of partnership with any technology product. We’re agnostic. So, what that means is [that] we go in and understand your problem before we even suggest any technology. And that ultimately is where I always challenge [them], and to some extent, when you’ve been a consultant and have had experience in design, that is my job. I need to challenge them and ask, “Have you got data? Have you got insights to say that you need this platform? Is this a real problem? Or actually, is this problem based on an assumption and a bit of a gut feeling?” So, it’s only once we know about the problem [that we can help find solutions]. I think it’s being able to go, “Okay, you want this? Let’s have a look of what tech is out there, what fixes this problem, but also, you know all of a sudden everyone’s working from home because of COVID, and a lot of technologies had fallen over because of this. It’s speculative design, I guess, is where I’m going with this and trying to think about the possiblities of what might happen in a year or two years’ time.” We’re seeing more and more now around kind of how some tech works really well with each other and some doesn’t. For example, I can put a picture on my Instagram and I can have that sent out to Twitter, I can have that uploaded to Facebook and it’s all through one interaction. And what we’ve seen with technology is that you buy a technology but then it puts a bit of a ring fence around you and you can’t work with all the technology providers or you can only work within this constrained environment. So, actually, I think clients should really be asking questions about that. What are the limitations of this technology? That tends to be the first question I ask [clients]. Okay, you’ve told me everything about what’s good about it, but actually what’s its limitations? And it’d be interesting to see what these technology providers say to that. If they tell you, actually this is the limitation, I will be more inclined to go with them because they’re having an open, honest conversation with me rather than someone saying, “Actually, our tech has no limitations whatsoever, it’s a unicorn of learning tech,” which we know doesn’t exist.
Sarah Gallo:
Yeah, it’s a lot to consider right now and that openness is just so important, for sure. You mentioned earlier the idea of design as mindset, how can thinking like a designer, help training managers improve their solutions and approach and how can they actually develop this kind of design mindset?
Danny Seals:
So, I always revert a question like this back to my career. If you always do the same thing, you’ll always get the same result. That tends to be how I look at my career. So probably around about four or five years ago, I started to look up other industries and looked at how they addressed different problems. So that could be how product designers look at creating a product. Sometimes that product will be completely irrelevant to learning or creating that [customer] experience and journey. I looked at all these other industries, retail, you know right now retail is probably taking a bit of a hit [due to COVID-10], but actually look at how some of these other companies such as over here, [for example], we have a brand called BrewDog. And BrewDog is a drink, but actually throughout the whole COVID situation they changed their direction a few times, they gave all their workers to allow them to go and work for a supermarket. Then they went from creating alcoholic drink to creating hand sanitizer. And they were pivoting a lot throughout the whole COVID situation. So I think having that innovative mind and looking at how other people are kind of adapting and changing, Theme Park designers, if you want to see how people work when they’re excited look at Theme Park designers, you know they design only for grownup child in us, but also designed for adults. They also design for people who may be in a wheelchair, there’s lots and lots of fun in understanding around how they design things like that. Obviously you’ve got other things such as behavioral science, and looking at things such as our biases and things such as labor illusion, and the Ikea Effect, all these things our people took into account when understanding [how] they’re doing their design. It just ultimately helps us become better designers. And it stops us looking at everything being a learning problem and more being a work problem.
Sarah Gallo:
Alright, well, Danny, thank you so much for chatting with us today. Before we wrap up, do you have any last thoughts you’d like to leave our listeners with?
Danny Seals:
When I was younger my grandparents used to call me the mad scientist. And I think that was often because I was always asking why, why is it like that? Why is it this? Why is it that? And then I’d always go away and look at two different bits of things and go, Ooh, I wonder if I could remix these and put these two things together and kind of see how that pans out. And I think we don’t see that a lot in, in learning at the moment and I think it’s about kind of tapping back into that child and that crazy professor, if you’re like that mad scientist and start asking them questions again, why? And well what happens if I connect these two things together? Let’s see what happens there. Don’t be worried or scared to the point where it stops you from experimenting. So yeah, I think that’s probably the last thought. So not really.
Taryn Oesch DeLong:
It’d be great if we could all kind of go back to that childhood curiosity that I think a lot of us tend to lose as we grow up.
Danny Seals:
Yeah, for sure. For sure. And it’s such a shame, right? It’s such a shame because the one thing what makes us unique is that curiosity and over time we lose that, so … to find that again [is critical].
Taryn Oesch DeLong:
Alright, well on that note, thanks again, Danny, for joining us on the Business of Learning.
Danny Seals:
It’s been an absolute pleasure. Thank you for having me.
Taryn Oesch DeLong:
We’ll be sharing more resources on design thinking and learning technology and development in our show notes at trainingindustry.com/trainingindustrypodcast. And if you enjoyed this episode, please rate and review us on your favorite podcast app to help other learning leaders find us.
Sarah Gallo:
Thanks for listening.
Speaker:
If you have feedback about this episode or would like to suggest a topic for a future program, email us at info@trainingindustry.com or use the contact us page at trainingindustry.com. Thanks for listening to the Training Industry podcast.
