Every organization relies on quality training. From onboarding to introducing new/updated policies, procedures, and systems, quality training is seen as being effective in ensuring that employees learn and apply their learning correctly, safely, and productively. It also achieves training goals in the most cost-efficient and time-efficient ways for the company.  

Sometimes, however, it is all too easy to slip into emphasizing efficiency over effectiveness and to confuse information dissemination with training. Crowding groups of employees into a room might work for simple information dissemination: retiring staff announcement? Ok. Upcoming conference dates? Alright.   They’re physically present to hear (and perhaps see) what needs to be delivered.  And it’s ok if they weren’t thoroughly paying attention. But what if what was shared needs to be applied to improve work performance, safety, and/or productivity?   

Effective training is rarely a “one-size-fits-all” endeavor. While the content to be learned is usually uniform, adult learners are not: they have unique learning needs that must be addressed for the training to optimally achieve desired training outcomes.  It begins with an expert understanding of general adult learning traits and a specific respect for the individual and diverse learning styles present in a workplace.   

General Attributes of Adult Learners

Your employees bring a wealth of learning and knowledge with them to the workplace. As adult learners, they typically have pursued advanced content-area/skills training on their own and feel they have a level of expertise with such. In addition, when they are told it’s time for professional training, they tend to exhibit some or all of the following attributes:  

• They need to know why they need to learn something.  
• They need internal motivation.  
• They want to know how learning will help them specifically.  
• They are self-directed and want to take charge of their learning journey.  
• They find the most relevance from task-oriented learning that aligns with their own realities.  

Effective training modules will be designed with these traits in mind. Further, the training will explicitly address them at the beginning of and throughout the training materials/educational experience to create optimal learning. Doing so is overt acknowledgement that the training respects its adult learner audience

Specific Learning Styles of Workplace Learners

In addition to addressing general features of adult learners, effective training will address the different, more specific learning styles present in a workplace.  A learning style or learning preference/modality simply refers is the way an individual learner most effectively understands and retains information. There has been and continues to be much research on learning styles. Among the most useful in the workplace is the V.A.R.K. Model which outlines four main learning modalities:   

• Visual (V): Visual learners prefer information presented in graphic forms such as maps, diagrams, charts, graphs, shapes, and images. They benefit from mentally visualize their learning and from creating their own graphics (doodles/illustrations) to process and retain new learning.  
• Aural/Auditory (A): Auditory learners prefer information presented through voice-over videos, lectures, and audio clips. They benefit from verbally paraphrasing, thinking aloud, and engaging in pair or group discussion to process and retain their new learning.  
• Read/Write (R):  Reader/Writer types prefer receiving knowledge through text such as articles, text accompaniment with video, manuals, and written instructions. They benefit from taking written notes to process and retain their new learning.   
• Kinesthetic (K): Kinesthetic types prefer hands-on learning. They best process and retain new learning when engaged in simulations, role-playing, and project-based learning.    
• Multi-Modal: Some workplace learners use two or more of the above modalities when learning and/or change modality depending on the material to be learned.   

Given these modalities, effective training will be designed to deliver and assess competency with uniform training material in a variety of formats so that the learner can choose to learn in the way that is best for them.     

When it’s time to train workers, investing in efficient AND effective learning design pays off. A Learning Specialist/Instructional Designer perspective can help to create training that respects adult learners and addresses the unique mix of learner preferences in a workplace, leading to customized training that meets any organization’s training needs.    

SPARK THOUGHT can help. Our Learning Solutions specialists work with you to discover your training needs, assess your workplace learners, and create customized training solutions that work for you and your workforce. We listen. We collaborate and innovate. We deliver customized Knowledge Management Solutions. 

Let’s face it. Many organizations believe they have achieved robust Knowledge Engagement. They explored the potential business value of their employee experiences, learning, and best practices. They saw value in creating an easily accessed collective enterprise intellect that included some implicit and tacit knowledge into resources for ongoing business needs like onboarding and upskilling. Those pdfs, videos, podcasts, and other materials are warehoused in applications or directories for on-demand employee access. Knowledge Engagement done and dusted, right? Wrong.  

Knowledge Engagement is a dynamic process of ongoing knowledge access, use, and expansion and is supported by effective Knowledge Management (KM). Over time, it can slow to a standstill. Here are three signs it’s probably time for a Knowledge Engagement makeover.

