Cal Wick
Founder and CEO
Fort Hill Company

I have focused my research and the work of the Fort Hill Company exclusively on learning transfer and application because, historically, it has been the weakest link in training and development.

We have developed tools and processes that have helped hundreds of companies ensure that training is put to work and pays a return on its investment.

Last month I had the pleasure of seeing a truly successful training implementation, but I had to go to prison to do so. I wanted to share the experience with you because I believe it holds important lessons for those of us in corporate learning and development.

Cal

Cal Wick is the Founder and Chairman of Fort Hill Company.

Cal is a nationally-recognized consultant, educator and researcher on improving the performance of managers and organizations and co-author of The Six Disciplines of Breakthrough Learning: How to Turn Training and Development into Business Results.

Cal's research led to the concept of Follow-Through Management® and the development of web-based Follow-Through Tools® that improve results by increasing follow-through and learning transfer.

Cal graduated as a Rockefeller Fellow from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut and continued his studies as an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow at MIT's Sloan School of Management.

He can be reached at: wick@forthillcompany.com

The purpose of the Learning Alert is to share best practices that help learners accelerate learning transfer to improve their personal and business results.

If you are not already receiving Learning Alert and would like to subscribe, send your name, title and company to: subscribe@LearningAlert.com

To send feedback on this issue or questions for future Learning Alerts, please email us at: ideas@LearningAlert.com.

Recent Learning Alerts

 
What I Learned In Prison

Cal Wick
Founder and CEO
Fort Hill Company

Last month, I went to prison.

While I was there, I learned a lot about what it really takes to transform training into results.

I went to prison with Darlene Sullivan, Founder and Executive Director of Canine Partners For Life, an organization that trains service dogs to enable people who have physical disabilities to live mobile and independent lives (www.k94life.org). Fully-trained dogs are remarkable: they open doors, pay cashiers, put clothes in washing machines, and even alert their owners of the onset of a seizure.

The system that Darlene has created to ensure learning transfer, application, and follow-through is one that should inspire any corporate learning organization. Similar to leadership training in companies, there is an urgent need, sizable investment, and critical importance of the outcome. In both, learning must be reliably converted into valuable results.

I went to prison, because in addition to using people to train dogs in their homes, Darlene engages prisoners to provide basic training for service dogs until they are one year old.

The prisoner-trainers learn to use “clicker training,” which is entirely based on positive reinforcement. When a dog does something right, the prisoner clicks a little clicker and gives the dog a food treat. I watched the prisoners work their pups through exercises from simple sit and stay, to more advanced stay with distractions, closing a door and “go pay”. “Go pay” is the first step in the dog’s learning to pay a cashier. At the command of “go pay” the dog puts its front paws on a table and stays there until released.

As impressive as the dogs are, the prisoner-trainers are even more so. Each puppy has two trainers: a lead and a backup. The value of practice and repetition are evident: Newer trainers are less focused and less confident; they often mumble or hesitate, rather than giving clear instructions to their dogs. Something as simple as saying “Come” with a happy, engaged, encouraging voice is difficult for some at first. Yet, with time, practice, and coaching, they learn to do so in a way that causes their dogs to race towards them.

Darlene accomplishes this transformation in her prisoner trainers by showing up every other week for an hour and a half. The session begins with trainers reporting about their dogs, what they have been working on, and where they need help. The session then becomes a time for practice – reinforcing the fundamentals and adding new skills for dogs and trainers alike.

This commitment to on-going assessment and coaching produces a 95% success rate; 19 of 20 prisoners who enroll in the program become successful trainers of dogs that go on to help others.

As we drove home, my inspiration became admiration. Darlene explained that after the year of basic training, the dogs go through a year of advanced training. Only then are they introduced to their physically-challenged new owners whom they will support in so many ways for the rest of their lives.

The dogs and new owners spend three weeks of intensive training learning to work together, followed by on-going support for learning transfer. There are follow up telephone calls every week for the first month, and every month for the first year to make sure that the owners are following the instructions on their “Learning Card” and are giving their dogs enough practice, as well as to help resolve any problems.

Because of the rigorous training and extensive follow-through process, more than 95% of the dog–owner pairs forge a successful partnership that enables the owners to lead more productive, safe, and independent lives.

As I reflected on the success of the program, several questions came to mind:

• How does our success rate in corporate Learning and Development compare?
• What processes and systems do we need in order to build a comparable level of improved performance?
• How much would the people who work for our companies benefit if we could achieve such results?
• How much value do we leave ‘on-the-table’ with training that goes unused? Do our organizations adequately hold people accountable?

As Darlene says, “Each of these dogs is worth $20,000, so we hold each of our owners accountable to produce a productive relationship. Otherwise, we will take the dog back to give to someone who will.”

It seems to me that keys to the program’s success are the duration and rigor of the follow-through and the accountability for results. My day in prison made me reflect once again that perhaps we are investing too much in training content and not enough in ensuring follow-through. If Darlene’s program can routinely transform rambunctious pups into highly skilled service dogs with the help of incarcerated individuals, what should we be able to accomplish with highly skilled and motivated employees?

Ideas Into Action

1. Deploy a Comprehensive Improvement Process
   

   Design the complete experience of your participants to include how you will give them support, encouragement, and feedback as they work to apply the training and improve.

2. Assess Improvement in Work Results.

   Track the work of participants to assess the improvement that learning produced and identify opportunities for enhanced workplace success.

3. Use Pairs
   

   Have participants apply what they learn in pairs. Ask them to help each other with application and reflection to extract the lessons of experience.

Learning Alert is sponsored by:

Copyright 2007, Fort Hill Company, All rights reserved