When was the last time AI surprised you with its inventiveness?
In my experience, it doesn’t.
Which is why, when I hear people (even competitors in the training ‘design’ game) boasting about the use of AI to create their training materials, my heart sinks.
Because, when we rely on artificial intelligence to build training, we’re missing a vital component of learning: Surprise, wonder and wow! (Ok, that’s three, but you get my point.)
We know that our brains are designed to remember things that are strange, peculiar, surprising, shocking, emotionally engaging, unusual, different, weird, fun.
Want proof. Let me illustrate. Imagine, if you will, that you’re sitting in the cinema. All around you are the darkened silhouettes of dozens of people. You’ve been here a lot recently, but you really couldn’t say if you’ve seen any of these people before. There’s nothing extraordinary about them. They’re just shadowy people in an audience.
Then, two rows in front, you see someone put their arm around the person to their right. And then another arm. And then, hang on, another? You’re gripped! This is now far more interesting than whatever dilemma Lesley is facing with Beatrice on the screen in front you. This is real. And it’s weird!
The lights go on and you realise that you’ve been sitting two rows back from a walking, talking man-sized octopus!
You’ll forget the film. But you’ll never, ever forget Octopus Man.
The first stage in learning is Retention. Without that, we can’t hope to have a lasting impact on people. So, we need to be able to create our own versions of Octopus Man - learning interventions that are weird and wonderful, fun and, therefore memorable.
Sadly, most learning content is more like the grey silhouettes that surrounded Octopus Man – it lacks the ingenuity or creativity to truly stand out.
So, we need training content that stands out from the crowd – something that AI, by definition, can’t produce. It is, after all, albeit a very advanced one, a search engine and replication tool.
Standing out is not, however, enough on its own to make training great.
We’ve all been on training haven’t we, where, noticing the drooping post-lunch eyes, a trainer reaches into their ‘toolbag’ and pulls out some balls, or bean bags or some such thing. The next thing we know we’re flinging these around and perhaps having loads of fun.
When we leave the training, that might be the part of the training we remember most.
But what if that activity wasn’t relevant? Or not relevant enough to have a real impact on our beliefs or understanding? What if it didn’t generate any sort of meaningful light bulb moment?
Well, then, sadly it was just an oddity for the sake of it. A wasted opportunity.
Training becomes magical when memorable, learner-led experiences lead to deep insights and genuine ‘Aha!’ moments that motivate and inspire people to want to do something differently.
And that only happens when what you create is not just surprising, but inspirational in the way people can connect the learning experience to their real-world experience.
Good training design matters. It’s perhaps the most important element in training. After, all, if the content is good, facilitating learning becomes much easier.
And it matters because training is only effective if it results in tangible actions and change that’s sustained.
Training should never be a tick box activity. And neither should its design.