1. You have “go-to” people.

Certainly, every business benefits from its subject matter experts. However, if employees are consistently going to the same few people for answers and/or if the same questions are being answered over and over, you are dealing with knowledge asset ignorance—when employees don’t know where to find information or, worse yet, knowledge hoarding—when employees gather information for their private use.  Both are the opposites of Knowledge Engagement. Dynamic Knowledge Engagement empowers all your employees to be knowledgeable by creating an easily accessible knowledge base so they know where to go to find the information they need and can easily get there. It also encourages all your employees to become information resources by sharing their knowledge. To promote knowledge sharing, regularly and explicitly acknowledge the benefits of doing so. Also consider rewarding those who do and redirecting those who don’t. This shifts “go-to” from particular people to all accurate, relevant information resources. 

2. You have outdated knowledge resources still in place. 

It’s smart to have a store of knowledge assets, but who’s minding the store? How often are knowledge assets routinely assessed for current relevance and effectiveness? An important part of healthy Knowledge Engagement is empowering the teams using the knowledge resources to update and/or “weed out” outdated material so the resources are helpful in changing business climates. If an employee seeks company instructions on how to store and share information and a pdf on floppy disk use surfaces among the resources, it’s time for a clean out.  

3. You lose information when employees leave.

Robust Knowledge Engagement is reflected in the ongoing expansion of knowledge resources. This happens when employees are regularly encouraged to add what they know to build knowledge assets. If you experience a feeling of panic when key people announce they are leaving your organization, that’s a sign that it’s time for a Knowledge Engagement makeover to regularly capture your workforce’s useful knowledge so all employees can learn from each other during their time with your company and continue to do so long after some leave.   

Dynamic Knowledge Engagement transforms workplace knowledge into a continuously expanding resource to be regularly drawn from and added to. It is vital to keep it vigorous with the right KM solutions. With the proper maintenance, Knowledge Engagement will increase an organization’s collective intelligence which, in turn, leads to greater efficiency, collaboration, and productivity.

Not sure where to start?  SPARK THOUGHT can help. We can collaborate with you to assess the current state of your Knowledge Engagement and offer the right KM solutions for its improvement and growth. We listen. We collaborate and innovate. We deliver customized Knowledge Management Solutions.

“Hey, good job on that project. We knew you’d deliver.” Who doesn’t love a little work praise, right?  But just HOW good was that job?  Deliver what, exactly? Is “good” the company’s desired level of performance? 

That’s where Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) come in. KPIs are measures of performance over time for specific corporate objectives. We love them because they transform vague assumptions into specific, measurable data that empowers companies to gauge the performance and health of their business and, when needed, guide them to make important adjustments in the ways they are choosing to achieve their strategic goals.  

Types of KPIs

First, it’s important to understand that KPIs are “indicators”, meaning they measure what has already happened. Therefore, each KPI should be assessed in terms of target values so that it is possible to determine whether expectations have been met. While they are not “prognosticators” of future developments, sometimes predictive analysis may be performed based on a KPI.  Understanding this, KPIs can be either quantitative or qualitative.

Quantitative KPIs are objective and fact-based. They are measured by numbers. A couple of examples are percentage of Sales Growth or number of return client project requests.

Qualitative KPIs are subjective, based on someone’s feelings or opinions. A workplace satisfaction survey, gathering employee opinions about the effectiveness of a workplace is an example. 

The actual types of measures used as KPIs can vary greatly based on the type of organization and what aspect of that organization is being evaluated. For instance, the KPIs can be chosen to measure the overall progress of the organization, or they can be focused on measuring the success of a specific project or product.

The following are just a few examples of metric categories that can be used as KPIs:  

Financial metrics:

• Profit margins, cost effectiveness, sales by region, return on equity, etc.

Customer metrics:

• Customer acquisition cost, customer satisfaction and retention, etc.

Personnel Metrics:  

• Employee turnover rate, employee satisfaction, etc.  

Professional Services metrics

• Utilization rate, project profitability, project success rate, etc.

Digital Marketing metrics

• Return visitors, brand awareness, click through rate, response rate, etc.

Supply Chain metrics

• Order tracking, rate of return, inventory accuracy, etc.

Call Center metrics

• Active and waiting calls, blockage, call volume, average talk time, etc.

KPI use is a powerful knowledge-based tool that keeps companies focused on growth and improvement.

SPARK THOUGHT has years of experience using KPIs for clients across many industries. Let us help you make the best use of this profitable business tool to help your company achieve your business needs by: 

• Selecting the appropriate metrics to track success 
• Performing a strategic analysis to define what goals or processes should be evaluated  
• Comparing the results with end goals and interpreting their meaning  
• Conducting periodic reviews to assess the effectiveness of chosen KPIs   

 We listen. We collaborate and innovate. We deliver customized Knowledge Management Solutions. 

Companies rely on a variety of vital documentation to ensure that business operates efficiently, profitably, and safely. However, sometimes the writing of necessary corporate documentation is approached as an auxiliary task that any or all employees can take on. After all, anyone can write, right? Wrong. Especially when it comes to complicated concepts and processes that need to be broken down into easy-to-understand pieces and conveyed to a broad audience. It takes a skilled writer with expertise in explaining information thoroughly and clearly. It takes a process-minded thinker who can logically organize details to be easily understood by all. It takes a technical writer. 

The corporate materials a technical writer creates meet a variety of business purposes. They establish operational structures and create processes as well as inform employees of changes and how to effectively implement them going forward. Examples of corporate technical documentation include operational manuals, onboarding documents, online help systems, compliance documentation, instructional materials, and even video tutorials (they need scripting). Most importantly, technical documentation is vital to maintain and advance the productive work a company does to serve customers and their industry. 

So don’t task just anyone with your business writing needs. Technical writers have a keen awareness of audience, purpose, and topic. They have the refined skills of matching the right language, the right sentence design, the right formatting to the right audience, ensuring information is clearly conveyed and easy to understand. Putting your business writing needs in the capable hands of technical writers fosters clear communication strategies that establish trust and respect inside and outside of your organization.

SPARK THOUGHT an help with your technical writing needs. We take a detail-oriented approach while working with your Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) to simplify complex processes and create well-written, clear, and informative documentation. Let us use our expertise to meet your business needs. We listen. We collaborate and innovate. We deliver customized Knowledge Management Solutions. 

All organizations are responsible for protecting the health and safety of their employees. This is why it is necessary to have a current Emergency Operations Plan (EOP) in place.

An EOP, sometimes referred to as an EAP or ERP, is a carefully developed plan designed to comply with applicable government regulations and standards for responding to emergency situations. Its purpose is to inform and guide all employees in effectively preventing, preparing for, responding to, mitigating, and recovering from any incident or emergency possible in their work environment. There are three key features that make an EOP effective. 

1. SCOPE

The primary goal of any EOP is always to prevent incidents before they happen. However, if an incident does occur, then personnel within your organization must be prepared to respond safely and effectively.  Other important goals the ERP should address are to establish and maintain the procedures, plans, resources, and roles that will:  

• Prepare for and respond to emergencies  
• Reduce or remove the effects of emergency incidents and prevent exposures from turning into larger emergency incidents  
• Activate, mobilize, and coordinate all necessary resources and activities to manage the emergency’s immediate consequences  
• Restore the affected area back to pre-incident or better condition and learn from the event.

2. OBJECTIVES

To accomplish these goals, the EOP implementation must meet the following objectives: 

• Complete hazard identification and consequence analysis to develop specific emergency procedures and plans  
• Train all personnel who may be involved in a response  
• Maintain competent and sufficient resources and service providers  
• Complete emergency exercises at regularly scheduled intervals to test the plan and procedures  
• Transition from the emergency phase to the recovery phase to ensure that sites are remediated  
• Consult, communicate with, and inform the public and other external agencies, as appropriate, of the procedures, plans, and training materials to educate and prepare those who may be involved in or affected by an emergency  
• Develop, implement, establish, and report on controls to prevent, manage, and mitigate conditions during an emergency  
• Regularly evaluate and continually improve incident management, compliance with regulatory requirements, and community relations plans and protocols  
• Communicate lessons learned from exercises and events as part of the continuous improvement of the EOP

3. COVERAGE

An EOP cannot be generic; there is not a one-size fits all. Every business, facility, field-site, and organization should have an Emergency Operations Plan tailored to its unique physical and operational design. All personnel affected by an EOP must be trained in that EOP’s procedures and how to react to any emergency situation including site-specific details that are unique to a facility and situation.   

An effective EOP is developed and implemented to ensure that all personnel can respond to emergency situations in a consistent, methodical, and organized manner for the protection of employees, visitors, contractors, and anyone else in the organization.

SPARK THOUGHT can help your organization develop functional EOPs and implement them.  We help through several related services including Regulatory Compliance services to ensure current compliance, Technical Documentation services to create and update EOP and related documentation and Learning Solutions to streamline and differentiate your compliance training process. We listen. We collaborate and innovate. We deliver customized Knowledge Management Solutions.

Government audits can be daunting. In fact, 44% of organizations say their top compliance management challenges are handling compliance assessments, undergoing control testing, and implementing policy and process updates (MetricStream State of Compliance Survey Report 2021). That’s why preparing for government audits is a vital part of your organization’s compliance program. If your business is not compliant, there could be serious consequences, including fines, lawsuits, or even a dissolution. Not preparing properly for your audit is a risk you can’t afford to take. 

A mock audit allows you to walk through the process that you will follow in an actual audit, helping your company prepare by going through practice questions that accurately reflect what will be asked. 

Benefits of a mock audit include the following:  

• The mock audit allows your company to find and correct weaknesses and problems before the government audit.  

• The mock audit process helps prepare personnel for the actual audit so the official visit runs smoothly. This includes identifying where to find documentation to answer various probable lines of questioning. As such, your personnel’s efficiency and confidence increase.   

• Personnel who are responsible for responding to the actual regulators will gain a greater understanding of the regulatory requirements and your company’s processes, ensuring these requirements are followed. This will help not just in passing the audit; it will also aid in improving compliance throughout your organization on an ongoing b

The mock audit is conducted in a manner that is as realistic as possible. This means that participants remain “in character” as if it were a real audit. To fully benefit from the mock audit, the mock auditors must make the whole program as tension-driven as possible so that the participants know how to answer in every worst-case scenario. The more participants are trained in stressful situations, the better the outcome will be during the actual audit.   

At the end of the mock audit, participants engage in a review process. This includes comments by the mock inspector that address what was done correctly and where improvements need to be made. It also incorporates feedback from participants that helps in evaluating the mock audit’s effectiveness.  

The mock audit is also a timely opportunity to review and upgrade your current compliance program. Adding an effective Knowledge Management (KM) portal or refining your current KM system can help you level up your culture of compliance. It ensures that your employees stay compliant by giving them 24/7 access to real-time knowledge and changes. 

SPARK THOUGHT has expertise in assisting major companies with audits by regulatory agencies. We help through several related services including Regulatory Compliance services to keep your entire organization compliant, Technical Documentation services to create easily understood and more thorough enterprise compliance documentation and Learning Solutions to streamline and differentiate your compliance training process. We listen. We collaborate and innovate. We deliver customized Knowledge Management Solutions. 

Knowledge Management (KM) is a vital resource for companies. With its history rooted in the management consultant community, KM has grown into crucial information and collaboration frameworks that facilitate multi-industry business growth. Developing a customized KM plan requires expert assessment of knowledge needs then matching the right information to the right collaboration resources and tools to meet those needs. Just as important, it also requires finding the right people in an organization to facilitate the implementation and expansion of the company KM system (KMS). These people are Knowledge Leaders. Here are five truths to help you tap those people already in your work culture who naturally utilize their accumulated knowledge, skills, and resources to create the kind of knowledge sharing culture that is essential to running a successful business.

Truth 1: Knowledge Leaders are initiative takers.

Knowledge Leaders are the people in your organization who take the initiative to identify new opportunities. They instinctively offer help with projects, outcomes, or challenges within the organization and have built up a strong repertoire of captured and uncaptured information because they are invested in your corporate vision. They are like walking, talking databases who offer informational resources to facilitate profitable decision-making and make efficient workflows happen in your business. 

Truth 2: Knowledge Leaders are knowledge gathers.

These individuals have demonstrated that they are highly capable of identifying information assets that are purposeful to your business growth and assessing the best way these assets can be utilized.  The variety of resources they employ can range from internal assets—such as building their knowledge of current policies and procedures within the company—to external assets—where they may network or take classes to learn about alternative solutions outside your company. 

Truth 3: Knowledge Leaders are expert communicators.

Often naturally social, Knowledge Leaders are willing and eager to offer their captured informational resources to help everyone in the organization, and they possess the communication and interpersonal skills to do so. They have a knack for clearly and unassumingly communicating what they know to assist in problem solving and in developing frameworks to achieve organizational outcomes. Their inviting communication styles respect and address individual differences in readiness when moving ahead with corporate initiatives.

Truth 4: Knowledge Leaders are natural collaborators.

A company’s Knowledge Leaders are not always top management, and they definitely are not individuals who like to be a “one-man show”. They flourish in team settings, and beyond this, they are intuitively skilled at team building and nurturing relationships with people who may have uncaptured knowledge or information. Moreover, they are naturals at cultivating an overall culture of company knowledge-sharing through actionable efforts to achieve desired outcomes for everyone involved.

Truth 5: Knowledge Leaders are knowledge empowers.

Knowledge Leaders have a high capacity for capturing details, aligning people, and executing appropriate actions to get things done. Their level of commitment to reach the objectives of a KMS can be contagious. They set an open, inviting tone of knowledge empowerment by creating a cohesive culture of sharing that allows all team members to bring their solutions to the table. This enables an array of knowledge assets to be identified and can create awareness of new opportunities and solutions. Such efforts are invaluable when aligning team members with business priorities.   

Use these truths to help you identify the natural Knowledge Leaders in your organization. Consider them your Knowledge Management champions who will guide your business objectives towards success. They are already spread throughout your organization, creating profitable changes on multiple levels. Identifying them puts the right people in place to successfully implement an active and thriving KMS. 

SPARK THOUGHT is well-equipped to assist you with finding your next Knowledge Leaders while creating or upgrading your Knowledge Management System.  We listen. We collaborate and innovate. We deliver customized Knowledge Management Solutions.  

“Scale down” is a business term that tends to leave a bitter taste on the tongue, especially when it’s code for staffing cuts. No organization truly wants to go through the downsizing process; laying off a portion of your workforce is highly unpleasant for all involved. And while many companies demonstrate astute business acumen with the procedural and legal steps involved in trimming and realigning resources, the attention given to the “human” in “Human Resources” or people in the “People Operations” can demonstrate low emotional intelligence/emotional quotient (EQ).   

EQ is the ability to understand, use, and manage emotions in positive ways to relieve stress, communicate effectively, empathize with others, overcome challenges, and defuse conflict.  A company’s low EQ, especially during the downsizing process, can result in irreparable damage to its work culture. Here are three EQ-based tips to keep the people impacted by downsizing front and center during this uneasy period of transition.  

Tip 1: Transparent “Open Door” Communication is Crucial 

At all levels of this difficult process, consistent communication is crucial.  Having a downsizing plan in place will better facilitate this. Employees will have more confidence in management if the rationale for downsizing is clearly explained, and they are regularly kept abreast of the changes as the downsizing occurs. When employees learn why you must downsize, communicate how their jobs might change. Your door should always be open to anyone who needs to vent, to clarify, or to understand. After staff reductions, remaining staff may feel concerned about their employment and/or the direction of the company. During this time of unrest, don’t wait for them to come to you. Arrange team and individual meetings more often to clarify new goals and responsibilities, to offer training or retraining options, and, if needed, to console and reassure.   

Tip 2: Respect Individuality: Listen more, Talk less

Despite earnest advice to depersonalize downsizing by sticking to and delivering causal business facts, it is important and humane to remember that at the center of “depersonalize” is “person”.  Downsizing is ultimately about people, all of whom have unique stories and concerns. As such, each employee impacted by downsizing deserves to be treated with respect and understanding of their unique situations regarding the changing status of their employment. This means conducting more individual and less group meetings. Most important, during those meetings, it means not dominating the conversations–that can dehumanize. Remember these aren’t lectures; they’re dialogues. Compassionately deliver relevant, essential information and remind each and every person you engage with that confidentiality and privacy will be maintained. Then give control of the conversation to the employee by listening to reactions and questions. Ask for such if necessary. And listen. Actively listen. Each individual voice needs to be honored. It’s the emotionally intelligent thing to do.  

Tip 3: Genuine Empathy Engenders Trust

Workplace trust and morale can nosedive during and after downsizing. Genuine empathy goes a long way in re-establishing trust in your downsized workplace. Related to active listening, empathy is the ability to understand and to share the feelings of another. It is shown by asking the staff how they feel about the downsizing and by letting them freely query and/or vent. Don’t judge reactions or take ownership by saying that you know how they feel (because you don’t). Stay away from responses like “You shouldn’t feel that way”. Instead, try “I can see this is difficult for you” or “Thank you for trusting me enough to share how you really feel.” Don’t try to fix or change their feelings by telling them things will get better or, worse yet, by offering them a cliched response like “Let’s look at the bright side”. That’s not empathy. Simply be genuine and present with the emotions of those who were let go and respect the feelings of remaining staff who might be frustrated and overwhelmed by taking on more job/task responsibilities than they hired into. Trust begins to be repaired when authentically acknowledging the very real human emotions of downsizing. 

SPARK THOUGHT is well-equipped to assist you when downsizing becomes a necessity. We can analyze the root cause of your situation and develop strategic solutions to help make a trying time a little less difficult for everyone involved. If your organization is facing these challenges, you don’t have to face them alone. We listen. We collaborate and innovate. We deliver customized Knowledge Management Solutions.